OINK MAN NOT GUILTY
So, as probably expected, the man behind the infamous Oink BitTorrent tracker and file-sharing community was found not guilty guvnor at the end of his trial, for conspiracy to defraud the music business, at Teesside Crown Court on Friday afternoon.

As previously reported, Alan Ellis was the man behind the invite-only Oink file-sharing community which was shut down in 2007 following a joint investigation by British and Dutch police, working in collaboration with UK and global record label trade bodies the BPI and IFPI. While four prolific users of the community were previously successfully prosecuted for simple copyright crimes, Ellis was tried for the more serious offence of conspiracy to defraud.

The prosecution claimed that Ellis had deliberately and deviously set out to profit big time from his file-sharing operation, which encouraged users to make cash donations (the prosecution claimed said donations were compulsory when a user wanted to introduce a friend, though former users of the service have denied that was so). As previously reported, prosecutors also said that some $300,000 in donations had been raised by the time the service was shut down.

According to local Teesside newspaper The Gazette, prosecutor Peter Makepeace told jurors on Friday: "This was a cash cow, it was perfectly designed to profit him and it was as dishonest as the day is long. We say this was a criminal conspiracy to operate a pirate music-sharing website that facilitated the sharing of copyrighted music. This was a website specifically designed for that purpose. It was - one has to give credit to Mr Ellis - perfectly designed to achieve that aim. It was a smooth-running, wonderful machine designed for the purpose of doing this and achieving this at an extraordinary rate".

He continued: "The money kept rolling on in. Kerching, kerching, kerching. He sat back just counting the brass. Oink is dishonest because common sense says it's dishonest. It's obviously dishonest. He knows it's dishonest because he's not stupid. He knows it's dishonest to promote, encourage and facilitate criminal activity. This man is patently and obviously acting dishonestly and he patently and obviously knows that he is".

As also previously reported, Ellis argued that he originally set up the Oink community to test and develop his own programming skills, and that he was never motivated by plans to profit from the file-sharing phenomenon. Donations, he argued, were to pay for the costs of hosting the service, and would ultimately have been used to buy the operation its own server. Meanwhile, he said he was not aware that his service, in itself, could be guilty of copyright infringement, believing that while members of his community may be liable for such infringement, that he had no such liabilities as the operator of the Oink platform itself. He added that no one in the music industry - despite them clearly being aware of his operation - made any effort to explain that operating the site could amount to infringement.

Ellis' defence lawyer Alex Stein argued: "This was all a brave new world in 2004. It was like the Wild West on the internet. [Ellis was] like a rabbit caught in headlights, who might be seen as deluded but did not come to court to lie. [In fact,] in many societies he'd be [seen as] an innovator, a creator, a Richard Branson. His talent would be moulded, not crushed by some sort of media organisation".

He continued: "The IFPI sat and watched. They used this site. Their own members used this site to promote their own music and now they're crushing him. Maybe he grew too big for them, maybe they've taken a different marketing approach. I don't know. But it was decided that this site should be taken down. All of us here are being manipulated to some sort of marketing strategy by the IFPI. If anybody's acting dishonestly it's them. He was co-operating. He was in communication with copyright owners. He was never told what he was doing would lead to some sort of criminal prosecution".

Ellis chose not to comment on his court win, though many in the file-sharing community were very happy indeed. The BPI, unsurprisingly, were less pleased. They said on Friday afternoon: "This is a hugely disappointing verdict which is out of line with decisions made in similar cases around the world, such as The Pirate Bay. The defendant made nearly £200,000 by exploiting other people's work without permission. The case shows that artists and music companies need better protection".

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DO WE GIVE AN OINK ABOUT AUTHORISING INFRINGEMENT?
As previously commented, pursuing Ellis for conspiracy to defraud was always ambitious, given the slightly slapdash nature of the Oink operation in its early days, and the lack of any obvious deception, or the sort of all round shady behaviour required to prove fraud. The case for copyright infringement really was stronger.

