Intellectual Property Law

The Recording Industry Association of America is clearing the air over its comments that it has not initiated litigation in months against alleged copyright scofflaws.

On Friday, the RIAA announced it was abandoning its legal strategyof suing individuals for copyright infringement, and said it had not sued anybody for months.

Ray Beckerman, an attorney the RIAA has declared as " vexatious," posted Friday on his blog ??? Recording Industry vs. The People??? that dozens of RIAA lawsuits have been filed within the past couple of weeks.

Cara Duckworth, an RIAA spokeswoman, e-mailed Threat Level in a bid to clear the air. She wrote that any suits recently filed were already in the "pipeline" for months.

"We are not initiating any new lawsuits and have not since August. Any lawsuit that has been filed since then is a named lawsuit or those for which we've received identifying information about the ISP (or issued the subpoena for). Simply put, we are continuing those that have already been in the pipeline but nothing new has been initiated since August," Duckworth said.

She added that some lawsuits are moving forward "because settlement discussions that began before then fell through."

Beckerman, in a telephone interview, said it's a matter of interpretation as to how to define a new case. "If they are saying they are not new cases, that's their definition of a new case."

The RIAA has sued more than 30,000 individualsthe past few years, and has settled most of the cases out of court for a few thousand dollars. Under the RIAA's new strategy, internet service providers will notify(.pdf) alleged copyright infringers detected by the RIAA that they need to cease their alleged infringement of the industry's music. Three-time offenders face losing internet access.

Illustration: Modernhumorist

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