The industry succeeded in shutting down brash Napster with litigation, but this led to the development of services like Kazaa and Grokster, which unlike Napster, do not host MP3s on their own centralized computers, but function as searching and linking tools between their millions of customers, who make music files available for copying from their own computers.

This is "peer-to-peer," or P2P, and while this technology has been tainted by the unauthorized sharing of copyrighted music and movies, the software enabling it is important - picture networks of freely shared ideas facilitating scientific research, software development — all kinds of collaborative efforts — and the general dissemination of information.

Gone Courting

After the courts refused to shut down the new decentralized services earlier this year because they possess "significant non-infringing" uses and because they don't host any unauthorized files themselves, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) decided to sue individual file-sharers, in other words, its customers.

Since September, 382 people have been sued nationwide. At least 220 computer users have agreed to pay settlements, averaging several thousand dollars apiece. "The legal actions taken by the record companies have been effective in educating the American public that illegal file sharing of copyrighted material has significant consequences," opined RIAA President Cary Sherman recently in a prepared statement. "Consumers are increasingly attracted to the host of compelling legal online music alternatives. These lawsuits help to foster an environment that provides a level playing field for these services to succeed."

Maybe, but the RIAA's campaign has also drawn a tsunami of criticism on various grounds, especially its attempts to force Internet service providers (ISPs) to disclose personal information about subscribers suspected of being illegal file sharers without prior court review. SBC Communications Inc. and the American Civil Liberties Union are separately challenging the RIAA in court over this issue. On December 19, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia overturned a trial judge's decision to enforce copyright subpoenas against Verizon, making it much more expensive and cumbersome to sue individual file sharers. The appeals court said the 1998 copyright law, the DMCA, doesn't cover file sharing networks. The law "betrays no awareness whatsoever that Internet users might be able directly to exchange files containing copyrighted works," the court wrote.

The campaign has also drawn customer boycotts and acts of defiance such as this http://www.downhillbattle.org/riaa/ one recently conducted by the Downhill Battle organization.

Politics

Washington has also taken note. Sen. Norm Coleman (R-Minn.) voiced three concerns about the campaign in an online chat in late-October. "First, the broad grant of subpoena authority has the potential to sweep in folks who may not have done anything wrong," he wrote. "Second, the civil penalties in this area, including fines up to $150,000 per song, are clearly excessive. They can be used to intimidate and threaten folks who may or may not have done anything wrong. Finally," he concluded, "I also have concerns about the impact on personal privacy protection. The technology used by the RIAA and P2P networks has the potential to undermine personal privacy protections."