Scotus: Court conflicted over file-swapping

Lyle Denniston:

The Supreme Court put on public display Tuesday two conflicting reactions to the apparently widespread practice of downloading copyrighted songs and movies from the Internet: a concern that software makers may be too enthusiastically encouraging the habit, and a concern that copyright law not be made so restrictive that it stifles new surges of technology creativity ....

In a one-hour hearing on the biggest Internet test case yet, Metro Goldwyn Mayer, et al., v. Grokster, et al. (docket 04-480), a number of Justices seemed attracted to the idea of letting copyright owners go after software developers on a theory that they are "actively inducing" theft of copyrighted works by computer users linked by that software.

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Several members of the Court -- but especially Justices Antonin Scalia, Stephen G. Breyer and David H. Souter -- seemed troubled about the potential impact of a tightening of copyright law on small inventors -- "the guy in the garage," as Souter put it....

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