Woman ordered to pay $222,000 for file sharing

[TheUniverse]

The recording industry has won a major fight in its effort to stop illegal music downloading with a U.S. jury decision to impose $222,000 damages against a Minnesota woman who used a Web service to share music.


Although industry commentators are divided over what impact the case will have on stemming illegal downloads globally, the size of the damages is significant -- nearly 80 times higher than the average European settlement figure in such a case.

The jury in the civil case in the U.S. District Court of Minnesota on Thursday found Jammie Thomas infringed copyrighted song recordings, and awarded damages of $9,250 for each of the 24 recordings cited.
....


http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071005/en_nm/musicindustry_lawsuit_dc_6;_ylt=Auj9OOjrwYbH4VL.7bPsEOgE1vAI


Regardless of your opinion of file sharing, this is wrong. Her life is now ruined. We need to fix the copyright laws. The recording industry should not be allowed to ruin a persons life for something like file sharing, which 1/4th of this country does. I hope this gets overturned. No excuse for such a ridiculous fine.

[gatorboy]

1. Time to download iTunes, lady!

[Fran Kubelik]

2. This is really messed up.

This is what happens when the moron accountants and lawyers take over the music "industry".

[bigtree]

3. I agree. This is theft, but I don't think stealing songs to listen deserves that much of a fine

Now, if she made money off of doing it . . .

[Kagemusha]

4. At least the headline's accurate this time.

She shared, she didn't just download. ...Having said that it's a pretty sad example of beating up on an ordinary person.

[bigtree]

5. we used to tape our records and share them, dub our tapes

and share them. Didn't seem like a big deal. Probably helped spread the music.

[TheUniverse]

6. If I were her, I'd counter sue.

I'm sure the recording Industry broke some privacy laws or any other technicalities to get the information.

[thunder35]

7. the problem is these ISP are watching you just like bush is doing witrh FISA

[Rainbowreflect]

8. I know most will disagree with me, but as an artist, I don't want

someone stealing my work.
I do realize that it is not really hurting the artist themselves, more likely the business side is being hurt. That said, I do believe that society has lost a great deal of respect for the artist and think that they have a right to use or steal someone else's work.

[Tesha]

9. Duplicate posting

See:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=1980477&mesg_id=1980477