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Breaking: LimeWire P2P network shut down by RIAA
The New York District Court, at the request of the RIAA, has forced LimeWire to shut down its network and cease distributing its software. TorrentFreak has the full story, and updates will surely follow as more data becomes available.That a U.S. federal judge would finally grant RIAA's request comes as a numbing shock to the system. Perhaps the RIAA simply drew the right judge -- this is the same Judge Kimba Wood that found LimeWire guilty of copyright infringement back in May -- or maybe the lawsuit just snowballed in gravitas until it became unignorable.
For those of you that use BitTorrent, you might be surprised to hear that LimeWire is still most-installed P2P application with a market share of 37% -- uTorrent, by far the largest BitTorrent client, only has a 14% market share. If LimeWire really has been shut down -- and stays down -- this could affect the entire makeup of the Internet.
Comments
12
Subscribe to commentsikeasangriaOct 26th 2010 6:52PM
Oddly enough, while the site may be shut down, all the software host alternatives continue to host it, although it might not work lol
Sebastian AnthonyOct 26th 2010 7:25PM
Yeah... I think they're meant to be shutting down the network's search engine. I don't know the actual architecture of LimeWire, so I can't comment with any more authority.
King AntoniusOct 26th 2010 7:23PM
I just fired up FrostWire (same network) and it is working alright. I seem to be getting less results than expected, but I'm still getting plenty.
computerwiz908Oct 26th 2010 7:41PM
Ha. "Our team of technologists and music enthusiasts are creating a completely new music service that puts you back at the center of your digital music experience." - http://www.limecompany.com/
Good luck with making a legal music service.
Crome TysnomiGnu32Oct 26th 2010 7:48PM
This is a good thing.
Frostwire has long been the necessary alternative that people needed to move to. I got sick of uninstalling Limewire on all my clients' laptops/computers.
Mobile Phone DivaOct 26th 2010 8:11PM
If Limewire's software is a mess, that's another story. But the fact that RIAA shut it down is bad. Who's next? RIAA needs to die a quick death IMO.
Crome TysnomiGnu32Oct 26th 2010 8:33PM
Don't forget that this is merely a perpetual game of cat and mouse. Congratulations to the RIAA; for every success they have, they will have three failures on their hands.
NakasiOct 26th 2010 8:44PM
Hey crome...
Read your post after my limewire refused to do an update and thus i could no longer use it. Thanks for mentioning frostwire as i was panicking. lol. Never heard of it before...works perfectly as a replacement,
DanielOct 26th 2010 8:39PM
Napster reprised.
JonnyOct 26th 2010 9:42PM
A little birdie tells me it still works. Dunno what has been shut down, but other then putting up a legal notice, nothing has changed.
ZorqueOct 27th 2010 9:01AM
The Gnutella network, which Limewire runs off of, is completely decentralized and can't really be shut down, unless every single computer was somehow kept from running any of the programs that use it. Limewire itself may not be under development anymore, but since it's an open source protocol, the alternatives still exist. Try Frostwire, I prefer it to Limewire on the off chance I need to find anything on there.
It sucks to see this happening, though. They tried harder than anyone to go legit, I remember them always pushing free Creative Commons downloads and trying other ways to prove that there was a legal reason for them to exist.
NoticeOct 27th 2010 1:07PM
Does anyone still use limewire?