It seem after hearing that the developers of Soulseek are not rolling in money as they had previously claimed a french recording industry group has decided to try to knock out the network, most likely using the "economic warfare" method, SoulSeek is susceptible to this kind of attack as it based on a central Napster-like server, thus hitting that single spot will close the network completely.
http://torrentfreak.com/music-industry-takes-soulseek-to-court-081120/Last week we reported that French record labels were going after four file-sharing applications, including Limewire and the BitTorrent client Vuze. Now, just days later, two other French organizations are to continue this crackdown and sue Soulseek.
SACEM, the French association for music producers and SCPP, which represents record labels including Universal, EMI, BMG, Warner have filed a complaint against the filesharing application.
The industry bodies argue that Soulseek, an application created by former Napster programmer Nir Arbel, is designed to permit unauthorized access to copyrighted works. According to a French law adopted in 2006, distributing such software is an offense that can lead to a 3 year jail sentence, as well as a fine up to 300,000 euros.
On the Soulseek website, it is clearly stated that the intention of their application is not to infringe copyright. Instead, it aims “to help unsigned and/or independent artists find a place in the ever-growing music industry, in a place where discussion and the creation of music can take place.”
Instead of supporting this creative platform, the French music industry continues its witch-hunt, effectively killing their own business. If they are successful, this case, or the lawsuits against the other four p2p clients, will undoubtedly impact other filesharing applications.
I will of course be watching this spectacle very closely as its likley at some stage the morons behind such lawsuits will target other networks and look for more non label sites to close, that is after all their key aim, you cant enforce a monopoly when you have competition and thats something the industry has been working to remove now since Napster when folks found out it wasnt necessary to go cap in hand to the recording industry to earn some revenue.