Why the prosecution went for conspiracy to defraud isn't clear. It is the crime more traditional music pirates - those who bootleg CDs in their garage for example - are often successfully prosecuted for, so perhaps the piracy police felt they were on more familiar ground pressing those charges. However, while it's hard to believe anyone would set up a bootleg CD operation for anything but dishonest intent, it is entirely possible a geek would set up a file-sharing website in his bedroom just for fun. The dishonesty required for a fraud conviction is therefore much harder to prove in this case.

It's possible that prosecutors and the IFPI wanted a tougher penalty than a copyright infringement conviction was likely to deliver, preferably jail time, to make a big bold statement to other internet pirates, and a custodial sentence was more likely with conspiracy to defraud. It's also possible that at the start the authorities genuinely believed the Oink operation was a lot more organised and disciplined than it really was. It's easy to forget just how easy it is to cover up a shambolic operation with a half decent website.

It is also possible prosecutors feared they wouldn't have a case for copyright infringement, or at least not without taking the whole thing all the way to the UK's shiny new Supreme Court. As with the services that have featured in all the key file-sharing lawsuits of the last decade - from Napster to Grokster to Kazaa to The Pirate Bay - the Oink platform never actually hosted any of the infringing content itself. While Ellis had admitted to personally sharing unlicensed music files via his own community - which would constitute so called direct infringement - the operation of the website itself would not amount to such a thing.

By operating the Oink community Ellis would instead be liable for so called 'authorising infringement'. This is a tricky concept about which the UK's Copyright Act says very little. The last time the record industry tried to use the concept in the battle against music piracy - in a pre-internet case related to home-taping - it failed. Arguably precedents set in cases like Napster, Grokster and The Pirate Bay, which centred on a related though slightly different legal concept of contributory infringement, would be persuasive in any attempt to do Ellis for authorising infringement. The precedent in Kazaa even more so, because that was heard in the Australian jurisdiction which also recognises the English Law concept of authorising infringement. Though none of the foreign cases would actually be binding on an English court.

And the last time authorising infringement liabilities, with regards the provision of file-sharing services, were formally discussed, during the previously reported Gowers Review of intellectual property law in 2006, the BPI itself admitted that the outcome of any actual lawsuit on the matter would be uncertain. In their submission to Gowers they wrote: "The outcome of a case against a P2P provider in the UK remains unpredictable - obtaining a definitive judicial interpretation would likely involve pursuing proceedings all the way to the House of Lords. [Such proceedings] are likely to be costly, time-consuming and not without risk".

The BPI asked Gowers to recommend that the government provide some clarity on the liabilities of file-sharing service providers in the UK with regards copyright infringement, perhaps be expanding the section on authorising infringement in the Copyright Act. Gowers promptly refused. And not such clarification has been discussed as part of the Digital Economy Bill either. Personally, I'd say such clarification is as important as the three-strikes ballyhoo that is included in the DEB, possibly more so - in reality you'll never stop individuals file-sharing, but you could make it difficult for people to operate and profit from online services which make file-sharing easier.

The lack of any such clarification makes things difficult for the UK record industry. Friday's ruling did not actually say that you can operate an Oink style service without being guilty of copyright infringement, but many will interpret that it did.

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SABIP SAY WE NEED TO KNOW MORE ABOUT ATTITUDES TO COPYRIGHT
More copyright news anyone? Don't worry, we've got a funny Dappy story coming up shortly. But first, the UK's Strategic Advisory Board For Intellectual Property, for such a thing exists, says that better information is needed regards people's attitudes to copyright law.

The body chose to state the obvious on this issue while discussing new evidence on the increase in offline file-sharing, where kids illegally share music files by swapping memory sticks and hard disks, a form of file-sharing that is by no means new, but which has started to increasingly appear on the agenda of copyright considerers of late.

The boss of the British Library, Lynne Brindley, a board member of SABIP, told reporters last week: "There's a whole big question here around what is happening offline digitally, the swapping of discs and data in that world, there's a lot of it going on". While useless IP Minister David Lammy added: "The need for research into this area is hugely important so we can understand consumer behaviour, understand how to enforce copyright and understand the scale of the problems we are experiencing".

The call for a review of copyright was backed by, erm, a review of copyright commissioned by SABIP.

