Well, it is the season of peace and goodwill and all that. I know this because Paul McCartney was just singing about the 'pipes of peace' on my stereo. It was presumably with that in mind that major music publisher apologised on Friday for sending the developer behind a lyrics search engine such a stern legal letter.
As previously reported, Austrian IT guy Walter Ritter closed down his lyrics search engine pearLyrics earlier this month after Warner/Chappell issued a cease and desist letter accusing his website of copyright violation on par with major P2P services like Grokster. Ritter argued that because his site merely searched for lyrics published elsewhere on the internet he was not guilty of copyright violation and, if he was, then so were Google, Yahoo and all of the other mainstream search engines. However, unable to afford a lawyer to state that case formally, Ritter chose instead to close down his service.
This led to Fred von Lohmann, one of the legal beagles over at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, to issue a warning to Warner/Chappell stating that if they issued such a letter to a lyric search engine in the US he'd help them counter-sue. He wrote: "In light of the foregoing discussion, we warn Warner Chappell against making any legal threats similar to those leveled against Mr Ritter against any US software developers who may develop products similar to pearLyrics. Such threats could expose Warner Chappell to a declaratory judgment action from either the software developers or the music fans who use the software in question."
With unrest growing in the developer community, Warner/Chappell have now backtracked saying that they didn't intend to accuse Ritter of copyright violation, rather, they want reassurances that his search engine operation was above board. With that in mind, they have admitted the wording of their letter to the Austrian developer were too strong. The publishing firm issued a statement reading: "The goal of Warner/Chappell's prior letter to pearWorks was to gain assurance that pearLyrics operated according to [copyright] principles. However, in both tone and substance, that letter was an inappropriate manner in which to convey that inquiry. Warner/Chappell apologises to Walter Ritter and pearWorks."
Seemingly keen to demonstrate that Warner/Chappell are willing to work with anyone with legitimate interests in online music publishing, the statement continued: "Based upon our common goal of helping consumers enjoy the song lyrics they want - and our common belief that technology can help to transform the music industry to the benefit of consumers and artists alike - we are committed to working together to provide consumers a convenient, legal way to find accurate song lyrics".
Ritter says that he hopes that now Warner/Chappell are talking to him that he will be able to relaunch his search engine to everyone's satisfaction, possibly with a publisher sanctioned 'licensed lyrics' and 'correct composer information' service.