Limewire v. RIAA verdict in...

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Ars wrote:
LimeWire sliced by RIAA, guilty of massive infringement


LimeWire has been tied up in court over copyright infringement claims for years, but LimeWire, CEO Mark Gorton, and the Lime Group are all feeling especially sour today—the recording industry has won a major victory in federal court.

Judge Kimba Wood has just granted summary judgment against LimeWire, agreeing with the labels that the peer-to-peer company was liable for inducing copyright infringement. Turns out that asking LimeWire downloaders to check a box marked "I will not use LimeWire for copyright infringement" before proceeding doesn't count as "meaningful efforts to mitigate infringement."

Secondary liability
Did LimeWire's users infringe copyrights? With a vengeance—and even the most ardent RIAA-hater knows it. But just to make the point, labels hired Dr. Richard Waterman, a statistics professor at Penn's Wharton School.

Waterman looked at a random sample of 1,800 LimeWire files and concluded that 93 percent were copyrighted and unlikely to be licensed for download through LimeWire. "Dr. Waterman next logged the number of times LimeWire users sought to download each of the files in the sample," wrote Judge Wood in her ruling. "Based on these results, Dr. Waterman estimated that 98.8 percent of the files requested for download through LimeWire are copyright protected or highly likely copyright protected, and thus not authorized for free distribution."

So the real question before the judge was about LimeWire's role, if any, in all this downloading. Had it "induced" people to infringe?

Wood said yes, citing numerous internal LimeWire documents showing a knowledge of all the infringement taking place through LimeWire's software and little done to stop it.

"For example, a draft of a LW Offering Memorandum, created in 2001, states that LimeWire 'allows people to exchange copyrighted mp3 files,'" she wrote. "A September 2002 statement of LW’s goals acknowledges that: 'Currently, the most common use of the Gnutella Network is the sharing of music files, many of them copyrighted.' Other LW documents state that 'the only information being shared on peer networks are media files,' a category composed primarily of copyrighted digital recordings."

In addition, LimeWire employees maintained an internal file called "Knowledge of Infringement." The program's built-in genre categories, like Classic Rock, "relate specifically to popular music and inevitably guide users to copyrighted recordings."

Finally, "In addition to ensuring that users can obtain unauthorized copies of recordings through LimeWire, LW has actively assisted LimeWire users in committing infringement. The record reveals several online communications between LW employees and LimeWire users that plainly relate to unauthorized sharing of digital recordings through LimeWire."

Not lifting a finger
With this knowledge of infringement, LimeWire still might have been okay if it had taken steps to mitigate the problem. But "the evidence reveals that LW has not implemented in a meaningful way any of the technological barriers and design choices that are available to diminish infringement through file-sharing programs, such as hash-based filtering, acoustic fingerprinting, filtering based on other digital metadata, and aggressive user education."

The company did roll out its own hash-based filter in 2006, but the default setting was "off." When LimeWire opened its own digital music store, it also employed filtering to "prevent LimeWire users from sharing digital recordings purchased from the LimeWire online store"—but not from sharing anything else.

In Wood's view, this all adds up to a business model knowingly built on copyright infringement, and it continued with no attempt to address the massive problem.

As the main LimeWire owner, Wood also held CEO Mark Gorton personally liable for the same set of claims. No penalties have yet been handed down, but a status conference on June 1 will lay out the schedule for moving forward. (A few issues remain unresolved by the ruling, as Wood decided that the facts were unclear.)

The RIAA asked for an injunction against LimeWire and a host of damages in its complaint, and a spokesperson tells Ars that those issues will likely be discussed on June 1.

Winners and losers
In 2008, a coalition including the EFF, Public Knowledge, the Consumer Electronics Association, and others filed an amicus brief with the court. The document didn't take sides in the case, but it did warn that some music industry arguments could gut the key rulings from Sony's Betamax case and the much more recent MGM v. Grokster case.

