Kazaa, a web application that allows users to exchange a basically unlimited supply of music MP3s, videos and more, has attracted 60 million users around the world (Todd Woody, "The Race to Kill Kazaa"). Kazaa turns a profit by selling ad space through its application without charging the user a cost for downloads; therefore making Kazaa an extremely popular choice for music download.
Kazaa was able to escape the wrath of Napster's copyright infringement lawsuit because the company is very segmented with no clear person to sue... "There is no plug to pull" writes Woody in his article, "The Race to Kill Kazaa" (304).
The global entertainment industry banded together to try to shut down Kazaa, but the U.S. District Court judge was looking at the logistics of the situation: with Kazaa employees and central unit split up and separated across the globe, "Does Sharman (the company with ownership of Kazaa) do enough business in the U.S. to be lawfully included as part of the Morpheus-Grokster lawsuit (agaisnt file share)?" (305).
I think because of all the loop holes and technicalities the indsutry had to face to begin legal proceedings with Sharman (and the rest of the Kazaa network), it makes it easy for a company to become secretive and allow users to access free music download. I also think music download is too expensive - CDs can cost $20 - but I wish there was a more happy medium. Record labels and the artists deserve their fair cut of the music they make, but they shouldn't be able to charge an unreasonable fee for it. I think the proliferation of the Internet, combined with audience frustrations over the cost of CDs led to the creation of free music download.
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