Grokster to stop distributing its P2P software

Grokster Ltd. has finally succumbed to the pressures from the law authorities after it lost the case in the U.S. Supreme Court. They will no longer be distributing the p2p software, which was being used by the web users to share digitally protected files over the internet. This settlement comes after the court ruled that any “peer to peer” networks could be held liable if they induce users into violating copyright laws.

Grokster has now agreed to stop activity that leads to copyright infringement. A notice of the website of the company said: “There are legal services for downloading music and movies. This service is not one of them. Grokster hopes to have a safe and legal service available soon.” The MPAA and RIAA believes that networks and services like these are causing it huge financial deficit as users are no longer interested in buying cassettes and CDs from the market.

They also have sued more than 15,500 peer-to-peer users for copyright infringement. RIAA chairman Mitch Bainwol said in a statement: “At the end of the day, this is about our ability to invest in new music. An online marketplace populated by legitimate services allows us to do just that.” Grokster however is no longer the most popular file sharing application on the internet. As a result, it will not cause much damage to the trends currently prevailing with the web users.

Another disappointing factor about this whole situation is that Grokster users will still be able to continue to share files with each other, as the decentralized nature of most peer-to-peer software makes it impossible to control once it is released on the Internet.