Music & Copyright (2 items)

["Hamaker, Charles" <cahamake@uncc.edu>]

From: digital-copyright Digest 20 May 2008 15:00:00 -0000 Issue 
793

RIAA Setback: Making Music Available May Not Be Copyright 
Infringement. By Thomas Claburn, InformationWeek, May 15, 2008. 
http://tinyurl.com/6fpapn

"A district judge may order a new trial in a music file-sharing 
suit that won record companies $222,000 for copyright 
infringement. The act of making music available online may not be 
a copyright violation after all. And if that's the case, Jammie 
Thomas of Minnesota may not have to pay the $222,000 judgment won 
by record companies last year, an amount Thomas' attorneys argue 
is unconstitutionally excessive." ... "According to a Star 
Tribune report, the judge's order said that "he may have made a 
'manifest error of law' last October when he instructed a Duluth 
jury that simply uploading songs to a music file-sharing network 
could be considered illegal distribution, even in the absence of 
proof that anyone received them."

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(c)ollectanea Blog. Collected perspectives on copyright. 
http://chaucer.umuc.edu/blogcip/collectanea/ -- Get the Feed 
Blog: Royalty Logic Seeks To Prove Copyright Board 
Unconstitutional. By Eliot Van Buskirk, WiredBlogNetwork, May 14, 
2008. http://blog.wired.com/music/2008/05/disgruntled-web.html

"Just when record labels thought it was safe to start charging 
webcasters on a per-listener, per-song basis, the US Copyright 
Royalty Board that set the rates has been charged 
unconstitutional in the Federal Court of Appeals."

Chuck Hamaker
Associate University Librarian Collections and Technical Services
Atkins Library
University of North Carolina Charlotte
Charlotte, NC 28223