Compact Disc Minimum Advertised Price Antitrust Litigation Settlement

January 7, 2003 10:16 AM

I made my claim. Have you? This Web site was established to provide information about a proposed Settlement of lawsuits brought by Attorneys General of 43 states, Commonwealths and Territories, and by counsel for the Plaintiff Settlement Class entitled In re: Compact Disc Minimum Advertised Price Antitrust Litigation. You may be a member of the Settlement Group and your rights against Defendants may be affected if you are a person or entity that purchased these prerecorded Music Products from a retail store during the period of January 1, 1995 through December 22, 2000.
posted by Witty (12 comments total)

Direct link to the claim form. Some told me they saw this on Fark... but I wouldn't know. Anyway... did I buy a CD during that period. "Yes, just about all of them".
posted by Witty at 10:18 AM on January 7, 2003

This is a repost.
posted by Pretty_Generic at 10:18 AM on January 7, 2003

The number of claims filed will determine the actual amount of the individual refund but will not exceed $20.00 per claimant. If the number of claims filed would result in refunds of less than $5.00 per claimant, there will be no cash distribution to individual consumers

D'oh! Why did you tell everyone, witty!!?!?! Now I'll never see my cold hard cash!!
posted by jonson at 10:18 AM on January 7, 2003

...crap
posted by Witty at 10:25 AM on January 7, 2003

Maybe if they fixed their piece of crap web site more people would file claims. When I tried in Mozilla it keeps looping on the three questions.
posted by chipr at 10:39 AM on January 7, 2003

Problem found ... cookies required.
posted by chipr at 10:45 AM on January 7, 2003

I found this interesting... I think it's about the same program..
posted by ajpresto at 12:08 PM on January 7, 2003

Pardon the pointless complaining, but I'd rather see a lawsuit that actually requires the labels to stop price-fixing. I'm not sure how $20 (at the most) can possibly be seen as a real remedy. It's still not uncommon (unless you live in a college town) to see new releases on the shelves for $17.99.
posted by rachelpapers at 12:16 PM on January 7, 2003

Here's how this works: The lawyers for the "Plaintiff States" and the "Plaintiff Settlement Class" (two different groups, hence two different groups of lawyers) will first be given their reasonable attorneys' fees out of the settlement pool (that's the $67 million cash payment portion -- it does not appear to come out of the $75 million non-cash product certificates). It is not uncommon for lawyers to seek fees in class action cases in excess of $300 per hour. That will substantially reduce the size of the pool. At that point, the pool will be divided by all those making claims.

In other words, based on the full $67 million, it would take about 13 million claims before the per claim dollar value dipped below $5 (at which point no money is given to consumers). But after attorneys' fees the available pool is likely to be significantly less -- I'd wager $20 million less. At that point, it would take 9 million claims to reach that $5 point. If I had to bet, I would say they won't have quite that many claims. But the individual payouts will certainly be closer to $5 than $20 per person.
posted by pardonyou? at 12:24 PM on January 7, 2003

Damn, I knew all that pirating was going to cost me in the end.
posted by Ogre Lawless at 2:38 PM on January 7, 2003

I know, Ogre.. I know.
posted by ajpresto at 2:40 PM on January 7, 2003

NO! This is soooo pointless & stupid! Nobody forces us to buy CDs. And at the time of purchase, the buyer obviously thought that it was a good deal - otherwise, why would he have purchased it?
posted by davidmsc at 7:11 PM on January 7, 2003