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Strowel, Alain --- "Introduction: Peer-to-Peer File Sharing and Secondary Liability in Copyright Law" [2009] ELECD 328; in Strowel, Alain (ed), "Peer-to-Peer File Sharing and Secondary Liability in Copyright Law" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2009)

Book Title: Peer-to-Peer File Sharing and Secondary Liability in Copyright Law

Editor(s): Strowel, Alain

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781847205629

Section Title: Introduction: Peer-to-Peer File Sharing and Secondary Liability in Copyright Law

Author(s): Strowel, Alain

Number of pages: 11

Extract:

Introduction: peer-to-peer file sharing and
secondary liability in copyright law
Alain Strowel1
Every book has a history. This book originates in a 2005 Brussels conference
discussing the impact of peer-to-peer technology on the future of copyright
law.2 Peer-to-peer technology, as further explained below, allows people to
exchange information over the Internet via many equal or `peer' machines
linked across a network, rather than on a central server. From a copyright point
of view, the main controversy surrounding peer-to-peer networks is whether
providers of peer-to-peer technology and services can be liable when users
infringe copyright through their networks. This issue has been hotly debated
in legal circles and in the press, especially in 2005, when the US Supreme
Court issued its highly anticipated decision in the controversial case MGM
Studios, Inc. v Grokster Ltd.3 In this decision, the Supreme Court held that the
two popular file-sharing networks, Grokster and Streamcast (dba Morpheus),
were indeed liable for `actively inducing' the end-users' acts of infringement.
As will be explained, the liability for inducement is one form of secondary
liability for copyright infringement.
Peer-to-peer (or P2P) file sharing and secondary liability are the central
themes in this collection of essays on copyright. Both topics are closely linked.
`Secondary' (or derived) liability presupposes a primary infringer. In peer-to-
peer networks, the primary infringers, those who upload copyrighted files
without authorization, are numerous and difficult to reach, and going ...