Puretunes settles: $10.5M
p2pnet.net News:- Sakfield Holding Company SL, the operator of Spain’s Puretunes, has agreed to pay $10.5 million to settle a copyright suit levelled by the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America).
Daniel Rung, Michael Rung, Matthew Rung and Wayne Rosso also agreed to pay $125,000 each.
Daniel Rung founded and owns Grokster Ltd. His brother, Matthew, and his son work with him.
Rosso, the former ceo of Grokster and Blubster, says he was Grokster’s ceo at the time and was acting as a marketing consultant to Puretunes. He was never one of the owners, he says.
Puretunes went online in May and, “Sakfield claimed it had obtained licenses from Spanish trade associations representing publishers and musicians, enough to comply with Spanish copyright laws,” says an IDG News Service story, going on to quote RIAA president Cary Sherman as saying:
“Puretunes.com duped consumers by claiming it was a legitimate online music retailer when, in fact, it was no such thing.”
Puretunes went off-line in mid-June.
“There’s a number of these sites throughout the world that are going untouched,” Rosso told p2pnet.
“These people [the Rungs] wanted to do the right thing. They were told by their attorneys in Spain that emails from all the property societies were in hand, but not executed copies of agreements.
“In Spain, evidently, emails aren’t legal. As soon as it was discoverd these contracts hadn’t been executed, the site was shut down voluntarily.”
Rosso said the action was meant to embarrass him but, “I’m beyond embarassment.”
We asked Rosso who’s after him.
“The RIAA,” he said. “They’re going to be laughing today but frankly, they need all the laughs they can get.”
For the past few months, Rosso has been working on a deal which he says will revolutionize the online music world.
An announcement is expected imminently, he told p2pnet.
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See:-
obtained licenses – RIAA aims to bid adios to Puretunes, IDGÂ News Service, July 10, 2003
October 26th, 2004 at 6:46 pm
I wouldn’t count on Rosso.
Anyway as far as I am concerned there is no need for more revolution.
As long as Allofmp3 and Mp3search are online I can get all the music that’s hard to get through filesharing for a few pennies.
This Russian Revolution is fine with me
))
October 26th, 2004 at 7:17 pm
They should counter sue and enter those emails as evidence. As for the revolution, while the Russian services are cheap, nothing beats P2P.
Drake