I missed this while I was in the bush, dammit, but it’s a big deal and good news. The MGM vs. Grokster case walked into the courtroom back in Febuary, and I was pleased to have access to MP3s of the opening arguments from the Electronic Frontier Foundation. In short, the case was about the legality of creating tools for sharing stuff on the internet, when that stuff may be and mostly is copyrighted. Are the creators of the tools liable for the actions of the users? How much of the stuff shared has to be legal for it to be okay? And, by symptomatic effect, how much control over coming technologies do old industries get?

Strangely enough, the answer the courts gave was no, very little, and as little as possible. As in, we won this round.

From the court’s judgement:“Further, as we have observed, we live in a quicksilver technological environment with courts ill-suited to fix the flow of internet innovation. AT&T Corp. v. City of Portland, 216 F.3d 871, 876 (9th Cir. 1999). The introduction of new technology is always disruptive to old markets, and particularly to those copyright owners whose works are sold through well established distribution mechanisms. Yet, history has shown that time and market forces often provide equilibrium in balancing interests, whether the new technology be a player piano, a copier, a tape recorder, a video recorder, a personal computer, a karaoke machine, or an MP3 player.Thus, it is prudent for courts to exercise caution before restructuring liability theories for the purpose of addressing specific market abuses, despite their apparent present magnitude.

Kee riest yes.

There are plently more arenas that this fight will be fought in – several more pending or ongoing court cases, supreme court appeals and most importantly, the ebb and flowtides of public opinion. But this is an important case and a good step. It will make the people who make file sharing tools more comfortable in doing so. File sharing tools in turn, destabilize the current godawful music industry stranglehold on music propogation and distribution.

Possible alternatives will seem more relevant and worth discussing. Eventually, maybe just maybe we will start talking about finding systems of music and cash flow which pay artists without paying far more to completley artless opportunists in the music industry who take a huge cut in return for limiting our access to good art.

For the pleasure of wild optimism, I’ll point out that this could be the grain of sand that sets off the sandpile avalanche. At the very least it’s a damned good thing.