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Grooveshark Has Been Resurrected … For Now

Earlier this month, Grooveshark shut down. A week after a judge ruled that the music streaming service made “willfull” copyright violations, the music streaming site gave up and offering a formal ...
Grooveshark Has Been Resurrected … For Now
Written by Josh Wolford
  • Earlier this month, Grooveshark shut down. A week after a judge ruled that the music streaming service made “willfull” copyright violations, the music streaming site gave up and offering a formal apology to the music industry.

    “Today we are shutting down Grooveshark. We started out nearly ten years ago with the goal of helping fans share and discover music. But despite [the] best of intentions, we made very serious mistakes. We failed to secure licenses from rights holders for the vast amount of music on the service. That was wrong. We apologize. Without reservation,” said a post on the site.

    And that’s still what’s up over on grooveshark.com.

    But if you head to grooveshark.io, you’ll see a strikingly familiar interface.

    So, what’s going on?

    “All the Mp3 Files listed on Grooveshark.io are property of their respective owners, are all derived from several internet resources and not physically located on Grooveshark.io servers. Grooveshark.io is a not-for-profit internet resource which is NOT generating revenue by selling or distributing Mp3 Files, it generates advertising revenue to maintain its server and personnel costs. Grooveshark.io does NOT endorse the distribution of copyrighted content. When you listen/download Mp3 Files from Grooveshark.io you do so with the understanding that Grooveshark.io and its operators will not be held accountable or responsible for violations of copyright or intellectual property laws that may occur as a result of your action,” says a disclaimer on the new site.

    It goes on to say you can only “download mp3 files supplied by Grooveshark.io search engine (“Grooveshark.io”) for preview purposes” and that you “you intend to delete Mp3 Files after previewing.”

    Crafty, but that’s not a new sort of craftiness. That sort of maneuvering is commonplace with any service that even has the remote possibility of dealing with copyrighted materials.

    So who’s running the new, resurrected Grooveshark? According to BGR, it’s someone connected to the original Grooveshark team who’s built a new team to get it back online.

    From BGR’s Jacob Siegal:

    On Tuesday, I received an email from someone calling himself Shark — an individual connected to Grooveshark who has assembled a team to bring the site back to life.

    “How can I do this?,” he asks in the email. “Well, I started backing up all the content on the website when I started suspecting that Grooveshark’s demise is close and my suspicion was confirmed a few days later when they closed. By the time they closed I have already backed up 90% of the content on the site and I’m now working on getting the remaining 10%.”

    “It’s going to be a roller coaster and we’re ready for it,” he added.

    Yeah, that’s an understatement. We’ll see how long it stays operational. Your guess is as good as mine.

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