| 22 June |
LimeWire Court Decision Could Mean Huge Changes |
The decision by Judge Kimba Wood that LimeWire is responsible for actively encouraging its many users to download copyrighted material could have wide reaching effects on other filesharing networks and software like Ares, Gnutella and BitTorrent.
There are a few aspects of this decision against LimeWire that are interesting for those of us that follow the filesharing news with any degree of diligence.
First, there is the fact that this is a rare win for the RIAA (Recording Industry Artists of America) who generally have a ’sue everything and see what comes out’ attitude. In this case they came up trumps.
Second is the fact that the age-old arguments of filesharing networks and entrepreneurs that they cannot be held responsible for the actions of their users has, in this case, been rejected by the judge. The filesharing networks generally relied on this defense because it worked. Whether this deviation by Judge Wood is set to continue in other states with other judges is unknown, but these are nervous times for networks.
Thirdly is the simple yet startling fact that it is Lime Wire’s founder Mark Gorton who is being held personally responsible for the charges.