In the latest of several lawsuits targeting Web sites that help users search for and stream online music files, a group of record labels including three of the four majors have
filed a copyright infringement suit against Project Playlist Inc., a "social music experiment" with almost 25 million members. The site searches various sources around the Web, including blogs, social networks, label and artist sites, and other public sources, and allows users to play them from a single widget.
Although Project Playlist
says it pays royalties to clearinghouses ASCAP, BMI and SESAC, the company also acknowledges that its playlist function is built on a series of links to third-party sites whose actions it does not control. Although it doesn't host files itself--or perhaps for that very reason--the big music labels see Project Playlist as a "massive" facilitator of piracy," according to the claim.
The lawsuit casts a shadow on blog search engine
Hype Machine Inc., which allows users to stream songs found on blogs or buy them from legal sources. The service also lets people link directly to a blog that hosts an illegally uploaded file. Hype Machine couldn't immediately be reached for comment, but co-founder Anthony Volodkin has previously
expressed a desire to set up a site that searches online stores, as well as blogs.
Private equity firm KR Capital Partners is identified as a stakeholder in Project Playlist, according to the complaint. Sony BMG Music Entertainment was the only one of the four majors not to participate in the suit; nine subsidiary labels of the other three majors were named as plaintiffs. EMI is also suing MP3Tunes Inc., which allows users to store their music files in an online "locker," while labels and trade associations have previously banded together to shutter several peer-to-peer services, including the original Napster Inc.
-- Paul BonanosSee April 28 story on lawsuit from BetaNewsSee Project Playlist's copyright policy statementSee May 2007 Wired interview with Hype Machine's Anthony Volodkin
Continue reading below
