New2Maine.com

As reported on several online news outlets today, those plucky UMaine Law students have decided to take action on Magistrate Judge Kravchuk’s suggestion that the RIAA lawyers face Rule 11 sanctions. In an article entitled Maine law students try to derail RIAA lawsuit express, Ars Technica reports that the same students at UMaine Law who argued to have the RIAA’s John Doe lawsuits thrown out are now filing suit demanding the exact sanctions Kravchuk suggested. My best wishes go out to them in their efforts.

Suing your customers is not a way to sustain a business model. When will the RIAA learn?

In follow-up news to my previous post about students at UMaine Law assisting their fellow UMaine students in their fight against the RIAA, a Maine Judge Magistrate accuses RIAA of ‘gamesmanship’:

These plaintiffs have devised a clever scheme to obtain court-authorized discovery prior to the service of complaints, but it troubles me that they do so with impunity and at the expense of the requirements of Rule 11(b)(3) because they have no good faith evidentiary basis to believe the cases should be joined.’ She noted that once the RIAA dismisses its ‘John Doe’ case it does not thereafter join the defendants when it sues them in their real names.

While magistrate judge Margaret Kravchuk did not go so far as to recommend dismissing the lawsuit, she did suggest to the presiding judge in the case that the RIAA attorneys be sanctioned under Rule 11 for their gamesmanship. “Suppose,” she writes, “instead of university students, the record companies chose to target all individuals within the District of Maine who had used these P2P services and had TimeWarner Cable for their ISP.”

Would all those individuals be properly joined in a single complaint? I think the Plaintiffs know the answer to that question because on May 5, 2007, many of these same plaintiffs filed a very similar lawsuit, Atlantic Recording Corp., et al. v. Does 1-22, 1:07-cv-057-JAW. A procedure similar to the one used in this case was adopted in that case, but no motions to dismiss or motions to quash were filed and presumably the plaintiffs obtained the discovery they sought.”

According to Ray Beckerman at Recording Industry vs. The People, “It’s highly unusual for a judge to suggest Rule 11 sanctions. It shows that this judge really understood the pernicious and dishonest game the RIAA lawyers are playing…[i]f Rule 11 sanctions do wind up being imposed against the RIAA lawyers, I don’t think you’ll see any more mass John Doe cases.”

I’m glad to see that people are finally standing up to these legal bullies in a meaningful way, and I’m glad that some of the impetus to fight back is coming from Maine.

Portland again made it to CNN.com with an AP story about [s]elf-serve dog washes springing up throughout the nation - Jan. 1, 2008. She and I actually live just down the street from the Portland Dog Wash, but we’ve not been in. Our 6 year old boxer mix doesn’t get along so well with other dogs when she’s on leash, so we’ll continue to deal with the sore backs, the messy tub, and the rest of the hassles of washing at home. If you’re in Portland and looking for a way out of cleaning up after washing your pooch, give them a call at (207) 797-7082.

As mentioned in several places on the Internet, such as Recording Industry vs. The People, the U. Maine Law School’s Cumberland Legal Aid Clinic is representing two U. Maine students in a lawsuit filed by the RIAA for illegal music sharing. This is a watershed moment in the backlash against the RIAA’s litigation campaign against music consumers. This represents the first time that a university’s legal clinic is getting involved on its students’ behalf.

While I do believe the file sharing may harm the music industry as it currently exists to some extent, I am appalled by the RIAA’s tactics as it attempts to save its failing business model. I support the decision by students at the legal aid clinic to get involved in defending their fellow students. This is both a great learning opportunity for U. Maine Law students, and a good way to show the RIAA that the people, its consumers, will not lay down and accept the dictates of the recording industry. Go U. Maine Law! You make me proud to be a new Mainer.