Following that recent victory in the MGM v Grokster case in the US Supreme Court, the record labels are increasingly proactive in taking on technology companies that help consumers illegally acquire or distribute copyrighted music, companies that pre-MGM v Groskter case would have confidently pleaded the Betamax principle as a defence - if a technology has a legitimate use, its maker cannot be held liable for any illegitimate uses.
The latest target for the music companies is China's leading search engine Baidu, which, the labels claim, aids music fans looking for illegal supplies of online music with their popular MP3 search function, that enables users to search for music files (available legitimately or not) by song title. The lawsuit, brought by all four major labels, names a few hundred tracks they know are illegally available via the search engine, although they say those tracks are just the tip of the iceberg.
The record labels' case against Baidu is not just backed up by recent developments in the US Supreme Court. Back in January a court decision against ChinaMP3.com ruled that their MP3 search engine was illegal, and that is the precedent that the industry's latest case will most strongly rely on.
Baidu dispute the lawsuit, saying it is not guilty of copyright infringement because it does not actually host any of the music being illegally downloaded. What's more, the company argues, it has long been a keen advocate of finding ways to combat online music piracy in China. However, insiders at the labels are not convinced, saying that Baidu is clinging on to its MP3 search function because it is the main thing which enables it to stay ahead of near rival Google in China.