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"In a rare outburst of subjectivity, I commenced my blog post 'Ha ha ha ha ha' when reporting that, based upon the RIAA's disclosure form for 2008, it had paid its lawyers more than $16,000,000 to recover $391,000. If they were doing it to 'send a message,' the messages have been received loud & clear: (1) the big four record labels are managed by idiots; (2) the RIAA's law firms have as much compassion for their client as they do for the lawsuit victims; (3) suing end users, or alleged end users, is a losing game. I don't know why p2pnet.net begrudges the RIAA's boss his big compensation; he did a good job... for the lawyers."

Well, I only pirate stuff which is old or unavailable. I guess this means they probably won't bother going after me.

I like how you use of the term "lawsuit victims." This leads me to question, do you view murderers as victims of their upbringing, thus sympathizing with them over their dead victims? Was Mumia Abu Jamal the victim when he shot and killed Daniel Faulkner during a routine traffic stop?

As for lawyers, they win financially no matter the outcome of the case.

I like your strange irrelevant statement. It makes me wonder if you view Pol Pot as some misdirected chef instead of the mass murderer he actually was.

The relevance is in sympathizing with the perpetrators rather than the victims who in this case are the individual musicians and their record labels.

A term such as "lawsuit victim" implies the reverse, which in my opinion is false.

Victim of lawsuit. How hard is it to understand?

Civil cases surrounding concepts like copyright are completely different to criminal cases involving murder and have nothing to do with each other. Its a complicated subject and both sides do wrong, even to the extent that some people see artists as being greater victims of the publishers/record companies than they are of file sharers.

Yes, I wholeheartedly agree with the various shades of grey and the "pimp/prostitute" relationship that record labels and producers have over musicians. This relationship has been around since the start of popular music mainly concerning who controls the master records thus controlling the lion's share of royalties.

As for the individual file sharer, they are not hapless victims of a lawsuit. Everyone I know, including myself and relatives, who has illegally downloaded a copyrighted song or movie has done so willingly and intently with the express intent to avoid having to shell over $10 for a craptastic album with one to three great songs and  not wanting to spend the money and find the space to fill a bookshelf full of DVDs.

I admit it, I have pirated in the past and have done so because music nowadays consists of fluff, atrocious CDs with a few good songs and DVDs being overpriced at more than $20 for new releases.

iTunes and more recently, Amazon has erased my need to pirate music. Now I can just buy the song for .99 cents saving me from having to make the decision to pirate or fork over $10 for a CD I will listen to here and there for a couple great songs.

As for being hypocritical, it is the same with gossip, everyone does it, noone likes it, but it is better if we all own up to it.

Then its good to see we're pretty much on the same page.

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If anything, the labels are worse than people p2p.