January 24, 2004 New York, NY, January 24, 2005 A certified class of over 27,000 songwriters and music publishers today filed their opening brief in the Supreme Court of the United States, seeking to overturn the decision permitting unlicensed peer-to-peer music services Grokster and StreamCast to escape liability for copyright infringement In the brief, the class which represents the interests of the creators of more than 2.5 million musical works, from pop songs to symphonies argued that the Court should extend infringement liability to companies whose Internet-based file-sharing services facilitate copyright infringement and receive revenues from it through advertising and data mining services. The class urged that imposing such liability provides the only practical and effective remedy for widespread infringement of copyrights, will not thwart legitimate uses of file-sharing technology, and will spur demand for legitimate online distribution of music. By contrast, Grokster and StreamCast operate commercial businesses that depend upon their users offering a veritable treasure trove of unlicensed copyrighted music and motions pictures for downloading by others without any compensation to the copyright owners. Legendary songwriter Lamont Dozier ("Stop! In the Name of Love", "I Hear a Symphony", "My World Is Empty Without You" and numerous other number one hits), a plaintiff in the case, commented, This case is about the future of American songwriting. It is about making it possible for young songwriters to have the kind of opportunities that I had as a young writer at Motown. It is about making sure that creators who have to make their house payments and put their kids through school can make a living writing the music that we all love. Songwriters are passionate about what we do we said we would take this case to the Supreme Court if we had to in order to stop businesses from exploiting our songs for profit without compensating the people who wrote them. We hope the Court will hear our plea and right this injustice. We hope this case will result in a landmark ruling for songwriters and other creators, and I believe I speak for the entire music community when I say that the economic harm inflicted through file-sharing services like Grokster and StreamCast is staggering, said Irwin Z. Robinson, Chairman of the National Music Publishers' Association, Inc. The operators of these services know that the main use of their services is to trade copyrighted songs and motion pictures illegally, with no compensation to those who have invested their time and effort into creating, developing, and promoting those works. They are endorsing copyright infringement on a massive scale, while siphoning into their own pockets millions of dollars that should go to creators to support the creation of new works. By immunizing such services from the copyright laws, the courts below have imperiled the future of songwriting as a profession for which the public stands to lose. It is my hope and that of the professional songwriting community that the Court will right this gross injustice and assure that the era of great songwriting that copyright law fostered in the 20th century will continue into the 21st century. About The Harry Fox Agency Established in 1927 by the National Music Publishers Association, HFA represents over 27,000 U.S. music publishers for their mechanical licensing needs, issuing licenses and collecting and distributing royalties. HFA also provides collection and monitoring services to its U.S. publisher clients for music distributed and sold in over 75 territories around the world. For more information about HFA, or to become an affiliate publisher or a licensee, see www.harryfox.com.