WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The recording industry has “blacklisted” Internet file-sharing services and is preventing other companies like RealNetworks Inc. from doing business with them, according to music and technology industry officials.
The record labels’ attempts to isolate song swapping “peer to peer” networks like Grokster and Morpheus have blocked deals that could have potentially brought in millions of dollars in revenues, the sources said, and might violate antitrust laws.
“If the last names of the CEOs of most major record labels ended in a vowel they’d be calling this behavior racketeering,” said former Grokster president Wayne Rosso.
Record labels say they are simply refusing to work with companies they regard as illegal.
Some 9.5 million Internet users log on to peer-to-peer networks each day to copy music and other material from each others’ hard drives.
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