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Music Government Media The Courts Your Rights Online News

Record Labels Sue Morpheus, Again 29

Posted by timothy from the and-again-and-again dept.
Brushfireb writes "In a move that most Slashdotters will find suprising (/sarcasm), the RIAA has once again sued Morpheus, over a service that Morpheus never launched, known as StreamCast Networks. This comes not long after the RIAA lost the case to Morpheus, as you may remember from this Slashdot article."
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Record Labels Sue Morpheus, Again More

Record Labels Sue Morpheus, Again

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  • Hope they don't win.. (Score:2, Insightful)

    by PFAK ( 524350 )
    Lets hope that the RIAA doesn't win this case. This would be a big boost for the P2P community, and would probably in the end mean that P2P wouldn't always be related by piracy.

    Why does the RIAA always think they can boss everyone around, they act like everyone is a little child, and that they can be squashed.

    Doesn't help with the current state of the US justice system though..

  • Frivolent (Score:5, Insightful)

    by clonebarkins ( 470547 ) on Wednesday June 04, 2003 @10:54AM (#6115646)

    From the article:

    Record labels allege in the suit that in preparing to launch the radio service, Streamcast bought thousands of CDs with thousands of songs and then transferred the music onto a digital database on computer hard drives and other memory devices without the permission of the copyright owners.

    I'm sorry, but why would they have to notify the copyright owners? There are thousands of radio stations that do this same exact thing.

    Now, if Morpheus planned on not paying appropriate royalties, there might be a case. There might also be a (unjest, nevertheless still legal) case if any of those CDs are copy-protected. But simply making a database should not be illegal.

    Hopefully this will be dismissed for the farce it is. Morpheus should countersue the RIAA for filing frivolent lawsuits.

    • Greedrageous (Score:3, Insightful)

      by cgenman ( 325138 )
      Company A pays large amounts of royalties for CDs for music to be broadcast across the internet. Company A transfers the legally paid for music to another medium for internal use only, in preparation for a service that would pay an additional fee. Company B-F, represented by the RIAA, sues company A for copyright infringement.

      The RIAA has been making the case for quite some time, unsuccessfully, that consumers do not have the right to meduim-shift the music they purchase licenses for. It is no surprise
    • Quoth clonebarkins:
      I'm sorry, but why would they have to notify the copyright owners? There are thousands of radio stations that do this same exact thing.
      Radio stations pay a lot of money for broadcast rights. While small labels may give out some songs free to college radio stations and the like, radio station owners can count on paying tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars for broadcast rights to a hot new single from a major label.
      • Your right. Radio stations do pay lots of money for broadcast rights. That isn't why they filed the lawsuit. The suit says they violated the copyrights by space shifting the CDs to digital media. Many radio stations do this to set up play lists, instantly find that "requested" song, and so on. Space shifting has been upheld time and time again as fair use....as long as you old the original media. It is the very same thing as you recording a CD to a cassette to listen in your car. Morpheus never laun

  • Reactions.... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Sevn ( 12012 ) on Wednesday June 04, 2003 @11:35AM (#6116032) Homepage Journal
    RIAA: We don't care if we win or we lose. We have
    all the money people buying our way overpriced
    products have paid to bring about as many pointless
    lawsuits as possible til these punks learn who their
    corporate masters are.

    Morpheus: Gee, I hope we get the same Judge we did
    last time.
    • They won't even need the same judge this time. This one is completely ludacris.

      They are suing over something they never launched, because they intended to copy music on to computers they intended to pay for to distribute, but never distributed, so the whole thing is moot.

      Can we slashdot the RIAA with lawsuits? That would be fun.
  • He's busy defending Zion, and things look dire. This is the LAST thing he needs!

  • wow (Score:1)

    by alcharn ( 675533 )
    I think in a way they are correct. But all of these music networks are out of control. The artists are getting no credit. At least there should be a monthly fee in order to download music. I love Morpheus and Kazaa, but am I really supporting my favorite artists?
    • I think in a way they are correct. But all of these music networks are out of control. The artists are getting no credit. At least there should be a monthly fee in order to download music. I love Morpheus and Kazaa, but am I really supporting my favorite artists? But all of these RIAA cartels are getting out of control. The artists are getting no credit. At least there should be some money going to the artist in order to buy a CD. I love my CD and record stores, but am I really supporting my favorite
  • A work of fiction - any similarity between this story and actual events is only dreamed of by the masses, and wishfull thinking on others.

    In a confusing and somewhat dumbfounding move today, the RIAA has started multiple criminal law-suits involving every known manufacturer of audio cd's.

    Spokespersons of the :Fictional:RIAA were quoted as saying "We've had so much luck suing everyone that had a hand in the potential copying / pirating of music, that we've decided to take it to the digital source." "I mea

  • What's that smell? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by HTH NE1 ( 675604 )
    There's something ripe here, and it's not the RIAA's case.

    They should have to wait until there such a service is launched before suing, just like those who fear being sued under the DMCA seeking affirmation of legality beforehand have been rebuffed by the courts.
  • Streamcast bought thousands of CDs with thousands of songs and then transferred the music onto a digital database on computer hard drives and other memory devices without the permission of the copyright owners.

    Maybe I missed something, but how the hell does the RIAA know that Streamcast bought thousands of CD's and ripped them? And besides, ripping CD's is perfectly legal, distributing the ripped music is not. So, what...you can sue someone these days because you think they are going to break a copyrigh
  • Man, bonus points for them in working through the numerous Java issues that turned this program into e-molasses.

    Dolemite
    _____________

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • I hope they hack the RIAA again like they did a year a go or so... God that was funny. They need to learn that Music isn't about money.

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