November 3rd, 2005
67 Year Old Sued by MPAA for iMesh Downloads
By Jimmy Daniels
Contributing Writer, RealTechNews
A man from Racine in Wisconsin has been sued by the Motion Picture Association of America for illegally downloading and sharing four movies on his computer, The Incredibles, I, Robot, The Grudge, and The Forgotten. Fred Lawrence, a 67-year-old retiree, says he hardly ever watches movies, and that his grandson downloaded the movies. He also stated that his grandson’s family already owned three of the movies and that he did it out of curiosity.
The Motion Picture Association of America, on behalf of three major Hollywood studios, filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday against Fred Lawrence, a 67-year-old retiree. The suit seeks as much as $600,000 in damages for downloading four movies over iMesh, an Internet file-sharing service.
The lawsuit comes after Lawrence, a former employee of Snap-on Inc. and seasonal worker for the City of Racine, refused a March offer to settle the matter by paying $4,000.
“I personally didn’t do it, and I wouldn’t do it. But I don’t think it was anything but an innocent mistake my grandson made,” Lawrence said.
We say: Sounds like something a LOT of parents could end up having to deal with, I know I’ve run my 12 year old off the family computer and had to remove all kinds of spyware, toolbars, etc from the iMesh installation. But, that is a different story. He also said that a lawyer told him that it was probably a scare tactic and that it wouldn’t result in a lawsuit. Apparently, he was wrong.
The movie industry readily concedes it won’t gain public sympathy suing someone like Lawrence, but a spokesperson said that’s not the point.
“We’re not asking for anyone’s sympathy. We are asking for people to understand the consequences of Internet piracy,” said Kori Bernards, vice president of corporate communications for MPAA.
Bernards said the problem is the movies Lawrence’s grandson downloaded were then available to thousands of other users on the iMesh network.
Bernards said that illegal downloading costs the movie industry an estimated $5.4 billion a year. Source: JSOnline via Yahoo
$5.4 billion dollars? Where does this figure come from, does anyone know how they figure this total? I’ve tried a couple movies that friends downloaded, cough, and the quality normally isn’t very good, even if you can get it too work properly to start with, and the sound is sometimes off, making it very annoying to watch. Heck, even the real good copies I’ve seen will occasionally have people get up and walk in front of the camera that they used to record it with. Most movies online, that I have seen, are a joke. That’s why I buy mine. I like the packaging and the extras you get with the DVD, and I’ll even sometimes buy the regular DVD and then buy the special edition later on when it comes out, like the true nerd I am. But, stories like this and the one Michael wrote about getting the rootkit from the CD from Sony is why I make sure no one else in my family buys it, I let them watch MY copy.
Kent says:
Really not seeing a huge problem with him getting sued.
If his grandkid had taken the family car and plowed into another car, I don’t think anyone would have any problem at all pursuing the grandad for damages.
November 3rd, 2005 at 1:08 pm
dew says:
‘cept he didn’t plow into another car and caused physical damage. The kid downloaded some movie that someone else was sharing. I am not saying it is right to do, but it is insane to sue the grandfather for “damages” and apply some monetary figures some accountants and lawyers drew up. A better, but still not yet analogy is, would you sue the grandfather, if the kid was sipping on some stolen alcoholic beverages that someone else was offering at his grandfather’s place and the grandfather was not aware at the time. I know. Crappy analogy, but it is just as far fetched as these huge corporations “making an example” of someone who is more than likely not able to afford an expensive bunch of lawyers to fight back when it is the source of the pirated material that they can’t get to.
November 3rd, 2005 at 1:36 pm
Rob says:
Kent: No physical damage was done, no sale was lost. Etc. etc.
—
As for the 5.4 billion dollars … it’s likely an extrapolation of how many times a move is likely to have been shared. Multiply that by per-showing profit and BAM … 5.4 bil. Of course, they’re not considering that 1) many who download also see it in theatres and 2) many who download wouldn’t have seen it in the theaters even if they couldn’t download it. I’m not saying that justifies piracy (as there are very few justifications for it), but that’s another story.
Hopefully this guy doesn’t lose his friggin retirement fund over this.
November 3rd, 2005 at 1:44 pm
dew says:
Rob, those are some great points that I thought about too! But I forgot to mention them.
