[untitled #513]

By Todd Stadler · Tuesday, September 9, 2003 5:41pm

Always looking for a new way to get into legal trouble, I tried to do some research today on file-trading software Kazaa Lite.

Naturally, the first thing I did was search for it on Google.

I noted the following text at the bottom of the results page: "In response to a complaint we received under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, we have removed 9 result(s) from this page. If you wish, you may read the DMCA complaint for these removed results."

My first thought was that Google's usefulness had once again been curtailed by a stupid lawsuit, this time apparently from the makers of the original (and more annoying) Kazaa (or "Kazaa Media Desktop software" if you will, which I won't).

But upon reading the linked-to DMCA complaint (hosted on the aptly named site www.chillingeffects.org), I had to laugh.

The complaint itself lists all the Web sites that Google was legally not allowed to. True, they weren't hyperlinked ? I had to cut 'n' paste ? but in no way was I prevented from using them to get some information.

Equally humorous was that Google's top hit for "kazaa lite" is (or at least was) www.kazaalitekpp.com, which, as far as I can tell, is the (new?) official Kazaa Lite Web site URL.

It only goes to show how pointless it is to use the legal system to fight this sort of battle. You can have a new Web site up and running in a fraction of the time it takes a lawyer to get an injunction against that particular URL.