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DAPPY DROPPED BY ANTI-BULLYING CAMPAIGN
N-Dubz's Dappy has been dropped from a campaign aimed at stopping bullying over mobile phones and the internet after he sent abusive text messages containing death threats to a Radio 1 listener last week.

As previously reported, Chloe Moody sent a message in to the Chris Moyles radio show while the band were being interviewed, calling them "losers" and branding Dappy "a little boy with a silly hat". Dappy managed to take down her phone number and bombarded her with calls and texts, including one which said: "Your gonna die, U sent a very bad msg towards N Dubz on The Chris Moyels show yesterday Morning and for that reason u will never be left alone!! If u say sorry I will leave u alone u fuck".

N-Dubz helped launch the government's latest anti-bullying campaign, BeatBullying, last November with Schools Minister Ed Balls, releasing a song called 'RU Cyber Safe'. At the time, Balls called them "great ambassadors" for the campaign. However, last week he condemned Dappy's actions, saying: "This text message was completely unacceptable and it is right that he has not only apologised, but accepted there was no excuse for his behaviour. I know that many artists work with Beatbullying because they genuinely want to use their influence with young people to campaign against bullying. But that starts with ensuring their own behaviour sets the right example".

Announcing that the group were being dropped from the campaign, a spokeswoman for it added: "BeatBullying in no way condones this behaviour and we stress that sending any threatening messages of any kind is completely unacceptable. Dappy's behaviour is not becoming of an ambassador to young people. We have no further plans to work with the band".

Both Dappy and the BBC have issued apologies over the incident.

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WEEZER MAN BACK ON STAGE
Weezer frontman Rivers Cuomo will be back on stage with the band again this Friday, the first time since a bus crash last month left him with a punctured lung and five broken ribs. Cuomo spent several weeks in hospital, resulting in the cancellation of the band's US tour.

Announcing that the band would perform at Florida State University this week, Cuomo said via Twitter: "Doctor says my lung is all healed - cleared to fly to Florida for the show".

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JEAN DEFENDS HIS HAITI FOUNDATION
Wyclef Jean has spoken out in defence of his previously reported Yele Haiti Foundation after a charity screening group raised concerns about the organisation's accounting practices.

Their concerns were raised as many of Jean's fans donated to the charity which is involved in the relief effort in Jean's native country of Haiti following last week's devastating earthquake. An Associated Press report claims that the accounts of the Foundation are closely intertwined with Jean's business enterprises, which I think is generally thought of as a no no in charity circles, even if everything is legit.

But Jean hit out at those criticising his charitable organisation, especially at this time. He said in a statement: "It is impossible for me to even comprehend the recent attacks on my character and the integrity of my foundation. The fact that these attacks come as we are mobilised to meet the greatest human tragedy in the history of Haiti only serves to perplex me even further". The former Fugee added that he had never personally profited from the Foundation, and in fact had donated large amounts of time and money to it.

In sort of related news, George Clooney and MTV have announced they will stage a benefit concert to raise funds for the Haitian relief effort which will air across the MTV network and a load of other US TV stations on Friday night.

Speaking to the Associated Press at the Golden Globes this weekend, the actor said that he hoped Bono, Sting, Justin Timberlake, Christina Aguilera and Alicia Keys would be among those to appear at the benefit. Recordings of any performances will also be sold via iTunes, he added. The Red Cross, UNICEF, Oxfam America, Partners In Health and Jean's aforementioned Yele Haiti Foundation will be beneficiaries.

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BOBBY CHARLES DIES
Singer-songwriter Bobby Charles has died, aged 71.

Born in Abbeville, Louisiana, Charles had a prolific career from the fifties onwards, pioneering the genre that became known as swamp pop, and writing hits songs for the likes of Bill Haley And His Comets and Fats Domino, in particular 'See You Later, Alligator' and 'Walking To New Orleans'.

Although preferring to stay out of the spotlight, Charles continued to compose and record for much of his life, recording a duet of 'Walking To New Orleans' with Fats Domino in the 1990s, and recently collaborating with long term friend Dr John to put together a record of new songs dedicated to Domino.

