By Michael Santo
Contributing Writer, RealTechNews
In what I originally labeled “hilarious” and “ironic”, the Virgin chain of stores in France has been fined for illegal downloading and selling of a Madonna song, “Hung Up.”
The store’s online portal, virginmega.fr, was ordered by the Paris Tribunal de Commerce to pay 600,000 euros, or $754,000, in damages for downloading the Madonna song “Hung Up” from a France Télécom Web site that had exclusive rights to distribute the song for one week.
“This is an amazing case of simple piracy by a respected company,” Hervé Payan, senior vice president for content partnership and service at France Télécom, said Tuesday. “Virgin behaved in a surreal manner by downloading the song, cracking protection measures and then selling it from their own Web site.” Source: Newsfactor
We Say: Why do I say I originally labeled it “x”? Because originally I thought it was a simple mistake, but since the story clearly states they cracked the DRM … Then I thought about the flap between France and Apple over the iTunes DRM. Although the proposed law has essentially been neutered, it was brought up by Laurent Fiscal, a director of the store.
Piracy? Virgin Megastores In France Fined
Michael Santo of RealTechNews writes: In what I originally labeled “hilarious” and “ironic,” the Virgin chain of stores in France has been fined for illegal downloading and selling of a Madonna song, Hung Up. The store’s online portal, virginmega….