What effect will the closing of OINK have?

radiohead33 wrote:

They seemed to be going after "non rabid" downloaders (Ie people who download a few singles off Kazaa or Limewire). The lady that was fined 200,000 was fined for doing just that. People that frequent those sites dont download entire albums.

It now seems the RIAA has gotten hip to the fact that the hard core downloaders go to the torrent sites, thus why OINK was shut down.

What effect will this have?

Is anyone else scared?

Couple of things:

I think they are going after easier targets. Kazaa and Limewire are much more cut and dry than bittorrent, and the users are typically more casual, thus (the RIAA is hoping) they will just settle. Easy case, make an example out of someone.

Also you have to look at what they are (were?) trying to get people on. The RIAA isn't going to attack me for downloading that Mountain Goats record I downloaded the other day, but they sure as hell are gonna have my ass for downloading a Norah Jones song (personally know someone who got a letter for that specific thing, not a fine or dragged to court, but a "hey knock that shit off" warning kind of thing).

So are they learning? Maybe. But don't forget how fucking stupid the RIAA is, and the fact that the OiNK take down was a UK and Dutch police operation, not US based. I wouldn't doubt it if the RIAA is stupid enough to just keep trying to nail Kazaa users, while the real power downloaders continue their torrenting.