Hank Barry, CEO of Napster said after a court hearing on Friday:
“This is a case that should be settled… At today's hearing, Sony, AOL TimeWarner, Vivendi Universal and EMI pushed well beyond the dictates of the 9th Circuit decision in their quest to shut Napster down, insisting on an injunction that it would be impossible to comply with other than by shutting down the service.”
He added that he is hopeful that the court’s injunction, when it is issued, will allow the Napster service to continue in operation while it continues to seek a settlement deal with the recording industry and a move to a subscription-based service. He said: “We believe that this matter could and should be successfully resolved by the mediator appointed by Judge Patel.”
Napster’s attempt to filter song files may not satisfy its opponents who will likely argue that it will be easy for users to circumvent the filtration software by changing the titles of songs and artists, many of which are already misspelled on the service.