Metallica Rips Napster Summary

This case with the A & M Records vs. Napster, Inc. stated that record companies and music producers are filing a lawsuit against Napster. Napster is an online media source that serves the consumers for downloading music to their tablets, I phone’s, MP3 players, to where the consumers must have access to the Napster system to receive files and data. The A & M records are suing for the copyrights that the Napster is taking advantage from the music industry that the company had no rights to give permission over to Napster to transfer through servers. The A & M Records must have evidence that shows the ownership of the material and the copyright.

In 1999, Shawn Fanning and his little program called Napster created quite a stir in society. Napster's software allows music listeners to open pieces of their personal hard drives to everyone using Napster, sharing whatever MP3 songs they have already downloaded or stored. At any time, thousands of people are online, sharing hundreds of thousands of songs, many of which are technically illegal to download without the permission of the copyright holders. [1] This led to a lawsuit filed by the Recording Industry Association of America, with the rock group Metallica as its frontman. In this case, several issues were brought up, one of which was the right of the creator of the music to control what happens with

According to the New York Time article, Major Record Labels Settle Suit With LimeWire written by Ben Sisario, the settlement for this suit was $105 million which was far from the $1.4 billion the labels had sought as a maximum penalty. This article also explains that the companies are hoping that the case will act as a deterrent (2). The damage LimeWire created negatively affected the artist community.

There are many definitions of copyright laws but according to vox “the purpose of copyright laws is to provide incentives for the creation of new works”(vox). Without copyright laws nobody would want to invent because their idea would be stolen, and that is exactly what Anti-Napster supporters thought Napster was doing. They thought Napster was stealing their music. The RIAA thought that Napster was the same as stealing a cd from a store.(Spack). So the RIAA took matters into their own hands and sued Napster for copyright infringement.

Facts: Grokster, Ltd. and another company, StreamCast Networks Inc, created software that allowed users to share electronic files through a series of peer-to-peer networks on computers without using a central server. This software allowed users to share any type of digital file, but most people used the software to share and distribute copyright music and video files without permission of the copyright holders, which was encouraged by the software companies. As a response a group of movie studies and other copyright holders sued Grokster and StreamCast for the infringement on their copyrights, arguing that the software companies were knowingly and intentionally using their software

The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) filed a lawsuit accused LimeWire of creating and running a Web service “devoted essentially” to piracy in 2006. LimeWire used peer-to-peer file sharing networking technology to allow their users easily download distribution of copyrighted songs at no cost. The LimeWire peer-to-peer client software was downloaded over 50 million times in two years since the suit was brought up and an estimated 200 million copies in total. According to this result, the RIAA claims that “LimeWire owes trillions of dollars in damages for enabling distribution of copyrighted songs”.

Starting in the year 1999, a company called Napster opened up a whole new world to the Internet where every song ever made was instantly available to you on your computer for free. It was created by an 18-year-old Northeastern University student named Shawn Fanning. Napster transformed personal computers into servers that shared mp3 files all across the Internet (Mayer, 2008). It became popular very quickly because exchanging mp3 files freely and having any music desired right at your fingertips had never been possible before. However, this program that provided the privilege of having free instant music to download did not last long, it was shut down after just two years by

Along with the development of a file format (MP3) to store digital audio recordings, came one of the new millennium’s most continuous debates – peer-to-peer piracy – file sharing. Internet companies such as Napster and Grokster became involved in notable legal cases in regards to copyright laws in cyberspace. These two cases are similar in nature, yet decidedly different. In order to understand the differences and similarities, one should have an understanding of each case as well as the court’s ruling.

Artists such as Metallica have suffered from this problem. They sued Napster for copyright infringement and were on their way to shut Napster from its services. Napster was facing legal charges from both the artists and the music industry and that made it hard for them to fight the battle. They thought it was easy, but the judge ruled against Napster.

When not at the playground with her friends, "Biggie Brianna" is trading music files from her home in New York. The little girl received one of the 261 lawsuits filed by the RIAA She may look like a sweet and innocent child, but the RIAA says it's only going after major copyright violators at the moment. So you make the call. Peer-to-peer file sharing advocates received a boost in their ongoing battle against music industry executives when Jupiter Media Metrix released a study indicating that Internet file-sharing traffic volume actually increases music sales.

The issues that will be slugged out in federal district court in San Francisco sound a little too pop culture to be all that serious. How many music CDs are people buying these days in record stores throughout the nation because of Napster? Is the technology that Napster uses legal? Napster is, of course, the wildly popular file-sharing service whose 20 million users have downloaded some half a billion songs--most copyrighted for free. The technology that Napster has brought to music listeners across the globe has allowed the freedom of obtaining music for free and should not be shut down by the entertainment industry's argument in federal court.

Napster may have been popular with free lancers but not with other sound recording companies. According to Implications for the Digital Music Library, members of the music industry filed a lawsuit against Napster by accusing Napster of copyright infringement. (Crews) One of the biggest violations that

The question then became “Just because we can get the music we want without paying for it, should we?” (Tyson, 2000, p.1). This issue of illegal downloads, which is also referred to as piracy, has been a hot topic ever since the introduction of Napster. According to Recording Industry Association of America “In the decade since peer-to-peer (p2p) file-sharing site Napster emerged in 1999, music sales in the U.S. have dropped 47 percent, from $14.6 billion to $7.7 billion” (RIAA, 2014).

Napster, a free online file sharing network, allowed peers to share digital files directly with each other by way of connections through its software and system. The no cost peer-to-peer sharing gained popularity, particularly with trendy music. A&M Records took notice of the free digital music downloads and brought suit against Napster for direct, contributory, and vicarious copyright infringements (Washington University School of Law, 2013).

1. The legal issue involved in this case is the piracy of music from various artists that is easily accesible to everybody from the website called “Napster”. The moral issue in this case is the music being stolen according to the music companies or the music was just being borrowed by people all over the internet according to Napster supporters. The difference between the two is the legal issue is based on actual evidence like there is a law imposed about this case while the moral issue is based on strong likelihood or firm conviction. The systematic, corporate issue is about the website booming and how it affects the music industry while the individual issue is the persons who makes