Legal/Government

Supreme Court rejects RIAA John Doe case

C-NET reports that the Supreme Court has declined the RIAA's appeal of the Verizon court case that states that the RIAA must file John Doe lawsuits in its Sue the World program. While this is not expected to change their practice of suing file swappers, it does keep the cost of filing these suits high and at least one minor portion of the DMCA has been invalidated.

And it doesn't seem to be doing any good -- file sharing programs are exploding on the scene and P2P traffic outweighs web traffic (this article also has a pic of my P2P hair-do :-) ). If the suits are expensive and not doing anything, why does the RIAA insist on filing more? Simple -- stopping the suits would be admitting failure with their last resort of combatting P2P users directly and would send a strong message that P2P is OK.

The recent scorching Grokster case is headed to the Supreme Court as well -- I wonder what the chances of it being heard are. The ninth-circuit laid down a solid ruling -- I really hope the Supreme Court will deny a hearing to this case as well.

The INDUCE Act is on the rocks. Grokster may not be heard. P2P suits must be John Doe lawsuits. Is the RIAA dead end coming up? It sure sounds like it -- I'm not sure what the RIAA could pull next. Buying congresscritters doesn't seem to be working anymore; suing their customers is not working.

What next? Will they finally wake up and smell the business opportunity here? One can only hope, but the precedents set by the RIAA call for a next move that is 10 times more stupid than their last move. Are we winning the war or will the next battle be really ugly?

Posted by Mayhem at October 12, 2004 11:49 AM