Almost as quickly as news circulated that award-winning R&B artist Prince was suing 22 fans for copyright infringement, the "Purple Rain" singer has dropped the suit,
according to TMZ.
The lawsuit, which was originally filed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco on Jan. 16, demanded $1 million from each of the 22 people who allegedly posted bootleg concert footage of the pop star on Facebook and on blogs.
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According to legal documents, the lawsuit was dismissed without prejudice, which means it could be refiled at a later date.
A copy of the original legal filing, published by Matt Jaffe on Scribd.com, showed that Dan Chodera and Karina Jindrova are named in the suit, along with several websites.
"Defendants, rather than publishing lawful content to their blogs, typically publish posts that list all the songs performed at a certain Prince live show and then provide a link to a file sharing service where unauthorized copies of the performance can be downloaded,"
the Jan. 16 lawsuit stated, per The Wrap.
In the lawsuit, Prince claimed that a Facebook group and the website WorldOfBootleg.blogspot.com contained more than 363 files combined that infringe on the copyright of artists. The entertainer demanded that a permanent injunction is enforced to prevent the users from repeated copyright violations in the future.
The Guardian reported the lawsuit pointed to video recorded illegally at several concerts, including a concert on March 24, 2011 in Charlotte, N.C., on April 24, 2002 in Oakland, C.A., and an April 10, 1983 concert in Chicago, I.L.
"While it's clear by now that Prince doesn’t share the same opinions as the Grateful Dead or Nine Inch Nails on bootlegs, for once a file-sharing site isn't in the cross hairs,"
the file sharing website Torrent Freak said on Monday before the dismissal news. "The lawsuit says that the defendants used Facebook and Google’s Blogger 'to accomplish their unlawful activity,' either by running fanpages or blogs and linking to live concert recordings without permission."
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