Friday, October 5, 2007

The Beginning of the End?

One Pirate Pays for Our Collective Soul Seekin' Sins

When I first wrote about the trials and tribulations of music piracy, I failed to mention one particular nuisance. Sometimes you get fined $222,000.

That's right, folks. A Minnesota mother-of-two has been found guilty in the first ever criminal case regarding illegal music downloading. The kicker -- she wasn't even sharing the tracks, yet the RIAA insisted the "potential" was there for her to do so. Her punishment? To pay $9,250 in damages for each of the 24 plundered tracks.

Apparently some organization called the Electronic Frontier Foundation predicts that this ruling will do little to thwart illegal downloading. It states, “Every lawsuit makes the recording industry look more and more like King Canute, vainly trying to hold back the tide.” I don't know who the fuck King Canute is, but if he's some money-grubbing, ineffectual asshole, I'm right there with you, EFF.

On a side note, this poor pirate's tracks included Aerosmith, Green Day, and Guns N Roses. Does this mean all music downloaders should take heed, or just those with popular (aka shitty) taste?

3 comments:

Mandy♥ said...

I take offense that GNR is shitty taste lady! C'mon!
I think all of us should be aware, no matter what we download. You never know who is watching...

Anonymous said...

Ha! Do you have a GNR fetish I should know about???

SonicRyan said...

Just don't download major label artists. They're much less likely to come after you for downloading the latest Spoon album than the latest Kanye West album. Also, she was using Kazaa. Who the fuck still uses Kazaa? Her, and the major labels that were tracking her apparently.