Absolutely ridiculous.

These people are disgusting. They should really be ashamed.

"This is what can happen if you don't settle"

So essentially what they're saying is that if we accuse you of stealing (rightly or wrongly) it's best to just pay up rather than confront us in a court of law.

The RIAA is operating by mafia tactics more and more except instead of breaking your kneecaps they just sue you into oblivion.

If only the laws would come down that hard on child molesters, muggers, murderers, sex offenders and the like.

And of course, RIAA refuses to address the real problem, which is that they refuse to capitalize on the online market, not to mention 95% of the stuff they produce is absolute crap. Maybe I should sue for having to listen to the torture of another rap song about sex or whatever they talk about.

And they just signed their death warrant. They can and will put themselves out of business.

I hope the court finds them guilty of antitrust violations, collusion, and racketeering, and fines them some exorbitant amount, like $900 billion. That's the amount I would pick if I were on that jury.

It's dumb PR on the RIAA part if they insist on this $220,000. They should instead offer her to settle for $1000 or so and not come across as the bad guys.

Just for that comment, your honor, I'd like to sue RIAA for blackmail , racketeering, mail fraud, extortion, collusion, antitrust violations, and emotional trauma from listening to their crappy music.

@topgun: The law doesn't come down that hard on child molesters and murderers? I'd bet most murderers and child molesters serving life in prison would love to be able to pay $220,000 and walk out free.

Not to mention anyone with a pulse will be so repulsed that they'll boycott RIAA forever. Over what? $24? That's what they should have gotten. The fair market value of one song is $1. Therefore, they're entitled to $24. That's it. Not a cent more. The jury should have awarded RIAA nothing.

@IRSistherootofallevil: So by this logic, you should be able to walk into Barnes & Noble and steal books off the shelf that don't meet your criteria of fine literature? Start your own record company if you don't like what's out there.

So the value of each song was $9,250?

So I assume that CDs will now start costing between $111,000 and $166,500?

3 words:

Long live bitTorrent

While I believe that if you do something wrong (such as "stealing" a song) then you should be punished and that punishment should hurt or it would not be a punishment at all. In my area, if you get convict of "Theft under $50" you typically get a fine of around $90 bucks. That is reasonable. Stealing a $1 song and having to pay $9,250 for each one is not.

Cases like this are far too complex (as are most cases) for the "jury of your peers" model. It's not fair to the lady that complex legal matters are decided by people with no legal training or background. If you don't know any better or understand all the terms and intricacies of what's going on I bet the RIAAs case is pretty convincing.

I don't know how to fix the broken system (the RIAA/music system or the US legal system) but they sure are broken!

This is just absolutely pathetic and disgusting. Anyone who was following that trial has to be more than a bit shocked that this is the result. Whether or not this lady was downloading (or making available for download) music (I defy you to tell me how the prosecution proved either of those things beyond reasonable doubt), I think we can all agree that $222,000 is far beyond egregious. However, now the RIAA and their tactics are in the light of public scrutiny. The time of them extorting money out of thousands of innocent people without most of the population knowing is gone. I think justice will finally be served when people vote with their dollars and just simply stop buying their products. If you do continue to buy their products, know that this is what they're doing with your money - destroying people's lives.

What I find hard to believe is that this result was from a jury trial. In America!

C'mon, O.J., time for lunch.

If I interpreted the verdict correctly, she was not fined for "stealing" the song, she was fined for sharing the song on her Kazaa account and thus allowing it to be distributed for free. I guess the jury assumed that 9,250 people on average might have downloaded the song from her.

Regardless, I still think the RIAA are a bunch of bloodsucking asshats.

Is there a list of the names of the jury?

Those people have become the worst people in the world today!!!!

We need their emails and address and send them thousands of letters telling them how dumb they are to screw over a woman who did nothing wrong.

@topgun: That would be expecting way too much. Children don't have a powerful industry working in their interests.

Let's hope it washes out as a classic Pyrrhic Victory.

The press coverage of this is a bit simplistic. One of the things that sunk this case was the woman replaced her hard drive a month after receiving her RIAA notice. Then lying that she replaced it a year later. The RIAA lawyers were able to point out this is fishy, and the jury bought it.

Also, the jury only had one member that ever downloaded music (legit or not). And had several members that didn't even have a computer.

So, odds are quite good that the next jury trial won't go as well for the RIAA.

I hope more of these cases to to court. It will even out the bad news that this loser of a case represented, and make the RIAA lose even more money (they've admitted that they're losing money using this technique).

It's a sad, sad day.

