That lady got messed up! I personally have sympathy for her because for sure she's not the only one who downloads music. She has to pay $222,000, equivalent to the price of a house (not in California, of course). Although downloading music is illegal - at least when downloading for free or from a non-authorized site - many people do do it. Most especially when it comes to kids, they might as well be smoking or drinking or anything when it comes to breaking the law. I remember back then when the RIAA wanted to sue a 7 or 14 year old girl because she downloaded a lot of songs from Kazaa or Bearshare (not sure which). It's ridiculous what the music industry is coming down to.
Even though I agree to not illegally download music, it might be a good idea to at least download to listen to the album, making sure it's worth a trip to purchase at the local music store. This is only because when you purchase a CD from major stores like Best Buy, Circuit City, or Wal-Mart, you cannot return or exchange it for a different album once opened. A prime example was when I purchased Plies's (up-and-coming rapper) CD, and $12 was wasted. He only had ONE good song!
I hope her appeal is successful.
Click here to see the outcome of Jammie Thomas and the RIAA.
Oh man, that sucks! Before I buy new artists' albums, I usually go to cdnow.com and look for the album there. Sometimes they'll have samples for each track. If you need to hear the entire song you can use imeem.com too. Hope that helps!
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