The record company Universal is currently suing Grooveshark, an online music streaming service, for copyright infringement. According to the latest estimates, the case could cost Grooveshark up to $17 billion in damages if it loses, so hopefully the company has professional indemnity insurance that is up to the job.
In the lawsuit, Universal is claiming that Grooveshark, a service which allows users to upload, search and stream music, has illicitly uploaded more than 113,000 songs belonging to the record company to its site. This, according to Universal, is copyright infringement, and the company is seeking a massive $150,000 (£96,000) per song in compensation.
Fighting back against the accusation, Grooveshark released a statement to Digital Music News via its attorney Marshall Custer, who said:
“We have reviewed the complaint that Universal Music Group filed last Friday against Grooveshark in the US District Court in Manhattan. Universal’s claims rest almost entirely on an anonymous, blatantly false internet blog comment and Universal’s gross mischaracterization of information that Grooveshark itself provided to Universal.
“While Universal has deliberately engaged the media prior to serving a copy of the complaint on Grooveshark, Grooveshark intends to fight this battle before the Court, not in the press.”