"Relying on certain of Plaintiffs' arguments would replace the limiting principles set out in those cases with broad, ill-defined substitutes that would chill innovation in multi-use technologies, to the detriment of at least three constituencies," said the brief. "First, the technology industry would be denied the opportunity to Develop and market technologies that form an increasingly important segment of the global economy. Second, consumers would be denied the legitimate, non-infringing benefits that multi-use technologies offer. And third, copyright owners who are eager to take advantage of opportunities made possible by these new technologies would be stymied...

"Regardless of the outcome in this case, the legal standards the Court enunciates will be persuasive precedent in future cases."

What the drafters didn't know at the time was that the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) would also try to export secondary liability around the world, though without the same judicial precedents (like Sony and Grokster) that shape it here in the US. We may see more judges around the world wrestling with issues like contributory and vicarious infringement in the next decades if ACTA passes, making verdicts like this one possible in more places.

That may be scary for software and device makers who create multi-use tools, but it's music to ears of the recording industry, which celebrated this decision.

"LimeWire is one of the largest remaining commercial peer-to-peer services," said the RIAA's Mitch Bainwol. "Unlike other P2P services that negotiated licenses, imposed filters or otherwise chose to discontinue their illegal conduct following the Supreme Court's decision in the Grokster case, LimeWire instead thumbed its nose at the law and creators. The court’s decision is an important milestone in the creative community’s fight to reclaim the Internet as a platform for legitimate commerce. By finding LimeWire's CEO personally liable, in addition to his company, the court has sent a clear signal to those who think they can devise and profit from a piracy scheme that will escape accountability."

LimeWire did not respond to our request for comment.

Re: Limewire v. RIAA verdict in...

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I'm a very light LimeWire user. My daughter, however, probably has 5,000 or so songs picked up off limewire.

We have bought a few CD's just because we'd heard shitty .mp3's on limewire first, but most of what she's downloaded...is just downloaded and listened to. We own some of the CD's (that the downloaded songs came from), but most we don't.

I can't say that LimeWire has actually kept us from buying any music, but I would imagine we're not "average" in that respect. Without having LimeWire, we just wouldn't have the music collection that we have, we wouldn't really have spent any more money than what we already do.
Are you propositioning me? I taste like candy and you want the recipe?

Re: Limewire v. RIAA verdict in...

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I didn't know LimeWire even still existed. I think the last time I used it was in 2001. I pretty much pay for everything on cd these days. Not just because as someone who makes a living off intellectual property I can appreciate not stealing it, but also cds have gotten so cheap lately. I don't think I've paid more than $10 for one in a couple of years at least.
Just cut them up like regular chickens

Re: Limewire v. RIAA verdict in...

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p2pnet wrote:Does LimeWire owe the RIAA $1.5 trillion?

If anyone has ever wondered if Vivendi Universal, EMI, Warner Music and Sony Music and their RIAA have lost it, they should wonder no more.

“The corks were popping over in LaLa land”, said p2pnet in the middle of May.

That was because judge Kimba Wood had ruled LimeWire infringes copyright.

Now it looks as though one Kelly M. Klaus of Munger, Tolles & Olson, yet another RIAA posse, wants Wood to order LimeWire owner Mark Gorton to pay $1,500,000,000,000 for 200,000,000 alleged downloads, at $750 per.

To whom? To Arista Records, Atlantic Recording, BMG Music, Capitol records, Electra Entertaiment, Interscope Records, Motown Recording, Priority Records, LaFace Records, Sony BMG (?), UMG Recordings and Warner Bros Records.

That’s one point five trillion dollars.

If you think that’s ridiculous, bear in mind the labels were once awarded almost $2 million because Jammie Thomas-Rasset allegedly downloaded 24 copyrighted songs.

That’s not all. Klaus also wants Wood to issue an order permanently shutting LimeWire down.

“As in Grokster and Aimster, Plaintiffs have been and will be irreparably harmed because Lime Wire will most likely be liable for more in damages than it will ever be able to pay”, says Klaus in a legal document going on:

“Plaintiffs seek statutory damages under the Copyright Act as a remedy for Lime Wire’s unlawful conduct. (First Amended Complaint ¶¶ 74, 87, 99). Where the defendant’s conduct is willful, the range of statutory damages runs from $750 to $150,000. See 17 U.S.C. § 504(a)(2)-(c).”

