The recording industry has spent the past several years picking off one peer-to-peer file-sharing company after another: Napster, KaZaa, Grokster and several others have settled lawsuits, been acquired or agreed to stop allowing users to share copyrighted music. But LimeWire is standing firm. In response to the industry’s lawsuit against it last month, the company that owns the LimeWire file-sharing software filed a counterclaim last week, accusing members of the Recording Industry Association of America of anticompetitive practices, restraint of trade, tortuous interference and other claims (info.riaalawsuits.us).

The countersuit is “encouraging,” wrote John Paczkowski, an editor at SiliconValley.com who writes Good Morning Silicon Valley (gmsv.com). Paczkowski called LimeWire’s language “heavy-handed,” but concluded that it’s not off base. “Much more interesting,” according to Nate Anderson of ArsTechnica, “is the lengthy section in which LimeWire discusses its decision to ‘go straight’ ” (http://arstechnica.com).

http://www.sptimes.com/2006/10/04/Business/On_The_Web.shtml