wanderson:
- No one has been, and no one will be charged with violations of those laws for 'fair use' because all parties understand they would loose, so despite the stupid law they are not criminals
you hope. we have no guarantee of that.
wanderson:
- Those fines are fair by definition. After all we don't let murderers, rapists, etc.. define what would be their fair punishment.
This I find questionable. I mean any fine is arbitrarily established. In Texas, I believe you have the death penalty. In most of Europe this is considered barbaric. I am not implying judgement here - I just mean to point out that even the way murderers and rapists are treated is open for debate. Saying a fine is fair by definition assumes that there is some higher moral authority who has the right to decide on what a fine is. I believe that is wrong.
Concerning fines for data-sharing, you can imagine that there are very strong political lobbies putting pressure on politicians. I do not believe that lobbyists who are trying to have stricter convictions for rapists have even a fraction of the power that lobbyists going after file sharers have. (before you ask... I dont know that as a fact. This is simply my assumption, as there is no group with an economic interest in prosecuting rapists.)