By David Johnston
Contributing Writer, RealTechNews

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Today the Supreme Court of the United States decided the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios v. Grokster case in which MGM was suing the Grokster network claiming that it was responsible for the content shared over its network. Lower courts had ruled in favor of Grokster because of the lack of centralization and direct control it had over the content shared on its network, however the Supreme Court determined that because Grokster distributed its software “with the object of promoting its use to infringe copyright” (Justice Souter) that it was responsible for the illegal actions of the users of its software. It has been noted, however, that this ruling will probably not do much to stop file-sharing software makers since the Supreme Court doesn’t have jurisdiction outside the United States. In any case, this is a major decision in the continuing battle between the music, movie, and software industries and the creators of file-sharing networks.

Source: Top Tech News