Global industry body the IFPI and its various local members are continuing their fight against stream-manipulation websites, with Brazil the latest frontier in the battle.
Yesterday, the IFPI and Pro-Música Brasil announced that they have succeeded in getting 10 sites shut down this year; forced 20 more to stop offering these features; and have got 35 more sites de-listed from the Mercado Livre online marketplace.
This follows the shutdown of 14 other Brazilian sites late last year. “Streaming manipulation has no place in music; we continue to tackle it globally,” said IFPI boss Frances Moore.
However, on another facet of the IFPI’s activity around streaming – stream-ripping – it may not be so keen on developments in France, where (as TorrentFreak reports) the Ministry of Culture appears to have claimed that stream-ripping is legal IF it meets certain conditions: “It must be made from a lawful source at the request of the user, without being stored by the converter, and no circumvention of technical protection measures must be carried out”.
The latter point may be the one where the IFPI can argue its case though.
This story was amended after publication to clarify that the Brazilian announcement is about streaming manipulation, not ripping. Our bleary-eyed morning writer (me) is very sorry for the error.