Judge issues injunction against Shawn Fanning
  03/06/2001 5:57:08 PM MST Albuquerque, Nm
  By Dustin D. Brand; Owner AMO

Injunction effectively gives control to RIAA   When I say "the unnamed service" you should know what I'm talking about.

  Patel issued an injunction ordering the unnamed service to continue, in effect, with the blocking mechanism the company put into place on its file-sharing service late Sunday night.

  The injunction puts the burden of notification on the recording industry, requiring that the plaintiffs in the case against the unnamed service provide four things to the unnamed service for songs to be blocked: the title of the work to be blocked, the name of the artist, one or more filenames the song was available as on the unnamed service, and certification the plaintiffs own the work.

  Under the injunction, the unnamed service will have three business days to "prevent such files (identified by the plaintiffs) from being included in their index," in which case they would use its "screen" to prevent other users being able to see the specific file in any database, thereby making it impossible to download. This screening process "the unnamed service" implemented is in direct contradiction to their stance all along, which was simply as Shawn Fanning put it, "we can't block these files, there is no way for us to do that..".

  Patel also stated in the ruling that the two sides must work together in "identifying variations of the filename[s], or of the spelling of the titles or artists' names" of the songs in question. Since late Sunday night, little or no effects were shown, and users were still able to access Copyrighted Music. This injunction means that if Shawn Fanning doesn't comply, he may be reaching the $130 Million+ payments ordered to the Music Companies like MP3.COM had to pay. MP3.COM is now struggling for survival, and even Shawn Fanning is doomed to failure because the system is built on stealing and piracy.

  "If it is reasonable to believe that a file available on the unnamed system is a variation of a particular work or file identified by plaintiffs, all parties have an obligation to ascertain the actual identity [title and artist name] of the work," the ruling said.

  The injunction is a middle ground between the proposed injunctions drafted by the unnamed service and the recording industry and sticks to what Patel implied she would do when both sides appeared before her at a hearing last Friday. This is when David Boies said, oh by the way we're implementing a screening system to block access to 1 million copyrighted songs.

  The burden of ensuring no copyrighted work is transmitted over the unnamed service is shared between the industry and the unnamed service, with the industry being responsible "to provide notice to the unnamed service" and the unnamed service being responsible for "policing the system within the limits of the system." I'm a programmer, and let me tell you first hand it's not hard to search for certain text within a song, for example Metallica, but it's much harder and more precise to block a song by using an exact filename. The unnamed Service is screening by using EXACT filenames, this is where the RIAA comes in and gives every possible variation. Look forward to mountains of paperwork provided to Shawn Fanning by the RIAA, and the ultimate rise and fall of Shawn Fanning.

  "We are gratified the District Court acted so promptly in issuing its injunction requiring (the unnamed service) to remove infringing works from its system," Hilary Rosen, president of the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), said in a statement Tuesday. The RIAA represents the recording industry, while the actual plaintiffs in the case are individual recording labels.

  Shawn Fanning, in San Mateo, Calif., was not immediately available for comment. Go Figure.

  Related AMO Articles:
   Shawn Fanning taking legal moves 03/02/2001 4:10:30 PM MT
   The rise and fall of Shawn Fanning 02/13/2001 3:50:00 AM MT