And that’s not all either.

The RIAA aka Klaus also wants LimeWire’s assets frozen.

“By this motion, Plaintiffs seek a preliminary injunction imposing an immediate freeze on all of Defendants’ assets to prevent them from any further attempts to insulate their ill-gotten gains from a future judgment. The Court has found Defendants Lime Wire LLC (’Lime Wire’), Mark Gorton (’Gorton’), and Lime Group LLC (’Lime Group’) liable for inducing infringement of Plaintiffs’ copyrights (and related state law claims). (May 25, 2010 Amended Opinion & Order (“Order”).) Plaintiffs will be entitled to substantial damages, totaling hundreds of millions of dollars, or even billions, because of the massive infringing conduct for which these Defendants are liable.”

But as a post on Ray Beckerman’s Recording Industry vs The People says, Klaus’ efforts do little more than show “the lawyers have no clue as to the technology they seek to stop”, going on:
Unlike Kazaa, grokster, and napster, there is nothing that can or will be shut down. They may try to stop the distribution of the limewire client. But the client is so widespread on the internet that they have no real chance of it disappearing.

The same thing happened when AOL tried to stop the original gnutella client.

Speaking on the technology side, I think they have no idea of what they are trying to stop, this is the gnutella network. There is no server to be shut down that will kill the network like with napster and grokster. Each client is a part of the network and can function without a server in some warehouse. It will be impossible to close it down.

All clients will still function even if Limeware as a group/company ceases to exist.
Which adequately sums it up.

Apart from the fact Gorton doesn’t have a trillion, or even a billion, dollars, the RIAA’s demand is exactly like demanding an order to plug one hole in a hose chock full of holes, and that’s permanently left On.

“In the nearly two years since the parties filed their respective summary judgment motions, LimeWire has continued to be a tool of choice for rampant infringement of Plaintiffs’ works”, Klaus tells Wood, adding:

“Since July 2008, the LimeWire client software has been downloaded from the website more than 50 million times, bringing the total downloads of the client from just that one website – i.e., exclusive of downloads from Lime Wire’s own website – to more than 200 million (and counting).”

Stay tuned.
BWA-HAHAHAHAHAHAHA..... wow. they are out of their fucking minds. this is so ridiculous. i can't believe some documentarian that is "for the people" *ahem, michael moore* hasn't jumped all over this. you couldn't make up plotlines and villains better than this.

Record companies seek damages of $75 TRILLION

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Law.com wrote:Manhattan Federal Judge Kimba Wood Calls Record Companies' Request for $75 Trillion in Damages 'Absurd' in Lime Wire Copyright Case

Does $75 trillion even exist? The thirteen record companies that are suing file-sharing company Lime Wire for copyright infringement certainly thought so. When they won a summary judgment ruling last May they demanded damages that could reach this mind-boggling amount, which is more than five times the national debt.

Manhattan federal district court judge Kimba Wood, however, saw things differently. She labeled the record companies' damages request "absurd" and contrary to copyright laws in a 14-page opinion.

The record companies, which had demanded damages ranging from $400 billion to $75 trillion, had argued that Section 504(c)(1) of the Copyright Act provided for damages for each instance of infringement where two or more parties were liable. For a popular site like Lime Wire, which had thousands of users and millions of downloads, Wood held that the damage award would be staggering under this interpretation. "If plaintiffs were able to pursue a statutory damage theory predicated on the number of direct infringers per work, defendants' damages could reach into the trillions," she wrote. "As defendants note, plaintiffs are suggesting an award that is 'more money than the entire music recording industry has made since Edison's invention of the phonograph in 1877.'"

While Wood conceded that the question of statutory interpretation was "an especially close question," she concluded that damages should be limited to one damage award per work.

"We were pleased that the judge followed both the law and the logic in reaching the conclusion that she did," said Lime Wire's attorney, Joseph Baio of Willkie Farr & Gallagher. "As the judge said in her opinion, when the copyright law was initiated, legislatures couldn't possibly conceive of what the world would become with the internet. As such, you couldn't use legislative history. Instead, the overarching issue is reasonableness in order to avoid absurd and possibly unconstitutional outcome." Baio, who is scheduled to represent Lime Wire when the damages trial begins on May 2, joked that the money that the record companies sought from his client would be better spent on paying for health care or wiping out the national debt.

