Music sharers may be sued, industry says
By Mike Musgrove
Washington Post
The music industry's chief trade group said yesterday it was preparing to unleash a wave of civil lawsuits against users of music-trading software. The move comes after months of threats failed to slow the practice.
No longer will the industry simply go after those running software programs that allow users to exchange song files, the Recording Industry Association of America warned. Nor will users simply be sent cease-and-desist e-mails or other messages. Hundreds or thousands of such users may soon be sued on the basis of evidence the trade group said it plans to begin gathering today.
"The public has been educated and re-educated and re-educated again. People now know this is illegal," said Cary Sherman, president of the RIAA. "People can no longer count on just getting a warning."
Sherman said his organization had no hard-and-fast rules governing what sort of file-trading activity would draw legal attention, though the group plans to go after the biggest offenders first. Still, he said, "even offering one file without permission is one too many."
The recording industry said music sales declined 20 percent since 1999, which it blames mainly on what it calls music piracy. Though it succeeded in 2001 in shutting down Napster, one of the original file-trading programs, newer file-trading programs such as Kazaa and Grokster are more decentralized and technologically harder to shut down.
In a conference call to announce the RIAA's legal attack yesterday, Nashville songwriter Chuck Cannon stood by the trade group. Whenever somebody trades a song of his online and doesn't pay for the copyright, "they've effectively broken into my house and stolen my paycheck," he said.
The RIAA said that by tracking public directories of peer-to-peer software programs and issuing subpoenas to Internet providers, it plans to track down those who trade music files illegally.
The trade group has a precedent: Verizon Communications Inc. was compelled by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia this month to give the RIAA names of four Internet service customers suspected of illegally distributing music files.
One major software industry association, the Business Software Alliance, issued a statement yesterday supporting the RIAA's hardball approach. Consumer and artist groups, however, gave it mixed to negative reviews.
"I don't think it's either a good thing or a bad thing, honestly. We've been expecting this for a long time," said Jenny Toomey, founder of the Future of Music Coalition, a group that fights for artist's rights. "If file-trading is cutting in on legitimate sales, then that's a problem ... but I go back and forth" on whether that's the case, she said. "We welcome the public discussion."
"I think this really suggests that the recording industry dinosaurs have completely lost touch with reality," said Fred Von Lohmann, senior staff attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit organization that lobbies on civil liberty issues related to technology. "Over 57 million Americans are using file-sharing software today. That's more than voted for President Bush."
Phil Leigh, digital media analyst at Raymond James & Associates, said he thought the RIAA should have delayed threatening lawsuits until Windows-using consumers have a successful alternative to file-trading software. For-pay music services are available on the Web, but none has won much acclaim except an online music store from Apple Computer Inc. that can be used only by Apple computer users.
"I understand why they're doing it," said Joe Kraus, founder of DigitalConsumer.org, a consumer rights group. "But it's not going to be effective if there are not legitimate alternatives that consumers are excited about."
