Limewire

Limewire and Copyright Infringement

Limewire is a peer to peer file trading program that allows millions of users to swap illegal copies of songs and videos back and forth every day. Record companies have estimated losses in the millions of dollars range thanks to Limewire and similar programs. What these users are doing constitutes copyright infringement, and is one hundred percent illegal.

However, what the owners of Limewire are doing… is one hundred percent legal.

All Limewire does is offer a channel through which files can be shared. Those files can be pirated, or they can be legitimate. It may be true that the vast majority of content being swapped back and forth on Limewire is copyright protected and completely unauthorized, but another portion of that content is free content, open content, or within the public domain.

Lately, something that’s come into vogue has been the use of a “copyleft” protection. Copylefting allows for the holder of a copyright to give their work away for free, and to make sure that that work remains free.

This differs from releasing work as free content, or into the public domain. When you release work into the public domain, this gives other people the right to take your work, put it on a CD or DVD or print it out, and then sell it for whatever price they want to sell it for. Likewise, any derivatives of that work can be copyrighted. So if they wanted to remix one of your free songs or make a movie out of your book, that would be protected under a copyright held by them, not by you, and they would be within their rights to charge money for it, and, to press charges against anyone who gives it away for free or illegally duplicates it, even though the source material was free to begin with.

Copyleft protected content actually uses the protection of a copyright to ensure that the work remains free. Anyone who downloads or otherwise acquires something that is protected by copyleft is agreeing to a license which dictates that not only is the original work free, but you cannot sell that work, yourself, either. You can make as many derivatives as you want, remixes, remakes, etcetera, but those derivatives have to be free, as well. Furthermore, the copyleft has to hold to those free derivatives. If you create a remix, and then someone creates a remix of your remix, the original, the remix, and the remix remix, all have to be offered under the copyleft licensing arrangement.

Now, recently, artists like Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails, as well as Blues Traveler and a number of other artists have begun releasing their own work under copyleft protection. That means that these songs are one hundred percent legal to download on the internet or to trade back and forth on peer to peer file sharing sites and services. So, if the government were to take action against these services, they would basically be placing a ban not on copyright infringement, but on online trading, and online trading is one hundred percent legal, and a legitimate way of trading legitimate content.

The black mark of piracy is an unfortunate stigma that peer to peer trading may never shake. Certainly the negative image innocent trading has in some circles isn’t being helped by the fact that the majority of file traders on the internet really are practicing internet piracy and trading copyright infringing material.

Most recently, services like iTunes have tried to offer alternative, legitimate ways of obtaining copyright protected music for lower prices than you would pay to buy the actual CD. Oftentimes on a pay-per-song basis or by all-you-can-download monthly membership fees. Really, it’s the easiness that provides the allure for internet piracy. Most people wouldn’t steal a CD from a record store. When security cameras are pointed at you and anti theft devices are placed in the CD itself, it’s not worth the risk. Even if you can outrun Wal Mart security, you’re never going to be able to shop there again! Internet piracy allows people to download hundreds of songs in a manner of minutes without the hassle of driving to the store and without having to spend a dime.

People really are basically good when you come down to it, and most people who steal music online don’t really see themselves as thieves. Many don’t even see the act as being immoral, so much as convenient. Make no mistake though, it’s completely illegal, and not really worth the risk.