Of COURSE they don’t want to have to show actual damages. That would enter into evidence their entire pricing structure, AND they would then have to show exactly how much they were losing, per download, vs the amount asked for as punishment, and then have to defend the fittingness of the punishment. Remember that excessive fines are a no-no Constitutionally.
Defense would then be able to enter all the studies that show that piraters in fact buy MORE music, pirated items actually sell more legit copies on the market, etc etc etc.
In short, the MPAA’s entire case would fall apart.
Shorter MPAA: We need the courts to enforce arbitrarily high extortionist fines on piraters to make up for our losses, which, um, are SO great that we can’t really define them, so, up, just give us the damn money and stop asking so many nosy questions…
