FC: Judge says current P2P networks are legal to operate

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

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Date: Fri, 25 Apr 2003 11:43:40 -0700 (PDT)
From: Joseph Lorenzo Hall <jhall () astron Berkeley EDU>
To: Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>
Subject: summary judgemnet order (grokster, etc.)

http://www.eff.org/IP/P2P/MGM_v_Grokster/030425_order_on_motions.php

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From: "Hiawatha Bray" <watha () monitortan com>
To: <politech () politechbot com>
Subject: Judge: File swapping tools are legal
Date: Fri, 25 Apr 2003 15:05:23 -0400

http://news.com.com/2100-1027-998363.html?tag=fd_top

A federal judge in Los Angeles has handed a stunning court victory to
file-swapping services Streamcast Networks and Grokster, dismissing much of
the record industry and movie studios' lawsuit against the two companies.
In an almost complete reversal of previous victories for the record labels
and movie studios, federal court Judge Stephen Wilson ruled that
Streamcast--parent of the Morpheus software--and Grokster were not liable
for copyright infringements that took place using their software. The ruling
does not directly affect Kazaa, software distributed by Sharman Networks,
which has also been targeted by the entertainment industry.

"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, released Friday. "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."

<snip>

Hiawatha Bray
Boston Globe 




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