Business Tort Michael Robertson is the CEO of MP3.com. In recent years he has built a thriving business, which has a market value of around $1.8 billion. In February 2002, a non-profit trade organization representing the recording industry, namely the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), filed a lawsuit against mp3.com. Robertson claimed that the RIAA was presenting a false image to its shareholders and lying to its partners. The RIAA sued him for copyright infringement. Robertson sued them on charges of defamation, trade slander, intrusion with potential economic advantage, and undue business practices. If you analyze the situation, the Recording Industry Association of America's (RIAA) lawsuit against MP3.com actually highlights the fact that Mp3.com had illegally copied approximately 45,000 CDs. Through this, MP3.com could offer an instant "Beam-it" feature that would upload the contents of CDs from your personal library to the MP3.com website. Beam-it software is a revolutionary program that allows MP3.com to instantly identify CDs you own so they can add them to your My.MP3.com account. With Beam-it, a visitor will never have to upload song files or convert their CDs to MP3s. No need to rip or encode. While it takes hours to upload an album to other sites, Beam-it lets you start listening to music from your My.MP3 account in less than a minute. Therefore, users can store their music online and listen to it anywhere. Record companies around the world staged a large-scale revolt. There have been press releases against this venture. Artists and singers favored record companies whose profits began to decline. Everyone thought MP3.com was becoming a giant in the music business, just like Micr...... middle of paper ......utive director, Hilary Rosen, for planning an influential financial lawsuit against MP3. com to demolish their stock value. MP3.com's lawsuit alleged that the RIAA committed defamation activity by sending letters to artist management companies and showing them an incorrect image. The RIAA obviously denied the allegations. Rosen said the RIAA has clear experience tracking and enforcing legal uses of MP3 technology. This leads the thinker astray, should Beam-it be legalized? David Pakman, founder of Myplay, said a license should apply to legalize it. References Jodi Mardesich. Valley Talk: MP3.com vs. RIAA. Fortune, February 10, 2000. Retrieved from http://www.fortune.com/fortune/articles/0,15114,372735,00.html on June 7, 2003. MP3.com. Retrieved from http://www.mp3.com website in June 7, 2003.