

US agrees to pay $50m after 'piracy' of software - choult
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-25137089

======
miahi
Looks like these military software licenses are cheaper than songs.
$9000/song[1] vs $6000/user license.

[1] [http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/minnesota-woman-
order...](http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/minnesota-woman-ordered-to-
pay-222-000-in-music-piracy-case-20120912)

~~~
tzs
That's not a very good comparison, because she did almost everything she could
possibly do to try to run up the price.

She was offered a settlement before she was sued of under $3/song (she pirated
1700 songs and the RIAA asked for $5000). When she would not settle, they
picked 24 of the 1700 songs and actually filed suit for statutory damages. Why
24, instead of all 1700? I'll cover that at the end.

Statutory damages range from $750 per infringed work to $30000. If the
defendant can prove she was an "innocent infringer", the low end drops to $200
per infringed work. An innocent infringer is an infringer who did not know and
had no reason to believe they were infringing. If the infringement is willful,
the high end can go up to $150000. The actual amount within that range is
determined by the jury.

Since she was in fact guilty, and should have easily known she had almost no
chance of winning at trial, and almost no chance of convincing anyone she was
an innocent infringer. It is then a simple matter or arithmetic to conclude
that going to trial is in the best realistic case going to result in a minimum
of $18000 damages. This is the point where those who are not massively stupid
say "I'd like to accept your settlement offer now".

As I said, the actual amount of damages awarded is determined by the jury. She
had tried to destroy evidence, she was caught in outright lies on the stand,
and she tried to blame her children and boyfriend for the infringement. This
probably made the jury less likely to head down to $750 per work, and they
ended up at $9000 per work.

Why sue over just 24 songs, instead of all 1700?

Contrary to popular belief, they aren't setting out to ruin people's lives.
When they catch a pirate and make a settlement offer, they offer a very
reasonable amount, typically around $2-4 per infringed song, which comes out
in most cases to a few thousand dollars. This is large enough to be annoying
and serve as a discouragement to others, but not so large in most cases to
seriously mess up one's life for a long time.

If they cannot get a settlement and it goes to trial, they cannot ask for $2-4
per song. That's below the minimum possible statutory damages award. If they
sued over all 1700 songs in the Thomas-Rasset case, for instance, a win would
result in a minimum award of $1.3 million, and probably much much more. Since
they will be happy with a much smaller amount, they can cut down on the number
of songs and still achieve their goals.

Also, there is a cost to including a song in the lawsuit. For each song, they
need to make sure it was properly registered with the copyright office, and
show that they are authorized by the copyright owner to sue on his behalf. The
court will know about the settlement offer and so will know what kind of
damages the plaintiff finds acceptable, and might get annoyed if it perceives
them as just piling on. You do not want to annoy the court.

I don't know how they came up with specifically 24. 7 would be enough at $750
per song to get the $5000 they were initially looking for. Toss in a few more
to allow for the possibility that the defendant will be able to find some flaw
in the paperwork or in the RIAA's right to act on behalf of the copyright
holder on some of them. Maybe they now want more than $5000 because their
collection costs have risen in this case from "write a letter" costs to
"prepare a lawsuit" costs.

Or it could be that a list of 7 songs (enough to get the $5000 they want) just
looks small. Perhaps they believe a jury will think "why are they wasting our
time over a measly 7 songs?" and so go with a beefier list.

~~~
nathanvanfleet
They also aren't going to get anywhere if they sue the person for more money
than they'll ever have in their lives. It would end up just looking bad for
them to sue someone into the ground. But I think they are trying to sue them
for all they're worth.

------
belorn
> "Piracy is theft, clean and simple," remarked vice-president Joe Biden at
> the time.

Can we expect Joe Biden to server some jail time for his role as responsible
leader when the army commits acts of piracy? Or maybe Obama?

~~~
coherentpony
Don't be silly! People in power don't go to jail.

:)

------
codelust
The quote below is priceless.

"Apptricity is now incredibly energised to use the settlement resolution as a
catalyst for aggressive investment in our team, our solutions and our untapped
market opportunities," said Randy Lieberman, Apptricity's chief financial
officer.

~~~
drcube
I swear that's just what PHB said on last week's Dilbert.

------
archildress
From Apptricity's site, this seems bold:

[http://i.imgur.com/PuRvnFE.png](http://i.imgur.com/PuRvnFE.png)

~~~
Jare
I imagine the disclosure of the agreement details would itself be part of the
agreement.

------
tkellogg
This definitely highlights how broken the software licensing system is. The US
military is notorious for placing money and budgets as a rather low priority.
The biggest hurdle for most groups isn't obtaining money, it's going through
the bureaucratic processes. Likely, the priracy was committed to avoid the
painful bureaucracy. If the company simply made it easier to obtain a lawful
copy of the software they would probably be recovering a lot more than $60M -
and without lawyers.

~~~
nathanvanfleet
That's absolutely backwards though. You're saying it's the Apptricity's fault
for not making the military less bureaucratic about purchases? How could they
do that?

Besides, they got deep discounts by stealing.

------
pcunite
Join the club. My software is pirated by everyone: grandma, military, little
mikey, and santa claus too.

~~~
gravitronic
dude.. sorry about winzip. I'll pay for it next time, I promise.

------
linuxhansl
> "Piracy is theft, clean and simple," remarked vice-president Joe Biden at
> the time.

It is interesting how we have accepted the term "piracy" already and are
equating it with theft. Copying software is neither "piracy" nor "theft", it
is a copyright violation. We should call it such rather than dramatizing it
with these terms.

------
Fuxy
"US military are pirating software" would have been a better title :)

------
daemin
Having worked at a company that sold software to governments (Armies and
TLA's) I heard stories of rampant piracy occurring in the most secret of
places. Though there isn't really a way to fix that since the computers aren't
connected to the Internet, and you can't physically get into those sites being
a software vendor. So there's no way to check that they are adhering to the
licensing terms.

------
goldenkey
A gigantic win for them considering licenses usually don't cost their company
a cent. If the US had queried first, they probably could have got an unlimited
license for less than $10 million. Heh, staircase wit.

~~~
dpacmittal
You're not being serious, are you?

~~~
rfnslyr
What kind of a fucking comment is that? Is he supposed to arrive at the
conclusion you failed to make?

 _You 're_ not serious, are you?

------
TomGullen
Wonder how they found out. Does military software report back to the author
corporation? Would of thought that'd be something the military would insist
against.

~~~
codelust
Lucky find, I guess.

From the story: "The unauthorised copying only came to light after a US Army
official mentioned "thousands" of devices running the software during a
presentation on technology."

~~~
eternalseven
Some US army official is no longer employed by the US army now :(

