Chicago court rejects P2P Fair Use
The 7th circuit court of Appeals on Friday rejected Cecilia Gonzalez' fair use argument. She claimed the Copyright Act gave her the legal right to sample music downloaded from a P2P network. The court fined her $22,500, compared to the typical $3,000 RIAA settlement.
Despite significant evidence to the contrary, the Court bought RIAA's claim on file sharing damages.
"As file sharing has increased over the last four years, the sales of recorded music have dropped by approximately 30 percent. Perhaps other economic factors contributed, but the events likely are related."
This is the first ruling on a fair use claim.
Hale to the music industry. Support the artists. Banned those who contribute to the low sales of cds.