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Los Angeles -- In a stunning turn of events in the legal battle between
the recording industry and software companies distributing peer-to-peer
file-sharing software, a federal judge in Los Angeles on Friday ruled that
the file-sharing programs Grokster and Morpheus are not liable for
copyright infringement. Judge Stephen Wilson said in his ruling that
Grokster and Streamcast Networks' Morpheus are less like Napster, which
was ruled to be infringing copyrights, and more similar to a VCR, which
can be used for both legal and illegal purposes. Wilson's decision mirrors
the landmark 1984 Betamax decision that gave the VCR the legal footing
needed to propel it to its current ubiquitous status in homes worldwide.
"Defendants distribute and support software, the users of which can and do
choose to employ it for both lawful and unlawful ends," Wilson wrote in
his opinion. "Grokster and StreamCast are not significantly different from
companies that sell home video recorders or copy machines, both of which
can be and are used to infringe copyrights." The ruling does not
immediately impact the more popular Kazaa software, which has also been
sued by the recording and motion picture industries. The Recording
Industry Association of America told CNET News.com it intends to appeal
the ruling.
http://news.com.com/2100-1027-998363.html?tag=fd_lede1_hed
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=technologyNews&storyID=2633222
Marc Freedman
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__________________________________________________
The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one
persists to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on
the unreasonable man. -George Bernard Shaw, writer, Nobel laureate
(1856-1950)
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