-Ars Technica.com, June 21, 2009 by Nate Anderson
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/06/whats-next-for-jammie-thomas-rasset.ars
University of California law professor Pam Samuelson, an expert on statutory damages and copyright law, also called for reform in a fascinating paper released in April 2009. In reference to the first Thomas-Rasset judgment, Samuelson concluded, “Some jurors in the Thomas case wanted to award $750 per infringed song, while others argued for $150,000 per song; why they compromised on $9250 per song is a mystery. In today’s world where the average person in her day-to-day life interacts with many copyrighted works in a way that may implicate copyright law, the dangers posed by the lack of meaningful constraints on statutory damage awards are particularly acute.”
-Wired.com, June 22, 2009 by David Kravets
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/06/thomasfollow/
Fellow Tara Wheatland and Berkeley scholar, Pamela Samuelson, argue that juries and judges need more congressional guidance when it comes to their deliberations on damages. “We know of no other area of law in which judges and juries are given such open-ended discretion to award up to $150,000 in damages without any burden of proof on plaintiff to prove the fact or extent of the harms they suffered,” the duo write in Statutory Damages in Copyright Law: A Remedy in Need of Reform.