Tech

Free music streaming app Grooveshark removed from Google Store, cannot stop getting sued

by Sam Sutherland

Probably because they offer a free, illegal version of the paid services of Rdio, Spotify, and a dozen others, Grooveshark has been removed from the Google Store (again). It was first banished by Apple in 2010.

Admittedly, subscription streaming services are far from perfect, and many labels and artists have their issues with the streaming royalty system. But Grooveshark just doesn’t even pretend to be on artists’ side, arguing that under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, their business is perfectly legal so long as they remove copyright material when asked.

It would seem that EMI suing you twice and Universal insisting that you owe them $15 billion could be interpreted as “asking,” but we are not lawyers. Grooveshark’s parent company, Escape Media, has promised to fight to have the app reinstated and their right to make money by streaming other people’s music for free (even when an Rdio subscription costs $4.99 a month) upheld by the courts.

Godspeed, dinks.