Even on the heels of Radiohead’s unparalleled “In Rainbows” music industry bitchslap, the RIAA continues to bash its head against the wall by suing its customers and alienating artists. And now they’re taking it yet another step…
Tomorrow’s Washington Post has a story about a man being sued for simply ripping CDs he owned into mp3s on his computer.

In legal documents in its federal case against Jeffrey Howell, a Scottsdale, Ariz., man who kept a collection of about 2,000 music recordings on his personal computer, the industry maintains that it is illegal for someone who has legally purchased a CD to transfer that music into his computer.

The industry’s lawyer in the case, Ira Schwartz, argues in a brief filed earlier this month that the MP3 files Howell made on his computer from legally bought CDs are “unauthorized copies” of copyrighted recordings.

“I couldn’t believe it when I read that,” says Ray Beckerman, a New York lawyer who represents six clients who have been sued by the RIAA. “The basic principle in the law is that you have to distribute actual physical copies to be guilty of violating copyright. But recently, the industry has been going around saying that even a personal copy on your computer is a violation.”

RIAA’s hard-line position seems clear. Its Web site says: “If you make unauthorized copies of copyrighted music recordings, you’re stealing. You’re breaking the law and you could be held legally liable for thousands of dollars in damages.”

Somebody better call Steve Jobs and Bill Gates and get them to block the “rip” and “import CD” feature on the big three multimedia programs (e.g., iTunes, Zune and Windows Media Player) millions of vicious music fans flagrantly use to convert their legally purchased music into digital formats like mp3s.

Otherwise, shouldn’t the RIAA take Apple and Microsoft to court for giving us innocent music fans the ability to rip CD’s we’ve purchased into mp3s to use on our personal handheld music players?

FULL DISCLOSURE: I review music on this site solely from my 60 gig iPod Video, 16 gig iPod Touch and/or my 80 gig Zune. Any and all CDs that are mailed to Perfect Porridge are promptly ripped into mp3s for convenient listening ease. I’ve never shared a single song online without artist consent (perhaps why this site isn’t more popular than it is), but I am “guilty” of importing these tracks for personal use. Guess I’m going to jail. Oh yeah, and my car doesn’t even have a CD player in it. (Also, Microsoft is a client of my day job, but I don’t work on the account directly.)

In other news, it appears music fans around the country are uploading photographs of themselves holding album artwork over their faces to create vinyl sleeve heads. It does not appear the record labels are being compensated.

Quick RIAA, get your legal team on this next top priority ASAP!