@Alex I thought the whole point of process serving via neutral third party was to prove the person received the summons. You can’t feasibly do that via email.

I can’t believe this was even considered, let alone legally binding.

@Alex obligatory statement that legally justified extortion by record labels is still extortion.

@cy Agreed, but this isn't really one of those cases of extortion, such as when record labels send toothless threats of litigation unless you settle, just hoping to settle with people fearful of ligation.

This is a combination of two issues: artificially high damages with the expectation that the damages will be argued down in court, and a flimsy summons system that prevented the defendant from receiving a cease and desist or summons, and being unable to argue down the damages in court.

@Alex That sounds to me like extortion and abusing the justice system. At least "toothless" litigation wouldn't result in court summons, but this way drains money and effort both out of our courts and the victims of extortion.

It's probably part of the reason the court only sent an email; I'd assume they're understaffed and processing a high volume of fraudulent but technically legal claims.

@cy I'm sure there are plenty of shortcomings to address, but I don't really care to make assumptions.

Going after for-profit counterfeiters is not very predatory, I don't see how suing someone for selling unlicensed merchandise meets the definition of extortion, and lawsuits often start with the maximum allowed damages until they can discover the actual scale of infringement.

The only major shortcoming I can actually see is that the defendant's right to a defense was unjustly forfeited.

@Alex She's not a for-profit counterfeiter she's a lady with a heart condition and medical bills. But yes I'll grudgingly give the benefit of the doubt that MAYBE they didn't know suing her for more than they could possibly win in court would result in the court failing to properly notify her she was even getting sued. but:

1) they didn't cancel the debt
2) they don't get punished for betting on the courts failing
3) they have a high volume of lawsuits

so that's why I call it extortion.

@cy I empathize with her heart condition, but I doubt that information was even available to the record label, nor is it a factor in this situation at all.

Regardless of that context, selling merchandise on Amazon is a for-profit endeavor, she was absolutely selling counterfeit merchandise.

They have, as of yesterday evening, dropped the judgement against her because of media pressure and the iffy details surrounding the lawsuit, which is good because this wasn't a fair judgement.

@Alex Not sure if you can hire a non-delivery consultant, you know that optimizes your email using a couple of common SPAM detection technique and tools to make the chances high that it will land in the junk folder?

Or perhaps if your victim uses a gmail account, register a 100 or so gmail accounts before, and spam the email to these beforehand (from another IP address!), and complain to Google, that the email is SPAM!!!

@yacc143 I'm tempted to proactively reach out to the Illinois court system to ask how to register my primary email address and learn what domains they email from so I can whitelist them.

Or, better yet, opt out of paperless communications.

Because this sounds like the beginning of a new type of litigious trolling that people are going to have to protect themselves from.

@Alex Lucky us here in Austria, as much they can be a pain in the posterior, all official mail comes as RSa/RSb letters (basically registered letters that only sovereign bodies, e.g. courts can issue, that either the recipient personally has to sign for, or somebody from his household can sign for). End of story. If you want them electronically, you have to opt in for that.
RSa usually for the bad stuff, RSb for the mixed or sometimes good stuff.