Thomas-Rasset was found liable for willfully infringing all 24 copyrights controlled by the four major record labels at issue in the case. The jury awarded the labels damages totaling a whopping $1.92 million.
The recording industry lawyers, though clearly pleased, had no desire to showboat this one. The massive damage award, which increased from $9,250 per song in the first trial to $80,000, might sounds like a "win," but will probably stoke grassroots anger against the industry's campaign... if the music business tries to collect. There are hints that it might not.
While it looks like she may be guilty, $80,000 per song is unfair. I honestly want to know what the jury was thinking by awarding 80,000 times the cost to buy the songs online.
All the music industry is doing with cases like this is causing more and more people to hate it.
