The BPI, Britain’s largest recording industry association, has sent a cease-and-desist letter to Google demanding the popular search engine take down links that lead to “one-click hosting” sites such as MegaUpload.
The complaint says there are at least 38 links “available via Google’s search engine, and [requests these] links be removed as soon a possible as they directly link to sound recordings owned by [BPI] members.”
A few of the songs mentioned as being readily available for unauthorized download via Google are K’Naan’s “Wavin’ Flag,” Michael Bublé’s “Haven’t Met You Yet” and Eminem’s “Not Afraid.” While Google does not host any of the infringing sites or songs, searches lead users to MegaUpload, SendSpace, Rapidshare and others.
The BPI, in an example, typed “k’naan wavin’ flag download” into Google and the first couple of pages of results showed off free download sites.
Google has often said they are not liable as they only index sites and list them, while not hosting any files.
Result for: music labels
According to sources close to the talks, it appears the U.S. Justice Department has been looking into whether Apple “unfairly dominates” the digital music market with its popular iTunes store.
The sources say the Justice Department has been contacting music labels and other digital music providers, asking broad questions about the nature of the market in general, and Apple’s role in it.
The new inquiries may have been stemmed by accusations in March that Apple was using its giant market share lead to prevent rival Amazon MP3 from debuting new songs exclusively before they hit iTunes a day or two later.
The iTunes store currently has about 70 percent market share, with Amazon trailing at around 9 percent.
Global music sales have fallen from $26.5 billion at the start of the decade to just $17 billion last year, even as digital music sales have exploded.
Result for: music labels
Vodafone, the world’s largest mobile phone operator (in terms of revenue), has inked a new deal with Warner Music Group that completes its collection of deals with major music labels.
The Warner deal will see music from artists such as James Blunt being made available by Vodafone without any copy protection mechanism included that would not just make copying harder, but also lock music to certain devices.
The operator had previously signed deals with the EMI group, Universal Music Group and Sony Music. Vodafone is now the first global mobile phone operator that will offer over-the-air downloads of music from all four major record companies.
“The response to the DRM-free offering in all the markets where it has launched has been incredibly enthusiastic,” said Pieter Knook, Vodafone Internet Services Director. “Our customers love … the flexibility that DRM-free on mobile gives them.”
The record labels continue to seek out new deals where DRM is now negotiable, as it tries to fill revenue gaps created by falling CD sales, rising piracy and other economic factors since the start of the century.
