Download error: Music industry pulls the plug on file-sharing site

File sharing websites were dealt a huge blow last night when a judge in New York City pulled the plug on LimeWire, the music-sharing website used by as many as 50 million users, issuing a permanent injunction forcing it to go offline, probably for good.

United States District Judge Kimba Wood handed down the order saying the company, launched in 2000 in competition with other pioneering peer-to-peer sharing sites like the original (now defunct) Napster, had intentionally engaged in a "massive scale of infringement" of copyright laws.

Visitors to LimeWire are now greeted with a notice confirming the party is over. "This is an official notice that LimeWire is under a court-ordered injunction to stop distributing and supporting its file-sharing software," it says. "Downloading or sharing copyrighted content without authorisation is illegal."

It is a signal victory for the Recording Industry Association of America, which first filed suite against LimeWire on behalf of several leading record companies. In a statement, the Association praised Judge Wood's decision to hamstring LimeWire and its founder Mark Gorton. The injunction, it said, "will start to unwind the massive piracy machine LimeWire and Gorton used to enrich themselves immensely".

Not that the case is over yet. In January both sides will find themselves before Ms Wood again, to begin the process of assessing what level of damages LimeWire may owe to the record labels for the years of copyright abuse. LimeWire may then begin to regret its regular boast that the 50 million users had sharing and downloading no fewer than three billion songs a month.

"Naturally, we're disappointed with this turn of events," LimeWire chief executive George Searle said in a statement. He added, however, that "our company remains open for business". But with the file-sharing technology disabled it wasn't clear what other purpose the company would serve.

LimeWire is following a path taken already by Napster, which similarly fell foul of the recording industry as did other peer-to-peer sites like Grokster and Morpheus. The advent of Napster in particular drastically altered the business model for record companies as they adjusted to the new reality that demand for physical product like CDs would plummet while the opportunities to access music online for nothing would proliferate.

Judge Wood also ordered the company to notify its customers, employees and investors about the injunction and report back to her with 14 days on its implementation. Her ruling tells LimeWire simply to disable the "searching, downloading, uploading, file trading, and/or file distribution functionality" of the software it distributed to users on the site.

Wood said in her 17-page ruling that Gorton "committed copyright infringement, engaged in unfair competition, and induced copyright infringement".

With the next round of litigation still pending with sky- high monetary stakes for both camps, any kind of serious entente between them seems unlikely.

File-sharing sites vs the music industry

Napster (1999)

The godfather of illegal "peer-to-peer" music sites, it was launched in 1999 and became a global phenomenon. It was taken down two years later after a costly legal battle brought by the US recording industry. It now operates as a legal site.

Kazaa (2001)

Europe's answer to Napster, Kazaa battled a string of lawsuits in the US, the Netherlands and Australia. Eventually settling with a $100m payout, it now operates as a legal music download site.

Torrent Spy (2005)

As record labels targeted peer-to-peer sites, the illegal download industry moved towards decentralised file-sharing sites like Torrent Spy. Large files could now be downloaded in minutes. Taken offline in 2008.

The Pirate Bay (2006)

The founders of the world's most-popular file-sharing site have been jailed – but it is still accessible. It's currently the 19th most popular website in the world.