grokster goes down

Movies & Music Blog

It has caught my attention through this article that not just anyone can host a piracy of products on the net. You have to be some what competent as it turns out.

As obvious as it is what and how these software’s are up to, which is to horde a site for free trade of music and other media so that they may also run advertisements throughout the homes of users; there is a way of getting such services shut down, although I find it very hard to do so based on the fact that there are almost identically functional software’s such as "Kazaa" that have not been deemed illegal nor have been banned from the web. Inevitably, it is the choice of the users to either buy or down load media for free. This ban of Grokster may affect the company dramatically sometime in the future but I am sure with the amount of users it already has, they can buy time to create a new, "legal" software with the same functions. The RIAA is working hard to stop piracy claiming that it costs the music industry over $300 million a year. It is impossible to patrol all of cyberspace or even a significant fraction of it seeing as how it is endless. Educating web-surfers is almost as pointless because the youngsters today already believe that down loading media is not wrong. They see big corporations as the wrong doers and in turn look past moral judgment when it comes to "stealing" media product.
This is John Schwartz here for the Washington Post.

but not without a fight

Its hard to believe that a program that helps connect wayward travellers on the information superhighway could be wrong. Many people see programs like Grokster as a godsend, and why not? Who can argue with free music obtained anonymously? Who else but those who would otherwise profit off that music. They say they lose 300 million dollars a year on "illegal" downloads but they are wrong. Anybody who can obtain music for free will obtain more than they would buy otherwise. Whatever they believe they are losing, they never would have had. It is indeed nearly impossible to regulate the entire domain of cyberspace, but why should we? Cyberspace is a beautiful new Arcadia where people can redicover themselves and each other. It has grown to be a society all its own, and still they infect it with regulations and censorship. It is a stubborn and proud society though, and as Grokster falls, three more programs will come in its place.