I think Chemical's point that the punishment needs to fit the crime stands. $100,000 sounds like a reasonable sum if these people were all distributing copies of Activision games for profit (actually distributing, not just using Bittorrent).
$100,000 seems completely out-of-line if these people were simply downloading games for their own use. The punishment would be far less severe if they had simply shoplifted the games from a retailer, to go with the flawed analogy of theivery that always comes up in these discussions. Is downloading really so much more heinous than shoplifting?
It's not clear whether these people were distributing or profiting from illegal copies, but if they weren't, then there is no justice here. Just a big company (ab)using the state to protect their bottom line by stringing up some petty criminals to serve as an example to the rest us.
"The worst part about these reviews is they are [subjective]--and their scores often depend on how drunk you got the media at a Street Fighter event." — Mona Hamilton, Capcom Senior VP of Marketing
*Image indefinitely borrowed from BrainBoxLtd without his consent.
