The RIAA is now issuing subpoenas.  Are the people that have
uninstalled the p2p sharing program now safe? How up to date are these
subpoenas?  That is, are these subpoenas from illegeal activity from
the end of June...or, are they from recent (within a few days)
activities? Of those that uninstalled the software...very
specifically, when will everyone know whether they are "in the clear."
 Or, better yet...can
people avoid any subpoenas by just paying for already downloaded song
(in order to avoid a lawsuit)?  Before you answer these
questions...please let me know how much it will cost!!!

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Clarification of Question by clearch-ga on 28 Jul 2003 11:14 PDT

I have used the google search engine for quite a while now (I have
downloaded the toolbar).  But, this is the first time that I have used
the answers section.  Thus far, you are impressive.  I am POSITIVE
that I will use this service again!

---

Clarification of Question by clearch-ga on 28 Jul 2003 22:31 PDT

I have seen this quote at...

http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/techscience/story/0,4386,202149,00.html

"The mother of the 14-year-old boy said she had assumed that her son's
file-swopping was all right, because she knew that Napster, the
company that drove the original wave of online music piracy, had been
shut down after the record companies sued.

Any other company whose software is used by so many of her son's
friends, she reasoned, must have done something different to be
allowed to continue operating.

After receiving a copy of the subpoena in the mail, the mother said
she did some research and learnt that though the software itself might
be legal, the way her son was using it was almost certainly not.

The 150 songs her son had on his computer have been deleted, and his
computer privileges have been cancelled for the rest of the summer."

What's up with that?

---

Clarification of Question by clearch-ga on 28 Jul 2003 22:34 PDT

Also, no one has touched on this portion of the question...

"are these subpoenas from illegeal activity from 
the end of June...or, are they from recent (within a few days) 
activities?"

That is, most of the subpoenas that I have seen are from early July!
(or has someone seen otherwise)??? Are they up to date now with
subpoenas?

Wow thats a lot of questions....

Lets start
1) Are people who have uninstalled P2P systems safe?
No - The RIAA has been tracking users since the days of Napster
     This doesn't mean that they will use the data, but they could if
     they decide to.  Realistically, if you did not share over a
thousand songs
     and you removed the software before June 25th you are probably
(id say
     99.9%) safe.

2) How up to date are these subpoenas - The RIAA claims on their own
site that
   they started gathering data specifically since June 25th
   -http://www.riaa.com/news/newsletter/062503.asp
   Only the RIAA knows the criteria they are using to prioritize cases
and I
   doubt that they would let it out.

3) When will people know that they are in the clear.... Again, the
RIAA could
   always go back and use the data that they have already gathered. 
So there is
   no way to know that you are in the clear unless the RIAA at some
future time
   decides to announce amnestey.  

4) Can you go back and buy the music or do something to be legal now,
   I can't find the source, but the RIAA hasn't really resolved this.
   Personally I wouldn't do anything until you are contacted....

Something you didn't ask but should help clarify, The RIAA is
currently going after people that SHARE the songs to others... It
would be pretty hard to track what you downloaded unless you got it
from them.  If your not sharing songs, your pretty safe.

logically, I tend to agree with the notion that if you didn't "share"
you are probably not a candidate for subpoena, but I wonder how
accurate this statement really is:

"Realistically, if you did not share over a thousand songs...you are
probably safe."

Is this statement supported somewhere?

regards;
tutuzdad-ga

See:

Parents, grandparents targets in U.S. Internet music-sharing
subpoenashttp://www.salon.com/tech/wire/2003/07/25/grandparents/

---l

The Electronic Frontier Foundation has published:

How Not to Get Sued By The RIAA for File Sharing
http://eff.org/IP/P2P/howto-notgetsued.php

The EFF also offers a service that enables people to find out if their
username or IP address has been included in an RIAA subpoena.

Subpoena Query
http://eff.org/IP/P2P/riaasubpoenas/

---l

To clarify a previous statment, I actually stated:

"Realistically, if you did not share over a thousand songs and you
removed the software before June 25th you are probably (id say 99.9%)
safe. "

tutuzdad-ga
Gave a direct quote of me saying: (incomplete I might add)
"Realistically, if you did not share over a thousand songs...you are
probably safe."

