Cox owes $1 billion to record labels for harboring music pirates, jury decides:
Over the past few years, record labels have been suing ISPs for not removing music pirates from their services, and today, the record labels may have won a tremendous victory. A US District Court jury has found Cox Communications liable for piracy infringement of more than 10,000 musical works, and as a result, has awarded $1 billion in damages to Sony Music, Universal Music Group, Warner Music Group and EMI, as reported by Billboard and Variety.
Essentially, the recording industry just showed that a jury will buy its argument that an ISP should be held liable for failing to kick a music pirate off its network. And similar lawsuits like the one Cox lost today have been filed against Charter, Charter subsidiary Bright House Networks, RCN, and Grande Communications, so there's a chance that rulings against those companies could go similarly.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Freeman on Friday December 20 2019, @03:35PM (20 children)
While, it's popular to hate on your ISP, the MAFIAA err... Record Pirates of err....the Recording Industry Association of America is much worse. The RIAA & MPAA have a history of predatory practices and have been slowly been drug kicking and screaming into the 20th century. They've yet to really embrace the 21st century. If they had their way, you'd still be buying CDs / Records at exorbitant costs.
Who would charge the water company $1B, because their customers found a way to steal a bit of water?
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 4, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Friday December 20 2019, @03:41PM
A jury artfully selected and played by the prosecution. See: The Rainmaker (please don't pirate it ;-)
I wonder if Cox was somehow complicit in this judgement, the linkage isn't clear but it seems like they could have put on a more effective defense.
Cox enterprises annual revenue is around $20B, with $11B from the communications group and $2B from the media group. Maybe they're betting that a one time hit to communications can help them to grow the media sector significantly over time? Of course, back room favors, payola, etc. are even more likely.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 20 2019, @04:15PM (8 children)
Rain barrels were forbidden for a while because water utilities were complaining that their use was depleting the underground aquifers. Thankfully that law was repealed.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday December 20 2019, @05:45PM (7 children)
>Rain barrels were forbidden for a while... Thankfully that law was repealed.
Where was this? I know not too long ago some Australian states had laws like this, didn't hear about them being repealed.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 5, Informative) by Phoenix666 on Friday December 20 2019, @06:04PM (6 children)
Colorado had those. It might still have them.
Isn't it something? You don't have a right to use water that falls out of the sky onto your land. Also, you don't have a right to breathe oxygen that blows across your face. Neither do you have a right to sunshine that warms your ground.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 20 2019, @06:08PM (1 child)
Read Heinlein, where the air actually isn't free but is TANSTAAFL. Why do you think the rain falling on your land makes it your personal property? If my car breaks down on your land that does not automagically make it your car. (Not trying to flamebait, and sorry if it comes off that way).
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Saturday December 21 2019, @02:19AM
A car is already someone else's personal property. We've *long* had laws that prevent people from just seizing your personal property because it accidentally landed on their land.
Rain isn't someone's personal property. It's a natural resource in the atmosphere, just like air.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday December 20 2019, @07:12PM (3 children)
With the advent of utility scale solar power, that one is coming.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2, Insightful) by RandomFactor on Friday December 20 2019, @08:00PM (1 child)
When they GENERATE the sunlight (and rain...and wind...and air...), I'll have more sympathy for the perspective that it isn't mine to use just like anyone else :-p
В «Правде» нет известий, в «Известиях» нет правды
(Score: 5, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Saturday December 21 2019, @03:48AM
I was pretty shocked about the realities of mineral rights. Sure, you "own the land", but somebody has severed the rights to the minerals under the land - giving the owners of those mineral rights (in the case of phosphate) the right to STRIP MINE YOUR LAND FOR AS LONG AS IT TAKES to remove the minerals they have purchased. I bought some acreage at the tail-end of those phosphate rights, luckily the mineral claims were for a limited term period and expired a few years after we bought the land - unexercised.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 21 2019, @07:37PM
they already either had or tried to have a similar law in florida, IIRC
(Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Friday December 20 2019, @05:24PM (8 children)
Well said. We don't hold the lienholder of a car or a house responsible for what the driver or occupants do in it, either. (Although there are disturbing aspects of holding a car owner/driver responsible for what the occupants of the car are doing that is not a parallel case). Holding the ISP's responsible, even ordering them to disconnect services, should not be tolerated. Let the AA's go after the users individually in a civil setting, or let the TLA's handle legitimate cases of widespread facilitation.
