[Air-l] RIAA and freedom to copy

[Richard Forno]

> Is anyone aware of the effort by RIAA to force college students to pay huge
> cash settlements of supposed copyright infringement?

Not aware of any legal precedents (yet) but I have heard that some unis have
pushed-back and told the RIAA they won't do their dirty work unless the RIAA
pays for the staff costs associated with log analysis and such.  Others have
rolled over and supported the RIAA, too.

> There is no actual law suit, just the threat of a suit and a proposed
> settlement. 

That's the RIAA's strategy, such that it is.  Unfortunately in it's other
non-college cases where they use similar tactics, they're being tossed out
of court with growing frequency for any number of reasons -- including for
suing the wrong person or having very circumstantial evidence to support
their claims.

> Is file sharing really copyright infringement?

My own personal view is that the RIAA  (and MPAA, by extension) would have
the public and courts believe that 'file sharing' is the same as copyright
infringement.....and their ongoing public statements over the years
continues to strongly-suggest or equate the notion of 'file sharing' with
something that is (or should be) a criminal act.  It's this belief that has
made the entertainment industry so reviled because that "fear of
file-sharing" is what's led to things like HDMI, PVP, AACS, DECSS and any
number of other technological controls contributing to the creation of a
marketplace of barely-interoperable digital entertainment devices and
services that increases customer costs and levels of aggravation.

Additionally, ongoing legal woes pertaining to DMCA and the various
provisions regarding 'copyright circumvention' --- particularly when DMCA
has been used to threaten (and sue) people for reasons that far exceed its
original spirit of enactment by Congress -- have raised serious issues about
free speech, basic research, and assorted aspects of what constitutes
"information" and "knowledge" going back to DMCA's enactment in 1998.

>From a more scholarly and legal perspective, Lessig, Littman, Felten, and
Granick (attornies all, I think) have written copiously on this topic over
the years and would be the ideal starting point for looking at this matter
in greater detail.  I strongly-endorse any and all of these folks' writings
as fantastic primers on these very complex issues at the core of the
information society.

-rick