P2P music sites closing doors in legal fallout

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Popular file-sharing site WinMX.com ceased operating and the New York office of another, eDonkey.com, appeared to be closed, in the continuing legal fallout among underworld peer-to-peer music services, industry sources and users said on Wednesday.

Both sites appear to be in a continuing legal fallout among underworld peer-to-peer music services, industry sources and users said on Wednesday. The turmoil among file-sharing networks follows the landmark ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court in June that held anyone who distributes a device used to infringe copyright is liable for the resulting acts of infringement by others. In the wake of the decision, the trade group Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) last week sent out "cease-and-desist" letters to seven file-sharing groups

News source: Reuters

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(9 replies) #1 cragdoo on 22 Sep 2005 - 14:34

with regards to the ruling , if we were to equate that to say cars , does that mean that manufacturers would be held responsible if say I was caught speeding or transporting drugs say ?? As in i was doing something illeagle with their product ? So if we were to take that to the 'nth'degree , does that mean that all manufacturers of OS's are responsible as their product allow me to a) connect to t'internet and transport illeagle software and b) view/copy/make illeagle software ?

#1.1 Ironman273 on 22 Sep 2005 - 14:38

With regards to cars, it would be like having a heavily armed military vehicle. Sure you could drive it to work and back each day, but it's made for a specific purpose. The government wouldn't want the sale of such a vehicle to the public because of it's possible capabilities.

Disclaimer: I'm not saying I agree, just how I think they view it.

#1.2 joshpo on 22 Sep 2005 - 14:40

I think a better analogy would be that Honda might get in trouble if they said "The all new Honda Civic 2006: Now with secret compartments for carrying tons and tons of illegal drugs."

#1.3 cragdoo on 22 Sep 2005 - 14:44

So in keeping with the Car anology , shouldn't all manufactures restrict the top speed of all cars , therefore 'forcing' buyers to use them legally ?

I mean they are designed to be able to be driver over the speed limit , so shouldn't the manufacturers be punished if we do so , that's at least my take/interpretation on the Court ruling in relation to P2P software

Last edited by 119501 on 22 Sep 2005 - 15:14

#1.4 Ironman273 on 22 Sep 2005 - 15:13

You are assuming all infractions are considerd the same. That is not the case. Yes, you can argue "But if it's illegal, then it's illegal" till you're blue in the face but the reality is it isn't true.

Why are there different money fines for different infractions? Different degrees of breaking the law. Speeding is not considered a big deal. Downloading music and videos is. Remember, you are limiting the monetary income of a company, so they're going to come full force to try to stop it. Speeding doesn't take money away from anyone so they're not going to do much about it.

Bottom line is analogies don't work well. There are always other factors that aren't taken into account.

#1.5 Ice Brewed Beer on 22 Sep 2005 - 17:42

<immaturity>What! How can you say that speeding doesn't take any money away from anyone? What about the police who are speeding with you to try and stop you. Who's paying for that police officers gas? Tax payers. I rest my case.</immaturity>

#1.6 DJ Specs on 22 Sep 2005 - 20:22

Actually speed doesnt take away money, it takes away lives, for those it kills. A far more serious offence.

#1.7 Ironman273 on 22 Sep 2005 - 21:57

My point exactly!! As long as it doesn't have to do with money, it'll take lower priority. Touch the income of a corporation and watch it unleash the lions.

#1.8 Dirtie on 22 Sep 2005 - 23:42

Indeed. Companies losing money is far more imporatant than people losing their lives... Yeah right.

#1.9 cann0nf0dder on 24 Sep 2005 - 15:23

Ahhhh it is nice to see the corrupt American legal system supports the American corporations in trying to rule the rest of the world.
Yay Team America! Policing the world again! (I am not American... can you tell)

Oh and a good analogy could be that all CD burning software companies should be shut down because I can borrow CDs from my friends and burn em.

Also the RIAA is shooting its self in the foot here, most of the people I know (myself included) use Win MX to sample music they wouldn’t normally buy, and then if they like the music they go and buy the CD because it is better to have the album than a bunch of random files on your computer… I don’t want to buy a product till I research and/or test it first. This move will cost record labels a substantial amount of money in lost sales due to the fact that we have no way of sampling the products. Typical big business being short sighted again.

