DRE NAMES NAMES, METALLICA FANS OBJECT

As he'd said he would (see hitsdailydouble.com, 5/15), Dre handed notification to the company of 935,500 tracks available for downloading in the MP3 format on Napster, as well as a list of 239,612 users he claims are responsible for exchanging some 89,760 tracks without permission.

The hip-hop superstar, producer and Aftermath Records ruler wants Napster to delete the offending files from its directory rather than target users, since Metallica has touched off a firestorm of protest and derision among users with its more hardline stance.

Dre's information, like that provided to Metallica, in whose investigatory footsteps Dre is following, was provided by NetPD, an online tracking firm that has already become a lightning rod for the online music community. Dre and Metallica are both advised by barrister Howard King of King, Purtich, Holmes, Paterno & Berliner,, who has publicly declared his intention to help other artists go after Napster.

Meanwhile, thousands of Metallica fans booted by Napster for allegedly swapping the heavy metal band's music want their access tothe service reinstated.

To date, more than 30,000 Metallica fans have come forward and sworn under penalty of perjury that they were identified in error by the group when they asked that Napster block their use of its file-sharing service.

"The fact that so many people have come forward and disputed Metallica's accusation that they did not break the law demonstrates that this is not a black and white issue," said shawn fanning',390,400);">shawn fanning',390,400);">Shawn Fanning, 19-year-old founder of Napster. "Napster has employed every available means it has to honor Metallica's requests. However, we truly believe we should be working with the artist community in such disputes to avoid putting the fans in the middle."

Napster, the San Mateo, CA-based provider of the most popular file-sharing software on the Internet, was legally obligated to block more than 317,000 users of its service at Metallica's request last week.

If Metallica does not take legal action against the named individual users who claim they have been falsely accused within 10 days of Tuesday's notice, Napster will restore those blocked accounts, citing federal copyright law.

Napster has begun forwarding those petitions to King, who disputed their claims.

"(The users) are absolutely lying. There's no question that they're lying," said the attorney. "Each and every one of them was offering Metallica MP3s for uploads."

Metallica sued the company last month for copyright infringement and racketeering, alleging that Napster's software encouraged users to freely trade the band's songs without their permission.