Monday, July 11 12:00 AM ET

RIAA Steps Up Action on Copyright Violators

Los Angeles , CA - The RIAA has initiated legal action in two cases that they hope will provide precedents in their ongoing efforts to reward recording artists for their work.

The RIAA filed suit against a mother of four for depriving one of their member musicians of their rightful earnings. An RIAA spokesman has suggested that the woman had effectively stolen from the artist by buying groceries for her children instead of buying a copy of Mariah Carey's The Emancipation of Mimi.

Jonathan Lamy speaking for the RIAA said that the defendant was seen buying groceries from a supermarket while a nearby music store had many copies of Mariah Carey's CD still on its shelves. "This kind of behavior plainly represents a lost sale," Mr. Lamy said. "We've done the research, the defendant is clearly in the right demographic to own Mariah's music and yet willfully neglected to buy the album"

When asked to make a statement the woman said "but I don't even like her. My daughter dragged me to see glitter and now I twitch every time I even hear her name."

Mr. Lamy suggested that the woman's stance was "ridiculous". "Every woman of that age loves the empowering spirit of Mariah Carey, we have the marketing surveys to prove it. This is an undeniable case of theft. "

In another case, the RIAA is suing the owner of a "BitTorrent" tracker site. Mr Lamy commented that the use of bittorrent continues to deprive artists and labels of their earnings. When asked which artists music the tracker server was hosting he said, "none, the RIAA is suing for the loss of potential law suit earnings in this case."

"The man does not deny that he runs a bit torrent tracking site. We know this technology is used to illegally distribute music and yet this man has chosen not to announce torrents from our artists. This malicious activity has deprived us of the opportunity to sue, so we are suing on that basis."

"Bit torrent often leads to thousands of defendants and this man's activities have prevented us from realizing those monies. This is just one more example of where bittorrent is ruining our industry."