Popular i2hub shuts down
2005-11-16 14:40
Los Angeles - Online file-sharing service i2hub, which linked university students and other users over the super-fast Internet2 network, has shut down under threat of a lawsuit from the recording industry.
Founder Wayne Chang said that the entire network linking users of the i2hub file-swapping application was taken off-line on Monday afternoon.
Visitors to the i2hub website on Tuesday were greeted with the message "Remember i2hub."
"At i2hub's peak, hundreds of thousands of students from more than 500 universities were regularly users," said Chang, 22. He created the software in 2003 when a freshman at the University of Massachusetts.
"I've never believed i2hub was illegal," said Chang. "A lot of people have met their significant others there, or have received or given homework help. It was a real-time social network."
I2hub was one of seven firms behind file-sharing software which received cease-and-desist letters from the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) in September, accusing them of enabling computer users to distribute copyright-protected music without permission online.
In the notices, a trade group representing the major recording companies warned recipients of legal consequences if they continued to operate.
US Supreme Court rules it piracy
In September, the firm behind the WinMX file-sharing software also apparently shuttered the service after receiving a RIAA letter.
The Internet2 network, which links universities researching the next-generation internet, is used by several million students, researchers and professionals around the world but is generally inaccessible to the public.
The RIAA also filed copyright infringement lawsuits against 635 individual computer users using i2hub at 39 college campuses this year.
A US Supreme Court ruling earlier this year established that the entertainment industry can file piracy lawsuits against technology companies caught encouraging customers to steal music and movies over the internet.
The court decision significantly weakened lawsuit protections for companies that had blamed illegal behaviour on their customers, rather than the technology that made such behaviour possible.
- AP