from MTV
http://www.mtv.com/news/a...lines=true

Prince has settled his copyright infringement complaint against a Seattle webmaster out of court. In exchange for Prince dropping the $7.5 million lawsuit, Matthew Lankford of FreeMyHeart.com admitted to posting downloads to unauthorized songs and agreed to never do it again.

A pointless exercise, except of course free publicity

dnaplaya said:

Or maybe a wrning to those who trade unofficial material...

If thelawsuit was still on you would have said prince is a money maker

Now that he drops this is free publicity. Come guys!!! Make up your minds!

klaatu said:

"Money maker"? Prince wouldn't have gotten shit if he'd won the case anyway. I'd say this makes Prince look like less of an asshole. Perhaps he didn't want negative publicity overshadowing the release of ONA Live, who knows. It certainly wouldn't surprise me especially since, as I said, he wouldn't have gotten much of that $7.5 million.

dnaplaya said:

pointless only if he doesnt want to exercise his right to the ownership and distribution of his art. Prince still isnt obligated to let anyone just give out his music through unofficial and illegal sources.

very noble of Prince indeed

BLACKMF said:

WORD UP FACE !!!
Prince could've been a bigger asshole by continuing the lawsuit !

muleFunk said:

It's exactly what i said before...

COOL


:NONO:

I'm glad that's settled...

Blue

dnaplaya said:

And who started these whole pointless execerise when asked to stop with the free downloads? - freemyheart.com

And what did freemyheart.com gain by starting this whole pointless exercise? - free publicity.

thedoorkeeper said:

Touche'...!

this is good newz... just ask the person 2 stop & then if they don't "Sue they Ass"!

Call me a Hippyloverlover but I think this is a great move by Prince. Clearly, he's not in it for the money and he doesn't even want to close down a service which others enjoy. He merely wants to protect his work of which he is, rightly, fiercely proud.

This is certainly an event which only reflects well on Prince and I am thus rather perplexed that anyone has a problem with the handling of this.

I knew this would never see a courtroom. It was a matter of principle...

Berry said:

---

A good move on Prince's part. I always belived that the lawsuits are just a scare tactic to get people to back off.
I do not think anyone as been taken to court concerning these websites.

I'm glad it over. It's time to focus on more important things like getting the music out to the fans.

Quite a relief indeed. I was going to ask matt if I could borrow 7.5 million bucks, and if he lost this lawsuit, he wouldn't have the money.

thedoorkeeper said:

free publicity for freemyheart = no cash income for the website owner, and probably a larger expense each month to the ISP that hosts his webpage because of increased traffic.

purplecam said:

yes exactly. can't wait for matthew's next slew of downloads!

He probally realized he would not get much money from the poor guy.

WHEW!!! SO glad this is over with

Congrats Matt, now keep your promise!! But if you slip up, hit me w/ an OrgNote!!

AaronUnlimited said:

thedoorkeeper said:

exactly if you're reading prince, thanks!

suomynona said:

Still "bad blood" huh...?

gubbins4ever said:

I completely agree. I think the Prince haters Just don't like the prospect of losign another resean to hat ehim.

suomynona said:

surely part of the negotiated settlement was that you don't talk about the case ?

korovyov said:

I don't thate him. And \i don't think criticism is equal to hating... and this has nothing to do with protecting his work, lawsuits are the worst way to protect your work, nor was it ever a good move. And I would be more perplexed about fans that support an artist that sues fansites, than about fans who are pissed off when Prince wastes more membership money on attorney fees.

i figured this already. it wuz bound 2 happen.