Paying tribute, Dr John told reporters: "[Bobby was] a special guy, [very] easy to work with. We were very close for 40, 50 years".

Charles died at his home on Thursday. He suffered from diabetes and had recently fought off kidney cancer.

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BRITS PERFORMANCES CONFIRMED
Kasabian, Lady Gaga, JLS, Dizzee Rascal and Florence And The Machine will all perform at the BRIT Awards this year. Alongside Outstanding Contribution winner Robbie Williams, obviously. The BRITs take place on 16 Feb and will be broadcast on ITV.

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CYPRESS HILL SIGN TO PRIORITY
Cypress Hill have signed a worldwide deal with EMI's urban division Priority Records, which is currently being headed up by Snoop Dogg, of course.

And look, here is Snoop confirming the Cypress Hill deal: "My role as Creative Chairman of Priority Records has put me in the driver's seat to help revive the most important west coast hip hop label. As such, I'm excited to announce my first signing as Cypress Hill. Undeniably one of the most important hip hop groups in music history, not only are they incredibly talented and the first Latino hip hop group to go platinum, they are also from the west coast - so this signing is the perfect marriage".

Cypress Hill's B-Real added: "We're very excited to be part of the Priority Records family. It's a label with a rich history, and together with Snoop we're going to add to its legacy".

The band's first release via Priority will be new long player 'Rise Up', their first new studio album in six years, due out in April.

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NEW SNOW FEST WITH ADDED YETI
Another alpine festival date for your diaries. The Yeti Festival will launch in Nassfield, Austria this April, providing a mix of great DJ action, some superb Lost & Found parties and plenty of snow-related activities. On the DJ bill so far are Jagz Kooner, James Priestly, EddyTM, Stuart Patterson, Tim Fanucci, Radioproof, the Lost & Found DJs plus Secret Garden's Head Gardener.

For more info you really ought to check www.yetifestival.com

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BEGGARS LAUNCH NEW PUBLISHING COMPANY
The Beggars Group is launching a new music publishing venture in collaboration with Andy Heath, an existing director of the London-based independent music company who has headed up previous Beggars publishing ventures including the former Momentum Music company, sold to Universal in 2001, and the group's existing publishing outfit 4AD Music.

The new venture will involve both the main Beggars Group and its founder Martin Mills, and the firm's all important XL Recordings subsidiary, and its founder Richard Russell, as well as Heath, and will be based out of both Beggars and XL's London HQs. Both Mills and Heath also have an interest in New York-based music publisher Mattitude, an interest which will be integrated into the new company, to be called Beggars Songs.

A statement from Beggars says: "The new company will be aiming to acquire and exploit both new and existing copyrights and at launch its roster will include work by, amongst others; Yo La Tengo, Dizzee Rascal, Cat Power, Holy Fuck, Los Campensinos, Air France, The Ponys, Dark Horses and Scout Niblett to name but a few".

Exec-wise 4AD's Jen Willis will be come GM of the new company, with former V2 A&R Manager Amy Morgan appointed as Creative Manager. Heath will be MD.

Confirming it all, Heath told CMU: "Our aim with Beggars Music is to create a full service independent music publisher that delivers the best results for its clients and adds significant value to their work and career. We have put together a great team and are in an excellent position to apply our extensive experience to this new venture".

Martin Mills added: "This is a tremendous opportunity for Andy and I to bring together our various publishing interests and, with the addition of Richard's unique skills, shape a great new creative and proactive publishing business".

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FULLER PLANNING NEW COMPANY, PLUS BOY BAND SEARCH
Pop and telly guru Simon Fuller has announced he is launching a new entertainment company. He has reached a deal with entertainment giant CKX, which bought Fuller's 19 Entertainment company in 2005. He will continue to work with CKX and be involved in some of their key TV shows, while also being free to launch his new venture.

Fuller's recently announced new reality project, 'If I Can Dream', which will be based primarily around web-based media, will remain as a 19/CKX production, but with Fuller staying on as the project's Executive Producer through his newly structured partnership with his former company.

