Grooveshark shuts, apologises, and dodges massive fine
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Grooveshark shuts, apologises, and dodges massive fine

Grooveshark shuts, apologises, and dodges massive fine

The premise of Grooveshark was always a little iffy, and at numerous times in their history the recording industry has agreed. But when Universal, Sony, and Warners decided that enough was enough, largely down to Grooveshark not actually licensing their music but still making it available, they sent their legal dogs in for the kill. And with the potential threat (more like absolute certainty) of being found guilty of sharing almost 5000 unlicensed tracks with possible fines in the region of three-quarters of a billion dollars, Grooveshark has shut up shop, wiped everything clean, and handed over all their stuff to the courts, and in doing so has avoided any fines at all. Thus Grooveshark is official over.

This statement, and last ever word from Grooveshark is from their site, and it’s an image rather than actual words:

 

grooveshark

Now it would be all too easy for me to tear apart the words above it an exercise of literary evisceration, but it would serve no purpose. All you need to know is that Grooveshark is over, and there are considerably more legal ways to discover and play music out there, something that some VirtualDJ customers are about to find out.

VDJ ContentUnlimited user? Read This

A key part of a DJ’s existence is having access to heaps of music, and for a growing number, video too. Enter VirtualDJ’s ContentUnlimited service, where for a varying amount of monthly cash you can get said access to a world of content, hence the name. The problem here for some is that a lot of that content was supplied by Grooveshark, which obviously leaves a gaping hole in their paid-for service, one that Atomix is trying to plug ASAP. In the meantime, CU users should check this statement on the VirtualDJ user forum for more detail.

UPDATE: There’s a fresh statement from Atomix:

For the past few years, Atomix Productions has been in contract with Grooveshark, who took care of the hosting and licensing of the catalog used in our service ContentUnlimited Audio.

Following the lawsuit brought against Grooveshark by some music labels, Grooveshark management assured us that a settlement was being reached and that everything was ok.

Last Saturday, we were shocked to discover that this was apparently not the case, and that Grooveshark was convicted of willfully hosting a small number of tracks on which they didn’t acquire the proper licensing, and were consequently shut down.

The lawsuit concerned a very small number of tracks (less than 5 thousand out of 15 million), so it’s very unlikely that ContentUnlimited customers ever played a track that was not properly licensed.

Nonetheless, we immediately removed Grooveshark from our catalog, and momentarily limited our ContentUnlimited Audio service (and made sure that we are not charging anyone anymore for this service until a proper replacement is in place).

To avoid any such surprise in the future, we are now working with some specialized companies, to get licensing deals directly from the labels.

We are trying our best to restore the full service as soon as possible, while still making sure that now and in the future, our users will get a high-quality catalog, fully licensed and legal, and that the copyright holders are properly compensated.

In the meantime, you can follow Grooveshark’s parting advice and go check out other sources of legally licensed music.

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Mark Settle
The Old Owner
I was the editor around these parts for the first two decades of the DJWORX journey. I’m on a creative journey at The Worxlab, and drop in occasionally here. Expect the odd article from me every now and again.
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12 Comments

      1. What’s the big deal about it being free anyway? If you’re out working as a DJ then you can afford to pay for your music. You know, like we used to do.

        We even had to leave the house and go to the store to get it. Sometimes the track you wanted had been sold to another DJ minutes before you arrived, so you had to wait a whole week to get a copy for yourself.

        I can’t believe the amount of fuss being kicked up on the VDJ forum about this. “Oh woe is me. I won’t be able to do my gig now.” Wait, you’re relying totally on streamed (rented) music to do gigs?!

        Time for a facepalm I think. :-)

        1. I have to agree with you. I would never put all my eggs in the ‘streaming music rental’ basket (especially considering your music is the heart of your dj business). I also use VDJ and the streaming service, but only as a supplement to my primary music library which I purchased. If it goes away, it’s not a big deal to me. Just a very minor inconvenience.

        2. In those days ppl weren’t complaining, it was actually much more fun to go out and buy the latest music no matter the effort or the price we had to pay and then show off the tracks to friends, everybody wanted the same equipment, when you had it you were happy and everybody was impressed

          Now with the easy of streaming and downloading nobody really cares anymore what music you have, it seems to DJ now is not something special, hence the profession of DJing is fading away unless you do some crazy tricks but then its called turntablism instead of just DJing

          the conclusion: the more we have, the more we complain

          1. The nobody caring thing is a symptom of the ease with which music is available. We’re on a level playing field with the dance floor these days, because they can go to the same online outlets and get the same upfront tracks and remixes as DJs. It’s harder for a DJ to impress just with track selection alone, because chances are the punter was listening to it on their phone on the way to the club.

  3. As far as the concept of streaming being a big deal, and how this changes much of anything, I don’t think our discussion, as DJs, should focus on how much of a crutch streaming has become.

    For mobile DJs, wedding DJs, etc., I the streaming option is a massively important tool, and could easily become a crutch. If you’re spinning an event where the expectation is you can play whatever anyone there wants, then having a tool that gives you unlimited access to literally every song ever is not only preferential, but indeed critical.

    Yes, music is more available than ever before, but we have almost allowed what we do to be redefined, and have it taken away from us. Club DJing should not be about playing songs, but about defining the energy in a room and controlling people with it. When your set lists are dictated then that becomes impossible. How to combat that is the biggest challenge we are going to face, what with figuring out what the future of DJing is to begin with. But I lay the blame on promoters and venues who don’t understand what we are supposed to do, and DJs who feed that ignorance by not understanding their job.

    Grooveshark, however, should be buried. They broke laws and violated trust, and while the biggest victims are faceless corporations I feel no love for, taking even a penny from an artist is unacceptable in my mind for any business.

  5. If I like it and want to mix it I pay for it. Most streaming is GooglePlay for me.
    And I still buy tracks and sounds from Beatport also.