Google and Microsoft Sued By Mini Music Label

carre4 writes "Blue Destiny Records has sued both Google and Microsoft for allegedly 'facilitating and enabling' distribution of copyrighted songs illegally. The suit alleges that RapidShare runs 'a distribution center for unlawful copies of copyrighted works.' RapidShare is helped by Google and Microsoft, which benefit from the ad relationships, according to the suit. Blue Destiny has attempted to link to pages with RapidShare links to their music via DMCA takedown notices, and Google has, apparently, not complied, while Microsoft's Bing site has removed the links. RapidShare, for its part, is based outside of the US and does not accept DMCA notices."

Seriously?

[gman003]

They know, absolutely, that they're going to lose. So what reason could they have for suing? Well, they're about as unknown on the Internet as possible. No Wikipedia entry, and their website seems to be hidden, unless they call themselves "Blues Destiny Records" when not filing frivolous lawsuits. Maybe they just want some attention? Which raises the question: Is a lawsuit against the two biggest companies in technology cheaper than buying some ads?

Re:Sue the White Pages

[rtaylor]

If the publisher who puts out the book received a percentage of the spoils from the robbery, then probably.

Re:Google never posted the links in the first plac

[Martin Blank]

If someone kills by stabbing them in the head with a knife it's the same charge as if they used a gun, everything else being equal.

Actually, in most of the US, using a firearm in the commission of a violent crime is a slightly different charge set containing an automatic sentence extension, usually of five or ten years. Killing someone by stabbing them in the head with a knife would carry the same charge as caving in the head with a hammer, though.

Re:Google never posted the links in the first plac

[Sfing_ter]

I concur, except I see this as a great way to rid us of this issue. With all the $$ that Google & M$ have, and all the sway they get with their lobbying, it will be interesting to see who wins in this battle. If the record company wins, then the RIAAssholes step in and start fucking shit over. If G & M$ win, then you see more sites linking. Either way we get a clearer definition of what we will be allowed to do.

Re:Sue the White Pages

[Anonymous Coward]

What if the thing robbed was a very long prime number written in the front door which the robber memorized? We are supposing this thief did that because he is an appassionato of very long prime numbers, not because he intended to sell the number.

(I'm just taking the analogy to it's logical extreme)

The DMCA does *not* make the case go away

[pem]

if, as claimed, google ignored the DMCA takedown notices.

I actually had the misfortune to have to send google a takedown notice after our neighborhood's property manager put some of our newsletters online at a public place (they were already available on a different website via password). I got the idiot property manager to take them down (but only after threatening him with going to the state board of realtors for violating his fiduciary duty), but google was actually a *lot* harder. In the end, I was never sure whether they responded to my takedown notice, or whether the newsletters just rolled off the cache. (FWIW, Microsoft Live!, at the time, took them down almost immediately.)

In any case, forcing google to take the takedown process more seriously and deal with it more expeditiously can only be a good thing, IMHO.