KAZAA - APPEALING, BUT SLOWLY

In Australia, Sharman networks have indicated that they intend to appeal against the recent Federal Court decision which found the company guilty of encouraging copyright breaches through its Kazaa software. That, in itself, is not surprising. And the appeal will have to wait until early next year - that, too, doesn't surprise what with the speed of justice.

What is incredible is that the music industry intends to seek "billions of dollars" in settlement. Now, we know that the RIAA and its client bodies around the planet show themselves time and time again to be harsh in their demands - insisting that each illegal download is worth thousands, and so on - but this really shows them to be outside reality on such a grand scale we're not sure how they can find office space while they orbit Jupiter.

Clearly, the Australian music industry hasn't misplaced "billions of dollars" in the short time that Kazaa had been operating, so the demand isn't based on any real sort of loss, is it? It's a made-up figure.

And even if the billions of dollars were legitimate, surely even a record industry executive must realise, somewhere in the coke-fugged head, that Sharman wasn't selling illegal copies of the stuff; it's not like you're going through a robber's pockets to find the cash he got selling your DVD player down The Goat and Compass. Sharman simply don't have billions of dollars, because not only did billions of dollars worth of material go through their networks, but they weren't selling anything anyway.

Time and time again: The music industry don't live in the same world as anyone else.

music australia kazaa