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The practice of stream ripping could fade into the past thanks to a landmark ruling against the world’s largest stream ripping website that will see the site shut down and pay settlement charges.
The Verge reports music labels UMG, Sony Music, Warner Bros among other labels filed a 35 million Pound lawsuit against the German-based website Youtube-mp3.org and its owner Philip Matesanz, arguing that the site enabled people to illegally profit from the distribution of the material they ripped.
For the uninitiated, the site allows users to convert YouTube links into mp3 files, ready to be downloaded and shared. The website was allegedly responsible for “upwards of 40 per cent” of all audio ripped from YouTube last year.
The suit named songs by Zedd, Lady Gaga and Missy Elliot, seeking damages of $150,000 US for each canse of copyright infringement.
A study in September 2016 by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry found stream ripping had overtaken torrenting as the biggest source of music piracy.
The site is currently still live awaiting the confirmation of final judgement by the court.
Remember kids, piracy is still a crime, even if that classic movie piracy advertisement was pretty much only good for a laugh.
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