Movie Studios Jump In Late: Sue LimeWire And Demand Cash From Dead Site
from the the-new-business-model? dept
Limewire is long dead and buried as a file sharing platform, and with the company settling the lawsuit filed against it by the major record labels for $105 million (down from the many trillions it had originally said it deserved), you might think that the legal shenanigans were long over. Apparently, someone in the MPAA just woke up to the fact that this might be a way to get some easy cash to pump into its next lobbying campaign, and has just now sued Limewire as well, demanding cash for any of its files that were traded. Of course, a bunch of indie record labels also sued, so it appears that lots of those who chose not to innovate are now trying to feed off of what's left of Limewire's carcass. It does make you wonder, of course, what made the movie studios wait so damn long. Of course, isn't that just like Hollywood? Rather than do something original, it just does a "remake" of something someone else already did?Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: copyright, file sharing, lawsuit
Companies: limewire, mpaa
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
....Oh god, the MPAA/RIAA are so stupid, it's funny now.
I think we should create a tally of all the times they've done something stupid over doing something smart.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Old Dog, Old Trick...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Question
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
WTF Hollywood?!?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: WTF Hollywood?!?
Hollywood has made truckloads of money from riding dead horses....
Put a moving background behind them and a wind machine... horses on the move (pay no attention to the unmoving legs)...
... sorry meme too old...
Declare the horse is now "better, faster and cheaper."
Say this horse was procured with cost as an independent variable.
Or the source of current management at the **AA's:
Promote the dead horse to a supervisory position.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: WTF Hollywood?!?
Id say they would put the dead horse on some stilts, have a motor move the stilts... TADA; a whole new plot
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: WTF Hollywood?!?
But of course it would cost them 10 times more money to do this, then when people didn't want to pay the inflated price for a crappy version, claim piracy is ruining them.
In the mean time, they could have gotten a live horse for a lot less and created a better plot!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: WTF Hollywood?!?
Snore.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: WTF Hollywood?!?
lol just crop their legs out of the shot, no one will ever figure it out
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: WTF Hollywood?!?
.....wait for it......
And now your laughing....
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: WTF Hollywood?!?
I saw the movie, it wasn't that good. Bit on the squishy side, actually.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: WTF Hollywood?!?
this one time, at band camp, ...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
"What are they trying to do here? Are they trying to get some type of favorable court ruling to set future precedent? There is no way that they think this could get them any payment- there's nothing left. This move has to be costing them money in legal fees"
What I think people forget is that the MPAA are not content creators. The MPAA is a firm, hired by the Hollywood movie execs, to specifically lobby, sue and bully the rest of the world to do their bidding. (So the Hollywood execs do not have to actually 'waste time' with things like thinking about hwo to improve their businesses).
I think the entire world needs to stop trying to address Chris Dodd and the MPAA. That is not to say that we shouldn't try to stop them at every point; but along with pointing out the fallacies that they promote, we should try to educate the common workers in the industry about how the internet could work for their benfit.
We should address the film making unions in this country, and work to teach the union members about new ways their bosses could be selling the product that they (the union members) have created.
If we get the unions to understand the whole "failed business model vs. new media" AND "new business models are often created through new media" this might all get a whole lot easier for those of us in the supporting freedom of the internet crowd.
aPaulD
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
You can't write this shit.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
CAn't hear you over the..
I picture this
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: CAn't hear you over the..
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_027yG3D69yE/TB0pSjKMLzI/AAAAAAAAADk/8A9tYev1azI/s1600/flogging-d ead-horse.jpg
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
There Be YARM !!!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
tsk tsk tsk
How dare you. You are always telling the MPAA to adopt new and upcoming business models... And this the the only one they are good at. So, let them enjoy trying to get blood from a stone. -_-
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
If it's dissolved, there's nobody or nothing to sue.
It no longer exists!
It's like suing Pan Am for an airline crash in the 1970s!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
***waddles off to the attorney's office***
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
it works for dvds, i'm sure!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
MPAA WINS $3.5 KAJILLION DOLLARS IN COPYRIGHT LAWSUIT.
That is the headline.
So few people will get down into the details of the case and point out that they were just picking over the carcass.
This is a lawyers idea of how to generate fear, I've seen this happening in other cases going on now. Name a lawyer with multiple $200K "wins", where the actual award will be a tiny portion paid over time and the 200K will be reduced as long as he behaves.
SJD - No fair giving it away yet....
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Of course, i'm sure they also thrive on bad caselaw this shit generates. It's win-win for them. Their money came easy.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Its stupidly brilliant. Or brilliantly stupid? Think about it. They can claim they have no ideas or writers, because pirates are destroying creativity and jobs.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
But apparently the **AA's are full of these people.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
And here, Mike, you have provided a very accurate picture of what the MPAA truly is: a scavenger. A vulture, in other words. Such birds do not typically bring down their prey themselves but instead feed only on the wounded and the dead. Interestingly, one of the terms for a group of vultures is, in fact, committee. Like vultures, the MPAA and other gatekeepers do not do anything productive themselves, but merely subsist off of the efforts of others. Ironic given that that is the very accusation which they level at anyone who questions their behavior.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
What a shill. Rants about copying, and copies someone else wholesale. Oh, right, Big Media is wounded and dead. Just like Limewire!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Not sure if I'd pay to watch it or just download it though!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]