Warner Music has filed suit against music search engine Seeqpod for copyright infringement.
Seeqpod offers a music search engine that allows users to play music they find directly on the site. According to comScore the service had over 6 million page views in December 2007.
Warner Music claims in its suit that Seeqpod infringes on their copyrighted works by “making on-demand and unauthorized digital public performances of these works,” making a direct and material contribution to infringing content by presenting content from “pirate sites.”
What’s interesting about this case is that Seeqpod is a search engine; it links to content as Google would, although it does allow users to play the content from their site, but ultimately they never host any of the content.
The EFA notes that there is little case law relating to search engines and copyright claims, and the DMCA should be applicable here; “the defendants are complying with the letter of the law, but copyright owners are now trying to change the rules in court.”
anyway… it is bringing copyright infringing materials to users…
Just curious, what exactly happens to a company like SeeqPod if they lose a case like this? Does the company just fold, or do the owners actually owe millions of dollars out of their own pockets?
i think seeqpod is rubbish, i’ve been using search4file.com and happy with the search results i get.
Yikes. I always thought seeqpod was a little outfit. Wonder if they’d still be in court if it wasn’t for the investor $.
Zaid
the money and traffic combined I’d think, certainly if they were a little site with no funding….
Simon, I’m probably totally offbase, but unless the company is incorporated - the owners are held liable.
SeeqPod is awesome. The lawsuit is crap. They are just a search engine with a player built in. I like them better than Last.fm. Why not go after sites like rapidshare or mediafire for hosting pirated goods - oh yeah, it’s too hard.
I dont understand why people keep comparing seeqpod and google. They are completely different. if seeqpod simply gave you the links to the site where the song was being hosted and you had to go to that site, then they would be similar.
Jason, obviously they are incorporated. Do you think the founders are suicidal or something?
did google buy them yet?
playable search results - cool concept
It is obvious that Warner Bros is going to protest, imagine the losses that they have by the amount of CD which they have let sell… most of the people prefer the pirate CD.
I am suprized they didn’t use it to go after the hosts because it lists where the files are.
Well damn, if this holds up in court, they are coming after Google next.
If they are complying with the letter of the law, then the law needs strengthened. But there’s no way in hell this is ethical. Is the world really THAT bereft of ideas that piracy is considered the best way to make a living?
I wonder if Seeqpod created a press release in regards to this lawsuit!
No doubt the attention from it will their traffic!
Warner’s new organic growth is filing law suits!
Google links to millions of copyrighted pages. What makes music different than text or images. If someone has posted a coprighted article or image, can Google be sued too? How is a search engine able to distinguish? The hosting site is the guilty party here.
Chuck: How is this ‘unethical’? Firstly, it is just intelligently scouring the open web for results to a search to stuff other people are posting. The other people may or may not be being ‘ethical’. Exactly to Bobs comment… the whole Internet is comprised of what could be considered the copyrighted works of individuals.
SEEQPOD is not running banner ads. Signing up is free. The ONLY promotional content on the page just so happens to be the fact that they link to when an artist is on tour. They also seem to not provide a direct means to grab the media file in question (even though the URL is displayed, typically cropped, below the playlist item).
If they were SELLING the content, that would be unethical. If they were reaping massive ad revenue while not complying when a copyright owner sends them a notice to remove a link that would be unethical. If they were unwilling to remove links to materials a copyright owner asks them to remove according to the letter of the law, that would be unethical.
And to the notion that this isn’t like google because on google you have to ‘click’ to go visit that site the results produced. Well, this is not a search to find pages this is a search to find time-based media. You don’t have to end up at a page to view that media (much like when you use google image search you don’t have to go to the page to ‘view’ the image). Furthermore, isn’t click the results of the search to play it essentially the same thing as clicking to go listen to it on a site? Result: you hear/see the content.
And no, the world isn’t bereft of ideas. One of the problems is we have people unwilling to leverage this new platform into sensible revenue sources because they are more concerned with limiting and controlling consumer options in favor of price control (because us consumers don’t want to find music on our friends’ web sites - we want to be forced to go to one e-store for one song, one for another, and never find that old song that was on one of the band’s early albums that doesn’t ‘test well’ (or the label doesn’t even know where the master recording went)). Some new idea comes along that they could very well leverage into a bunch of economic activity and the reaction is to sue it out of existence. I mean, they already did their deal with ‘imeem’ (which is a P.O.S. mess of a web site), so why let anybody else find a way to get music to the masses online?
And for the record, I have family who work in the music industry and great insight into it. NOBODY in the music industry pays for all their music. They give each other promos, they copy albums, they go to shows for free. They do EXACTLY what the consumers they are trying to shut down do: they copy stuff when it is inconvenient to them to buy it, or when it does not mean enough to them to buy it. They buy stuff that is convenient and important to them. I’d love to see someone sue all of Warner’s labels on grounds that they have violated their own (and other labels) artists’ copyrights and should be liable for $150k or so for every CDr or ripped song sitting on their harddrives.
