A popular YouTube ripping website which enabled people to convert YouTube videos to .mp3 audio files has been sued by a group of record labels which includes some big names like Sony Music, UMG and Warner Bros. The website – youtube-mp3.org – is believed to be the largest of its kind serving more than 60 million users per month. A report says that a “formal notice of intended legal action” has been served today to youtube-mp3.org.
The BBC reports that the legal papers filed against this website claim that the copyright infringement is on an “enormous” scale and that the website is alone responsible for more than 40 percent of illegal ripping of copyrighted music from YouTube.
Record labels want the company operating this website to pay $150,000 for each instant of copyright infringement or all of the profits that the website has made from the infringement which will only be conclusively proved when this case goes to trial.
Cary Sherman, chairman of the Recording Industry Association of America, has said that this website is making “millions on the backs of artists, songwriters, and labels.” Sherman added that “We are doing our part, but everyone in the music ecosystem who says they believe that artists should be compensated for their work has a role to play. It should not be so easy to engage in this activity in the first place, and no stream ripping site should appear at the top of any search result or app chart.”
The website is yet to comment on this matter.