Last August, the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) filed a complaint against Dave Greubel, accusing him of using his family’s computer to illegally share at least 600 music files. The RIAA demanded that Greubel should pay a $9,000 judgment, but noted that they were willing to settle for half that, if they received Greubel’s payment in a certain time frame.

Apparently, this was part of an ongoing campaign where the RIAA is going after people that they believe to be sharing 9 specific songs, including the song “Sk8er Boi” by Avril Lavigne, who is a client of Nettwerk management. When Nettwerk president and CEO Terry McBride found out that one of his artist’s songs were alledgedly being illegally shared, and that the RIAA was considering pursuing legal action to get money back, he jumped right in the middle of this fight.

But he didn’t land on the side that you might expect.

Instead, McBride launched a vicious salvo at the RIAA, calling them to task for their actions. “Suing music fans is not the solution, it’s the problem,” stated McBride.

Nettwerk became involved in this case after 15 year-old Elisa Greubel emailed Nettwerk artist MC Lars, saying she indentified with the MC Lars song ‘Download this song’. Greubel said, “My family is one of many seemingly randomly chosen families to be sued by the RIAA. No fun. You can’t fight them, trying could possibly cost us millions. The line ‘they sue little kids downloading hit songs,’ basically sums a lot of the whole thing up. I’m not saying it is right to download but the whole lawsuit business is a tad bit outrageous.”

Nettwerk agrees, and McBride has agreed to pay any and all legal fees, and/or fines that the Greubels may have to pay.

McBride added, “Litigation is not ‘artist development.’ Litigation is a deterrent to creativity and passion and it is hurting the business I love. The current actions of the RIAA are not in my artists’ best interests.”

No they aren’t Mr. McBride, but rest assured that YOUR actions ARE in both the best interests of your artists, and your customers. Because this is just another form of marketing. This is a company that isn’t so short-sighted that they would try to gain a few dollars from one of their customers, in exchange for alienating millions of current and potential customers.

This is a case of a record label that honestly cares about their artists, and their artists’ fans. And they care about their industry, so much so, that they are willing to call to task the industry’s governing body.

Well done. Nettwerk just said what a lot of us have been thinking for years.

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