Harvard Team Responds To RIAA Legal Moves

The RIAA is not just fighting piracy anymore; it's also battling a court order forcing net broadcast of the trial in its lawsuit against Joel Tenenbaum.  Led by Professor Charles Nesson, a Harvard law school legal team is defending the graduate student at Boston University who is being sued for $1M for allegedly downloading 7 songs.

Over the weekend the Harvard team issued this statement: “If the RIAA’s position is to educate people about the business and legal climate of the music industry, it is unclear to us why they are appealing this decision.  Further, we believe that the true public interest in this case is permitting civil involvement in courtroom proceedings. Our case is fundamentally about the ‘so-called Internet generation,’ and it is seemingly appropriate that such an opportunity be made available to these individuals.

“We are working hard to ensure that the Berkman Center is not the exclusive distributor of the content, and we welcome the RIAA’s help in finding additional websites through which the proceedings can be viewed.  Other parties have approached and are planning to narrowcast the feed.

“Finally, one of the virtues of the Internet is that other sites are accessible by just a few clicks – that is the essence of the Internet’s information democracy.  For whatever it is worth, the Berkman Center’s site links directly to the RIAA’s site, whereas it does not even directly link to the websites the RIAA argues are prejudicial to their position.”