Conventional wisdom is the content companies won, P2P lost.\u00c2\u00a0 The Grokster decision was heralded as a great day in the fight against file-trading and the establishment of legitimate online services.<\/p>\n
The only problem is this is not what Justice Souter’s opinion said.<\/p>\n
Justice Souter questioned whether file-trading was even hurting the labels.\u00c2\u00a0 He restated the essence of Sony Betamax.\u00c2\u00a0 The judgment didn’t turn on broad intellectual property issues, rather the decision took the form of castigation and liability for heinous behavior.<\/p>\n
Below please find from Souter’s decision the actual behavior of Grokster and Streamcast.<\/p>\n
I ask you, are these scumbags who should have not only their business taken away, but should be sued into POVERTY?\u00c2\u00a0 YES!!!\u00c2\u00a0 Their sole goal was profit.\u00c2\u00a0 They were piggybacking on the illegal activity of others to build an illicit business predicated on breaking the law.\u00c2\u00a0 Is it THIS behavior that the technology sector condones?\u00c2\u00a0 Is it THIS they’re trying to protect?\u00c2\u00a0 ABSOLUTELY NOT!\u00c2\u00a0 The goal of technologists is to IMPROVE SOCIETY, not to rape and pillage rights-holders.\u00c2\u00a0 Then again, some might cross the line, but think of how bad you have to act to fall into the same category as Grokster and Streamcast.\u00c2\u00a0 Companies that didn’t write their own software, who skimmed profits on others’ efforts in the same way the MAFIA does.<\/p>\n
This is what the Grokster decision says: If you’re a heinous motherfucker contributing nothing to society, profiting by inducing others to break the law, you’re gonna be liable.\u00c2\u00a0 If you come up with a new software program with the intent to improve society via legal uses, and don’t INDUCE others into criminal activity are you liable?\u00c2\u00a0 PROBABLY NOT!!!<\/p>\n
\nThe record is replete with evidence that from the moment\u00c2\u00a0 Grokster and StreamCast began to distribute their free\u00c2\u00a0 software, each one clearly voiced the objective that recipients use it to download copyrighted works, and each took active steps to encourage infringement. <\/p>\n
After the notorious file-sharing service, Napster, was sued by copyright holders for facilitation of copyright infringement, A & M Records, Inc. v. Napster, Inc., StreamCast gave away a\u00c2\u00a0 software program of a kind known as OpenNap, designed\u00c2\u00a0 as compatible with the Napster program and open to Napster users for downloading files from other Napster and OpenNap users’ computers.\u00c2\u00a0 Evidence indicates that "t was always [StreamCast’s] intent to use\u00c2\u00a0 to be able to capture email addresses of\u00c2\u00a0 initial target market so that\u00c2\u00a0 could promote\u00c2\u00a0 StreamCast Morpheus interface to them"; indeed, the OpenNap program was engineered to leverage Napster’s 50 million user base. <\/p>\n
StreamCast monitored both the number of users downloading its OpenNap program and the number of music files they downloaded.\u00c2\u00a0 It also used the resulting OpenNap network to distribute copies of the Morpheus software and to encourage users to adopt it.\u00c2\u00a0 Internal company documents indicate that StreamCast hoped to attract large numbers of former Napster users if that company was shut down by court order or otherwise, and that StreamCast planned to be the next Napster.\u00c2\u00a0 A kit developed by StreamCast to be delivered to advertisers, for example, contained press articles about StreamCast’s potential to capture former Napster users, and it introduced itself to some potential advertisers as a company which is similar to what Napster was.\u00c2\u00a0 It broadcast banner advertisements to users of other Napster-compatible software, urging them to adopt its OpenNap.\u00c2\u00a0 An internal e-mail from a company executive stated: "We have put this network in place so that when Napster pulls the plug on their free service . . . or if the Court orders them shut down prior to that . . . we will be positioned to capture the flood of their 32 million users that will be actively looking for an alternative." <\/p>\n
Thus, StreamCast developed promotional materials to market its service as the best Napster alternative.\u00c2\u00a0 One proposed advertisement read: "Napster Inc. has announced that it will soon begin charging you a fee.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s if the courts don\u00c3\u00adt order it shut down first.\u00c2\u00a0 What will you do to get around it?" Another proposed ad touted StreamCast’s software as the ‘"#1 alternative to Napster" and asked "hen the lights went off at Napster . . . where did the users go?" StreamCast even planned to flaunt the illegal uses of its software; when it launched the OpenNap network, the chief technology officer of the company averred that "he goal is to get in trouble with the law and get sued.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s the best way to get in the new."<\/p>\n
The evidence that Grokster sought to capture the market of former Napster users is sparser but revealing, for Grokster launched its own OpenNap system called Swaptor and inserted digital codes into its Web site so that computer users using Web search engines to look for "Napster" or "ree filesharing" would be directed to the Grokster Web site, where they could download the Grokster software. And Grokster’s name is an apparent derivative of Napster. <\/p>\n
The record makes clear that StreamCast developed these promotional materials but not whether it released them to the public.\u00c2\u00a0 Even if these advertisements were not released to the public and do not show encouragement to infringe, they illuminate StreamCast\u00c3\u00ads purposes.
\u00c2\u00a0
StreamCast’s executives monitored the number of songs by certain commercial artists available on their networks, and an internal communication indicates they aimed to have a larger number of copyrighted songs available on their networks than other file-sharing networks.\u00c2\u00a0 The point, of course, would be to attract users of a mind to infringe, just as it would be with their promotional materials developed showing copyrighted songs as\u00c2\u00a0 examples of the kinds of files available through Morpheus.\u00c2\u00a0 Morpheus in fact allowed users to search specifically for "Top 40" songs, which were inevitably copyrighted.\u00c2\u00a0 Similarly, Grokster sent users a newsletter promoting its ability to provide particular, popular copyrighted materials. <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Conventional wisdom is the content companies won, P2P lost.\u00c2\u00a0 The Grokster decision was heralded as a great day in the fight against file-trading and the establishment of legitimate online services. The only problem is this is not what Justice Souter’s opinion said. Justice Souter questioned whether file-trading was even hurting the labels.\u00c2\u00a0 He restated the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-69","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-music-business","category-online"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p96vPs-17","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}