Money Matters, Simplified.
Court orders permanent injunction on LimeWire's music sharing service
by Anter Prakash Singh - October 27, 2010 - comments
The judge ordered Gorton and his employees to create default settings in the software that can block the unauthorized sharing of files.
A U.S. District Court judge has issued a permanent injunction against popular file sharing programme LimeWire. Judge Kimba Wood ordered the managers of LimeWire to stop all functions like searching, uploading, downloading and file sharing.
In May, Judge Wood of Southern District of New York has given a ruling favor of the music industry, claiming that Lime Group, parent of LimeWire had committed copyright infringement and engaged in unfair competition.
A popular tool for sharing files
LimeWire was launched in 2000 and it quickly became the preferred tool of circulating pirated music on the internet. The company has accepted that it earned millions from this software.
The Recording Industry association of America, which sued the company in 2007, said that Gorton has violated the law for ten years and benefited from their “massive piracy machine.”
A spokesperson for Lime Wire said that the company still exists and only file sharing services have been stopped. It is still not clear what the company plans to do in future.
The court has tried its best to discontinue the use of software by restraining any further release, upgrade or advertising of the software.
Court rules against the company
Judge Wood wrote in her order, “Lime Wire shall use all reasonable technological means to immediately cease and desist from the current infringement of Copyrighted works by legacy users through the Lime Wire system and software and to prevent and inhibit future infringement of copy right works.”
The judge ordered Gorton and his employees to create default settings in the software that can block the unauthorized sharing of files. Wood also ordered LimeWire to create a copyright filter to work on legacy software.
LimeWire would also be required to obtain permission from music labels before creating any legal version of the LimeWire software.
Big Victory for music industry
The ruling is being seen as a big victory for the music industry organization which sued Gorton and his company.
Now the music industry is contemplating filing a suit, seeking damages to the tune of $1 billion.
The Recording Industry association of America, which sued the company in 2007, said that Gorton has violated the law for ten years and benefited from their “massive piracy machine.”
However, there are plenty of options available to a person desirous of sharing files. Bit torrent is one such popular choice for file sharing on the net.