Record Labels Request $75 Trillion in Damages from Limewire
Record Labels Request $75 Trillion in Damages from Limewire
Posted 03/25/2011 at 6:51am
| by Paul Lilly
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Our apologies if you just sprayed your monitor with Starbucks and spit. That was our reaction too, once we learned that this wasn't an April Fool's prank, but an actual number record labels came up with when asked to estimate the damages Limewire should be held liable for. Their answer was $400 billion on the conservative side, and as much as $75 trillion on the high end. What did Manhattan federal district court judge Kimba Wood have to say about these numbers?
Wood called the figures "absurd" and "untenable," while further pointing out that "if plaintiffs were able to pursue a statutory damage theory predicated on the number of direct infringes per work, defendants' damages could reach into the trillions. As defendants note, plaintiffs are suggesting an award that is 'more money than the entire music recording industry has made since Edison's invention of the phonograph in 1877.'"
As CrunchGear points out, it's also more than the entire world's GDP, yet record labels had the audacity to ask for it anyway.
"We were pleased that the judge followed both the law and the logic in reaching the conclusion that she did," said Limewire's attorney, Joseph Baio of Willkie Farr & Gallagher. "As the judge said in her opinion, when the copyright law was initiated, legislatures couldn't possibly conceive of what the world would become with the Internet. As such, you couldn't use legislative history. Instead, the overarching issue is reasonableness in order to avoid absurd and possibly unconstitutional outcome."
Kudos to Wood for effectively calling the record labels out.
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RUSENSITIVESWEETNESS
April 06, 2011 at 3:14pm
From my perspective, media piracy is the logical consequence of runaway greed on the part of the recording industry. Aside from the outrageous prices they were getting for media (ever been in a Sam Goody?), there are the abuses the industry has heaped upon artists. New artists almost always find themselves heavily indebted to their publishers, penniless, and with no rights to their own intellectual property--even on the heels of apparent overnight success.
I've no sympathy for the industry. They brought this on their own heads.
If they hadn't been so damn greedy, they could have adopted thrifty pricing models in line with the new digital technology and continued making terrific profits.
scottscottscott
March 30, 2011 at 9:09am
I am an artist. I will continue to play music regardless of the fate of a label. I do it for the love of my art, and will very happily play for free. The idea that a company should make money from my time and talent is sketchy to begin with, but then to sue you for wanting to hear me? I wouldn't allow it.
Ghok
March 26, 2011 at 12:35pm
I like how just a few years ago there were people who would defend the record companies. Even I was sympathetic, I mean, it sucks to have a business model that made you rich become totally outdated. Now they just do stuff like this, and even their supporters no longer support them. Not wanting people to download mp3s for free, that's understandable, but this? What the hell is the point of this?
That artists are abandoning them in favour of smaller, less insane, labels. These labels still don't like their music being infringed on, but they don't react in the same way. This isn't even an issue about downloading music anymore, it's an issue about a huge industry whose leadership has become so out of touch and so greedy that eventually no one will support them.
Old music industry, keep digging your own grave, as a music fan, things have only gotten better for me in the last couple years. Now that you've started acting insane enough to alienate all your good artists, new ways of making and selling music have emerged and it's such an improvement.
Scatter
March 26, 2011 at 9:06am
The record labels simply took the amount of tracks they estimate were shared and multiplied it times the allowed amount per infraction. Don't blame the record inductry, blame our legal system and lawmakers for allowing the fines that they do for downloading a single song.
This is a good thing IMO. The courts will obviously recognize that it's an absurbd amount of money but if it's within the scope of current law then perhaps it will encourage changes to current law.
Scatter
March 26, 2011 at 9:02am
The record labels simply took the amount of tracks they estimate were shared and multiplied it times the allowed amount per infraction. Don't blame the record inductry, blame our legal system and lawmakers for allowing the fines that they do for downloading a single song.
Mighty BOB!
March 26, 2011 at 3:28pm
I'm just an armchair legal expert but I think the specific laws they always use in court with such high fines were written before the Internet as we know it existed. They were designed with massive corporate-level infringements of other people's work where the infringers sell the work for big profits. As such, the laws don't translate well to individual consumers who download one song for free and then seed it. The law should definitely be rewritten to account for the Internet.
However in the case of Limewire, they did profit from it (Pro licenses) even if they may have only had altruistic goals (questionable), and they are a corporate entity, so those laws might actually apply for once.
gr3atl10n
March 25, 2011 at 10:02pm
Why don't you make your own P2P sharing system with the BEST industry standards, run it on PC for 8-10 years, let it be illegally licensed, then sue yourselves, and write it off. No wait. Declare the whole body of your asses an organized religon first.....
untoten
March 25, 2011 at 10:02pm
Record label crybabies:"We want....(zoom in) 75 trillion dollars"
Everyone sane on earth: "lolwut?"
yu119995
March 25, 2011 at 12:54pm
Dear large record labels of the world,
Thank you for ensuring your even quicker than anticipated demise by pulling this $hit. We'll be reading about you in future ecomonics' textbooks. I believe the first chapter will be titled "Ignoring/Fighting Innovation: Seventy-five trillion ways to destroy your industry" only to be followed by the chapter on "Generating revenue through litigation: Why it hasn't succeeded and easily never will". In fact I believe Quintus said it best (Gladiator): "A people (well record labels in this case) should know when they're conquered."
