Spamigation is mass

litigation A lawsuit is a proceeding by one or more parties (the plaintiff or claimant) against one or more parties (the defendant) in a civil court of law. The archaic term "suit in law" is found in only a small number of laws still in effect today. ...

conducted to intimidate large numbers of people.Spamigation and How to Fight It
by Dana Blankenhorn, accessed 8-25-06. The term was coined in 2006 by

Brad Templeton Brad Templeton (born June 1960 near Toronto) is a Canadian software developer, internet entrepreneur, online community pioneer, publisher of news, comedy, science fiction and e-books, writer, photographer, civil rights advocate, futurist, public s ...

of the

Electronic Frontier Foundation The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is an American international non-profit digital rights group based in San Francisco, California. It was founded in 1990 to promote Internet civil liberties. It provides funds for legal defense in court, ...

to explain the tactics of the

Recording Industry Association of America The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...

(RIAA), which files large numbers of lawsuits against individuals for

file sharing File sharing is the practice of distributing or providing access to digital media, such as computer programs, multimedia (audio, images and video), documents or electronic books. Common methods of storage, transmission and dispersion include ...

, and

DirecTV DirecTV, LLC is an American Multichannel television in the United States, multichannel video programming distributor based in El Segundo, California. Originally launched on June 17, 1994, its primary service is a digital Satellite television, s ...

, which once filed large numbers of lawsuits against users of

smart cards A smart card (SC), chip card, or integrated circuit card (ICC or IC card), is a card used to control access to a resource. It is typically a plastic credit card-sized card with an Embedded system, embedded integrated circuit (IC) chip. Many smart ...

. Because of the costs of mounting a legal defense, almost all defendants in these cases tend to settle.Illegal downloads create unlikely defendants: Music industry seeks to protect copyrights
by Amy H. Trang, ''The Courier-Journal'', July 31, 2006, accessed Aug. 25, 2006. The RIAA then uses the money from these settlements to "file more suits." Spamigation is similar to a

strategic lawsuit against public participation Strategic lawsuits against public participation (also known as SLAPP suits or intimidation lawsuits), or strategic litigation against public participation, are lawsuits intended to censor, intimidate, and silence critics by burdening them with ...

("SLAPP"), which is filed by a large organization, or in some cases an individual plaintiff, to intimidate and silence a less powerful critic by so severely burdening them with the cost of a legal defense that they abandon their criticism. Spamigation differs in that it aims at stopping an economic activity, in the case of the RIAA's lawsuits the copying of copyrighted material.

References

Legal terminology {{Law-stub

See also

References