Another Gnutella client has hit the dust folks
http://www.slyck.com/news.php?story=1176On May 3rd, the plaintiffs filed a complaint against Free Peers, Inc., Vincent Falco (CEO and developer) and Louis Tatta (developer.) The plaintiffs contend that "...massive copyright infringement is the very purpose of the BearShare System and software...Defendants know it; they encourage and contribute to it; and they readily could prevent it - but choose not to."
According to court records, FreePeers, Inc. will pay a $30 million dollars to the plaintiffs of this case (Capitol Records, Sony-BMG, UMG Recordings, and Warner Music.)
As part of the settlement reached on May 4th, FreePeers, Inc. will give up all intellectual property rights to the BearShare name. This includes the BearShare source code, all associated domains (over 100), and its massive user base.
This was an expected move and I,m suprised they did not shift operatiuons out of the US and set up somewhere else more friendly to P2P.
Still I hope those who Use bearhare will stay online and filter into other non compromised networks
