Pursuing a legal strategy that has largely lost touch with reality, a music industry trade group continues to hound a woman for sharing songs on the Internet.

The record labels have abandoned their strategy of launching high-profile lawsuits against college students and grandmothers for file-sharing, but the Recording Industry of America continues to doggedly pursue cases already filed. Last month the RIAA seemed to hit the jackpot when a federal jury imposed damages of $1.92 million on a middle-aged Minnesota woman who shared 24 songs.

But these damages were set aside by the judge on the case, who called them “monstrous and shocking.”

Who could argue otherwise? If the defendant, Jammie Thomas-Rasset, had actually stolen something, she would have been hit with a small fine. For violating the small print of a copyright notice she was hit with damages of $80,000 per song.

Presumably these damages were meant to represent Thomas-Rasset’s role in the industry’s downfall. But many believe this is simply the excuse of industry executives who couldn’t find a way to keep up with their customers. The growing success of commercial downloads shows that the record industry was unable to change with the times.

Like their marketing failures, the industry continues to cling to a litigation strategy that only encourages resentment. But it now appears that the RIAA is caught in a case from which extrication will be difficult.

When District Judge Michael Davis threw out the $1.92 million judgment against Thomas-Rasset, he proposed damages of $54,000. The RIAA can’t accept this. It doesn’t object to lower damages, but is determined to oppose the idea that a jury’s damage award can be thrown out by a judge. It was willing to settle for just $25,000, so long as the defendant rejected the judge’s proposed settlement.

Thomas-Rasset refused. Her lawyers said even the reduced penalty was far beyond her means. And now the RIAA has said it will appeal the judge’s award and pursue another trial against her.

It will be the third trial, and the next jury will have a lot of history to consider as it begins to deliberate, including damage awards ranging from a few thousand dollars into the millions. As time goes on and the uproar over “stealing” music fades, there may be greater acceptance of the idea that bad management, not file-sharing, has been the bane  of the record industry.

— Questions? Comments? Contact Managing Editor Nick Cowenhoven at nickc@journaltribune.com or City Editor Kristen Schulze Muszynski at kristenm@journaltribune.com.