Thursday, April 10, 2008

RIAA lawyer responds on "royalty statement" issue in UMG v. Lindor

In UMG v. Lindor Richard Gabriel has filed a "surreply" letter responding to Ray Beckerman's last letter and exhibits.

April 10, 2008, Letter of Richard L. Gabriel to Hon. Robert M. Levy (8 discovery issues)*
Exhibit A (email string)*

* Document published online at Internet Law & Regulation



Keywords: digital copyright law online internet law legal download upload peer to peer p2p file sharing filesharing music movies indie independent label freeculture creative commons pop/rock artists riaa independent mp3 cd favorite songs intellectual property

7 comments:

Alter_Fritz said...

Ray, I'm a bit confused about the significance of it or what Mr. Gabriel wish to archive with this letter to Hon. Levy other then confuse him even more (again).

No offense intended, but since you are a lawyer too you might understand his intentions better then me can see them at this moment.

Is it just the exact wording he now seems to nitpick about or what is this all about?

How about recollecting some prior events here:

At the end of August 2006! Judge Levy ordered the Plaintiffs to produce "all relevant documents" concerning Plaintiffs' wholesale download prices

Both parties "played ball" about this issue until January of 2007 (so viewed from today already again more then 16 month ago) where there was this proposed order with respect to the prices how much the record labels make from the digital retailers. (1)

Mr. Gabriel again objected to this proposed order with hyperbole that you do this all only for your blog or other cases but not for your client Lindor. He used the term "download pricing issue" back then instead of "royalty statement" (2)

This thingy dragged on from there for a few more month playing "games" with each other and writing letters to Judge Levy about photos and other stuff until mid May '07 where the parties finaly reached an agreement that was signed by both of you and were send to Judge Levy with the request to make an order out of it.
The wording there in the caption was "Revenue from lawfull downloads" neither "dowload pricing issue" nor "royalty statement(s)" (3)

Judge Levy ordered that one on May 18th 2007 (4) (so again one would asume from there that everything would work out fast on behalf of the plaintiffs but we are now nearly again 11 month later and that issue is still NOT resolved)

Of course Plaintiffs dragged that thingy on for a few more month, with writing of a few more letters (5) (6) and a few more I don't cite here from both parties where for the first time the word "expenses" came into play while it should as far as I understand resolve around how much money the labels were making from digital sales instead of what they have to pay themself!
Blog commenter personal note; If I were at Judge Levy's position and had issued these already now 2 orders "against" Plaintiffs and would learn that they ignore them so blatantly and redicule the course of justice with their behaviour I would be seriously Rule 11 mooted, but what do I know, Maybe Judge Levy things the games playing from RIAA Richard and the Record labels in his courtroom is O.K.?

But in the end (was it really the end given that it isn't resolved yet anyway?) Judge Levy on November 25th AGAIN ordered something with respect to that issue. (7) This time he even wrote a relatively lenghty order text that was clear to understand one would assume. It wasn't oviously for Plaintiffs and freshly voted "Superlawyer"-Mr. Gabriel. Since he now tries to confuse the Judge with nitpicking about words like "royalty statements"

Man would I be *expletive deleted* if I were the Judge that ordered 3 times something and would recollect the events like I had done here as a blogcommenter simply from looking up some documents without being even directly involved like Judge Levy is.

So Ray, let me come back to my initial question, Whats Mr. "Superlawyer"'s intention?


(1) http://www.ilrweb.com/viewILRPDF.asp?filename=umg_lindor_070102proposedorderwholesaleprice
(2) http://www.ilrweb.com/viewILRPDF.asp?filename=umg_lindor_070103RIAAtoMagisWholesalePriceDownloads
(3) http://www.ilrweb.com/viewILRPDF.asp?filename=umg_lindor_070516LJBtoMagStips1
(4) http://www.ilrweb.com/viewILRPDF.asp?filename=umg_lindor_070518StipulationSoOrderedWholesaleDownloadPrices
(5) http://www.ilrweb.com/viewILRPDF.asp?filename=umg_lindor_071011RIAAtoMagisExpenseDiscoveryMot
(6) http://www.ilrweb.com/viewILRPDF.asp?filename=umg_lindor_071012RBtoMagisandJudgeExpenseDiscovery
(7) http://www.ilrweb.com/viewILRPDF.asp?filename=umg_lindor_071125OrderDirectResponseInterrogExpenses

Anonymous said...

Hmm...I could be mistaken, but IMO Richard's letter seems to say "I lied and will now compound the lie." But that could just be me...

raybeckerman said...

I'm not sure what he's saying. He's not denying that he lied.

And the email he pointed to does not support the claim he made as to what I had said.

All I can say is that he has an awful lot of nerve, and that I sincerely hope he's finally used up the incredible length of rope Judge Levy has given him.

Macros said...

Hi Ray,

Looks like an invalid link wrapped around "last letter and exhibits".

Cheers!

Anonymous said...

Ray, sorry but it looks like, at least on the surface, he can twist this to mean what he says... You do offer to do this by other means, including looking at the documents.

Of course he has probably left out the preceding e-mail where he asked if you would accept it.. LOL

He has a lot of nerve though...

Anonymous said...

IANAL, but doesn't ignoring judicial instructions grounds for being held in contempt of court? We've seen the RIAA lawyer troop dancing with rule 11 for a long time now, isn't there enough documented hypocrisy to burn them yet?

ZH

raybeckerman said...

Thanks, macros. I fixed the link. Sorry about that.