It's named for a chocolate-hazelnut compound, but compared to Napster's ordinary pirating headaches Gnutella seems to be causing pirating migraines. Gnutella's supporters may think this, and its freeware imitators are turning the Net into an open sharing environment; but its detractors think it makes Napster look like a mere prank by comparison, when it comes to injuring those who depend on royalties for their living. Thousands are logging onto Gnutella, typing search words, and looking into each other's hard drives to snatch whatever is offered whenever they want it, the Associated Press reports. The program installs in minutes and searches through no central servers, which critics say makes it more dangerous to intellectual property rights than Napster is accused of being. That, and its automatic contacting of every Gnutella user as the first one ever reached, the AP says. The Recording Industry Association of America has sued in federal court to bring Napster down. Gnutella's spread began when what the AP calls "rogue" programmers at the America Online subsidiary Nullsoft (makers of the MP3-playing Winamp application) posted the program in mid-March. The posting was pulled quickly, but not before numerous copies showed up on other Websites.
OSAKA, Japan - A district court here has ruled that, in certain conditions, links connecting one Web page to another could be considered illegal - if the page to which one links is considered to be in violation of the law. The case in question involved a Yokohama worker selling image-processing software he developed on his own from his own Website: FL Mask, software which can remove photomasks common in Japan for censoring porn's most explicit images. The programmer had also put links to porn sites on his Website, including one which features an executive convicted under Japanese anti-porn distribution laws, thus making the Yokohama man himself liable. The court ruled the programmer liable even though he himself was unaware of any illegality connected to the porn site to which he linked, according to Nikkei Network.
BERLIN - The European Union is finishing up an e-commerce directive to let freer movement of goods and services cross the continent, but one provision has some worried that it might really limit growth by setting up online taxes. The Directive on Electronic Commerce is expected to be finished and ratified by the EU this coming summer, with a vote set for April 11, according to Wired. The directive would stop restrictions on online contracts and keep member states from making their own bureaucracies to govern the cyber-economy, the magazine continues; but it's also gunning for closing a supposed loophole in online sales tax collection - online collection of value-added taxes from Europeans on all products sold online - which European critics say favors the United States unfairly. Officials in Brussels are said to be demanding e-businesses collect the tax based on the rate of a customer's country, but critics tell Wired that would turn an e-commerce site into a taxman.
--- Compiled by Humphrey Pennyworth