Here are the tracks she got busted for [blog.wired.com]

* Guns N Roses "Welcome to the Jungle"; "November Rain"
* Vanessa Williams "Save the Best for Last"
* Janet Jackson "Let's What Awhile"
* Gloria Estefan "Here We Are"; "Coming Out of the Heart"; "Rhythm is Gonna Get You"
* Goo Goo Dolls "Iris"
* Journey "Faithfully"; "Don't Stop Believing"
* Sara McLachlan "Possession"; "Building a Mystery"
* Aerosmith "Cryin'"
* Linkin Park "One Step Closer
* Def Leppard "Pour Some Sugar on Me"
* Reba McEntire "One Honest Heart"
* Bryan Adams "Somebody"
* No Doubt "Bathwater"; "Hella Good"; "Different People"
* Sheryl Crow "Run Baby Run"
* Richard Marx "Now and Forever"
* Destiny's Child "Bills, Bills, Bills"
* Green Day "Basket Case"

The RIAA should be paying her to distribute Richard Marx and Bryan Adams material.

Next useful step would be to ask each of these artists how much of that $222k they're going to get, and how they're planning to spend it.

Just so that we are clear: does anyone here think that she wasn't sharing those files on Kazaa? The pricetag of ruling not withstanding, she WAS sharing.

While I agree the $222k is way overboard, they caught her redhanded sharing the files on Kazaa. Her assertion that someone else was using her internet connection and used the exact same username that she uses EVERYWHERE ELSE is absurd.

@Pupator: It's not fair to the lady that complex legal matters are decided by people with no legal training or background.

I would add that probably the majority of the jury doesn't know anything about computers or file sharing. So they are learning about it from the RIAA. Neat.

I somehow doubt that the RIAA "won" as much as the woman "lost." I wonder what her lawyer's angle was...

At this point, the RIAA is making some lawyers very rich, making themselves and their client record companies HATED, and not much else.

@savvy9999: I'm guessing none of them are going to see a dime for three reasons:
1. This is probably going to be appealed ASAP.
2. If Jammie Thomas ends up losing her appeals I would think she'd just declare bankruptcy.
3. I highly doubt that on the off chance the RIAA sees this money, any of it is going to any artist (They need to cover their losses from the "sue em' all" campaign. Even they've admitted it's losing them money).

This is a sad, sad country we live in.

That i@sleze69:

That is not absurd.

She could have set up her computer and kazaa and not actually downloaded anything with it. Anyone in her household could have signed on to Kazaa which already had her username in it.

There is no way to prove it was her because there is no evidence on the harddrive.

It is reasonable to think someone else used her computer, downloaded the songs, and burned them for their own use.

I use to throw parties at my house all the time, many people downloaded from my computer. I would never pay for it as it was not my fault.

If were going to sue the equipment owners then we might as well sue the ISP and backbone providers.

I just have a hard time believing that any jury would make this decision. As a matter of justice, it is just so wrong.

The big problem is the inequality in law enforcement, penalties, and the like. I know that as a manager, I can have charges filed on up to three times the value of an item when it is stolen (i.e. scambarber steals a pack of razor blades, worth $10... I can file for up to $30 in theft).

I guess what I'm trying to say is, real thieves (shoplifters and such) will never see any real penalty, and those who copy have their lives ruined.

On the good side, the RIAA will never see a penny. This woman will file bankruptcy, and they'll be out the money anyway.

this kind of a ruling will only increase the hatred for them by Joe Consumer, and will drive people to be more careful about getting usic online (moving to private trackers for example). Also, if artists might shift to the ways of Radiohead & handle cd distribution themselves, since they'd move more product than if they went with the hated record companies.

And I can't see how 200K is justifiable, I mean come on.

I hate the RIAA, but this whole "single mom" BS is ridiculous. It shouldn't matter if it's a single mom, a horny teenage boy or a gay geriatric cripple -- one's personal situation is IRRELEVANT.

@sleze69: I agree with you that she did it. However, ip addresses and mac addresses can be spoofed. It's been proven time and time again and even admitted by the RIAA. Therefore, they have absolutely no concrete proof other than her having acted suspiciously. On that grounds alone, I argue that there is enough reasonable doubt that they should not have found her guilty.

I also agree with Harshmellow - everything you said.

I fear the Karmic repercussions that are to be bearing inevitably down on these shadowy villains who run this criminal organization.

C'mon God, get those lightning bolts out!

@Pupator: "It's not fair to the lady that complex legal matters are decided by people with no legal training or background."

Complex legal matters aren't. Factual matters are. Juries decide issues of fact. Judges decide issues of law.

Why does it matter what songs she downloaded/shared? It's not as if the RIAA is really interested in protecting the artists. No, it's all about big entertainment conglomerates making big money for people who already have big bank accounts.

