Copyright Law

Irish ISP to Launch ?Innovative New Music Service?

By soulxtc

Eircom will take efforts to appease the music industry one step further.

It’s been two days now that Irish ISP Eircom formally bowed to the Irish Recorded Music Association (IRMA) and began blocking customer access to Swedish BitTorrent tracker site The Pirate Bay.

The move is a result of a settlement reached between it and the Irish Recorded Music Association (IRMA) who accused the ISP in court of not doing enough to combat copyright infringement by its subscribers.

The agreement calls for a ?three-strikes? policy for repeat file-sharers as well as for it to not contest any request by the IRMA to block any site it claims is engaging in copyright infringement of its works.

It now seems that it’s taking this “partnership” one step further with plans to develop a new digital music service that it expects to launch sometime in the “next few months.”

“Eircom has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the four major labels to develop an innovative new music service for all Irish consumers,” it says in a press release. “This new music service is expected to launch in the next few months.”

It certainly has big shoes to fill if it expects to compete with the likes of Apples iTunes, for I don’t think it’ll be as “innovative” as it claims being that the IRMA surely has a heavy hand in its development.

Stay tuned.

jared@zeropaid.com

Full post as published by ZeroPaid on September 03, 2009 (boomark / email).