Looks like the P2P settlement industry is starting off the new year with a bang. By our scanning of the Justia Federal court dockets database, over 13,000 people could be dragged into "Doe" lawsuits based on complaints filed since December 20, and almost all of them are for porn.

The bottom line is that the recent defeats that porn movie copyright trolls have been dealt in West Virginia don't seem be discouraging other contenders in this field. As we reported, in December a West Virginia Federal judge repeatedly rebuked the Adult Copyright Company's porn infringement suits, ruling that stuffing all these Does into single complaints won't fly.

"Several courts agree that where there is no allegation that multiple defendants have acted in concert, joinder is improper," Judge John Preston Bailey wrote in response to Adult Copyright's suit against over 7,000 Does who allegedly downloaded Batman XXX. "Accordingly, this Court finds that the defendants' alleged use of some of the same ISPs and P2P networks to commit copyright infringement is . . . insufficient for permissive joinder."

This forces the firm to sue all these Does individually at $350 a pop. But the setback hasn't floored Adult Copyright's most famous client, Batman XXX movie maker Axel Braun.

"Heads will roll," Braun promised the XBiz adult industry site in response to the verdict. "I said it once, and I'll say it again, F**k 'em all. I didn't get into this fight thinking it was going to be an easy one, but I can assure you that I am not quitting."

And the West Virginia decisions haven't dissuaded these new attorneys either. Their filings insist that the very nature of P2P sharing is an act of joinder.

"Each Defendant has acted in cooperation with the other Defendants by agreeing to provide, and actually providing, on a P2P network an infringing reproduction of at least substantial portions of Plaintiff's copyrighted Motion Picture," one complaint contends, "in anticipation of the other Defendants doing likewise with respect to that work and/or other works."

It's up to judges in Northern Texas and Northern California to tackle these issues now. One thing is for sure - they're going to be reading a lot of porn movie titles. The only non-porn-related Doe filing we could find involved a German based distributor suing an unknown number of Does for allegedly downloading the Polish TV comedy Ciacho.