Glenn Pomerantz of Munger, Tolles & Olson, who represented 13 record company plaintiffs, did not return requests for comment.
there are not enough emoticons in existence to convey how much i'm laffing...

Re: Limewire v. RIAA verdict in...

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now this is an interesting development...
Wired wrote:CNET Accused of Copyright Infringement for Distributing LimeWire

CBS Interactive, the owner of CNET, is being sued for facilitating “massive copyright infringement” for distributing the LimeWire software, a file sharing service a federal judge ruled illegal last year.

A lawsuit brought by rappers and others accuses CBS of profiting from distributing 220 million copies of LimeWire on CNET’s download.com site since 2008, or 95 percent off all LimeWire downloads.

“The CBS defendants received massive amounts of revenue from P2P provders on a ‘pay per download’ basis and also from advertising revenues generated by advertisements placed on the download screen for P2P software,” (.pdf) according to the complaint, lodged in Los Angeles federal court late Tuesday.

The lawsuit, which maintains CBS was “well aware” of LimeWire’s infringement uses, comes as the Recording Industry Association of America’s damages trial against LimeWire gets under way in a New York federal court.

A New York federal jury is being empaneled to decide how much LimeWire and its owner should pay the record labels for wanton infringement committed on LimeWire’s service. U.S. District Judge Kimba Wood ruled last year that LimeWire’s users commit a “substantial amount of copyright infringement,” and that the Lime Group — the company behind the application — “has not taken meaningful steps to mitigate infringement.”

The record labels claim LimeWire, owned by the Lime Group, owes more than $1 billion in damages. Judge Wood shuttered the service in October.

The case against CBS accuses CNET of offering “videos, articles and other media that instructed how to use P2P software to locate pirated copies of copyrighted works and remove electronic protections placed on digital music files.” A 2009 LimeWire review, the suit noted, described the service as a “post-Napster clone” and gave it 4.5 out of 5 stars.

CBS, according to the complaint, maintains a “business model to profit directly from the demand for infringing P2P clinets.”

Among others, the plaintiffs include Detron Bendross, of 2 Live Crew, Trisco Smith-Pearson of The Force MDs and Eric Jackson and De’Angelo Holmes, both of the Ying Yang Twins. Alki David, a digital media entrepreneur, is also a plaintiff. They all assert their copyrights were illegally distributed on LimeWire.

CBS did not immediately respond for comment.

Re: Limewire v. RIAA verdict in...

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Ah, hell, why not sue the host DCs and upstream data carriers while they're at it. They all made money off it in an equally strained link. I mean, if LimeWire hadn't been hosted on CNET, CBS wouldn't have paid them for that particular amount of data transfer! Woo, let's fuckin' rake in the money!


So, now that we've taken out Bin Laden, can we focus on these cunts?

Re: Limewire v. RIAA verdict in...

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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-13388839
The Beeb wrote:File-sharing software company Limewire has reached an out of court settlement with record labels that sued it for helping people pirate music.

The Lime Group, which developed the Limewire system, has agreed to pay $105m (£64.6m) to 13 music firms.

The figure is far less than the billion dollar bill for damages that the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) claimed it was owed.

The prolonged legal fight has led to Limewire being shut down.

Mitch Bainwol, chairman of the RIAA - which represents record labels - said the organisation was pleased with the result.

"This hard fought victory is reason for celebration by the entire music community, its fans and the legal services that play by the rules," said Mr Bainwol in a statement.

Limewire was a program that used peer-to-peer technology to help people find media on other computers and let others see their libraries of files.

The RIAA first took legal action against Limewire in 2006 shortly after concluding a $115m settlement with peer-to-peer software maker Kazaa.

In May 2010, the judge overseeing the case ruled that Limewire and its creator Mark Gorton had infringed copyright and aided others in downloading pirated music.

Another court ruling in the case in October 2010 led to the effective closure of Limewire as it was banned from letting people search, download, upload or trade files using the program.

