Judge: Morpheus Software Encouraged Piracy
565675
A U.S. federal judge has ruled the Morpheus software program promoted illegal file sharing.
497512
Sharman Networks, parent company of the peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing software Kazaa, is rejoicing at the US court ruling that found two similar P2P programs, Grokster and Morpheus, do not violate US copyright law. However, the company concedes that the ...
248273
... People do. Or at least that's what two makers of file-sharing software argued successfully in federal court, shifting the balance in the Internet piracy wars away from the Hollywood and the RIAA. -washingtonpost.com
687362
p2pnet.net News:- p2pnet.net News:- The entertainment industry - Hollywood, for short - is calling for the US Supreme Court to overturn the Grokster / Morpheus ruling that says p2p networks aren&#39;t liable for alleged copyright violations committed by users
360646
p2pnet.net News:- The owners of the Morpheus and Grokster p2p applications are taking yet another stand in their David and Goliath battle against the multi-national entertainment industry.
82660
Setting aside Sharman Networks&#39; objections, an Australian judge accepted on Friday an affidavit with potentially damaging assertions about Kazaa&#39;s handling of copyrighted material.
246161
(InfoWorld) - A recent federal court ruling pertaining to open-source software in model railroads could derail enforcement of open-source licenses altogether, according to Mark Radcliffe, general counsel for the Open Source Initiative. If allowed to stand, the decision could withhold an important and expected remedy from open-source licensors, that being the ability to get an injunction against license violations, Radcliffe said. But the case does not necessarily set a precedent for other judges to follow, countered Eben Moglen, founding director of the Software Freedom Law Center. In the case, the plaintiff, Robert Jacobsen, claimed that the defendant, Matthew Katzer, sought royalties from Jacobsen on software covered by invalid patents obtained on open-source software. The software in this case was from the JMRI (Java Model Railroad Interface) Project, with which Jacobsen is involved. The original complaint is viewable here. According to court filings by Jacobsen, Katzer filed a patent application tailored to the capabilities of JMRI three days after the release of new JMRI software in 2002. The plaintiff alleged breach of the obscure Artistic License for open-source software and copyright infringement due to the removal of original copyright notices and substituting the name of Katzen's company, Radcliffe said.Â  But in a ruling on the case in San Francisco on August 17, Judge Jeffrey S. White denied a motion by the plaintiff seeking a preliminary injunction from infringing copyrighted open-source material. To establish copyright infringement, the plaintiff needs to show ownership of the copyrights and copying by the defendants, the judge said. Defendants, meanwhile, said they voluntarily ceased all potentially infringing activities. "This is one of the first cases about enforcement of any open-source licenses," Radcliffe said. In his ruling, the judge said the Artistic License was a contract and the failure to include copyright notices was not a restriction on the scope of the license, according to Radcliffe. Jacobsen sought to have Katzer put copyright notices in his software reflecting that it was open source. "What the court said was that remedy is not available," said Radcliffe. The remedy for contract violations under US law is damages, not injunctive relief, in which the court would order a party to cease a violation, Radcliffe wrote in his blog. The case, Radcliffe said, is a blow to the fundamental basis of open-source software, he said. "Most people in open source believe if you violate the license, you're outside it, Radcliffe said. "What this case indicates is that expectation may be wrong," he said. Assessing damages for use of open-source software is difficult because the software is given away free, according to Victoria Hall, attorney for the plaintiff. "What are the damages for an open-source project? These aren't your typical contract damages," she said. The case raises questions about the rights of those who release software via open source. "What rights do they have, and how strong are those rights?" Hall asked. But she and Moglen pointed out that the case does not necessarily set a precedent for future cases. "It seems to me a not very important ruling," said Moglen, who has not been involved in the case. The Software Freedom Law Center provides free legal services to those who make and distribute free and open-source software. "I do believe that the use of a more carefully drafted and more industry-tested license will probably help courts and other parties to deal with software in a more informed and accurate way," Moglen said. To avoid the lack of clarity in the Artistic License, the JMRI Project will switch to the GNU General Public License. "I think the big advantage [of GPL] is the automatic license revocation that is present in GPL that is not present in Artistic License," said Hall. Jacobsen also plans to appeal the judge's ruling, said Hall. Katzer defined to comment on the case. His attorneys did not return phone calls from InfoWorld. The judge set a September 14 date for a case management conference to further deliberate on the matter.
504204
Citing "massive infringement" of copyrights on the Morpheus file-sharing network, a federal judge says StreamCast Networks encourages its users to break the law.
429023
An Australian federal court has been told that Sharman Networks, the developer of file swapping technology Kazaa, is the largest music piracy system ever seen.
449232
In another blow to peer-to-peer file sharing, a U.S. federal judge ruled on Wednesday that the Morpheus software program encouraged users to infringe upon copyrighted works.
466491
The producers of a popular file sharing program have created the biggest system of Internet music piracy ever seen, the Federal Court in Sydney has been told.
109480
LOS ANGELES: The recording industry has turned to its former arch-nemesis, the founder of online music file-swapping service Napster, to help it beat the piracy that it once accused him of spawning.
479015
InfoWorld - The leader of one of the oldest and most widely recognized Internet software piracy groups was sentenced Friday to 51 months in prison on one count of conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement, the U.S. Department of Justice announced.
202646
THE search mechanism used by the Kazaa file-sharing network could contain malicious code, the Federal Court heard yesterday. Counsel for the record companies, John Nicholas SC, said in recent years there had
394430
A federal appeals court on Thursday delivered a stinging blow to the anti-piracy efforts of major movie studios and music companies by ruling several Internet file-sharing software companies are not liable for copyright infringement.
259774
A federal appeals court on Thursday  delivered a stinging blow to the anti-piracy efforts of major  movie studios and music companies by ruling several Internet  file-sharing software companies are not liable for copyright  infringement.
327938
(InfoWorld) - A U.S. judge on Friday sentenced the owner and operator of iBackups.net to 87 months in prison, the longest sentence ever given for software piracy, according to a software trade group. Nathan Peterson, of Antelope Acres, California, also forfeited nearly all of his assets to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia in Alexandria, and he agreed to pay more than US$5.4 million in restitution, the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA) said. Peterson pleaded guilty to two counts of criminal copyright infringement in December. At that time, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) called Backups.net "the largest for-profit software piracy site ever shut down by law enforcement." The Web site illegally sold software that would have been worth $20 million on the retail market, the DOJ said. Peterson will begin paying off the remaining $5 million in damages 60 days after his release from prison, at a rate of $200 per month. In criminal piracy cases, the average damages resulting from pirated software are just over $9 million, or less than half of the $20 million caused by iBackups, SIIA said. The $5.4 million Peterson agreed to pay in restitution is eight times the average fine of $659,000, according to a SIIA study tracking U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation cases on software piracy reported since 2000. Peterson's site used Google.com text ads to find customers, SIIA said. Buyers should be aware of the possibility that software being sold through text ads might not be legal, the trade group said. Neither the prosecutor nor Peterson's attorney immediately returned calls seeking comment.