LimeWire sued by pubs

PILING ON? It isn’t easy being green…or lime—actually, make that LimeWire. The service, whose leader Mark Gorton has been attempting to turn it into a legitimate online store, has been sued for copyright infringement by the National Music Publishers Association. The NPAA has asked the court to for $150k in damages for each song that was willfully infringed and $30k for any other kinds of infringement. Considering that LimeWire users have illegally downloaded hundreds of millions of songs, the damage award could be staggering, notes CNET’s Greg Sandoval. The NPAA suit mirrors one filed four years ago by the RIAA in which a judge found the P2P guilty of copyright infringement; last month, the company asked the court to reconsider its summary judgment decision. LimeWire has held talks with the majors in an attempt to create a fully legal service, nut thus far to no avail. Said a LimeWire spokesperson said in a statement, "We have had many promising meetings with labels, publishers, and artists alike about our new music service and a business model that will compensate the entire industry." (6/18a)