In this case, though, I don't think it's the decision that is at fault. It is the stupidity of the law.
This sig for rent.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday December 20 2019, @05:52PM (7 children)
They've done this, for many years now. Even though they have proven that they can get juries to occasionally pass judgements with awards that would ruin peoples' lifetime financial security over their children copying some music or movies, it's damn hard to actually collect enough money from the defendants to even pay for the legal expenses of prosecuting them, particularly on average when they win some, lose some. I think they get better ROI with extortion letters threatening to sue.
However, with a target like Cox, not only making 11B per year, but also so widely hated for various (well founded) reasons, apparently Cox either didn't put up a good defense, or the prosecution managed to play the jury into a "paltry" $1B judgement against the big bad Cox - to "send a message" no doubt.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Friday December 20 2019, @06:11PM
Sure. Let's see what the appellate courts do with it. (Something that those speaking of jury nullifications here don't seem to quite understand - civil law ain't criminal law and just because a jury decides to do something civilly does not mean it will be upheld). (Heck, wouldn't that be high strategy.... goad a jury into producing a ridiculous amount because one has good cause to believe an appelate court will reverse it on a technical matter.)
This sig for rent.
(Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Friday December 20 2019, @06:14PM (5 children)
Oh, and separately, I agree with you that even with the ridiculous valuations it likely isn't profitable for the AA's to keep suing individuals - or they'd still be doing it. And just because I might believe in copyright doesn't mean I agree with the current ridiculous term limits or the fines for violation. One should be hit up for the real costs lost, that is, sued in small claims court for the 99 cents or $1.29 or whatever the MP3 would have cost to purchase.
This sig for rent.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday December 20 2019, @07:16PM (4 children)
But, our legal process being an adversarial one, and "the computer" being an opaque system with mysterious inner workings for most of the court, the claim is that those 200 songs that the defendant shared on Napster were shared globally and downloaded hundreds of thousands of times each (coincidentally coming to a grand total of 99.44% of the defendant's family's net worth...)
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bzipitidoo on Friday December 20 2019, @07:49PM (3 children)
The hundreds of thousands of downloads is an especially bogus argument. In a perfect peer to peer network, the average number of downloads of any particular file is going to be exactly one (1). That's all it takes to saturate the entire network so that everyone has a copy.
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Friday December 20 2019, @07:55PM (2 children)
I should clarify, one download per participant.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday December 21 2019, @03:45AM (1 child)
You're talkin' fancy network theory higher mathematics - you will not be getting a jury of your peers in this regard.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 4, Insightful) by bzipitidoo on Saturday December 21 2019, @10:15AM
The MAFIAA's strategy has always been emotional manipulation, not logic. Which figures, since that's how they get the public to give them money.
If jurors are shown that the MAFIAA is manipulating them, by crying "thief" when no actual theft, only copying, has occurred, and they hear the suggestion that massive quantities of potential downloads is a hysterical exaggeration, never mind the exact mathematical details, some just might be swayed. Further point out, if necessary, that the MAFIAA are a bunch of big bullies, massive and well-funded organizations targeting individuals one at a time, to make the disparity in resources between the two sides as extreme as possible. Shoot down their arguments that they're poor, starving artists being driven out of business by evil pirates. Show instead that they are ungrateful, greedy, terrorizing bastards who even cheat their own artists, and want to use the fruits of technology themselves, while unreasonably expecting the "right" to keep those same fruits out of the public's hands. Give the jurors something to work with, and they just might.
Sure wish I could have a crack at being an expert witness in one of these trials. I'd pound the MAFIAA hard. I would say that to be anti-copying is to be anti-education. To be anti-education is to be anti-democracy. To be anti-democracy in the US could be treason. Hammer those bastards with the "traitor" label. They want to be overwrought, and scream "piracy" and "theft"? The defense can do that too, and scream "treason". I'd also quote the Thomas Jefferson saying that is engraved on his memorial in D. C., "I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man" to say that the MAFIAA are the very sorts of tyrants of the mind that Jefferson fought against.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 20 2019, @06:14PM
Ahh yes, the glorious Internet age where all the new companies are sooooo much better than the old ones.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by DeathMonkey on Friday December 20 2019, @04:06PM (7 children)
Thanks for making sure Cox isn't protected by common carrier status, Trump!