Confirming his new arrangement with CKX, and his planned new venture, Fuller told reporters: "As an entrepreneur I feel I am about to enter my prime years and starting a new entertainment company at this moment fills me with great excitement".

CKX top man Robert FX Sillerman added: "This new arrangement guarantees that Simon and CKX will be working together for many, many years to come. I'm also delighted that going forward Simon will be free to focus his creative energy on developing new ideas and projects and that CKX has the opportunity to invest in his new business".

Fuller has also revealed details of another new pop project - he will be teaming up with Perez Hilton to form a new boy band, to be recruited via a telly talent contest to be called 'Boy Band'. I'm not sure if this venture will be linked to Fuller's new business venture, the website where wannabe boy banders sign up is operated by a company called Queen & King Productions, LLC.

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NEWTON NAMED PRESIDENT OF COLUMBIA US
Sony Music last week announced the appointment of Ashley Newton to the role of President at its Columbia US division. He's previously been working as Exec VP of A&R at another Sony division in the US - RCA - though has previous label management experience as MD of Virgin Records in the UK, and later President of Virgin Records America. He began his career in A&R at Island Records in the London.

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MYSPACE RECORDS NOT CLOSING
An update on MySpace Records, the record label backed by the social networking giant which, in news that will surprise many of you, is apparently still operational. The US-based label was launched back in the early days of MySpace moving into the music domain, and is probably best known for releasing the 2008 album by Pennywise, 'Reason To Believe'.

There were rumours the JV label, also backed by Universal's Interscope, was about to close on Friday as it was announced its GM, Jay Scavo, was returning to Hollywood Records. Other execs were also reported to have been let go. However, various sources say the label will continue to operate and its current roster of artists will remain signed to it. Not sure who will be left to run it all, though.

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IMEEM PLAYLISTS READY TO APPEAR ON MYSPACE MUSIC
More MySpace, and the social networking flim flam's music platform said on Friday that it had transferred playlist data from the accounts of former Imeem users onto its system. Which means that former Imeem users who have or set up a MySpace Music account with the same email address will be able to see the playlists they had previously set up via the now defunct MySpace rival.

As previously reported, the Imeem service went off line overnight last month once MySpace confirmed a deal to buy various parts of the flagging streaming music service's operations, including all its user data. Because MySpace didn't buy the company outright - meaning what was left of Imeem couldn't afford to run up new royalty payment liabilities - the service had to be switched off without delay, even though MySpace didn't immediately know how it would incorporate Imeem user data into its music platform.

Whether Imeem users will now, five and a half weeks on, flock to MySpace to regain access to their former playlists I don't know. Some might wonder, if Imeem can disappear overnight, what is to stop MySpace Music suffering the same fate the day Rupert Murdoch decides to stop bankrolling the service? Some former Imeem users might think that they would be better off tapping file-sharing communities for free music, and organising playlists on their own PC, rather than investing time into organising their music collections on a platform which could just disappear one day.

Perhaps.

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MUSIC GAME SALES SLUMP
Stats from NPD Group suggest that sales figures for music-based videogames - so the pretend-to-play franchises - were down last year, which I think we already knew, but it's good to have these things confirmed.

The stats say that the much hyped Beatles edition of 'Rock Band' sold 1.18 million units in the US, and 1.7 million units globally. By contrast, 'Rock Band 2' sold 1.7 million units in the US alone in its first four months on sale in 2008. Similarly 'Guitar Hero' scored disappointing figures last year. 'Guitar Hero 5' shifted 996,000 units in the US, where as 'Guitar Hero: World Tour' shifted a whopping 3.4 million units in 2008.

For a brief time the pretend-to-play franchises were tipped as being important future revenue streams for the music industry. Of course, said franchises continue to generate money for labels and music publishers through ongoing download sales, so are still a welcome addition to the digital music mix. Whether the gaming sector will remain so committed to the formats remains to be seen.

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TOM DEACON JOINS RADIO 1
BBC Switch and stand up comedy blokey Tom Deacon will present a new show for Radio 1, to air on Sunday nights after the chart show.