I made my decision about the case on the principle that single mothers who work for a living should not be fined $222,000 for using Kazaa, much less $6,000 or $9,000. It is a ridiculous fine for a ridiculously insignificant act.

Okay, guys, the RIAA are the scum-sucking bottom-feeders of the universe, but the problem here isn't the JURY, it's the LAW.

She was not found GUILTY, she was found LIABLE, which requires only a preponderance of the evidence, not evidence "beyond a reasonable doubt."

The jury answers questions like "did she or did she not upload songs to kazaa?" when there's a factual dispute over it.

The problem here is that copyright LAW itself is bad; heavily weighted in favor of industry and against consumers, restricting traditional fair uses, etc. The jury frankly didn't have a lot of choice about finding her liable, since the law is pretty clear on that point. It's simply a bad law.

(And you'll note the most contentious issue -- whether the RIAA had to prove others downloaded the songs to prove damages under the statute -- was decided by the judge, because it was a legal (not factual) question: "The RIAA did not have to prove that others downloaded the files. That was a big bone of contention that U.S. District Judge Michael Davis settled in favor of the industry.")

Okay... in honor of BRIANH, I don't think that anyone who works for a living should be fined $222,000 for using Kazaa, much less $6,000 or $9,000.

Not a surprising result, she was clearly liable for the copyright violations. Using the same user name and password on your kazaa account as your other accounts? Swapping out your hard drive after getting a nasty RIAA letter?

I'm not shocked at all she was hit with something other than the minimum $750, she wasted 3 days of the jury's life with bs arguments.

This isn't a criminal case, the burden on the plaintiff isn't beyond a reasonable doubt, its the much lower preponderance standard, which was easily met in this case.

For crying out loud, she wrote a paper in 1999 on Napster, she was not an unsophisticated computer illiterate person.

cNet published an article analyzing how they came to their verdict. It's somewhat disturbing, but interesting:

"Four reasons why the RIAA won a jury verdict of $220,000"
[www.news.com]

@Eyebrows McGee:

In light of other recent SCOTUS rulings, I doubt that the judge's ruling on the no-need-to-prove-someone-else-downloaded-the-songs would stand. The present court is very suspicious of claims made by persons who have not been specifically injured.

Without even judging other merits, recent suits brought up against parts of the PATRIOT Act, etc have been summarily dismissed because the plaintiffs (usually orgs like the ACLU) could not prove that they themselves were the ones being 'spied upon' or whatnot.

Meaning, if the RIAA cannot prove that other people actually d/l'ed the songs (and thus the RIAA was injured under the law), then it cannot bring suit.

If this lady pushes this, IMO it will get reversed on that basis alone.

Its just a sacrificial lamb to set an example! That poor lady, she will be in debt for the rest of her life!

@IRSistherootofallevil:

"The fair market value of one song is $1. Therefore, they're entitled to $24."

Then she should've paid the fair market value to start with. Now she has to pay the fine. If you park your car an expired meter, you don't get a ticket for 25 cents, right?

@Shadowfire: What she should do is appeal the judges decisions of what the jury had to do. That's the next legal step. Wether they listen to the appeal is a matter of continued law writing I guess.

@Shadowfire:

"I can have charges filed on up to three times the value of an item when it is stolen (i.e. scambarber steals a pack of razor blades, worth $10... I can file for up to $30 in theft)."

You are missing the point, the bigger problem was not her stealing, but distributing.

@Stan LS: You don't get a ticket for $5,000 either.

There's something else which seems to be getting lost in the shuffle; there are a number of ways that she could very well NOT have known she was sharing.

There are any number of bots, rootkits, etc. which can take over a computer and set it up as an FTP server, share things on Kazaa, bit torrent, etc. All it takes is one missed patch and you're screwed. And there are rootkits that will stay on your computer even after it's patched and virus scans declare everything hunky dory.

It even could explain the user name, if the bot scanned the computer and found this user name that they claim she used everywhere.

Computers are shadowy things to a LOT of people, and a lot of people don't know what the hell is going on with them. She very well *may* be innocent. Even the new hard drive can be explained, if she took it somewhere to have it cleaned after hearing from the RIAA and they told her it was hopelessly compromised. I've had users do that at the Helpdesk where I used to work.

There's a lot more gray area in the computer world than a lot of people think.

If I am not mistaken she can still appeal? Surely this isn't over yet?

Keep in mind that the RIAA did not prove Ms. Thomas ever shared a single song. At the most, they proved she had 24 songs available for download.

Damages are a necessary component of every civil claim. The RIAA never showed that they actually lost any revenue, since they never proved Ms. Thomas ever shared a song.

For that, they won a verdict of $222,000.

This is barely Round 1. Post-trial motions and appeals will follow.