EMusic.com announced it is launching an initiative designed to prevent the illegal distribution of EMusic songs using the Napster service.

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EMusic will use internally developed software that includes innovative "acoustic fingerprinting" technology to continually identify songs on the Napster service that infringe on the rights of EMusic's artist and label partners.

Prior to taking this step, EMusic initiated discussions with Napster and proposed a consumer-friendly way to stop the unauthorized distribution of songs licensed to EMusic. Despite EMusic's efforts, Napster has refused to consider technical solutions that would prevent users from accessing and downloading EMusic content. Napster has suggested only one option; to provide the names of Napster users who are distributing EMusic tracks so their accounts can be blocked.

"Over the past several months, EMusic has continually offered to work in good faith with Napster on this issue," said Gene Hoffman, EMusic president and CEO. "We have proposed a number of viable solutions -- including detailing to Napster a fairly simple technology that would effectively block the unauthorized sharing of our music files without disrupting Napster users' accounts. Napster's unfortunate and inflexible response has been that EMusic's only course of action is to request that offending users' accounts be cut off completely. Although we feel that Napster could easily implement a more consumer-friendly solution, we will begin supplying this information on an ongoing basis."

EMusic represents thousands of artists and hundreds of independent labels, and has a responsibility to its partners, investors, employees, and most importantly, its customers, to do what is necessary to protect the valuable copyrights with which the company has been entrusted. EMusic legitimately licenses artists' and labels' digital music copyrights and sells this music to consumers conveniently and inexpensively in the MP3 downloadable format. (For more information on EMusic's position on the rights and responsibilities of MP3 users, go to http://www.emusic.com/about/rights.html)

EMusic.com offers a legitimate alternative to Napster through it's EMusic Unlimited service, a first-of-its kind music subscription program that provides consumers with unlimited to access to more than 140,000 MP3s for as little as $9.99 per month.

How EMusic's Technology Works
EMusic has developed a software application that will continually search for Napster users illegally distributing EMusic tracks. When an infringing user is identified, he/she will receive an instant message from EMusic making the user aware of the infringement and providing a 24-hour grace period to stop distributing the track.

After 24 hours, if the user continues to make the tracks available via the Napster service, EMusic will notify Napster of the infringement and ask that the user's account be blocked. Napster, in multiple communications with EMusic, has suggested that this is the only action it will implement.

"Napster's claim that it can't remove tracks from its database is disingenuous and we believe their stance will work to the detriment of their own users," added Hoffman. "It seems Napster would rather shut down user accounts, than to deal directly with the problem of illegally distributed files. Our proposed solution deals with illegal activity only, allowing the exchange of legitimate files. However, EMusic remains open to the possibility of working with Napster to implement a more reasonable approach to solving the problem." About EMusic.com
www.EMusic.com is a Web site for purchasing music in the MP3 format. Through direct relationships with leading artists and exclusive licensing agreements with over 600 independent record labels, EMusic.com offers an expanding collection of over 140,000 tracks for purchase -- individual tracks for 99 cents each or entire downloadable albums for $8.99. The site also offers "EMusic Unlimited," a revolutionary new music discovery service that allows fans to download as much music as they desire for as little as $9.99 a month.

EMusic.com features top artists in all musical genres, such as Hip Hop (Kool Keith, Blackalicious, The Coup), Alternative (They Might Be Giants, Bush, Violent Femmes, Tom Waits), Punk (Green Day, Pennywise, Rancid, NOFX), Rock (Phish, Elvis Costello, Goo Goo Dolls), Electronic (DJ Spooky, Sasha & Digweed), Jazz (Duke Ellington, Dizzy Gillespie, Louis Armstrong, Concord Records), Blues (John Lee Hooker, B.B. King, Buddy Guy) and Country (Kenny Rogers, Willie Nelson, Patsy Cline).

 

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