1/4 million dollar fine for bootlegging d+d books?

[jasamcarl]

To me, this is a semantical pirouette: Punishing someone for someone else's future crime versus punishing someone for someone else's past crime.



8th Ammendment: Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

"Making an example of someone" by inflicting egregious punishment not matching the crime is one of the precise reasons why this ammendment was created. This kind of unjust intimidation is a tool of pre-enlightenment tyrants and despots.

You are misreading the 8th. 'Excessive' refers to arbitrary, i.e. there being no compelling public interest. Precedence notes that there is a public interest in intellectual property.

And you still don't get this; you are punishing someone not based upon someone's actions, but based on what will deter individuals. It is very much unlikely that that individual will get caught on any INDIVIDUAL download; future and past offences don't factor in. This has nothing to do with what others are doing.

 

[Utrecht]

As by others - in general I agree with Sigil as well.

My only concerns comes into the fact that I feel organizations (i.e. companies) and to a lesser extent individuals that steal software need to be punished.

Now I will admit that I have bias since I work for a software company - but the fact remains that there is a real financial impact to piracy - and that the perceptions that the "right" to something is more important than the "right" to get paid for it is IMO wrong.

 

[Shard O'Glase]

If they did that here and would somehow be able to prove every single time when I was driving to fast, I'd go to prison, and some 200 generations after me, too

The worst that can happen is that you lose your licence - and that only if you drive way over limit, press people or drive drunk (or doing something worse). Everything below that will just cost you money.

But the problem's there: if you commit a crime concerning money, you'll get punished worse than if you hurt or kill people. That just can't be right.

In some places the speeding law to get you in jail is if you go twice the speed limit. That's somewhat reasonable, if your going 70mph in a downtown area you are a serious threat to those around you.

other that that its not so much going to jail for speeding but going to jail in order to secure your fine. And this can be for any fine not just speeding.

As for commiting a crime concerning money, well I suspect lots of it is based on the impression that white collar criminals and other straight money crimes are under punished and this is the trend towards over-reacting to solve the problem.

 

[jasamcarl]

I don't know. The punishment should be relative to the crime, not on the chances of getting caught. Punishing more just because it's unlikely to get caught just punishes the file sharers for the authorities inability to solve crimes. Should we punish walking on red light with tens of thousands of dollars just because it's easy to avoid getting caught?



Should we then charge more (like ten times more) for speeding because obviously the current fines aren't deterrent enough? Punishment according to crime is a fine principle I think. Statistics can't be applied to individual people, especially in when dispensing justice. Otherwise we could always just grab the nearest black male aged 20-25 when we are looking for a murderer. Because that's statistically the most likely candidate.

That is hyperbole. Racial profiling of the type you are alluding to acts on a misreading of statistics. While it might be probable that the offender is of a specific ethnic group, it is most likely the case that 'any' member of that group is not the person who committed the crime, making these techniques less effective. I am not supporting that.

The only discriminatory aspect of the penalties we are discussing is towards those who get caught, hardly a 'protected' group.

And define proportional. If the deterrence is the goal of the law, then high penalties can easily be construed as proportional because they deter the crime. Its a public policy question, not a legal one. The law would only be disproportional if it were based upon arbitrary, irrational categories such as race, religion, or morality, or if its enforcement neccessitated the violation of an individuals rights. None of these apply here.

 

[Emiricol]

In some places the speeding law to get you in jail is if you go twice the speed limit. That's somewhat reasonable, if your going 70mph in a downtown area you are a serious threat to those around you.

other that that its not so much going to jail for speeding but going to jail in order to secure your fine. And this can be for any fine not just speeding.

As for commiting a crime concerning money, well I suspect lots of it is based on the impression that white collar criminals and other straight money crimes are under punished and this is the trend towards over-reacting to solve the problem.

Last year, I think it was, the US Supreme Court upheld the legality of an arrest made by a police officer of a woman who was not wearing a seat belt. She was not arrested for freaking out and attacking the officer or any such thing. She was arrested specifically for not wearing a seat belt.

Naturally, she felt this constituted a blatant violation of the constitution, which protects us from unreasonable search and seizure of our property or persons. The supreme court disagreed.

This sets a *very dangerous* precedent. Since when is the Bill of Rights in the Consitution merely optional?

 

[The Sigil]

Having skimmed through the article, I have one question. How is this different from the $250k fine/5yr prison term that's been at the beginning of every movie you've rented or purchased (in the U.S. at least) for the last 20 or so years?