November 3rd, 2005 at 2:16 pm
Don Mynack says:
I would take my chances in front of a jury. I think it would be very educational for the MPAA to have to argue their nonsense in front of actual people, instead of politicians they are paying for. This is why they push so hard for settlement - they don’t have much of a chance if this actually goes to court. How would they prove that this guy caused them actual damages?
November 3rd, 2005 at 4:24 pm
David Johnston says:
Also, he probably didn’t give his permission for the kid to download the movies or know that he was doing it.
November 3rd, 2005 at 5:36 pm
Anthony says:
The media’s slant on this is pretty steep.
The issue is DISTRIBUTION, not downloading.
The laws govern the illegal copying and/or distribution of licenced products ( DVDs )
The MPAA’s issue is the distribution ( file sharing ) of the movies. Simply downloading the movie from the internet is not illegal. It’s the sharing or distribution that the law governs.
Downloading the movies, then allowing others to download it, is the issue at hand.
It is NOT illegal for you to go out and BUY a pirated DVD off eBay or the city streets, but it IS illegal to be the person SELLING those products on eBay or the street corner.
The rule of thumb. Change your “file sharing” settings.
Do not allow others to browse your files or download from your computer. Download all you want, just don’t share your files.
November 3rd, 2005 at 11:46 pm
Ed Schneider says:
The RIAA and MPAA are INTENTIONALLY filing these egregiously offensive lawsuits against grandmas, grandpas and 10-year-old girls. Their tactics will, however, bite them in their proverbial derrieres when juries become aware of the true intent: to intimidate those least able to defend themselves.
In a criminal lawsuit, one ingredient that MUST be present to successfully prosecute is INTENT. While this is a civil action, my personal feelings if I were a juror, is that without intent (which does NOT exist here), I would laugh at the MPAA.
I wish this fellow good luck and condemn the RIAA and MPAA for their wholly unbalanced and viciously offensive campaign of harassment.
This is little more than a prime example of using the courts to intimidate after buying and then using the Congress to legislate.
November 4th, 2005 at 5:25 am
Mike says:
I think the grandfather should be responsible for what goes on inside his own house. I DO NOT think they should sue him over it.
Mike
Oh - nobody cares anyway - people bitch and whine about the tactics of the MPAA and the RIAA, but do you see the sales of digital music falling, cds, dvds, tickets for movies(well when they have good ones playing anyway)…everybody stop buying music for a month and see how fast they change…maybe a year…they would change.
NO - I dont condone illegal activities, but if I own a cd and want to download the songs - I damn well should be allowed…same with movies. If they owned all the movies the kid downloaded - there should be no lawsuit. Distribution is a joke - Let the MPAA release a program that lets you download a movie from their servers if you have the dvd - problem solved..end of story….now we can go back to making this nice country of ours back into the old USSR… :p
November 4th, 2005 at 5:48 am
dew says:
Mike, your comment on how people continuing to buy music cds and dvds is exactly what MPAA and RIAA don’t want to admit to. They want to blame the lack of sales of not so great music and bad movies on the consumers.
November 4th, 2005 at 8:57 am
Mikey says:
I thought blackmail was illegal. No matter who commits it and for whatever reason.
If they ask for money up front, and then “settle” for less (in exchange for -not- setting a court date) and they do it repeatedly, that conforms to what I would call EXTORTION.
Drag out the RICO act, Mr Attorney General of The United States.
I think you’ve got a live one. And they’re not even trying to hide it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RICO_(law)
quote from the WIKI:
In 2005, Tanya Anderson of Oregon responded to a lawsuit on behalf of Atlantic Records by in turn suing them under the RICO laws. Her suit alleges that RIAA members, in this particular case Atlantic, engaged in illegal computer trespass, extortion, and unfair trade practices under Oregon state law.
November 4th, 2005 at 11:36 am
» MPAA Offers Deal in Download Lawsuit » Blog Archive Alice Hill’s Real Tech News - Independent Tech says:
[…] An update to yesterdays story about a 67 Year Old Sued by MPAA for iMesh Downloads, the MPAA has offered Mr. Lawrence a “deal”, they called him and said if he paid them the $4000 they originally asked for, they would drop the lawsuit. They even stated that he could make payments over a year to 18 months. An attorney for the Motion Picture Association of America called Lawrence late Wednesday, telling him the lawsuit would be dropped if he paid $4,000, Lawrence said. […]
January 14th, 2007 at 5:43 pm