MSNBC reports that the RIAA is going after small stores that are selling pirated CDs. Ok. This is way more solidly illegal than pirating music for one's own personal enjoyment--one is not only depriving artists (well, from record companies, anyway) of payment, but actually attempting to make a profit while doing so. However, the owners of those small stores do have a problem with this: as
...Radi Massis, owner of the EZ Stop Food Store in Jacksonville... [says], "You go to a flea market, and (illegal CDs) are all over the place," ... "How come they're picking on us?"
Excuse me? Because people in flea markets routinely get away with this sort of thing, he should too? I don't think so. In the first place, presumably a business license has some clause in it about not engaging in illegal activity--and this individual presumably has a business license. It's certainly a lot easier to find small store owners who are distributing pirated CDs than random people at flea markets or swap meets, and it's probably easier to gather evidence against them. Besides, I imagine the RIAA has more of a problem with "legitimate businesses" peddling pirated CDs than some shady character at a swap meet: in the case of the latter, it is pretty obvious what one is buying, whereas in the case of a convenience store or similar business, the customer is likely to assume that he is buying genuine goods.
Finally, illegal is illegal. If you're doing something you know is illegal, you should expect to be punished for it, and not whine about how unfair it is when you're being punished for doing something illegal while someone else is not. That's just the luck of the draw. "But the neighbor kid never gets in trouble for doing that" may work with one's mom, but it doesn't, and shouldn't, work with the law.