That questionably legal music service Grooveshark is in hot water again. EMI, the one big music label it has a licensing deal with, is suing its arse. The New York Times reports that, on Wednesday, EMI Music Publishing filed a suit against Grooveshark’s parent company, the Escape Media Group.
EMI claim that Escape Media has breached the contract they struck up in 2009, saying that it has “made not a single royalty payment to EMI, nor provided a single accounting statement.” The New York Times suggests that Grooveshark currently owes EMI at least $US150,000 in royalties. Oops.
Grooveshark’s business model relies on the the Digital Millennium Copyright Act: a federal law that protects internet companies that host third-party material if they comply with take-down notices from copyright holders. That lets Grooveshark host users uploads. Just about.
Obviously, it’s not gone down too well in music label land. Last year, Universal, Warner and Sony Music all filed copyright infringement cases against Grooveshark. With EMI joining the fight, it can’t be long before Grooveshark heads to the great goldfish bowl in the sky. Good luck, Grooveshark. [New York Times]
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