KaZaA won in Dutch court today: KaZaA attorney Christiaan Alberdingk Thijm expected the Dutch ruling to be closely watched in the U.S., as his defense was partly built on a 1984 U.S. Supreme Court (news - web sites) ruling which said manufacturers of video recorders are not liable if consumers use their products to abuse copyrights.
"This is not just about KaZaA. It also affects producers of digital recording devices," he said. These would include DVD recorders from Philips and Panasonic , and digital TV recorders from TiVo (news - web sites) . http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=581&u=/nm/20020328/tc_nm/tech_entertainment_dc_2 Also, a recent US court decision said that gunmakers are not responsible for the actions of their users, in the Burford case. Occasionally jurists have a clue. Being decentralized clearly helps --if you don't authorize a trigger pull, or serve lists of files, you can't be touched (though you can be harassed, but then, anyone can sue anyone for anything.)
