RIAA DISCUSS AND SUE

With the recent victory over Kazaa, it can only be a matter of time before the RIAA catches a little more up to date and starts to lobby for a levy on all sales of blank digital compact cassettes. In the meantime, it's launching a legal action against LimeWire.

The one piece of soothing balm watching the labels throw their money away bringing action against declining technologies is that every time they stride into court waving papers, it's like watching I Love the Early 2000s. The only thing missing from the chanting of nostalgic, half-forgotten names is Stuart Maconie popping up to blink in that attractive way of his asking "what was it about limes? Are they better suited to file sharing than oranges?"

That the music industry have crashed into court with this is an indication of how they work; LimeWire had been in talks to try and come into line with the RIAA demands of how they should operate. However, it looks like the label cartel have decided to stop talking softly, and gone straight for the big stick:

"Despite numerous efforts to engage LimeWire, the site's corporate owners have shown insufficient interest in developing a legal business model," the Recording Industry Association of America said in a statement. "While other services have come productively to the table, LimeWire has sat back and continued to reap profits on the backs of the music community. That is unfortunate and has left us no choice but to file a lawsuit to protect the rights and livelihoods of artists, songwriters and record label employees."

We're not entirely sure "reaping" is the word we'd have chosen for LimeWire profits, but the music industry has an odd attitude to money. As an example, they're demanding $150,000 for each song shared on the LimeWire network.

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