What’s the RIAA up to?

If you haven’t read lately, the RIAA—the folks who have sued single mothers and a whole mess of college students—announced that it will no longer pursue legal action against individuals who illegally download media, such as music, videos, and other copyrighted material. Sounds great, right? Sure, sounds good for now.

Here’s what I think about the RIAA backing off of threatening legal action:

• Maybe the RIAA decided that suing someone for $4,000 wasn’t worth the legal fees and that allowing Internet service providers (ISPs), like Comcast and Qwest, to shut off a subscriber’s service if they were suspected in downloading copyrighted material would be a good idea.
• Maybe instead of shutting off a user’s service if he or she is suspected in illegally downloading, ISPs might start charging a tax that in turn goes directly to the RIAA, theoretically making downloading illegal material, well… legal.

What do you think? Were you affected at all by the RIAA? Have you and will you continue to download copyrighted material? Are you a law-abiding citizen who buys your own music from the Amazon MP3 online store (which, might I add, is seriously the best place to download DRM-free music)?