The RIAA lawsuit engine is in FULL GEAR.
 

In another bold move to combat music piracy, the RIAA is now suing kids who make homemade music videos and post them to YouTube:

Source

Awesome, RIAA. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED.

Do the artists themselves actually condone this sort of nonsense? There comes a time when you need to quit letting your lawyer speak for you and put your damn foot down.

I'm willing to guess that any artists who do disagree with the RIAA will be branded as "deviant" (or something of the sort) and totally ignored. After all, it is in their best interests, isn't it?

Why did they crash into the WTC towers, why couldn't they hit the RIAA headquarters

Hopefully the RIAA will sue themselves broke sometime soon.

God, that's a joke. The RIAA really need to get over themselves. I couldn't stop laughing whilst reading that. Shows how seriously they are taken by me at least

Or the ones who do disagree with them are not a part of the RIAA.

I'd think that most studios and artists would approve of incidental usage in these amateur videos. In the marketing industry, there's a maxim: "there's no such thing as bad publicity."

I fail to see where profits are being made from incidental footage on YouTube, since I'd estimate that 99.9% of contributors aren't making a dime from their efforts. Most studios and labels trip over their bureaucratic forms to see that their works are "donated" to non-profit use. Normally this implies charitable foundations but if people are making videos just for fun, then that's technically non-profit as well.

The moment any of them makes a taxable earning from their video, then the RIAA might have reason to ask for a fair consideration. But this is definitely on a case-by-case basis and not to be implemented as a blanket policy for all YouTube users.

I think this world fell into a downward spiral the moment the merchants and lawyers seized control.

So the RIAA is going to get those "hardcore dancing" videos taken off the internet? Yay.

Otherwise, RIAA sucks. This new thing is totally useless.

I guess I better turn the music down whilst drivin' the Honda. Don't wanna share the music for people who haven't paid for it yet.

God, the RIAA has it's head so far up it's ass that if it was a woman, it'd be feeling it's ovaries on it's nose. They're to the music scene what Anne Coulter is to politics. A joke.

They have no rights. As part of their contract, their recordings became the property of the label, and therefore, of the RIAA. They have no right to interfere with the activities of the RIAA whatsoever.

That's fucking fair use under copyrights. Reading that makes my blood pressure spike.

Goodbye creativity. RIAA doesn't want people to be creative it seems. "OH NOES! SOMEONE MADE A MUSIC VIDEO AND POSTED IT ON YOUTUBE! IT'S GOOD! SUE THEM!!!1111"

Makes me want to create a music video and post it on YouTube now.

Keep cleaning the gun, RIAA. There's an "accidental discharge" waiting to happen.

About time they took action.
Pirate Video-ing, that's what I called it!
In my days we HANGED pirate video-ers on the town square, that's what we did!
You know what damage Pirate Video-ing does to such respected and established brands as Music Television? VH-1? Does that ring any bells?

Damn right.

Reminds me of that old hairdresser boutique down my street that had to close because of lawsuits about the music on the radio he had in his shop. <_<

If this wasn't so depressingly sad it might be funny. I can only assume that having your brain surgically removed must be a job requirement for working at the RIAA.

I don't think this is aimed so much at videos where people are dancing to some music playing in the background; it's more likely aimed at skits and amateur movies which are becoming more common. I saw something on CNN yesterday about an Italian movie that was entirely filmed with a cellphone camera.

As much as I think the music industry shoots itself in the foot, they do have a point. While most of u-tube is low-grade crap, it's possible that the next big internet fad will originate there, something that'll propel the video and it's author to fame and fortune, partially on the back of a work owned by the RIAA. On the flip side, I can also see why they wouldn't want their music "product" associated with a crap video.

I see one positive thing coming out of this - maybe now we'll see fewer videos where the producer tries to be urban and hip by using gangsta rap as BGM.

Come to think of it, you never heard Dragostea Din Tei (That annoying ass Numa Numa song) over here until that fat kid put up his stupid dancing video. Now it's playing during movie trailers and such.

Still, where exactly do they think these kids are gonna get the money to go to court or pay any fines, if need be? Most of these idiots are still in high school probably, and not everyone has rich parents.

Because that would have been an act of mercy?

What's next? Suing people for watching those videos? Where's that thread about the RIAA charging everyone for even thinking about music? That pretty much sums this up.

Ahahahahahahah. Oh WOW.

Since my digital camera can record audio+video, I think I'll make
a shitty video with incidental music, and carefully have it so that
the music is NOT affiliated with the RIAA, just to see what they will do.

As I see it, RIAA = Monopoly. After all, they have the word INDUSTRY in thier name, and INDUSTRYs are typically not to have monopolies in them. Can't wait to see how they would get around that one, given thier own sideways interpretation of law.

How long will it be before they import a Chinese Death Van to deal with the pirates?

Makes me wonder how long it will be before music is nothing but taboo.

My prediction is that the RIAA is going to destroy itself. Maybe the MPAA too, but from what I've seen they're not as bad.

I wonder if it's only in recent history that capitalism gets out of control like this.

God, what the hell. If this keeps up, music lovers are gonna have to maintain a listener's lisence if they wanna listen to music. How much do you think the people down at the RIAA actually listen to music? It's probably drowned out by a recording of a cash register going off every second, cause that's all they care about.