The difference is:

The way this law is worded, it does not just mean "putting an MP3 on Kazaa." If you upload a file onto a network - even, for example, a LAN in your own home that never touches the internet, you can get nailed under this law... even if you never distribute it. You cannot have a LAN where you "share" your CD drive in computer A and play the CD off computer B's speakers in the next room. That is normally "Fair Use" - but this law would criminalize that.

Furthermore, now you can get in trouble "because you have the capacity to possibly have done something" whereas before "you must have actually done it.

ADDED VIA EDIT:
Under the old law, my putting a file in a spot where someone else could downloaded was NOT illegal. If nobody ever downloads it, I have never distributed the file... and therefore am not in violation of someone else's copyright. Someone has to actually download it (and thus, I have to distribute it) before I have done something illegal.

Now the new law wants to make putting that file in a spot where someone could possibly download it illegal... even if nobody ever downloads it. That is where the difference lies. I can be prosecuted as though I had distributed it, even if I never actually did distribute it (because nobody ever downloaded it).

Granted, I'm not saying it's a good idea to make it available, but there is a big difference in what is legal and illegal under the "old" and "new" contemplations. It assumes guilt - because I "could have" distributed it, I must be punished as though I actually did... even if I *didn't.* THAT's why I'm not keen on this particular law.

END EDIT


It's like making me legally liable for having two VCRs hooked up and having a copyrighted tape in *one* of them. Before, I had to actually copy the tape before I could be punished. Now they want to punish me as though I had copied the tape (i.e., the fine is the same in this bill for "being able to" as "actually doing it" was before) - because I *could* have copied the tape, even if I never actually had.

They're presuming guilt... and that's what is disturbing.

It's kind of like passing a law that fines all people who place live ammunition into a handgun as though they had committed murder because they have the tools in place to do so... even if they have never actually shot anyone.

--The Sigil

 

[Planesdragon]

"Making an example of someone" by inflicting egregious punishment not matching the crime is one of the precise reasons why this ammendment was created. This kind of unjust intimidation is a tool of pre-enlightenment tyrants and despots.

Punishment should be punishment, above and beyond restitution of the wrongs. I.e., if you defaud me for a thousand dollars, and I win in court, your tort-liabiltiy to me will be my thousand dollars, plus some number (possibly several thousand dollars) of punative damages.

Plus, every time we punish someone we make an example of them. When each and every convicted prisoner goes to jail, a message is being sent that our laws will be enforced.

(And, IIRC, cruel government behavior persisted post-enlightenment.)

 

[Kestrel]

Ah yes, because piracy of D&D books is a much bigger problem than things like rape, murder, drunk driving, assault, etc...

(Though likely it would never be enforced against RPG pirates, since it's not the RPG companies with the big pockets that are pressuring politicians, but the music & movie companies...)

That's because there's no money to be made in enforcing those laws. Who cares if someone gets killed? Instead we can back this multi-media corps in Congress and take tons of campaign contributions for it.

 

[Shard O'Glase]

Last year, I think it was, the US Supreme Court upheld the legality of an arrest made by a police officer of a woman who was not wearing a seat belt. She was not arrested for freaking out and attacking the officer or any such thing. She was arrested specifically for not wearing a seat belt.

I stand corrected, my law knowledge is out of date.

 

[Planesdragon]

It is criminalizing what used to not be a crime. Copyright was an affirmative right. That means if you want to enforce your right, you can, but it was not a *crime* to copy information. That's just a shame. It is perfectly natural for human beings, who share information at a rate that is unparalleled in the natural world, cannot continue to do so. Before the DMA, we were allowed to share files and books with our friends. That was considered getting full enjoyment out of your purchase.

Actually, there has been a level of criminal copyright infringement for quite some time. It's just been lowered in the very recent past.

Plus, most new criminal laws cause something that wasn't a crime to become a crime. This is called "passing a law", and constitutionally is no different than the Civil Rights act, or the environmental protection act. Both curtailed the activiites of some to aid others.

The DMCA did not change what the average Amercan could do with the things that they buy--it adjusted the law to specifically enforce mechanisms which attempt to undo the Napsteresque massive infringement potential that the internet was and is. Is it too harsh, and is copyright's term too long? Probably. But a massive anonymous free-for-all of unrestrained copyright infringment isn't a better situation.

(This is the part where I bring up the unfinished song bit from Napser, but I'm sure everyone already knows that, so I won't elaborate.)