Sincerely,
Oppressed music lovers of the world
scoop6274
March 25, 2011 at 12:45pm
Dear record companies.
Now that you have disclosed your obvious plans for world domination, the United Nations has convened and has decided to put up an embargo against you. We will no longer ship materials need to make CD's and CD cases. We are also cutting off all your internet access so as to prevent you from providing your music online. It has also been decided, in unprecedented unanimous fashion, to authorize the use of snipers to take out all record executives as apparently you are immensly stupid. And in the interest of the rest of the world, we would like to prevent you from breeding.
warptek2010
March 25, 2011 at 10:45am
I dunno, can't we countersue the record industry for the utter crap that they've forced on us over the years?
Just for most rap music alone we'd have a case. Now, that would be justice served!
Renaissance 2K
March 25, 2011 at 10:44am
The really sad thing is - even if Limewire were able to defy the laws of economics (or just hire Goldman Sachs... whichever is more convenient) and produce that amount of money - the actual recording artists probably wouldn't see a dime of it.
LatiosXT
March 25, 2011 at 10:16am
Why don't they just ask LimeWire to pay off the US national debt? That's about how bad it is right now no?
Biceps
March 25, 2011 at 9:22am
Yes, your honor, we realize we are a complete joke. We just wanted to be up front about it. Thank you for wasting your time and taxpayer money on this farce. We a really don't appreciate your time, or our customers.
THANKS!
Captain_Steve
March 25, 2011 at 9:15am
This right here is why we can't legalize weed in this country. This is what happens when you show up to work high; things like this get green lighted. That is the only reasonable explanation I can think of, and I refuse, on the grounds that I don't want to lose any more faith in humanity, to think that this was done by someone who had a complete grasp of what he was doing at the time.
nauc
March 25, 2011 at 3:16pm
Captain Steve is the perfect example why people shouldn't be allowed to vote on things they no nothing about.
Rockyn
March 25, 2011 at 11:27am
This comment is not funny. This type of idiotic thinking on the part of the labels has nothing to do with cannabis and everything to do with greed.
bloodgain
March 25, 2011 at 12:35pm
You're right. Captain Steve's comment is totally off the mark.
Obviously, they were smoking crack, not marijuana. Stoners would have just forgotten the whole thing and sent somebody out for Funyuns and chocolate milk. Only a crack-head would think this wouldn't get them laughed out of court.
praetor_alpha
March 25, 2011 at 9:13am
I guess it never occured to them that that amount is 7 times the national debt.
rave13
March 25, 2011 at 12:59pm
Wow. Would that mean that according to the recording industry, the natl debt has been caused by Limewire & their ilk?
Since Limewire did not pay the recording industry, the recording industry didn't pay taxes on that money (which averages a third of the income). So if Limewire paid the recording industry, then the recording industry paid the taxes on that income, and we'd have the natl debt paid off with some to spare!!
Caboose
March 25, 2011 at 8:57am
It doesn't surprise me that the RIAA would do something like this. They've been on the warpath for years (decades?).
ChatterboxChuck
March 25, 2011 at 8:42am
Typical, just because you can sue doesnt mean you have to and just because you can calculate outrageous amount of loses doesn't mean you can sue for that amount. What I would like to know is who actually believed this was a good idea at all? I mean, seriously, what goes thru the persons mind when they consider such a concept ($75 trillion) and the agree to actually go thru with it? I would really like for this person to truly explain how they believe and can prove why they deserve such a 'ridiculous" amout.
da_samman
March 25, 2011 at 8:34am
My firs thought is, "Are record sales slipping that badly?" Come on, Limewire was costing the record industry CHUMP CHANGE at best. Hell, in most cases, if you download a tune and like it, you're that much more likely to go out and buy the album. The record industry really needs to wake up and smell the coffee with this one. They need to embrace the Internet and the idea of digital downloads, not fight it. Oh, and one more thing: KILL DRM!
nauc
March 25, 2011 at 3:24pm
And iirc, MaxPC published a study that stated, it's the people who illegally download music who BUY the MOST music anyway.
alexw1234
March 25, 2011 at 7:34am
Holy S***!
My first reaction was that this was an early april fools joke. Then I read the article, and I can't believe the record companies have the audacity to charge this much. I will repeat, Holy S***!
Mighty BOB!
March 26, 2011 at 1:35am
My reaction was slightly different.. (I don't get my coffee until I get to work, if at all.):
http://s4.photobucket.com/albums/y110/mightybob2000/?action=view¤t=New_StargateSG110X06200.mp4
But no seriously, the fact that they do have the audacity to make a demand that large just proves that they have lost all touch with the real world and every last shred of their sanity. Screw the record companies.
Morichalion
March 25, 2011 at 7:05am
I didn't spray any coffee on my hardware. As luck would have it, I didn't have any fluids in my mouth when I saw that.
I'm a fan of the idea of some kind of copyright law, with reasonable penalties provided for in the event of infringement. If I created some bad art (any art I create is likely to be bad) and some jerk started selling it without permission, I'd want to have some recourse.
I'm not sure I'd ever ask for anything near four times the world GDP. I have nowhere near that level of pride in my work.
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