Last year, the Recording Industry organization of America scored its first-ever legal victory in court when a federal jury awarded the group $220,000 for copyright infringement of 24 songs by Jammie Thomas. The crux of the RIAA’s complaint against Thomas was that she had made the songs (and roughly a thousand others) available to others on the Kazaa peer-to-peer (P2P) network.

However, on Wednesday U.S. District Court Judge Michael Davis overturned the verdict, telling the parties he had committed a “manifest error of law” during the trial. Specifically, Davis said he was wrong to instruct the jury that it could find Thomas liable without any proof that “actual distribution” of copyrighted material had taken place.

“Jury Instruction No. 15 was erroneous,” Davis said, “and that error substantially prejudiced Thomas’ rights. Based on the court’s error in instructing the jury, it grants Thomas a new trial.”

The RIAA will now have to decide whether to pursue its claim

against Thomas again or negotiate an out-of-court settlement. So far, the Thomas case is the only P2P infringement case to go to trial; according to a study by Wired magazine, most of the 30,000 lawsuits filed by the RIAA against individual file sharers have been settled out of court.

What Proof Is mandatory?

The issue troubling Davis is one that courts have wrestled with repeatedly. Is it sufficient for the RIAA to show that a defendant made copyrighted materials available for P2P users to access, or should the RIAA be needed to show that an actual transfer of copyrighted music took place?

As proof of actual distribution, RIAA offered evidence that its investigator, Media Sentry, had downloaded copyrighted materials from Thomas’ computer. However, Davis rejected that evidence, stating that a copyright owner (or its agents) cannot violate its own copyrights.

The RIAA was unavailable for comment and has not issued…

Orginal post by Mike

Mechanical Games Gizmo Gadgets Computers News Gadget Gismos Electronic