Tech Watch | InfoWorld Staff » Supreme Court gives file-sharing a hearing

March 30, 2005 | Comments: (0)

Supreme Court gives file-sharing a hearing

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The U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments this week that technology companies may shy away from inventing new products that could be used to violate copyright laws if the U.S. entertainment industry can sue the distributors of the Grokster and Morpheus P-to-P (peer-to-peer) software packages for their users' actions.

The landmark case is pitting copyright advocates from the recording and movie industry associations against those who say P-to-P file sharing in particular and technology innovation in general is in danger of being stifled if Grokster and Morpheus lose.

During oral arguments in the MGM vs. Grokster case, justices peppered a lawyer for the entertainment industry with questions, saying a move away from a 21-year-old standard on technology and copyright could have major effects on the U.S. technology industry, IDG News Service reported.

Donald Verrilli Jr., representing the music and movie industries in the case, told justices that Grokster and Morpheus distributor StreamCast Networks built their business plans around copyright violations, and the vast majority of files traded with the Grokster and Morpheus software violate copyright law. The Supreme Court's 1984 Sony Betamax ruling exempts makers of technology from secon-dary copyright liability lawsuits when their technology has "substantial nonin-fringing uses," but Grokster supporters can point to just a few hundred thousand legal files among the 2.6 billion traded with P-to-P software each month, he said.

"That's the whole business," Verrilli said. "What they're talking about as lawful is a tiny, teeny little fraction."

Verrilli called Grokster and Morpheus a "gigantic infringement machine that was built on inducement" of copyright violations.

But Justice Stephen Breyer questioned how the court could draw the line between Verrilli's assertion that P-to-P software enabled "substantial" infringements and the Betamax ruling, the news service reported. If the court recognized a new standard penalizing technologies enabling substantial copyright viola-tions, the copying machine, the VCR and the Gutenberg printing press might not be legal, Breyer said.

Using the same logic, the entertainment industry could argue that Apple Computer’s iPod also encourages copyright violations, added Justice David Souter. "If I can get music to the iPod without buying the CD, I'm not going to buy the CD," he said. "How do we know in advance on your test anything that gives the inventor or ... the developer the confidence to go ahead?"

Grokster supporters said they were encouraged by the justice's questions during the hearing. "I thought the justices asked exactly the right questions," said Fred von Lohmann, senior staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Founda-tion and lawyer for StreamCast Networks in this case. "Is it right that the en-tertainment industry should be in charge of the nation's technology sector?"

A Supreme Court decision is expected in about three months.

Posted by Jack McCarthy on March 30, 2005 04:44 PM

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