Wired: Good Gnus in Napster Ruling

[ Thanks to Tim
Rushing for this link. ]

“Concluded the appeals panel: ‘Napster may be vicariously liable
when it fails to affirmatively use its ability to patrol its system
and preclude access to potentially infringing files listed in its
search index. Napster has both the ability to use its search
function to identify infringing musical recordings and the right to
bar participation of users.'”

“That appears to leave a legal opening for file-swapping
services such as Gnutella and Freenet, which are set up in a way
that prevents their creators from easily patrolling the network and
deleting MP3 files at the behest of the Recording Industry
Association of America’s member firms. While MP3 files are stored
on users’ machines, Napster maintains a searchable list of songs in
a central database….”

“Gnutella, like Napster, is a distributed information-sharing
network technology — but unlike its more famous cousin, the
Gnutella network does not rely on one central server. Also, while
variants like Newtella retrieve and exchange only MP3 files, most
Gnutella applications will share any type of file.”

Complete
Story