RIAA Win Could Bolster Efforts Against Illegal File Sharing

The article can be found here :
http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,138136-c,onlineentertainment/article.html

This article talks about the RIAA's courtroom victory they had on Thursday in Minnesota. The federal jury found that Jammie Thomas of Duluth Minnesota, would have to pay $222,000 to six different recording companies for the 24 music files that he downloaded off of the Kazaa network. This equates to $9,250 for each song. This case was the first time that this type of case has gone to trial. This could mean a bad precedent for cases in the future or currently being tried.

Now that the RIAA has received its first victory in the battle against file sharers, it will no doubt continue in its work to make people pay if they illegally download music files. Charles Mudd, who is a Chicago attorney who has been representing defendants in these cases, has stated that the $222,000 that was awarded was much higher than the compensation that was warranted for this particular case. He claims that this number is ten times higher than it should be.

Now Mudd does say that he is not sure how this latest decision will impact future litigation and points out that every case is individual in nature. Some of these people have been falsely accused of this and those cases have been dropped by the RIAA.

Never-the-less, I feel this decision will make an impact on the way people think about downloading illegal music since there is that credible threat out there that was not there before. Now the case in Minnesota is not finished yet. Even though the jury brought in the original verdict, it can still be appealed and in the article Ray Beckerman, a New York attorney, who like Mudd, represents many individuals accused of illegal file sharing, said that most likely that figure of $222,000 will be lowered or thrown out. That is to be seened but for now that casts an eerie light on people who do download on the internet.

Now, I buy all my downloaded songs off of Itunes, but if I were an illegal file sharer, I would be extremely concerned with this decision and would think twice before purchasing any material.