The entertainment industry may have found a levy bank in this decision but it's likely all it will do is divert the channel. Their content will continue to stream. Kazaa appear confident they have never promoted their product as a way to break copyright and thus are safe from the effects of this judgement. The question of not taking "easily available steps" raises some questions that a court might have to decide. H/ever a Kazaa might argue the only easy steps would have involved industry co-operation and that has not been forthcoming.

In the end the greedy, bloated and parasitic music industry will hopefully be brought down by the technology. Why I should pay $25 for a cd, or $1.99 a song, to support an overpaid burueacracy to promote or "discover" another Beyonce is beyond me. Technolgy now has the capacity to eventually break down the "company wall" between artist and audience in a way that will send the money direct to the artist and save the consumer considerably. It might be the end of the millionaires of the industry but they won't be missed.

It's also about time the industry was told it's double and triple dipping claims are an outrage. Delivering content in one package does not give you the right to say you still own the content, and have the right to sell it to me again in a new package, and so on ad infinitum. This fiction must go, if I buy a cd I am buying the songs to use as I want, just as when I buy sausages I am not assuming I'm actually only buying the paper they come in.

If the tech companies can't be successfully sued the entertainment industry will probably try to apply the frighteners with some more big convictions against individual users. I suspect eventually some big case against a personal user will go to court and get thrown out on common sense such as that outlined above.

What's a Beyonce?