The lawyer for the Napster case, David Boies, is interview by Wired. Very interesting and a nice clear explaination of Napster's case.
Salon reports on Mojo Nation, a new file sharing system. File sharers earn 'Mojo' by sharing files. It's like payment for you harddisk, bandwidth etc. There are also systems in line to allow users to 'tip' creaters of content (ie. artists, record companies, me). It also places the 'fault' in cases of copyright infringment on the user. Check it out. Beta testing open now.
Some random thoughts
Do we want Napster to lose? Surely if it is ruled that services such as this are ok.. the RIAA will come down full force on the consumer, the individual user.
And how long before Netscape/IE/Opera/blah let you share files? I hear the next version of ICQ will allow sharing of files of people on your friends list.
Winamp Shoutcast
Winamp allows you to set up your own streaming server (Shoutcast) from your computer. A friend of mine in the US recently played some music to me. 'You have to hear this', she said. And so she stuck it in her CD player, gave me a URL and bang, I'm hearing it. She randomly changed CDs and we chated on ICQ at the same time. It was brilliant.
This is the equivilant of dropping over a friends place and playing CDs all day. What next?
Windows Media will let you do similar things, both are free.
I'm definitely going to start checking out internet radio a little harder.
Me
My main harddisk was saved. Yay.