Skynet's first strike
Last week the Copyright Tribunal made its first decision under the Copyright
(Infringing File Sharing) Bill (aka 'Skynet') which came into
effect in September 2011. An unnamed Telecom subscriber was ordered to
pay a total of $616.57 for pirating music.Time-line of the case
| 24 November 2011 | A "Detection Notice", originating from Island Def Jam Music Group (Universal Music NZ Ltd), was sent to the subscriber stating that they'd shared the Rihanna song ‘Man Down’. | |
| 19 June 2012 | A "Warning Notice" was sent after the subscriber was discovered uploading the same track again. | |
| 30 July 2012 | An "Enforcement Notice", this time from monitoring by RCA Records (Sony Music Entertainment NZ Ltd), was sent claiming the accused had shared the Hot Chelle Rae track ‘Tonight Tonight’. |
There was no actual hearing for the case. It was handled "on the paperwork", which is to say by written submission. In it, the subscriber admitted to downloading the first track, agreed that her ineptitude with the torrent software concerned (uTorrent) may have led to the second offence, but denied ever downloading the third track.
The Tribunal found her guilty nonetheless because, in it's own words;
The
Act creates a presumption that each incidence of file sharing
identified in an infringement notice constitutes an infringement of the
right owner's copyright in the work identified.
In other words, you're guilty unless you can prove yourself innocent. They go on;
An
account holder may submit evidence that this presumption does not
apply, or give reasons why it should not apply. In this case, the
Respondent has not provided any evidence that the presumption should
not apply. In fact, she acknowledges that at least some manner of
infringement has taken place and has apologised for this.
So acknowledging that "some manner of infringement has taken place" means she's guilty of every alleged infringement. What a bizarre idea! And even though the Tribunal admits
There
is insufficient evidence ... to make detailed findings on [the] factual
issues
it does so anyway. No doubt the Recording Industry Association of NZ (RIANZ), which prosecuted the case, are kicking themselves they didn't chuck in another 500 allegations and really score a big fine.
In case you're wondering about the odd amount, the fine was calculated as follows;
| Cost of all three song via iTunes | $6.57 |
| Cost of RIANZ notices | $50.00 |
| Tribunal application fee | $200.00 |
| "Deterrent sum" ($120 x 3) | $360.00 |
| $616.57 |
No doubt cheques are already winging there ways to Rihanna and Hot Chelle Rae. After all, as the industry keeps reminding us, "it's all about the artists". Isn't it?
It's worth noting that the RIANZ has dropped two potentially bigger cases, one "after the account holder filed submissions with the Copyright Tribunal identifying a large number of defects in the claims" and the second after "the account holder had not received any of the warning or infringement notices sent by his or her internet protocol address provider".
Sometime this month the Tribunal will hold its first proper (ie: face-to-face) hearing in Christchurch. Watch this space!
PC World is New Zealand’s top selling computing and technology magazine.
Comments
Years ago I worked for a software company that developed software for councils and authorities that administered public carparking and more specifically the collection of fines relating to parking. The whole scheme worked on the premise that if people paid their parking and used only the alloted time - that was ok. But where the authority really scored was going after those that where parked on expired meters as so forth. The money collected for legal parking was minor to the amounts collected by fines. The whole system works by assuming that users (car drivers) will try to get away without paying parking money and that they can be hit for fines which generated the cash flow.
It seems that the Recording Industry is starting to adopt the same policy in order to increase cash flow.
Posted by: Adrian | February 5, 2013 3:10 PM