I think the practical application is that it gets rid of bugs and it tells the time.

The Wikipedia page for Coalinga, California (where I assume this is taking place) estimates the 2007 population at just over 18,000 people. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coalinga,_California). It seems that the paper involved, the Hanford Sentinel, services all of King County (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kings_County,_California) which has a little over 150,000 people total. Granted, I am sure the LA Times or some other large circulation paper could condemn them, I doubt they cater to the same audience as those subscribing to a small-town oriented paper like the Sentinel.

Still, I agree with your point - people need to shun this circulation for its lack of journalistic integrity. Sadly, there aren't a lot of competitors (to my knowledge - someone have better knowledge?) to wag their finger at them.

I honestly haven't looked at the detailed facts of the case so I can't say whether or not I disagree with you or not. I'm just citing the reason given by the Justices.

The reason the officials were not held responsible is because of an idea called qualified immunity (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualified_immunity) which essentially states that public officials cannot be held personally responsible for actions they undertake as part of their public duty and which, if illegal or unconstitutional, must clearly be illegal or unconstitutional.

It is interesting to note that the two Justices that dissented regarding whether or not the school officials were covered by qualified immunity were Justice John Paul Stevens and Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and that Justice Souter was a part of the majority. If Sotomayor is placed on the bench, it is feasible she would rule much closer to Justice Ginsburg and Stevens then to Souter on these types of matters.

1) the degree of reprehensibility of the defendant's actions
File sharing with the intent to avoid paying for a product or help others circumvent paying for a product is, at least to some degree, reprehensible. (I am assuming objectivity and being reasonable.) However, from the facts of this particular case, it doesn't seem that the act is so blatantly reprehensible that it warrants a life-sentence worth of monetary damages.

2) the disparity between the harm to the plaintiff and the punitive award
This seems huge to me. Though I don't have the facts on this case and might judge differently if I did, it seems that the RIAA will have an incredibly hard time showing that the damages they incurred are even one a hundredth of the punitive damages. The 24 songs this woman had available would have to have been WIDELY disseminated to reach that kind of number. It will be interesting to see what kind of evidence they produce to address this question.

3) the similarity or difference between the punitive award and civil penalties authorized or imposed in comparable situations.
This is where the Eighth Amendment has tangential application. (None that takes direct legal effect, but still affects the approach that the courts' take.) This is obviously an incredibly excessive fine. Punitive damages, as the name obviously indicates, act to "punish" the individual for bad behavior. Two-million dollars as punishment for twenty-four files could very easily be considered excessive, egregious, unconscionable, or any other term for "whacked out" that I can think of.

"Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted." One line says it all. I can't see this standing when it is appealed. Twenty-four music files being available for download, whether it's wrong or not, does not warrant what is effectually a life-sentence worth of money.

Nothing new here, unless you have a relative who struggles with Parkinson's and you have more hope for helping the crippling symptoms subside a bit.

I am very interested to see whether or not use of the Wii could result in either preventing Parkinson's or delaying it significantly. Obviously there isn't any data available at this point on such theory, but I think 20 to 30 years down the road it would be interesting to see what happens to people who regularly used Wii and future Wii-like consoles.

Of course, since IIANDoctor, I have no idea on the science behind that. Anyone know whether or not that's feasible?