RIAA Seeks More Excessive Fines

This article caught my eye with the whole corporate effort to kill independent internet radio last year. The RIAA thinks that million dollar lawsuits are right, just & ethical as punishements to individuals for CD compilations. Another school-yard type reaction that shows the maturity level of the RIAA. They are a schoolyard bully and the more I learn about them, the less I like what I see.

Reprint:
RIAA Seeks More Excessive Fines under PRO-IP Act
Gluttonous bill outrages many
tags: legal · Fileswapping · business · consumers

Congress is currently in the process of considering a bill called the PRO-IP Act (Prioritizing Resources and Organization for Intellectual Property) which was introduced at the end of last year. The bill has several facets to it but one that’s drawing a lot of attention is proposed changes to the statutory damages imposed for copying CDs.

In essence, RIAA is pushing for an expansion of the damages in the area of compilation CDs; rather than charging per CD on a compilation, they would have people in violation of copyrights charged for each song independently. This could create situations in which someone copying one CD could be charged $1.5 million in damages. This has caused great dispute amongst stakeholders as meetings take place to discuss the issue.