Deacon is a presenter on the TV version of the Beeb's yoof brand Switch, and his new radio show will also appear in the Switch strand on Radio 1. He will replace the Sunday evening Switch show presented by Nick Grimshaw and Annie Mac, who will shift into a late night slot on Sundays.

Radio 1's Deputy Controller Ben Cooper said this: "Tom has been doing a fantastic job with Switch so I'm really pleased to bring him to Radio 1 and his new show means we are strengthening our relationship with Switch even further".

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CHART UPDATE
There's interesting news in this week's singles chart. And it's not that Iyaz is still at number one with 'Replay', or even that Owl City are this week's highest new entry with 'Fireflies'. No, it's that a single by the cast of a TV show are new at number five after just one edition of said show being aired in the UK.

As previously reported, the cast of 'Glee', a sort of 'High School Musical' with irony, release singles after each episode of the show is aired. Episode one's big finale, and the song used in the trailer for the show on E4, was a cover of Journey's 'Don't Stop Believin', which is now sitting at number five in the chart. Not only that, but the original version is sitting behind it at number six.

Time will tell if this is a new phenomenon that will see the show dominate the chart on a weekly basis, or whether their early success is in part due to comparatively low January record sales elsewhere. Upcoming covers of Rihanna's 'Take A Bow', Amy Winehouse's 'Rehab' and Kanye West's 'Gold Digger' are certainly not expected to chart quite as high.

Other new entries on the chart are Plan B with 'Stay Too Long' at nine, OneRepublic with 'All The Right Moves' at 30, JLS with 'One Shot' at 32, Biffy Clyro with 'Many Of Horror' at 38, and Vampire Weekend with 'Cousins' at 39.

The album chart is also quite interesting this week, as Florence has finally got her number one. Florence And The Machine's debut was held down at number two when it was released back in July, due to the death of that pesky Michael Jackson fellow. But now she's back, and she's kicked that Paolo Nutini bloke down to number two.

The top ten is littered with new entries this week, with Vampire Weekend at three, You Me At Six at five, and Delphic at eight. Though they do make up all the new entries on the Top 40, so you could say the chart overall is a little on the quiet side.

The charts are compiled (when they can stop themselves from spontaneously bursting into song) by The Official Charts Company.

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ANOTHER DAUGHTER FOR VAN MORRISON?
Well, following those strange rumours over Christmas that Van Morrison had become a father again, aged 64, by fathering the child of a business associate - rumours the singer strongly denied, of course - now Van The Man is being named as the father of another girl. Though this girl is currently 42 years old.

Apparently, Samantha Branch is convinced that Morrison is her father, her late mother Dee having shared a flat with the singer in the mid-sixties. Dee Branch died not long after giving birth to Samantha, but seemingly always let it be known who her daughter's father was. Samantha previously connected with Morrison in the eighties, but, while conceding it is possible he is the girl's father, she says he has always refused to take a paternity test.

Quite why she's having another push for her possible father to take a paternity test now I'm not sure, it's possibly the result of media meddling into Morrison's past following the Christmas rumours. Anyway, she's told reporters: "Dee left her family and friends in no doubt who the father was, but I would like to know once [and] for all if he really is. [In the eighties] he said he wasn't sure if I was his or not because he wondered about the timing of everything. All I ever wanted from him was recognition and to clear up whether or not he is actually my father."

A statement from Morrison issued this weekend said: "My private life is exactly that - it is private. I have, in my long career, never spoken about it and I'm not about to start doing so now".

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COLE REGRETS THOUGH DEFENDS 2003 ASSAULT THING
Cheryl Cole has spoken to Q magazine about that mini-scandal that threatened to destabilise her career in the early days of Girls Aloud. You'll remember she was convicted for assaulting a toilet attendant in 2003. Now the darling of prime time telly, Cole has told Q that she regrets the incident but stands by her claim that she acted in self-defence.

Cole: "As much as I regret that situation, I didn't attack someone, I defended myself. My brothers taught me: if someone hits you, you hit them back. That's still how I view it and that's what I'll teach my kids".

Now there's a new format for ITV1 - 'Cheryl Fans Slap Back', in which the Girl Aloud goes out on the streets of Newcastle and judges the best drunken pub fights. Smashing.

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