The MPAA has played things a little cooler than the RIAA with regards to file sharing. Well, the MPAA lawyers haven't been as active attacking those sharing files. Perhaps it is because that, unlike MP3s, full movies are just huge files and not as easily downloaded and shared. Perhaps it is because the quality of the files, especially screeners, are horrible. Or maybe it is because the movie houses aren’t as willing to finance lawsuits against the very people that pay their bills as the record companies. At least, that used to be the case. Recently, the MPAA opened the gates to release the hounds. Or the bees. Or the hounds with bees in their mouth and when they bark they shoot bees at you.

Typically, we here at tinfoil.music limit our coverage to things musical, but a woman, let's call her Jane, contacted us asking for help. Now, we're not lawyers, thankfully, but we aren't useless. After giving Jane contact information for some law-talking types, links to valuable resources and an ear to hear her story, we decided that it needs to be heard by others.

Jane isn't a pirate. That much is obvious. Jane is a consumer, a connisuer of B-movies in the horror genre. Who can blame her? Jane is also an ex-Marine, proudly serving her country in Desert Storm and Somalia. She's no longer a marine, and spends considerable time raising money to help families with adoptions services and counceling. Her only income now is her veteran's compensation. It keeps her in her appartment, keeps food on the table, but it doesn't offer a lot of money for luxury items like the horror movies that she so enjoys. So she chooses carefully, sometimes by borrowing movies from friends and sometimes by downloading bits from P2P networks.

Well, she got popped.

Jane has forwarded me the documents that the MPAA lawyers had sent her. When she first received the papers, she thought it was a joke. She had a couple snippets of poor quality screeners that weren't anywhere close to DVD quality. Hell, they weren't even VHS quality. They also advertised the website for the distributor of the file, which is still in operation. Has the MPAA gone after them for making the file in the first place? Unfortunatly, she ignored it, hoping it would go away.

She has since learned that some lawyers employed by the entertainment industry won't go away without an excorcism, and even then they may leave stains in the carpet.

It was after the second and more threatening contact a couple months later that she started to get concerned. As it turns out, there aren't many people willing to help someone the entertainment industry has branded a pirate. Even if they are innocent, how can you fight their billions? She finally was able to contact someone representing the MPAA who offered to settle this for USD$4,000. She talked with some lawyers about representing her and at minimum they would charge her USD$1,000 for *trying* to negotiate a better settlement for her, but there was no promises there. It would be a *minimum* of USD$5,000 to even start taking it to court. Clearly, the settlement fee is cleverly engineered to be just under the cost of trying to take it to the courts, where the questionable, by my eyes, evidence may be turned out as so much garbage by the judge.

With the help of Jon over at p2pnet.net, we've put together some questions for Jane.

TMusic – Tell us a little about yourself. (kids, married, other info that is not personally identifiable)

I am a 36 year old female in California recently married. I live in a mostly retired community so I spend time assisting others in the complex. I also volunteer time for a local charity that raises money to help families with adoption services and counseling. I help with getting information out to members and make blankets to give to the children. I enjoy sewing making handmade teddy bears, computers and gardening for hobbies. I enjoy being creative and helping others. My source of income is from my veteran’s compensation. I served in the Marine Corps 90-94 deployed to Saudi Arabia (Desert Storm) and Somalia (Restore Hope).

TMusic – Do you consider yourself computer literate? (explain a little about your computer background, hobby? Professional?)

I just use computers as a hobby, doing miscellaneous projects for people; business cards and stuff like that on my pc. I also prepare income taxes each year for a few people, and do simple computer repair for friends and family or installation and diagnosis of simple issues.

TMusic – What P2P client were you using at the time?

I used Kazaa-Lite, the 100% safe, 100% legal, and 100% fun (until the MPAA sues Me) program.

TMusic – What steps (in any) did you take to ensure that you were safe from prosecution?

I usually disable file sharing but obviously it slipped my mind on this occasion.

TMusic – Did you know that sharing copyrighted files is illegal?

I thought only if I was reselling them or if I was the one originally putting out the movie

TMusic – How many files do they accuse you of sharing?

I am being accused of downloading 2 movies
Which if being downloaded off of Kazaa would have to be four files [The movies were split into two files each – Tin]

TMusic – How do you think the MPAA caught you?

Sitting on Kazza for endless boring hours looking for specific files

TMusic – When did the MPAA lawyers originally contact you?

I originally received a subpoena from My ISP being named in the Doe Lawsuits in Dec. 2004

TMusic – What did you do at the time of the original contact?

First of All I never received any messages or warnings I was served by my ISP named as Jane Doe. I thought it was a joke. I just put it aside.

TMusic – What are the options presented to you by the MPAA?

They said they would settle for $4,000 or that they would consider a counter offer. I offered the price of admission to two movies needless to say they didn’t accept.

TMusic – You have been accused of sharing only two movies. Do you consider yourself to be a “pirate”?

NO not as the MPAA is implying

These are the list of [what the Doe's out of California were busted with]. This is what is being called a PIRARTES!!!!!

• Doe 1 Troy & Spider Man 2
• Doe 2 Napoleon Dynamite & Resident Evil
• Doe 3 Suspect Zero & Butterfly Effect
• Doe 4 Harry Potter and the Prisoner Azkaban
• Doe 5 Napoleon Dynamite
• Doe 6 Napoleon Dynamite
• Doe 7 White Chicks & Spider Man 2
• Doe 8 Taxi
• Doe 9 Alien Vs Predator & Hellboy
• Doe 10 The Manchurian Candidate
• Doe 11 Harry Potter and the Prisoner Azkaban
• Doe 12 Suspect Zero

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