We are not interested in people doing anything illegal.? The Digital Millennium Act allows search engine companies to link to MP3 files. However if notified that the link points to copyrighted music, the search company must remove the link immediately. Napster is completely legal simply because it does not store any content copyrighted or otherwise on their server. It is simply a trading utensil. Napster holds its users liable for illegal activity. Under their copyright policy,Napster reserves the right to terminate the account of a user and to block use of the Napster service permanently upon any single infringement of the rights of others in conjunction with the use of the Napster service.? On the same site Napster offers a notice of alleged infringement of copyright. Napster realized even early that, and I quote,This is a new territory for lots of people, and new laws are going to be made surrounding these issues. We believe that just like the radio, the more people hear songs, the more they want to buy the CD.? With this knowledge the company hired the same firm that successfully pushed away the lawsuit on the makers of the Rio MP3 player. The hired firm helped, but a lawsuit was inevitable. On Thursday, April 13th of 2000 Metallica became the first major band to sue an Internet music trading company. The suit against Napster claimed copyright infringement. This first case was settled out of court when Napster agreed to ban approx. 300,000 users who downloaded Metallica songs. It's next lawsuit was hosted by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) in June of the same year. This case has carried on and included an unsuccessful attempt to shut it down early this fall. The year and a half campaign against Napster took its toll just recently. After the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco decided that Napster needed to block access to certain popular tunes.