Kind of a bummer, huh? I like seeqpod because it’s useful: a search term + 2 clicks and I hear the results. My PC is loaded with audio software so I’d be able to hear the results even without their player. I suspect that this is part of Warner’s argument: it’s seeqpod’s software playing the song at the end of the transaction (between the person who ripped the copy of the recording and the listener).
The mashed-up web2.x browser experiences fuzz the legalities in new and interesting ways… I’d watch this case closely.
I’ve been using the site for awhile now, and I just checked it a couple minutes ago and it’s stuffing it’s results with various media. For example “Death Cab For Cutie” doesn’t bring up Deathcab audio alone, but also wikipedia page entries.
Weird.
Is this move part of their defense?
Mo-
I noticed the same. The complaint specifically mentions the fact that seeqpod’s search specializes in deep-link results for music files. “…SeeqPod is no simple search engine. SeeqPod searches for a particular type of content — music — that SeeqPod knows is overwhelmingly copyrighted.”
Can you imagine the Friday evening scrum: “Let’s get wikipedia in there asafp!!”
CG
This is a very simple case in court. There are historical cases brought against Google et al for similar violations (specifically with regard to video where Google won) however, the nuts and bolts boil down this these 2 simple facts.
1) Search engines cannot be held in violation of copyright law, simply because they provide listings of results within a specific vertical (in this case MP3 files).
2) This is the area that is not black and white and boils down to this question:
Q) Can a search engine that also allows users to listen to content (via a player) which (may) be copyrighted - be liable for the actions of the publishers (those third parities who are publishing content) who choose to: 1) host illegal content. 2) cache illegal content. 3) publish illegal content. Further can this also be extended that the widget providers be also responsible for users who chose to listen to that copyrighted content?
The arguments against are as follows:
A) It would be extremely unlikely that Warner Music could prove that a search engine is liable for the publishing actions of the entire internet publishing community, else we would see all search engines close down. Search engines are not the police, they have no ability or mandate to check that content is published with the permission of rights holders.
B) It would be extremely unlikely that Warner Music could prove that a company who offered a device or widget such as a music player that allowed users the ability to listen / view / gain access to content that is illegally published to be in breach of copyright law themselves for providing such a tool. If this were the case then companies such Microsoft / Apple / Mozilla would be also be in breach of copyright law because they too provide such a tool (a browser) that allows users a method to view content that (may) be copyrighted. - case closed.
The climate:
1) We have all witnessed labels such as Warner, et al fail to deal with the changing technology, and terrain for the last 7 years, now they are playing catch up while doing deals with the likes of Lastfm to try and bridge the void they left that others now fill.
2) Major artists such as Radiohead, Madonna et al, frustrated with their labels are breaking away from them in droves, and most upcoming artists are choosing to bypass labels altogether (no new blood) which also spells disaster.
3) Everyone (except the labels) can see that the industry will change to an ad revenue model and are pushing in that direction, Yahoo, Aol, Badoo, (the Russians) etc. are all offering search facilities to MP3 content.
4) There is no legal way that any company or organization can legally enforce copyright law across the entire internet. The legal system is a sham and the only winners of such cases is the legal system itself, which actually acts as a parasite to those involved, and besides where one fails another will take their place.
The Truth:
This is yet another attempt to intimidate a company into submission driven by week and ignorant staff within these companies so they can somehow justify to their sharholders and bosses that every effort is being made.
My advice:
Warner, fire the legal team, fire the ignorant members of staff who talked you into this ridicules case that you will never win, and go and employ the best young coders / hackers that you can find and build (or buy) yourself an application that competes with your new found competition.
It’s capitalism for better and worse. You cannot just enjoy it when it suits you, then complain when the tides shift and you find yourself on the loosing team!
That is why this case will probably not even get into a courtroom. It’s too muddy of an issue. As someone with some knowledge of the music business, I can say that Warner Bros. is actually more progressive and open minded when it comes to streaming digital music on-line than the other majors.
So why are they doing this? They are simply trying to bait Seeqpod into a settlement that would allow Warner to get some advertising income (when there is some) and not be left out of the revenue picture. The major labels actually see music streaming as a future revenue source (that’s why they did the imeem deal). But they need to start with lawsuits to get the Seeqpod’s to take them seriously. It may be crazy to say, but this is a right of passage for Seeqpod to ultimately become a legitimate music search engine. It’s all just part of the game.
who knows, They have full time legal staff sitting around, suing little old ladies gets old after while.
This was probably noted as a long shot , but if they win it gives all of them clear jurisdiction over how search engines index and display content… But if you notice, google displays a youtube player widget in it’s results with plenty of CR infringing works. so lets face it, this is bullying the little guy to set precedence.
http://www.google.com/search?q.....US257US257
case in point.
I dont understand, why new websites again and again think, that they can solve this problem with the copyright infrindgement
there is no free lunch - so easy it is