ABSTRACT
Joel Tenenbaum was a typical 16-year-old growing up in Rhode Island when he found himself caught up in larger-than-life situation. Like many other teens he enjoyed music and liked sharing songs with others. Thanks to the development of peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing software, Joel was able to share music via the Internet using Kazaa, a service that allowed users to download MP3 files from others’ computers. In 2003 Joel was contacted by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and told that he was liable for violating the copyrights on seven songs he downloaded. RIAA requested a payment of $5,250 ($750 per song). Joel never tried to deny downloading the songs but instead sent a check for $500 claiming that as a high school student, it was all he could afford. The check was returned and nothing more happened for four years.