An official updated version of the program has been distributed that stops people using Limewire to swap files in this way.

However, a pirate edition has been produced that leaves those services intact.
Yes, this is great cause for celebration by music fans. :roll:

Re: Limewire v. RIAA verdict in...

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Also, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-13387795
The Beeb wrote:Websites that link to pirated music and movies or sell counterfeit goods could soon be blocked in America.

US politicians are about to consider legislation which includes a raft of measures to clamp down on such sites.

The Protect IP bill gives government and copyright holders tools to stop Americans reaching illegal material.

Digital rights groups said they were "dismayed" by the proposals and feared the effect the final law would have on the internet.

"The Protect IP Act targets the most egregious actors, and is an important first step to putting a stop to online piracy and sale of counterfeit goods," said Senator Patrick Leahy in a statement released as the bill began its progress through the US legislature.

"Both law enforcement and rights holders are currently limited in the remedies available to combat websites dedicated to offering infringing content and products," said Senator Leahy, one of 10 politicians backing the proposal.

The Protect IP legislation is a re-write of the controversial Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act (COICA) that narrowly failed to become law in late 2010.

The law is being opposed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) which warned that it was no less problematic than its predecessor.

"We are no less dismayed by this most recent incarnation than we were with last year's draft," said Abigail Phillips, senior staff attorney at the EFF. She said the remedies suggested in Protect IP raised "serious First Amendment concerns about lawful expression".

Sites targeted under the Protect IP (Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property) Act would be removed from the internet's address books making them hard to find by their well-known domain name.

It allows the blocking of any domains that infringing sites switch to in order to avoid blocking. The bill also contains clauses that would force search engines to stop listing so-called infringing sites in their indexes.

As well as letting government take action, the Protect IP Act would allow copyright holders to apply for court orders to get sites blocked or de-listed.

Payment firms and ad networks could also be told to stop providing services to sites found to be infringing copyright or peddling fake goods.

Sherwin Sly, deputy legal director at the Public Knowledge digital rights group, said Protect IP threatened to unravel the consensus that the net is built upon.

If passed, it would "accelerate" the net down a path that could lead to governments everywhere sanitising online content so citizens only get what those in power think they should see, he said.

Ah, a watchlist created under the banner of making the internet safer where the corporations can apply to add sites to it... where have I heard that before... oh yeah, the IWF.

That's our watchlist here in the UK btw, the contents of which are held in the greatest of secrecy, and which regularly "accidentally" blocks other sites (such as rapidshare, megaupload, etc - how convenient) under the guise of pursuing "bad" websites.

Re: Limewire v. RIAA verdict in...

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the current case against CNET dropped...
Wired wrote:‘Massive’ Infringement Case Against CNET Dropped

Plaintiffs in a federal lawsuit accusing CNET of facilitating “massive copyright infringement” by distributing peer-to-peer software dropped their case Monday.

The May lawsuit was lodged in Los Angeles by a handful of musicians and filmmaker Alkiviades David. They accused CBS Interactive — CNET’s publisher — of illicitly profiting from piracy by distributing 220 million copies of LimeWire over CNET’s Download.com site since 2008 — accounting for 95 percent off all LimeWire downloads.

The case appeared to be nearing its demise last month when the plaintiffs submitted just six copyrights as being infringed. On the July 4 holiday, David quietly dropped the suit.

What remains to be seen are threats by David’s attorney, Adam Wolfson, who wrote in a filing that the case would be re-filed to represent more plaintiffs and “many thousands of songs and other copyrighted works.” (.pdf)

The now-defunct LimeWire service agreed in May to pay $105 million to settle accusations from the recording industry that LimeWire users committed a “substantial amount of copyright infringement.” In that lawsuit, the Recording Industry Association of America sought damages on 9,715 copyrighted recordings, and forced LimeWire of New York to shutter.

CBS has maintained it would “prevail” in the David case.

The Copyright Act allows for damages of up to $150,000 per infringement.

David claimed that CNET maintained a “business model to profit directly from the demand for infringing P2P clients.”
i sincerely hope they spin this back up.