File-sharing – A Notion Still Hard to Tame

There’s no sign that the legal status of internet downloads is about to be clarified any time soon. Perhaps because there are too many factors at stake.

In this respect, Ben Camm-Jones emphasized the imprecise nature the legal status of such services continues to show: "Although precedents have been set, we're still fairly unclear whether what they're doing is wrong or not." The comment followed the allegations against online music provider by nine record labels for copyright infringement.

Record companies including Interscope Records, Virgin Records America and Atlantic Recording are claiming compensation after suing Project Playlist.

According to statistics gathered by NPD in January 70 % of US 9 to 14-year-olds downloaded music online, 49 % of them via iTunes - the legal service from Apple - and 26 % resorting to p2p file-sharing clients like Limewire.

As Mr Camm-Jones put it, the need for a universal framework is more and more evident; without it the legality of music download provision can’t be evaluated so that it corresponds to the limitless nature of the Internet.