#2 freedom77 on 22 Sep 2005 - 14:39

i doubt winmx is closed permenently, if you do a whois serach for winmx.com the regestration has changed; the name of the owner and address, other P2P companies have done this in the past to dodge legal actions. So i don't think we have seen the last of winmx.

#3 HawkMan on 22 Sep 2005 - 15:16

WinMX New York offices have been closed since 2004.

They're in NEw jersey or something now and are operating just fine

#4 johnovanni on 22 Sep 2005 - 15:29

So... does that mean I can sue Xerox and Canon because people can use their copiers to violate copyright law? YAY, finally I'm gonna be rich!!!!

(1 reply) #5 Fubar on 22 Sep 2005 - 15:36

i think you will find that edonkey hasnt closed

http://www.slyck.com/news.php?story=923

Slyck has reported since the RIAA began its "cease and desist" letter writing campaign that virtually any move a P2P developer makes is immediately associated this industry move. Such has been the case with Ares going open source, MetaMachine joining the DCIA, WinMX going belly-up and now, the purported closure of eDonkey's MetaMachine.

If one conducts a search for "edonkey" on Google News, immediately the individual is confronted with headlines such as "WinMX and eDonkey cease operation" or content which implies that eDonkey's MetaMachine has closed.

Most articles have closely associated the RIAA letter writing campaign and the closure of WinMX with the inability to contact MetaMachine. This has caused tremendous confusion, as it implies that MetaMachine has ceased operations due to the RIAA's letter campaign.

Let's clear this up immediately. eDonkey's offices are open for business, and Sam Yagan is readily available, as Slyck spoke with MetaMachine's President on these wild rumors.

"We haven't been operating out of New York City since 2004," Mr. Yagan told Slyck.com. "Our offices are in New Jersey now."

MetaMachine is clearly open for business. While its narrowly true that MetaMachine's New York representatives are unavailable as many news articles report, this has been the case for almost a year.

#5.1 rm20010 on 23 Sep 2005 - 00:54

Ain't it surprising that the assholes over at **AA love distorting the facts in order to claim 'victory' for them.

#6 Toastyone on 22 Sep 2005 - 16:50

Huh thats why WinMX was not working.... I had not used it in months but I was looking for this el conquistador comedy thing and could not find it anywhere else.

#7 perochan on 22 Sep 2005 - 18:25

who still use winmx and edonkey anyway.... there is better alternative... if you KNOW what i mean

#8 MaX Velocity on 22 Sep 2005 - 18:45

This doesn't really come as a surprise for me as I kinda saw this comming for the P2P, It really was only a matter of time before The RIAA Leaped.

#9 theyarecomingforyou on 22 Sep 2005 - 20:09

That's a shame as WinMX was great for finding rare content or high quality audio - still, it hadn't been updated in such a long time I was expecting it to die a long time ago.

#10 Echelon Left on 22 Sep 2005 - 20:46

Um, the WinMX network has been drying up for years. Sad to see it go, be really it's no great loss.

#11 Yogurth on 22 Sep 2005 - 23:00

Here is the music only p2p network, You will find it far superior to WinMX

it is called SoulSeek, such a beautiful name.

http://www.slsknet.org/

Word of warning: Current version of nod32 and SoulSeek are not compatible, SoulSeek will generate random errors with nod32 running.

#12 Dirtie on 22 Sep 2005 - 23:46

Soulseek and Ares all the way.

(1 reply) #13 mayamaniac on 23 Sep 2005 - 00:14

they still can't touch bit torrent, which is by far the biggest P2P network now. But unlike other P2P networks, BT has a legitimate use, not just for downloading illegal content. A lot of businesses use BT to distribute their content legally.

#13.1 j0j081 on 23 Sep 2005 - 02:08

yeah too bad i received a warning letter for using it from my isp.

#14 panacea on 23 Sep 2005 - 13:04

about soulseek:

i used to like soulseek but its actiugn funy nowadays, search results one polular titles sometimes return no result (impossible, there got to be someone sharing files with this keyword)
connections are not that great too.

(1 reply) #15 Vandil on 23 Sep 2005 - 16:04

hear that? that's the sound of teens & tweens whining that they have to get jobs to pay for their OS, software, music, and movies.

#15.1 cann0nf0dder on 24 Sep 2005 - 15:33

Read my post above, number 1.9

I do pay for albums I like, I (and most people I know) use P2P to sample new music to see if it is worth buying.

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