It's the year 2012 and we're still talking about illegal file-sharing lawsuits. Earlier this year, All Shall Perish were stunned when their fans were getting subpoenas for downloading their most recent album, and the band was vehemently against it. Eventually, all charges were dropped.
Now Century Media is entering their hat in the file-sharing lawsuit ring.
According to a new article in NorthJersey.com, Jay R. McDaniel, an attorney representing the label is in the process of suing thousands of metalheads who downloaded Lacuna Coil's Dark Adrenaline and Iced Earth's Dystopia, the most recent offerings from both the bands. According to the article, the case is in the "John Doe" phase, with IP addresses obtained of file-sharers who downloaded the tracks using BitTorrent and McDaniels is currently trying to get permission to subpoena the internet service providers of those IP addresses, to track down the users behind them, at which point formal suits will be issued. Alleged downloads can settle for a pre-determined amount (usually a few thousand dollars) or choose to go to court, and if found guilty, they could face a fine upwards of $150,000.
First, I'd like to state it is completely within Century Media's rights to pursue legal action when it comes to these illegal downloads. The law is being broken when you download a full album without paying for it on a BitTorrent tracker (or anywhere else), and these are the type of risks you should know going into this. So you certainly can't blame the label for pursuing legal action.
But the question I have is what do they hope to gain from this? In terms of PR, this is a bad business move. They will get mostly negative feedback for this, as they are being perceived as "the man" trying to stick it to the little guy.
Do they think that word spreading of their impending lawsuits will halt illegal downloading? Because that will not happen. Metallica albums still get freely shared all over the place. Plus, for all intents and purposes, BitTorrent is seen as passé. There are thousands of MP3 blogs and file sharing message boards that use sites like RapidShare to illegally distribute album leaks now. You can find full album streams easily on Youtube. This will never stop. As soon as the labels catch on to the new way of doing things, something new will emerge.
Who are they targeting? It's a safe bet that most of these illegal downloads were by kids, younger than 18. Where are they going to get $5,000, or whatever the number ends up being, to settle this lawsuit?
Ultimately, what is their endgame? Since revenues from recording music are dwindling, are lawsuits being seen a new revenue stream for the label? I know that seems ridiculous to the average reader, but I can absolutely see this being the case. The label just lost one of their biggest acts, and might be scrambling for solutions.
It's very early in the subpoena process to tell if anything will come of this. The Jersey judge may deny the ISP subpoena and this may be over and done with, but should this keep going, it can get really messy.
[via MetalSucks]