(Score: 4, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Friday December 20 2019, @04:15PM
Accident? I think not. Masterminded by The Don himself? Absolutely not, but his crew (loosely speaking, like Ronnie he doesn't seem to have a lot of control of them, unlike Ronnie he can't even deliver a convincing speech) anyway - buddies he's installed in places of power stand to make a lot of money with these changes - that's why the changes are happening.
This one is particularly disappointing and if it continues down this path we're headed for a dark age on the net, hopefully it's not going to stick.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 4, Interesting) by EJ on Friday December 20 2019, @05:37PM (5 children)
You apparently don't realize that Cox does not WANT to have common carrier status so they can charge more for different types of traffic.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by DeathMonkey on Friday December 20 2019, @05:40PM (2 children)
And you apparently don't realize that I don't give a crap about what Cox wants.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Saturday December 21 2019, @01:04AM (1 child)
Oh my pearls! Slow down here folks, wouldn't want to hurt the feelings of a CABLE company!
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Saturday December 21 2019, @02:35AM
Say what you want about Cox, but at least they're not Comcast.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Friday December 20 2019, @05:54PM (1 child)
I'm thinking Cox wanted this judgement as a talking point for various (presently illegal) changes they want to roll out in their service agreements, and $1B (that may or may not ever be paid) could be small potatoes compared with the additional profits they plan to extract as a result of these, now justified by a court ruling, changes.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Friday December 20 2019, @09:18PM
That's the thing about common carrier, it protects MY rights from abuse by the carrier.
So of course they're going to be opposed to it. Why would anyone think otherwise?
(Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 20 2019, @04:43PM (4 children)
This kind of thing happens because there are only two ways to get on a jury today in the US, either be literally stupid, or lie. If you demonstrate two brain cells one side or the other will object to your selection.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 20 2019, @05:09PM
Jurors also need to be subservient. Juries are the most powerful legal body in existence due to jury nullification. Juries can choose to find a person innocent even when they acknowledge a crime has been committed: jury nullification [wikipedia.org]. They are, defacto, the ultimate arbiters of the law. And there is nothing anybody can do about this besides gesticulate madly trying to convince jurors that they have to vote on the merits of the case alone.
If jurors actually invoked their own power we could fix so much of the stupidity in the US legal system (and political system) practically overnight. And if somebody does decide to do this - keep it to yourself. You can't be punished for nullification, but judges can use it as grounds to remove you.
(Score: 2) by epitaxial on Friday December 20 2019, @06:59PM (2 children)
You are correct. Lawyers want juries stacked with wishy washy idiots who are easily swayed by emotion.
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Friday December 20 2019, @07:57PM (1 child)
If one side wants stupid jurors, shouldn't the other side want smart jurors?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by maxwell demon on Saturday December 21 2019, @11:01AM
No, the other side wants stupid jurors biased the opposite way.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 20 2019, @04:59PM (4 children)
The internet is over
Drastic price increases and drastic service reductions
(Score: 2) by MadTinfoilHatter on Friday December 20 2019, @05:34PM
No. It's much worse than that. Drastic spying is what will be the result. If this sticks, you can kiss any semblance of privacy goodbye.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Friday December 20 2019, @06:06PM (2 children)
We have open source software. We are beginning to have open source hardware. We need open source networks.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by MostCynical on Friday December 20 2019, @08:02PM
Mesh/shared wifi?
At some point, you need to connect aross town/state/country borders.
Deep sea cables are not cheap; neither are satellites.
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 4, Informative) by Grishnakh on Saturday December 21 2019, @02:24AM
Good luck with that. Unless you can invent some kind of subspace communications system, we're stuck with things the way they are. There isn't enough EM spectrum for mesh networking to be realistic, so we have to have fiber-optics transferring data long-haul, and that means big companies to manage it all, and to be liable for things.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 20 2019, @06:08PM (1 child)
On the one hand, cable companies lose. On the other hand, the record companies win. How can we get them to *both* lose?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Alfred on Friday December 20 2019, @08:16PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 21 2019, @07:39PM
stupid bootlicking, two party voting, IRS funding slaves.