Posted by: : Category: UncategorizedSeeqPod, the “playable search” music search engine we’ve covered extensively since its 2006 launch, has filed for bankruptcy. Apparently, legal fees from its defense against major label lawsuits have forced this action, despite an eleventh-hour plan to sell its source code for $5,000 a pop.
Besieged by litigation from EMI and Warner Music Group, which seek billions in damages for alleged copyright infringement, the company is the latest technological innovator to be “sued into oblivion,” as the phrase goes, by copyright holders.
SeeqPod, which raised $7 million in venture capital and is one-twentieth owned by Berkeley Lab (a member of the US Department of Energy’s national laboratory system), filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Thursday, as reported by TechCrunch on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, SeeqPod promoted a playlist entitled “All About That Cash” (embedded above) — an apparent tongue-in-cheek response to the suits.
Despite its predicament, experts including Fred von Lohmann of the EFF have questioned whether SeeqPod’s search engine — which hosts no music — constitutes copyright infringement under United States law. If anyone is infringing the labels’ copyrights, one might argue, it’s the sites that host the music played by SeeqPod.
If Google can display images in its image search results, why can’t SeeqPod put play buttons next to its music search results?
“The SeeqPod case is different,” wrote
von Lohmann, “because it is among the first
that directly tests how copyright law applies to search engines.
Despite the success of search engines like Yahoo and Google, there has
been remarkably little case law developed on the copyright front.”
According to him and others, SeeqPod’s music search engine could be
protected by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act’s safe harbor
provision, which stipulates that copyright holders must issue take-down
requests for each search result they deem infringing. Although the site
lets you collect music from various servers around the internet into a
playlist that can be shared or embedded anywhere (example to the
right), the DMCA does appear to protect the company — although
apparently not from bankruptcy.
EMI has also sued FavTape, a site that uses SeeqPod’s API to provide
its own music services. Streamzy, another SeeqPod API implementation,
started auctioning itself off on eBay on Monday. However, that site has
only received a top bid of $1,7250, with only seven hours left in the
auction. “It turns out streaming music
sites are not worth anything at all,” reads a note the Steamzy developer sent out this morning. “Whoever is buying the site is
getting it at a great price.”
As for SeeqPod, its Chapter 11th filing still allows the company to make money, and its still selling the code. (It also added a new option that
allows companies to license its API for as little as $3/month.) However, if SeeqPod goes out of business as a result of these lawsuits, it wouldn’t be able to provide support for the code. In addition, EMI and Warner could try to go after purchasers of the code, although they might have a hard time of that if those customers set up business abroad.
See Also:
- Facing Legal Pressure, SeeqPod Plans to Spawn Clones
- Major Label Fights Google-ization of Music With SeeqPod Lawsuit
- SeeqPod IPhone Button Allows Instant Access to Free Music
- SeeqPod Serves Up Tickets Alongside Playable Search Results
- SeeqPod: Real-Time MP3 Blog Playlisting
Source: Eliot Van Buskirk
