Mark Cuban Enters MGM vs. Grokster
Mark Cuban, the man who created and sold Broadcast.com and most recently became a major backer of the IceRocket search engine, is now stepping into the court rooms on behalf of Grokster. The EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation) apparently approached Mark about helping their cause, and Mark said he will pledge the revenue needed for their defense and to preserve the Sony Betamax ruling.
EFF is defending StreamCast Networks, (P2P) file-sharing software, in an important case that will be heard before the Supreme Court of the United States on March 29, 2005. “The copyright law principles set out in the Sony Betamax case have served innovators, copyright industries, and the public well for 20 years,” said Fred von Lohmann, EFF’s senior intellectual property attorney. “We at EFF look forward to the Supreme Court reaffirming the applicability of Betamax in the 21st century.”
More on MGM vs. Grokster from the EFF:
Ever since the Betamax ruling in 1984, inventors have been free to create new copying technologies as long as they are capable of substantial noninfringing (legal) uses. But by the end of this year, all that could change. In MGM v. Grokster, Hollywood and the recording industry are asking for the power to sue out of existence any technology that appears to be a threat, even if it passes the Betamax test. That puts at risk any copying technology that Betamax currently protects as well as any new technologies Hollywood doesn’t like.
From Mark’s BlogMaverick blog:
If Grokster loses, technological innovation might not die, but it will have such a significant price tag associated with it, it will be the domain of the big corporations only.
It wont be a good day when high school entrepreneurs have to get a fairness opinion from a technology oriented law firm to confirm that big music or movie studios wont sue you because they can come up with an angle that makes a judge believe the technology might impact the music business. It will be a sad day when American corporations start to hold their US digital innovations and inventions overseas to protect them from the RIAA, moving important jobs overseas with them.
Thats what is ahead of us if Grokster loses. Thats what happens if the RIAA is able to convince the Supreme Court of the USA that rather than the truth, which is , Software doesnt steal content, people steal content, they convince them that if it can impact the music business, it should be outlawed because somehow it will. It doesnt matter that the RIAA has been wrong about innovations and the perceived threat to their industry, EVERY SINGLE TIME. It just matters that they can spend more then everyone else on lawyers. Thats not the way it should be. So , the real reason of this blog. To let everyone know that the EFF and others came to me and asked if I would finance the legal effort against MGM. I said yes. I would provide them the money they need. So now the truth has been told. This isnt the big content companies against the technology companies. This is the big content companies, against me. Mark Cuban and my little content company. Its about our ability to use future innovations to compete vs their ability to use the courts to shut down our ability to compete. its that simple.
