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Universal sues Bertelsmann

13 May 2003 13:43 by Petteri "dRD" Pyyny | 4 comments

World's largest record company, Universal Music Group (part of French media giant Vivendi) has sued other media giant, German Bertelsmann, claiming that Bertelsmann aided Napster in copyright infringements by funding the start-up.

Universal joins in the case with group of music publishers who originally sued Bertelsmann for the same reason in February, this year. Universal Music Group is seeking for $150,000 per illegally distributed song -- the maximum amount the controversial DMCA law allows.

Well, for consumer point of view, it is finally nice to see equal-sized opponents in the ring, instead of the usual scenario during the last couple of year: in one corner, a poor student in his worn jeans and in one corner, a multi-billion dollar media giant. But as usual, the only ones winning in this case, however it ends up, are American lawyers..

Source: AtNewYork.com

Permalink to this article

Bertelsmann and UMG announce Napster litigation settlement (6 September 2006)

The old Napster case not dismissed (15 July 2004)

Bertelsmann cannot be sued in Germany? (26 July 2003)

Bertelsmann seeks dismissal of $17bn lawsuit (14 July 2003)

EMI sues Bertelsmann (4 June 2003)

Music publishers sue Bertelsmann over Napster funding (20 February 2003)

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Discuss this article!
Ghostdog (Senior Member) 14 May 2003 2:00
That�s an insane amount of money per song. Let�s say 2 million songs were downloaded (is this a fair estimate?). That amounts to 300000000000 dollars. What is that? 300 billion? I�m not very good when it comes to big numbers. [ + quote]
martin (Newbie) 15 May 2003 1:36
IIRC, napster had over 10 million users at one point. If every user downloaded one song that's at least $1,500,000,000,000 ! True, it's insane! [ + quote]
Ghostdog (Senior Member) 15 May 2003 3:25
And think it�s fair to say that mosty dowenloaded more than one song. No one with a healthy mind can actually beleive Universal will get that amount of money. [ + quote]
martin (Newbie) 15 May 2003 6:55
Agreed. It is pointless for Universal to go ahead with this. Even if they were to win something, it would probably be lost again on appeal. [ + quote]