Grokster Shutting Down?

An anonymous reader writes "Yahoo news is reporting that Grokster is shutting down. In a settlement with Hollywood and the music industry Grokster will be permanently banned from 'participating directly or indirectly in the theft of copyrighted files and requires the company to stop giving away its software.'" A continuation on their deal with Mashboxx, or the end of grokster entirely?

Comments

Propaganda from the AP

[Anonymous Coward]

The article begins, "Grokster Ltd., a leading developer of Internet file-sharing software popular for stealing songs and movies online,"

Uh, wait, I thought file-sharing technology was used for a variety of things. Yeah, it's mostly file-swapping of copyrighted material, but hardly the only use. According to the AP, let's just ignore the legal uses entirely and pretend that the whole purpose of this technology was to steal.

Temporary Victory

[mysqlrocks]

"This is a chapter that ends on a high note for the recording industry, the tech community and music fans and consumers everywhere," said Mitch Bainwol, head of the Recording Industry Association of America.

This is a temporary victory only for the RIAA. They can't change the fact that their business model is becoming obsolete.

Not a big loss, really.

[Red Samurai]

Grokster was never really that popular anyway. Anyway, they can shut down whatever network they want, and they can arrest anyone they want, but they'll never kill P2P off. As long as pirates exist, P2P will exist. It's a fact.

Timeline:

[voice_of_all_reason]

1990: We'll add passwords for computer games. Piracy "stopped."
1995: We'll copy-protect audio CDs. Piracy "stopped."
1997: We'll copy-protect DVDs. Piracy "stopped."
2001: We'll shut Napster down. Piracy "stopped."
2002: We'll shut Kazaa down. Piracy "stopped."
2005: We'll shut Grokster down. Piracy...