Associated Press
SAN JOSE, Calif. — The recording industry said yesterday it planned to send a list of 135,000 copyright songs to Napster Inc., essentially giving the file-swapping company until Wednesday to block their free exchange on the online service.
The Recording Industry Association of America planned to send the list to Napster electronically some time last night, said spokeswoman Amy Weiss.
Napster would have three business days to block the songs, according to an injunction last week by U.S. District Judge Marilyn Hall Patel. The injunction was issued based on a suit by record companies, who are seeking to shut Napster down for facilitating copyright infringement.
A Napster spokeswoman said late yesterday afternoon that the company had not yet received the list of songs. The association would not speculate on what action it would take if Napster was not able to effectively block the material from its service.
One option would be to request a hearing before Patel and tell her that Napster had not complied to its satisfaction, at which point the judge could appoint an independent third party to serve as a technical expert and assist the court with any disputes, according to the injunction.
In a Web posting to its more than 60 million users, Napster said it has received some notices and expects the record companies to send more.
"You will still be able to share music that we haven’t been asked to block," the statement read. "The Napster file-sharing service is and will continue to be up and running."
Napster did not specify how many files have been blocked, but a wide range were available yesterday.
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