Slashdot has posted a story about Sony's seemingly blatant copyright infringement against Alejandro Fernandez in which they distributed a CD of songs they didn't have rights to. Doing the math based on precedent set in two RIAA cases such as the Jammie Thomas ruling which gives $80K per song or the Sony vs Joel Tenenbaum ruling, which gives $22.5K per song, Sony would be looking at judgments of $1,151,460,000 to $4,094,080,000. Of course, while it makes perfect sense, it's something we'll never see. Thank you double standards for making life so baffling and yet predictable.
Yes, this is a little sensationalist since this is all taking place in Mexico, which has different laws and precedent is different, of course, but I still expect the US rulings will be indicated if this ever goes to trial. And also, we have no idea what Fernandez's contract was, so it's quite possible that Sony does have rights to those tracks.