Madster ordered to power down

Madster has been told that its got to switch off its computers. Do judges actually have the power to do that?

Madster still lives

The RIAA - who, let's face it, spend so much time in court these days might as well go the whole hog and rename themselves Wolfram and Hart - have trampled back into the state house to complain that Madster hasn't done as it was told, and stopped illegal music sharing. Madster say that it's not as simple as all that; the RIAA say "why don't you just unplug the servers", thereby missing totally the point that there are legal uses for file sharing.

The RIAA's attitude is, of course, that anything that could be used for illegal swappage must be removed from the system, even if that means everyone must return their PCs to the store and sit and wait to be told what to do next.

Next week, of course, a US court will deliver judgement on whether the case against Kazaa can be brought in the US of Americas when the company isn't based there. That one is going to be juicy.