EMI Using Rapidshare To Market Music

An anonymous reader writes "While Rapidshare defends itself around the world from lawsuits by media companies for copyright infringement, new evidence was revealed that UK-based major label EMI is putting music on Rapidshare and directing people to download it in the hopes that it spreads 'virally.' This came to light in the ongoing copyright battle EMI v. MP3tunes over personal cloud media storage and the Sideload.com music search engine. EMI accuses MP3tunes of enabling piracy by linking to Rapidshare, but since EMI is using Rapidshare, this would seem to weaken their argument considerably. You can read the legal brief online."

Make up your mind

[somersault]

Morons. If they're the ones doing the original copyright infringement and putting the files up on a file sharing website for anyone to get to, doesn't that kind of negate their claim on copyright infringements when people, you know, copy the files?

Re:Make up your mind

[SuricouRaven]

It's impossible for them to infringe upon their own copyright. But, if they are putting the files up and not identifying themselves, they could arguably be promoting infringement of their copyright by others. It appears that EMI has been using rapidshare as a promotional tool, but has been unwilling to admit that for fear that this could be seen as legitimising the site.

Won't matter to the judge

[VShael]

Such blatant hypocrisy hasn't stopped the courts from siding with the corporations against the consumer in the past.

This is more about setting the precedent that piracy is wrong, not about the merits of this particular case.

Re:Make up your mind

[clone52431]

No... even if they do it anonymously there is no copyright infringement. They (the copyright holder) are still explicitly authorizing people to download it. (That’s why they had to invent the “making available” charge. The copyright holder can’t sue you for downloading the song from them.)

They might have shot themselves in the foot, too... now anyone who downloads music from Rapidshare could claim that they didn’t know it was an unauthorized copy, since they’ve heard of some record companies putting their music on RS as a viral promotion campaign. How can you know for sure? It’d be an interesting case to watch, just for the precedent’s sake...

Re:Make up your mind

[CastrTroy]

Maybe they don't mean for anyone else to do it, maybe they just put the files there so they could access them later. </sarcas> To be more precise, just because I put some source code up on an FTP Site, doesn't give somebody the right to violate copyright on it. Think about it this way. Linux is available for free on many web sites around the world. But if you want to go around distributing it to other folks, you have to follow the rules set out in the GPL (which extend the freedoms of copyright). So, possibly EMI putting the files up on Rapidshare (and telling you to download it) gives you the right to download it. But it doesn't give you the right to then distribute it to everyone else. Another explicit licence would be needed for that.