The United States Supreme Court, in a unanimous ruling, disagreed with two lower court rulings. Today’s opinion agrees with the MPAA and RIAA contention that P2P developers are responsible for the infringing activities of its users. The decision is a serious setback for commercial file-sharing companies, who were hoping a favorable Supreme Court decision would give the necessary leverage to negotiate a distribution agreement with the RIAA and MPAA.
With today’s ruling reaffirming the rights of the RIAA and MPAA, these two organizations are now more secure then ever before in their distribution methods. This also leaves StreamCast and Grokster wide open for additional copyright infringement lawsuits. StreamCast and Grokster, the two defendants named in the MGM lawsuit, have been fighting the movie and music industry for nearly 3 years.