I dont understand how all these people can be sued.

over 16,000 have been sued already for downloading music. some of them were hardcore downloaders and others have downloaded barely a song or 2. how can the people who downloaded barely 5 songs be expected to pay thousands in court. i have a few questions.

1. couldn't you just destroy your hardrive?

2. couldn't they of had a trojan on there computer and it downloaded songs without them knowing?

the hardrive is my biggest concern. if you destroy your hardrive what evidence is there that you downloaded a song? your ip adress? thats not enough at all. ip adresses change AND like i said someone could of had a trojan.

am i missing something?

I think its absurd that an industry with so much wealth needs to be so harsh with downloading music, although if you think about it, it is basic theft.

but i would like to know where there proof is. ip adress is not proof at all.

1. it changes
2. you could have a trojan
3. etc.

if you destroy your hardrive or your whole comp for that matter what proof they got?

"We would like to scan your hardrive"

"I would but about 2 weeks ago my son's fish tank spill all over the computer and basically fried it. We had to throw it away because it didn't work"

"Well i know you downloaded music because your ip adress doesn't lie. give us 3000 dollars"

"we never downloaded music before. but i know we have had spyware and virus probelms for a while now"

"um yea im outta of ideas. just make sure not to download stuff. k thnx"

thats how the convo should go. WHERES THE PROOF.

Being hacked does not mean you cannot be sued. Their rule is, your computer, your responsibility, Your ISP, their responsiblity to guard you from being sued and keep you in check. Just the same as if you let somebody drive your car, its still your responsibility (disregarding usual common sense that the driver would give you the money if they crashed it)

but with no hardrive theres no proof. correct?

They can still litigate until you end up paying several thousand in legal defense fees even if they lose the case. Either way they punish you.

Well that's not fair at all.

So basically they can make up that you downloaded something even if you didn't.

if they dont even need the hardrive then they have no proof and just pick random ppl. pretty lame

Your ISP may be able to tie an ip address to the hardware (MAC) address to which it was assigned at the time. You will have to ask them to see if they keep such reccords.

Gnufsh said:

Your ISP may be able to tie an ip address to the hardware (MAC) address to which it was assigned at the time. You will have to ask them to see if they keep such reccords.

Click to expand...

O i understand that but i dont understand how the RIAA can sue you based on that. Dont they need real proof? (hardrives, computers, testimony, etc)

why do they bother going after people with like 5 songs downloaded in the first place?

Just to show that they are enforcing the law.

I think they are charging too much to legally DL songs in the first place. They wouldnt have as much of a problem if songs werent so expensive to download.

my $.02

@ Zatrix

Click and edit your post. At the top there is a delete button.

millhouse said:

I think they are charging too much to legally DL songs in the first place. They wouldnt have as much of a problem if songs werent so expensive to download.

my $.02

@ Zatrix

Click and edit your post. At the top there is a delete button.

Click to expand...

ooo nice. Never noticed that b4. good call

Zatrix said:

why do they bother going after people with like 5 songs downloaded in the first place?

Click to expand...

If I am not mistaken they mainly go after people who share the music more so than the people who just download.

yea thats what i thought.

people who download are only on for like 15 minutes or so a day downloading. people that are offering the downloads are on for hours upon hours.

You guys are looking at this the wrong way, someone correct me if I'm wrong:

It's pretty much legal to download songs and stuff you actually own. But! It's definitly illegal to share these with other people. That's how they get you, it's not that your downloading songs or whatever, it's that your freely sharing them with other people.

The proof is in your IP. They log your IP address sharing X songs at X Time/date. Then they can go through the ISP to get your address/whatever. You can destroy every computer component you have, but the fact is that your IP address was sharing the info. Don't kid yourself either, ISP's log this stuff, and your IP address doesn't actually change that often. (Depending on your service)

The thing that erks me is that the account holder is the only one basically responsible. If you are on a home network with 4 computers, you can't really prove which computer or which person did the deed. It's like giving the owner of a car a speeding ticket instead of person driving. But- there is no definitive way to prove who/which computer.

The bottom line is that there is currently no good way to evade this situation. If your downloading, there IS a clear risk, no question about that.

There is no way to avoid it. When you upload it is logged as traffic, port and ip is logged. Time and computer sig are stored and later retrieved for you to be sued under.

They cannot go into your computer without a warrent as that that is privacy invasion, but traffic going to and from (mainly from) is what they look at.

Oh and belief thinks you can 'spoof your ip' out of it. Think again.

Goodluck avoiding that

Here is a twist.

What if your was war driven? Are you still held to it? How do they prove a drive by download?

Enablingwolf said:

Here is a twist.

What if your was war driven? Are you still held to it? How do they prove a drive by download?

Click to expand...

I'm sure you would still be held liable. They have proof via your IP address and such, and I would imagine it would be very hard to prove you were war driven. Less maybe you have a police report or caught the guy doing it. I don't think they really care who/how it was done. It was done on your IP, so you're held liable for it.

shred /dev/hda

'nuff said.

Sometimes the Courts speak for whoever has the better lawyers, which usually means whoever has more money. But in reality, most of the time, justice (in some form or another) will prevail over the long term.

Law hasn't been able to keep up with the network revolution.