Author: Eric H.Eric H. Date: Jul 28, 2007 12:55
mitchell_leary wrote:
> Copyright infringement is criminal and he may be doing time for all I
> know.
Nah, copyright infringement is *typically* a civil matter except in
cases where outright large scale bootlegging is involved. Yes, the
tendency is to say that if money exchanges hands that it will be a
criminal charge but it is much harder to convince a jury to put someone
in jail for copyright infringement by looking/acting like a character in
a book than it is to get the defendant to simply settle.
However, since our dictator, err, Attorney General, Gonzales wants
people to do time for "attempted copyright infringement"(if you can
figure out that one, you're a better man than I) this could easily
change. At the same time I have a lot of clients with a lot of money
that think that software piracy is close to the most horrible thing in
the world BUT they don't see a problem with downloading an mp3/movie or
two, and when they get wind that they could soon be facing jail time,
you can bet the Congress critters will hear from them and put a damper
on that quickly.
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