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Grokster Shutting Down?

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the evil-is-as-evil-does dept.

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?

8 of 302 comments (clear)

  1. Propaganda from the AP by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful
    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.

    1. Re:Propaganda from the AP by Wavicle · · Score: 5, Informative

      IIRC, Grokster lost their case because they advertised themselves as a great way to get movies and music for free. Essentially marketing themselves as a conduit for copyright infringement. So much so that people were confused and actually believed they were downloading the stuff legally. (Don't start on how could someone think that, I won't argue the qualities of human ignorance.)

      There are plenty of good uses for P2P. Copyright infringement, while popular, is not a "good" use.

      --
      Education is a better safeguard of liberty than a standing army.
      Edward Everett (1794 - 1865)
  2. Temporary Victory by mysqlrocks · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "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.

    --
    Bradley Holt
  3. Not a big loss, really. by Red+Samurai · · Score: 5, Insightful

    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.

  4. Historical Precedent when Xerox was Outlawed by srobert · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Back in the mid-twentieth century, a company called Xerox was producing a machine which could be used to illegally copy copyrighted materials in books. The courts ruled that the company had to stop making and selling the illegal technology and pay damages to the publishers. At least that's how I remember it.

  5. Re:Besides Bittorrent and Usenet.... by varmittang · · Score: 5, Informative

    eDonkey
    Overnet
    Emule-kademlia
    BitTorrent
    Fasttrack (Kazaa, Imesh, Grobster)
    FileTP (FTP/HTTP downloads)
    Gnutella (Bearshare, Limewire,etc)
    Gnutella2 (Shareaza)
    Soulseek
    Direct-Connect
    Opennap

    Most of them are accessable by using a MLdonkey client, some are still in the works. MLdonkey Can be found at http://www.nongnu.org/mldonkey/

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  6. Timeline: by voice_of_all_reason · · Score: 5, Insightful

    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...

  7. Insightful? No. FUD! by kiddailey · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Why the hell was that moderated +5 insightful? It's so full of holes it isn't even funny.

    "I don't believe there are any real (as in frequently used) legitimate reasons for P2P networks to exist other than to distribute material illegally. ... I'm not saying that it's not possible to use P2P networks for legit reasons, and I'm not saying that on occasion people do obtain legal materials from them."

    I run a community gaming site that catalogs maps for First Person Shooters. With over 10 GB of maps and growing, P2P combined with magnet links is an incredibly valuable method of file distribution that doesn't require loads of cash, server cycles and bandwidth to operate and maintain. It boasts hundreds of downloads a week. I'd hardly call that "occassional."

    Really though, it's not a good way for an author to market something (no tracking, no content control, no targeting, etc), and it's not a convenient way for the consumer to retrieve something (file descriptors can be poor, you get queued up, you have to share back to get good rates with some services, etc).

    No tracking, content control and targeting? Not convenient? You have to share back to get good rates? File descriptions are poor?

    Any qualified web admin can implement tracking on the web site that's listing the download whether it be magnet, torrent or otherwise. As well, some P2P apps provide limited download tracking. BitTorrent on it's own does not provide tracking either (you'd have to analyze torrent downloads in the server log files), so your point is kind of moot.

    Not convenient? Ever heard of a magnet link? You put a link on your page. Clicking it launches the user's P2P app and starts the download. How is that not convenient? On a comparison to BitTorrent I'd say it's just as, if not more convenient (I don't have to delete old torrent files with magnet links). Compared to HTTP downloads, all P2P tech is obviously less convenient since you have to download P2P software.

    Share back to get good rates? Funny... that's how BitTorrent works and a good number of other P2P networks don't.

    The one giant exception here is Bittorrent ... encourages the distribution of *legitamate* content because it a) allows the author to create and maintain a torrent that isn't connected to some vast network of crap, b) torrents can be "distributed" via websites, which is where you want your consumer to be, c) the consumer gets faster downloads, d) the author pays for less bandwidth.

    As I mentioned, magnet links eliminate the problems of the "vast network of crap." They contain a file hash similar to a torrent file and can contain one or more source seed server addresses. They can be put on a website just like any URL with the added benefit that they don't require you to have a one-to-one relationship of all your files to torrent files.

    The fact that you even need to maintain and distribute torrent files is a pain. If I've got 4,000 files I want to distribute via BitTorrent, it requires that I maintain 4,000 torrent files. Granted, a software author may not have 4,000 files, but the requirement to maintain them still exists regardless.

    The consumer only gets faster downloads with BitTorrent if they are able to get it configured and playing nice with their particular setup. Most, but not all, "average Joes" I've tried to sell BitTorrent on always complain about painful tweaking and crappy speeds because of it. This is primarily because BitTorrent requires you to upload back to the swarm, while others do not.

    And a BitTorrent author only pays less for bandwidth if there are a large number of continually connected seeds and peers. If not, the