From what I've collected (I don't follow all this very closely), around two months ago, the Supreme Court somehow made it clear that they would not reopen internet law anytime soon, which, in effect, shut down the RIAA's main purpose: to take test cases to the Supreme Court in hopes of changing the laws. Layoffs would make sense in that context.
Yes, but they've targeted so many people that they've started getting people who have the balls to fight back. The worst thing for the RIAA would be if a judge ruled that they cannot sue individuals for copyright infringement.
You have to consider that the RIAA is currently going up against Harvard, including a counter-suit alleging that their practices is unconstitutional. If ruled unconstitutional it can be retroactively enforced, meaning all money they took will have to be paid back even if they paid peoples wages with it.
So essentially the counter-suit from Harvard could potentially destroy the RIAA in one bang of a judges gavel. The RIAA could be trying to get themselves protected by the whole statute of limitations, I'm unsure how this applies as I've never really looked into it (not living in the US and all).
As happy as I am to see this news, the RIAA is only an organization that represents the labels, therefore layoffs there only represent a tiny fraction of the member workforce (which I'm sure is shrinking too).
"Hypebot.com reports dozens of RIAA workers are being let go."
