Fast forward to about two weeks ago, when a new ruling gave EMI again a way to go after Robertson’s personal assets in court.

That poor decision was made after a key witness – a former director at MP3tunes who was fired – was reportedly paid by EMI to get her to change her deposition after the judge had already thrown it out. For more information about this unexpected turn of events, head over to this excellent article on TechDirt.

The fact that the record labels were going after Robertson personally was as despicable two years ago as it is now, and Robertson has now understandably appealed the court decision that would allow the roughly two dozen labels to personally sue him for MP3tunes’ alleged copyright infringement (which is also BS since the service only allows people to store their own digital music online and lets them access it from any Web-enabled device).

Robertson filed a motion for reconsideration or alternately certification for interlocutory appeal on Friday in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

Meanwhile, he continues to ask readers of his blog to spread the word about EMI’s lies to the world. I’d consider doing just that if I were you.

(Image credit: MichaelRobertson.com)

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Grooveshark is a web-based music application where you can go to listen to music on-demand, at no charge. Users get access to individual songs from a 7-million strong track catalog, save playlists, and embed both on other websites, blogs, and social media profiles via the Grooveshark Widget.

In addition, Grooveshark allows both artists and record labels to promote themselves through the application with ads and pay-per-listen campaigns.

Grooveshark has a paid VIP version with some exclusive features, and a special interface for users who cough up $3 per month (or $30 a year).

Under the fresh deal, Grooveshark users will gain access to content from EMI’s roster of current and legendary catalog artists and EMI Music Publishing’s songwriters.

Grooveshark CEO Sam Tarantino said:

“EMI Music and EMI Music Publishing have collaborated with us to create a mutually sustainable deal which represents the future of digital music. We will continue to deliver the best music service on the Internet to our users, and we will expand our capacity to strengthen fan-to-artist connections through our technology.”

The terms for the licensing agreement, which extends to the United States only, remain undisclosed. I daresay it was most likely a good deal for EMI and less so for Grooveshark.

If Grooveshark now manages to sign up the other majors too, it stands a chance to become the ‘Spotify in the U.S.’ before Spotify actually crosses the pond. But if its model will prove to be sustainable remains to be seen.

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Music search and streaming service Project Playlist may finally be turning the tide in its ongoing battle with the music industry. EMI Music, one of the three major labels which was suing Project Playlist for copyright infringement, dropped out of the litigation and is announcing today that it has licensed its entire catalog to the service instead. EMI joins Sony BMG, which was never part of the lawsuit, in licensing its digital catalog of music to Project Playlist.

That is two down, two to go. Warner Music and Universal Music Group are still party to the suit. If Project Playlist CEO Owen Van Natta can get them to license their catalogs as well, maybe the vultures circling the company will go away. The service is currently banned on both Facebook and MySpace. Getting the other two labels on board would be necessary for lifting those bans.

Warner and Universal don’t seem to be in any rush to settle, however. And Project Playlist doesn’t have much time. The number of U.S. unique visitors going to its site has dropped from 10.4 million in November, 2008 to 6.1 million in February, 2009, according to comScore.

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EMI is a particularly litigious company. In the recent past, they’vd sued or threatened to sue AllofMP3, YouTube, Apple, MP3Tunes, XM Radio, Infospace (can’t really blame them there) and even The Beatles.

One person close to the litigation says that the parties have been negotiating with EMI for well over a year to avoid litigation, but that they were unable to reach agreement. The shakedown attempt before litigation is standard practice these days. But what is a little different here is that EMI is going deep into the supply chain to find other deep pockets.

VideoEgg, for example, provided video functionality to Hi5 in the past, but the deal ended in April 2008, and they no longer work together. The ten John Doe defendants are presumably other service providers, and/or executives of Hi5, VideoEgg and those other companies. The fact that EMI included VideoEgg in the lawsuit shows that they care little about current infringement – they just want a payoff for stuff that happened in the past.

VideoEgg CEO Matt Sanchez says that they comply with all DMCA takedown demands, but never received one from EMI. VideoEgg also used AudibleMagic , he says, to identify and proactively removed copyrighted material.

The lawsuit complaint, which was filed in New York, is below.

EMI Music v. VideoEgg, Hi5 and others – Get more Legal Forms

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Merrill joined Google in 2003 as Senior Director of Information Systems. In the position he just left, he held direct line responsibility for all internal engineering and support worldwide. He was previously an SVP at Charles Schwab and Co.

Why would someone would jump ship from the do no evil company into one of the most despised industries in the world? I don’t have the details yet, but I look forward to reading the official press release when it comes out in the next few days.

One thing’s for certain – he finally found a place for that rock star haircut he’s sporting in the video below. Congratulations on the move, Doug, and Just Say No to a music tax.

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