Comments on: RIAA files copyright suit against Project Playlist

Music industry accuses company that makes embeddable music player of infringing on intellectual property.

[mattumanu]

They want to shut down legal competition

I'm a podcaster, who writes the music for my show as well as hosting and other duties. By targetting the services that allow me to easily distribute my show (and other shows) the RIAA seeks shut people like me down. Read the list of "third party" sites. Many of them host legitemate material.

[Imalittleteapot]

Media Player?

Would this also make Windows Media Player illegal too? I can use it to play illegally copied music.

A friend also has a website with links that when clicked play audio files via requesting Media Player to load and redirecting it to the audio file hosted on their site.

If my friend was hosting illegal music instead of audio commentary, or illegal movies then could they sue Microsoft for facilitating copyright violations by producing Media Player?

What about the flash player from YouTube that I can embed in my page? Instead of playing the song with this I could simply find the whole video on YouTube, and then embed the whole video right onto my page. Also, consider that if I embed the YouTube video, the files aren't even hosted by the third party anymore. They really are hosted by YouTube. Wouldn't YouTube's embedded flash player actually make a more logical target? Well at least I think that's how YouTube videos are hosted. Don't really use it much.

[aka_tripleB]

This will be costly for the RIAA

Especially if they lose. Project Playlist clearly has a legitimate use for its software. Not all, if not most, of the music played through the software is infringing copyright law. And the DMCA cannot be invoked, because it's not Project Playlist that is circumventing any protection that may have been placed on the music. Depending how the music is "reproduced," there might not be a case at all. But seems how there is no evidence on my computer that any music file was copied to it, it would appear that there isn't much of a case there. So the only people the RIAA should be going after are the people that are hosting the servers that have the infringing content on them.

But we know all about the RIAA and its lawyers: they're lazy. They don't try to do any research or do a little work that will do what they say they are trying to stop (they claim to be trying to stop copyright infringement of their client's work). It's pretty clear now that they are just trying to extort money from people.