Advanced Copyright Issues on the Internet - Fenwick & West LLP

(3) The Aimster/Madster LawsuitsOn April 30, 2001 a company called Aimster, which was operating a file swappingservice very similar to the Scour service, filed suit in federal court in Albany, New York againstvarious members of the RIAA for a declaratory judgment that it was not secondarily liable forcopyright infringement by users of its service to swap allegedly infringing material. TheAimster service was based on a peer-to-peer technology, but was different from Napster andScour in that files were traded in an encrypted format which Aimster claimed prevented it fromhaving knowledge of when its users were exchanging files, the identity of persons exchangingfiles, or what files were being exchanged through its service. 1341The Aimster service was based on instant messaging (IM) technology from AOL.Specifically, Aimster made use of AOL IM’s “get file” functionality, which gave AOL IM usersthe ability to designate certain files or directories on the user’s hard drive that would be madeavailable for other IM users to copy. The native “get file” functionality in AOL was limited intwo ways. First, a user could retrieve files only from a list of his or her known “buddies” whowere logged on at the same time. Second, there was no capability to search the files that wereavailable from a buddy; the user was required to know the particular file that was being soughton the buddy’s hard drive before that file could be fetched. 1342The Aimster service considerably expanded upon the basic file transferring capability ofthe AOL IM system by designating every Aimster user as the buddy of every other Aimster user,thereby allowing all Aimster users to communicate and share files with any other Aimster usercurrently online. The Aimster service also afforded its users the capability to search all the filescontained on the hard drives of other users that had been designated for sharing. 1343 Once thesearch for a suitable file was complete, an Aimster user needed only to click on the file nametitle and then click on a “Download” button to obtain a copy of the song. The Aimster systemthen facilitated the connection of its two users though a private, encrypted network so the filecould be transferred. During the copying of a file, the Aimster system provided a constantupdate about the status of each download or upload. 1344The Aimster service contained several additional features that ultimately proved relevantto the analysis of copyright infringement. First, located for a time on Aimster’s web site was autility called “Aimster’s Guardian Tutorial,” which demonstrated how to transfer and copycopyrighted works over the Aimster system using as illustrative on-screen examples some of thecopyrighted works of RIAA members. Second, Aimster’s service offered message boards onwhich Aimster users wishing to download particular copyrighted recordings could seek theassistance of others. In addition, users often posted messages on these boards openly discussing1341 In re Aimster <strong>Copyright</strong> Litigation, 252 F. Supp. 2d 634, 641 (N.D. Ill. 2002).1342 Id. at 640.1343 Id. at 642. The parties hotly disputed whether Aimster catalogued all available files for download in a single,centralized database, akin to the Napster system. In issuing its preliminary injunction, the court noted that itslegal analysis of the copyright issues would hold regardless of whether or not Aimster maintained a centraldatabase of files available for transfer. Id. at 641 n.6.1344 Id. at 642-43- 302 -