Brainerd Woman Granted New Trial
A judge has granted a new trial to a Brainerd Woman convicted of pirating music files. Jammie Thomas was convicted last October in the first-ever file-sharing trial. A jury in Duluth found her guilty of copyright infringement for offering to share 24 songs on the Kazaa File Sharing Network. She was ordered to pay $222,000 to the record industry. On Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Michael J. Davis granted her motion for a new trial. In a 44-page ruling, Davis said he made an error in the jury instructions that "substantially prejudiced" her rights. At issue was whether record companies have to prove anyone else actually downloaded their copyrighted songs, or whether it was enough to argue that a defendant simply made copyrighted music available for copying. Davis concluded in his ruling that the law requires actual distribution.
posted by KLKS News @ 5:13 PM
1 Comments:
and the consumers push back. The RIAA thinks that it can bully its customers into paying for what it thinks is revenue lost to filesharing, when in fact its shaking in its boots because they refuse to change with the times.
The fact is that online digital downloads (such as Itunes) are the way people want to buy their music now which are allowing musicians to cut out the middle man (RIAA and their controlled studios) and publish their music directly to the net.
Lets face it, the RIAA is only giving half the story when they talk about the percentage of people actually sharing files. The true story is that only a very small percentage of those "sharing files" do so without ever intending to buy them. I for one would never consider buying a $25 CD just for 1 or 2 songs.
Lets face it, with the stand the RIAA has taken, anyone who has digital music stored on their computer is therefore sharing files, simply because they are stored on your computer.
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