The significant difference is that the RIAA has publicly stated that
they started gathering information for the lawsuits on June 25th.
http://www.riaa.com/news/newsletter/062503.asp (which I cited in my
origional comment)
  
Therefore, my rationale is that if your did not have the software when
they started gathering information, you are safe from this round of
litigation.
With that said, there is still the chance that they could go after you
for past actions. My contention is that unless you were offering a
disproportionally HUGE list of files, they will probably never go
after you.

1) This round of lawsuits is based on people sharing after June 25th

2) Their motive is to end file sharing NOT to generate large cash
settlements.  Therfore after this round of cases, they will probably
not go back to older cases. Instead, they will continue after current
offenders.
 
3) If they were to go back to previous sets of data, they would
probably only go after the worst offenders. (where the 1,000 songs
came from)

I stand behind my previous statement but would be interested in
hearing any opposing views.

Thank you for clarifying that your information about sharing "over a
thousand songs" was based only on your personal "rationale" and not on
verifiable information. I suspected this might be the case. Your
clarification might prevent any misleading assumptions that that there
is a "magic number" which must be passed before being targeted for
potential litigation or prosecution. There are references to
"supernodes" being targeted because they do a great deal of sharing,
and to regional violators in high profile jurisdictions such as Ann
Arbor, Michigan, San Francisco, CA etc, but to my knowledge there are
no official (or unofficial) references to 1000 songs or any particular
number of songs for that matter.

Regards;
tutuzdad-ga

I would like to thank the previous commentor for notifying me that it
would not be obvious to some users when I use terms like "I Would Say"
that I am referring to educated personal opinions.    In addition I
also believed that people would be able to interpret the statement
that starts with a caveat that no one knows for sure and is then
followed with the term "Probably" would mean that the information is
an estimate or guess and not a definitive statement of fact.  I will
endeavor to not rely on such unclear terms in the future.

To further clarify-
The RIAA will not say who it will target, but outside experts are
voiceing OPINNIONS (* These are opinions of experts not to be
misinterpreted as statements of fact Nor to be interpritted as
statements by the RIAA's*) on who the RIAA is targetting.

"Experts say the action is most likely to target users who have a T-1
connection, keep their systems on continuously, and share THOUSANDS of
files"
-http://www.newsfactor.com/perl/story/21976.html

"If the RIAA truly begins by pursuing the heaviest music suppliers,
the first people they net will likely be those who have a
high-bandwidth connection like a T-1 line, hoard THOUSANDS of files
and keep their computer on all the time, said Kevin Lai, a scientist
who studies P2P systems at Hewlett Packard Laboratories. "
-http://www.wired.com/news/digiwood/0,1412,59392,00.html

"RIAA officials have said they are already gathering information about
people offering large numbers of copyrighted songs online, "
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105-1025684.html


Regards
-Vballguy

I'll second the opinion that you should check out the Electronic
Frontier Foundation's guidelines on this subject at the following url:

EFF: How Not To Get Sued By The RIAA For File-Sharing
https://www.eff.org/IP/P2P/howto-notgetsued.php

One important comment from the above article is that the RIAA seems to
be targetting those P2P users who are acting as supernodes. The
following is the EFF's suggestions on how to check to see if you're
doing this or not:

"The RIAA appears to be targeting subpoenas at users who allow their
computers to be "Supernodes" on the FastTrack P2P System (used, for
instance, by KaZaA and Morpheus). In order to further reduce the risk
of having your ISP subpoenaed or of being sued yourself, we recommend
that you make sure your computer is not being used as a Supernode. To
learn more about Supernodes and how to make sure your computer is not
one, look here: http://www.whtvcable.com/fasttrack and
http://helpdesk.princeton.edu/kb/display.plx?ID=9245. See also
Disabling the Supernode function with KaZaA (PDF 331k)."

I think it is safe to say that if the industry is willing to sue a
12-year old girl living in a housing project that no one who violate
the copyright law is safe, regardless of how may or how often they
download/upload music:

"Girl, 12, Settles Piracy Suit for $2,000"
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=529&ncid=529&e=4&u=/ap/20030909/ap_en_mu/downloading_music_11

Regards;
tutuzdad-ga