Na Napster nu ook Scour Exchange aangeklaagd

Questions and Answers
1. What is Scour.com?
Scour.com is a company that offers free software that searches other users’ hard
drives, finds audio and video recordings, and other files, on those hard drives and
delivers identical copies to the users who have ordered the search. Scour.com’s
service makes no distinction between the exchange of authorized material and stolen
copyrighted material. Although the action is popularly called “file-sharing,” in fact,
one user is allowing a limitless number of duplicate copies of the song or video
contained in his hard drive to be copied. Because all of the content is in a digital
format, literally millions of copies can be made and distributed without any
degradation in the quality of the recordings. All the copies are free, with no
compensation trading hands or going back to the rightful owners of the copyrights.

2. How is Scour.com different from Napster?
It is different from Napster in that Scour.com offers, among other things, video
content, including bootleg full-length feature films.

3. Why do you care about these companies?
These companies are facilitating the pirating of copyrighted material. They directly
support a trade in stolen goods. These goods, in the form of music and films, are
produced from the blood, sweat and tears of artists who should be compensated for
their work. What these companies are doing is no different than if they provided
people with a way to shoplift CDs and Videotapes from stores . It is not hard to see
how serious the problem is for anyone hoping to earn a living from their creative
work.

4. Isn’t this just sharing? Who is harmed?
This is stealing. Period. Sharing is when one person lends a product to another,
expecting its return. This is mass duplication and distribution of copyrighted
material. There’s no sharing going on. The harm is that earnings for artists and
studios are lost when people don’t pay anything to use the material. In addition, all of
the employees who get hired to support that artists work could also be harmed – from
sound engineers, to animators to anyone involved in the creative process – because
lost revenue over the long-term could mean lost jobs.
The losses to legitimate copyright owners are enormous and permanent. But even if
the damage were only a dollar, there is an important principle at stake here. If an
artist or an owner of a copyright doesn’t want their product distributed in a certain
way, it should not be distributed that way. Let’s ask ourselves when exactly stealing
became acceptable as long as it takes place on the Internet?
In addition, Scour.com contributes to a growing culture that treats intellectual
property as somehow less valuable than tangible property. One you pay for, one you
don’t. More and more high school and college kids are learning this unfortunate
lesson every day. It is a serious problem.

5. How can the MPAA and RIAA oppose sharing of material? Scour.com does not
charge anyone for it.
"File sharing" is a serious misnomer. If I share a piece of cake with you, we're each
doing with a little less, because I have half a piece and you have half a piece. Under
the Napster/Scour.com version of "sharing," I can give you and others two pieces,
four pieces, eight pieces, sixteen pieces of cake, etc., and still have as much as I want.
Accordingly, it's really more accurate to call Scour.com’s service file "squaring,"
because what's really happening is that they are exponentially increasing the number
of files.
Scour.com built its business model around copyright theft. They are attracting
hundreds of thousands of visitors by creating online bazaars for stolen copyrighted
works. In addition, Scour.com is generating revenue by selling advertising on its site.
Both sites provide mass duplication of copyrighted material. It isn’t reasonable to
call any of this sharing.