The UK record industry is returning to court in a long running dispute with online music seller CD-Wow.
As previously reported (though you might need a long memory to remember), the major record companies first took action against CD-Wow owners Music Trading Online in 2004 over the internet firm's practice of buying CDs from distributors outside the European Union, and selling them via their online operation to UK customers. Because those non-EU distributors sell CDs at a lower unit price, CD-Wow was able to undercut their high street and other online rivals.
Although the distributors used by MTO were legitimate, UK copyright rules say that retailers must only source content products from distributors within the EU, unless given specific permission from a content owner to do otherwise. With MTO clearly violating those rules, the UK industry won its case against the internet company in 2004, and the company committed to only buy stock from EU based suppliers from that point onwards.
The new lawsuit alleges MTO have broken that commitment. Representatives of the major record companies say that while monitoring the CD-Wow service they were sold CDs that had been sourced in Hong Kong. They will look to the courts to enforce the original commitment and to compensate content owners for any recent copyright violations MTO have committed.
MTO are yet to comment, though lawyers for the UK record industry say they expect the internet trader to claim the sale of CDs from Hong Kong were isolated incidents caused by human error.