Mark your calendars, December 6th is the date when the fate of many accused internet downloaders can change for the better or for the worse.
So far, over sixteen thousand internet users have received letters from their internet service providers accusing them of illegally using the torrent peer-to-peer (p2p) / bittorrent protocol to download copyrighted movies such as the Hurt Locker, Far Cry, and a number of others. None of them have been named in the lawsuit so far. That will all change on December 6th, 2010, which is the deadline the United States District Judge Rosemary M. Collyer set in the Far Cry case for the DGW plaintiff attorneys to either name the defendants over whom they believe the court has jurisdiction, or dismiss. This is good for a number of my clients who are unnamed defendants in this case.
With all the defenses against copyright infringement, e.g., “it wasn’t me,” “my roommate used my internet connection,” “my wireless connection was unsecured,” “I don’t know how to download via torrent,” etc., it is funny that in the end, the issue of who wins is PERSONAL JURISDICTION; law school civil procedure 101. This should be a lesson to all you 1L law students out there snoring away in your “CivPro” class — the topics you are learning can be applied to something cool as lawsuits against those who illegally download movies over the internet.
It’s not an issue of personal jurisdiction, we all know the DC Circuit Court doesn’t have it. It’s an issue of joinder, third party standing, FRCP 45, and abuse of the legal process.
If it were as simple as writing a memo on personal jurisdiction we would not be where we are today.