Australia's third largest internet service provider iiNet, has welcomed the withdrawal of certain legal claims made by industry organisations at the Federal court level. The industry groups were eager to punish iiNet for customers who use P2P and Bittorrent to download 'illegal' files.
iiNet's Managing Director, Michael Malone, is likely to be one happy camper with the news, although Mr Malone did note that took it almost six months for the industry groups to finalise their claims.
The David vs Goliath matchup pitches the might and dollars of the big music and movie copyright organisations against an ISP run with the cheeky grin of a smiling Irishman at their advertising forefront. iiNet have been awarded legal costs a result of the last minute amendment.
"There is still a long way to go and we will be vigorously defending the remainder of the applicants' allegations," Mr Malone said.
iiNet's chief thinks it would serve movie studios and music companies better if they used their time to target the individual downloaders. Cease and desist letters (or otherwise known as copyright infringement letters) have been part and parcel of the downloading scene for the past few years now, although most users simply ignore them.
Letters often get redelivered to junk mail folders and are quickly neglected by customers - without any fine or further threat to their downloading liberties.
The Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft (AFACT) continues to rattle their drums in the case and iiNet is keen to iron out a few hot-button topics with the group, even as the lawsuit gets off to a staggered start.
iiNet may have won the first round, but the real 'meat and potato' proceedings have yet to begin and that's probably when things are going to get a little heated for both parties.
