Editorial: Punishments don’t fit the crime of file sharing

The Recording Industry Association of America knows if
you’ve been bad or good ““ and it wants you running
scared.

On May 26, an additional 91 college students were sued for
illegal file sharing, and for the first time, seven of the
defendants are UCLA students.

The RIAA says sharing music is a crime similar to other forms of
stealing ““ i.e., downloading or sharing a song is the
equivalent of stealing a candy bar from a store. On some levels the
RIAA might be correct; sharing music without consent is illegal,
and record companies have the right to seek reasonable
punishments.

But the RIAA uses its power to sue individuals as a weapon meant
to strike fear in people via the threat of tremendous ““ and
unreasonable ““ penalties.

In fact, the recording industry shares much of the blame for the
current state of affairs. It is unfortunate (one could almost say
criminal) that it has resorted to targeting colleges for lawsuits.
Students from 51 colleges have been the recipients of RIAA lawsuits
since April.

The studios of the RIAA ripped customers off for years with
expensive CDs and ignored the constructive potential of the
Internet. The industry essentially waited for the release of
Apple’s iTunes Music Store in April 2003 before it had a
serious answer to illegally sharing music online.

More generally, the RIAA’s response to file sharing
hasn’t been to make music more affordable or accessible.
Instead, the RIAA spent its energy and money lobbying for extreme
punishments for those who share their files.

Let’s look at the comparison of stealing a candy bar and
the punishment it carries. Stealing anything worth less than $400
is considered petty theft and is punishable by no more than six
months in jail, a fine of $1,000, or both.

But in reality, few petty thieves receive the maximum penalty,
especially for first offenses. In some cases, California law
permits the victims of minor crimes to completely forgive the
perpetrator.

Even a more serious crime like driving under the influence is
counted as a misdemeanor for the first offense, with a punishment
of 96 hours to six months in jail.

But sharing 10 or more “phonorecords” with a total
value of $2,500 or more can result in up to five years in prison
and hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines and civil
penalties.

And a new law signed by President Bush makes possessing a single
unreleased song or movie a crime that can result in up to 10 years
in federal prison.

In the past, equally ridiculous penalties have been proposed by
the attack dogs of the recording industry.

In 2003, Rep. Howard Berman, D-Van Nuys, introduced legislation
that would have made uploading a single song or movie over the
Internet carry a penalty of five years in federal prison.

Instead of fixing their own industry model, the RIAA and Motion
Picture Association of America use their political clout to push
for harsher and harsher punishments for file sharers. Copyright
owners deserve to profit from their work, but they must moderate
their desire to punish with the understanding that copyright
infringement is not a violent crime.

It is the responsibility of both the studios and the politicians
to make sure the punishment fits the crime.