Boycott-RIAA.com, a site set up to offset the music industry’s Recording Industry Association of America, has called for public rallies against the RIAA across the US on August 1 and 2.
Site founder Bill Evans said the call had gone out following the RIAA’s move to go after individuals – mostly American teenagers – “illegally offering to ‘share’ substantial amounts of copyrighted music over peer-to-peer networks” in the “first round” of what could lead to, “thousands of lawsuits suits” by mid-August.
Evans said: “RIAA shot number two came on July 16 when Hollywood stalwarts congressmen Howard Berman and John Conyers introduced a bill cited as the ‘Author, Consumer, and Computer Owner Protection and Security (ACCOPS) Act of 2003′ which in effect says anyone nailed for file sharing could be jailed.”
Two weeks ago, Boycott-RIAA and the Webcaster Alliance called for an ethics investigation into an $US18,000 trip made by US House Judiciary Committee chairman James Sensenbrenner to Thailand and Taiwan to lobby on behalf of the RIAA.
Source: SMH
