Update on RIAA Ruling

Apparently, $222,000 in fines is "constitutionally excessive." According to the lawyer representing the woman fined for illegally sharing copyrighted songs, the sum of money is just too much to ask for. Check out the article here.

Some of the highlights are found below:

"The Minnesota woman a federal jury dinged $220,000 for pirating 24 copyrighted songs asked the trial judge on Monday to set aside the verdict on the grounds the judgment is unconstitutionally excessive.

It's a novel theory that, if successful, could undermine the Recording Industry Association of America's litigation machine that has sued thousands of alleged pirates.

The petition (.pdf) to U.S. District Judge Michael Davis, among other things, challenges the constitutionality of the 1976 Copyright Act, the law under which the RIAA sued Jammie Thomas of Minnesota, as well as over 20,000 other defendants. The $750 to $150,000 fines the act authorizes for each download is unconstitutionally excessive and against U.S. Supreme Court precedent, wrote Brian Toder, Thomas' attorney.

The RIAA said the argument is "baseless." In pretrial court documents in a New York federal copyright case against a Brooklyn woman, the RIAA acknowledged that such an argument might kill its zero-tolerance suing machine by making "it economically unsound for any copyright owner to seek to protect its copyright interests.'"

File Sharing Ruling Shows Sharing Isn't Always Caring

An NY Times article reports that a federal district court in Minnesota has fined a woman over $200,000 for sharing files on a music downloading program called Kazaa.

The article reads:

"In a crucial legal victory for record labels and other copyright owners, a federal jury yesterday found a Minnesota woman liable for copyright infringement for sharing music online and imposed a penalty of $222,000 in damages. The verdict against Jammie Thomas of Brainerd, Minn., brought an end to the first jury trial in the music industry’s protracted effort to rein in piracy with lawsuits against individual computer users. Since 2003, record labels have brought legal action against about 30,000 people, accusing them of trafficking in copyrighted songs.

Many of the people sued in such cases settle out of court for, on average, about $4,000, according to the industry’s trade association. Ms. Thomas chose to face trial instead, saying that she did not share files on the Kazaa network as the labels contended. She and her lawyer declined to comment after leaving the courthouse.

The jury verdict, which called for $9,250 in damages for each of the 24 songs involved in the trial, came after brief deliberations."

The ruling by the federal district court appears to reaffirm jurisprudence laid out in the USSC decision in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer v. Glotsker, Ltd. (2005). There the Court reasoned that:

"When a widely shared service or product is used to commit infringement, it may be impossible to enforce rights in the protected work effectively against all direct infringers, the only practical alternative being to go against the distributor of the copying device for secondary liability on a theory of contributory or vicarious infringement."

Hawaiian "Superferry" Worry Environmentalists, Judges

A ferry similar to the Staten Island Ferry in NY is creating quite a tussle for islanders. Environmentalists argue that the ferry poses a threat to protected marine life in the surrounding waters. Businesses argue that the fuss over the operation of the ferry is detrimental to Hawaii's economy and will deter future business owners from investing in island ventures.

Read more about the ferry disputes at starbulletin.com and follow the controversy. Here's an article to start.

Use of Sacred Land Case May Reach California Court Soon

Two interests--one over oil and the other over the preservation of sacred land to a Native American tribe--are about to come into conflict in the courts. Check out the NY Times article here.

Will Immigration Become a National Issue in the Courts?

The National Journal is calling attention to a District Court ruling in PA regarding an ordinance against illegal immigrants which may make its way up to the USSC. The PA District Court ruled that the ordinance which deals with housing and employment of illegal immigrants falls outside the jurisdiction of the municipal government of the states. A 1986 act called the Immigration Reform and Control Act stipulates that only the federal government--not the states--are allowed to regulate these matters.