Pretty early, apparently. [See Update below] Lawyer Bruce Boyden waited in line for one of the special seats reserved for members of the Supreme Court bar, and reports that even those who had showed up for one of the Supreme Court bar seats at 4 am didn’t get in to the Courtroom. Bruce also reports that Supreme Court bar members who showed up as late as 9:30am this morning were able to sit in the Lawyer’s Lounge and listen in; the Court’s sound system pipes in the audio from the Courtroom directly into the Lawyer’s Lounge, which is down the hall from the Courtroom.
UPDATE: Wired News has this story covered. From the Wired piece:
Gray skies, with intermittent rain and cold, didn’t deter a group of staunch file-sharing supporters — as well as a number of hired line-standers — from queuing up starting at around 2:30 p.m. Monday afternoon to secure a seat in court for the landmark copyright case.
. . . .
By 9 p.m. Monday, there were about 40 people in line to fill the estimated 50 available seats in court. Other space is reserved for the press and members of the Supreme Court bar.
Hired line-standers were paid between $200 and $500 for the night to hold spaces for various people with an interest in the outcome of the case, according to one line stander who declined to give his name. People can be sent to the back of the line if they are caught swapping places with a hired line-stander at the last minute. Those who pay the line standers usually show up an hour or two before the court opens.
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