Yahoo China Found Guilty Of Copyright Infringement For Linking To MP3s
from the how-dare-they! dept
A while back, we had pointed out that the success of a few Chinese search engines wasn't necessarily that they were any better than their counterparts -- but that because they were pretty explicit in helping people find downloadable music. Baidu was famous for this -- and we wondered if the company's move to go public would force a crackdown on such activities. Indeed, soon after Baidu went public in the US, it got sued. However, eventually the courts found that it was not guilty -- but because of the way the copyright laws were worded. Simple solution: a little pressure from the recording industry and... voila: new laws. So, with those new copyright laws in place, the IFPI went after Alibaba, who also happens to run Yahoo China. And, with those new laws in place, Alibaba has now been found guilty of copyright infringement for providing easy to find links to downloadable music (not hosting the music, just linking to it). Not surprisingly, the recording industry pulls out its favorite adjective, calling the win "significant." Given all of these "significant" wins, and the fact that the recording industry's future keeps getting bleaker and bleaker, while file sharing (and the rest of the music industry) continues to grow, I'm beginning to think that the industry maybe does not really know what that word means.
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Filed Under: china, deep linking, music search
Companies: alibaba, baidu, yahoo china
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Correct me if I'm wrong
PS: "the courts found that it not guilty" I believe you meant "the courts found it not guilty" or "that it was not guilty."
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Re: Correct me if I'm wrong
No, first suit was against Baidu. Second against Alibaba. Baidu got off clean.
PS: "the courts found that it not guilty" I believe you meant "the courts found it not guilty" or "that it was not guilty."
Whoops. You're right. Fixed.
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Nice Princess Bride Callback
Inconceivable!
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An MP3 is just a file
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Not Double Jeopardy
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The "Win" May Be "Significant," but...
All the recording industry did was spend money on lawyers and pound its' collective chest.
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Secure
There are talented musicians no one can find because labels keep the songs bottled up tight for fear of piracy. But guess what, I can't buy something if I don't know it's out there. And I'm not buying anything I haven't tried first.
Even the ice cream shop down the street lets me try samples before I order a 3 scoop cone with sprinkles.
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IFPI wrongly blames Chinese Law for Baidu loss, bu
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