The abbreviation P2P stands for peer-to-peer. Peer-to-peer is a term used to describe the function of one computer downloading or uploading files to another computer. Instead of connecting to normal Internet sites, the computers connect to each other over the Internet. The unique nature of this connection allows for fast downloads of large files. Users select certain files that they wish to make available to be shared with other users. Two users that have the same software, such as Napster in the early years of file sharing or a software program called Limewire, can trade content. There are various other P2P file sharing software programs that continue to appear.

Files such as songs or entire albums, full length movies, and computer software can be transferred from one computer to another. Much of the content transferred is copyrighted material. P2P software can be used to illegally obtain copyrighted material so the user will not have to pay for it as they normally should. This leads to copyright infringement on a wide scale. 

There are some gray areas involved with P2P file sharing. P2P software alone is not illegal. There are legal functions that take place with P2P software. If a document travels from one computer to another and it belongs to the person uploading it, nothing illegal has occurred. There are also P2P networks that have the same copyrighted material available as the illegal software with the only difference is that the legal networks cost money so the owners of copyrights are compensated.

Record and movie companies have begun to target individual users of P2P networks. They have not been successful in shutting down the P2P software producers because there are so many of them and new ones will just appear in their place if they are removed. The threat of losing hundreds of thousands of dollars to a record company has many P2P users intimidated.

Normal people who use P2P software just like everyone else have recently been sued for damages that they cannot afford to pay. Companies hope that the threat of lawsuit will help stop the distribution of illegal P2P file sharing. Until all users stop transferring copyrighted data, the record and movie industries as well as software producers are thought to be losing out on millions in lost revenue as a result of illegal copyright distribution.

A&M Records, Inc v. Napster, Inc was the first major case between the recording industry and a peer-to-peer file sharing network. Napster became wildly popular after it was developed by a computer science student attending Northeastern University in 1999. 

The P2P service offered the easiest to use and overall best P2P file sharing network at the time. Napster made millions off copyrighted materials available for download by using indexes created by Napster to search other people’s available files. The record industry believed this was copyright infringement and it was costing them large profits. Musicians were also greatly upset their intellectual property was being stolen.

       A&M Records

       Geffen Records

       Interscope Records

       Sony Music Entertainment

       MCA Records

       Atlantic Records

       Island Records

       Motown Records

       Capitol Records

       LaFace Records

       BMG Music

       Universal Records

       Elektra Entertainment Group

       Arista Records

       Sire Records Group

       Polygram Records

       Virgin Records America

       Warner Bros. Records 

Napster tried to claim it was free speech to let users download and listen to material on their computer. They also claimed the content on Napster was open to fair use. Napster believed they had three fair use defenses. The first was sampling, meaning potential customers had a right to sample music before they bought it. This was turned down by the judge because the sample was full and permanent.

The second fair use defense was space shifting. This meant audio files on CD were shifted to mp3 format and were open for circulation on the Internet. This was thrown out by the judge because the shifted audio was made available to anyone for free which was against the record companies’ intent. The third defense succeeded. It only gave Napster the right to distribute copyrighted material of artists who gave permission.

The United States Court of Appeals ruled Napster could be held responsible for contributory and vicarious copyright infringement. Napster was eventually shutdown and ordered to pay $26 million to the plaintiff.

Another separate case is sure to scare off some P2P users who think they are immune from the repercussions of copyright infringement. In this landmark case, the Recording Industry Association of America sued a 25-year-old Boston University student, Joel Tenenbaum, for $675,000. 

The doctoral student was sued for downloading and distributing 30 copyrighted songs. There were more songs in his folder but the RIAA focused on 30 songs. Tenenbaum was just an average P2P user who regularly swapped copyrighted material since P2P networks became popular around 2000.

The RIAA would win the lawsuit against Tenenbaum. Tenenbaum was represented by a Harvard University professor who took the case free of charge after hearing of the case on the news. Tenenbaum’s chances of a fair use defense were thrown out in the pretrial. Tenenbaum could have been ordered to pay $150,000 per song but ended up being charged $22,500 per song, still far too expensive for Tenenbaum to ever afford. The suit came out to $675,000. 

The suit led to more lawsuits against individual users who could be found after their computer’s IP address was determined. Most of the suits were for far less than Tenenbaum’s case, around $3,500. The RIAA recently announced they would stop suing P2P users because the defendant could rarely pay the court-ruled amount and the money spent on lawyers was far greater than the money coming in. The RIAA is now working on having users’ Internet access shutdown based on IP address rather than suing for a monetary value.