Not content with a mere statement to the press, LimeWire has instead updated the overlay message that appears when you load the company's website. The message, in all capital letters, looks Very Serious. While before it focused on the injunction that has all but shut down LimeWire, the new message goes heavy on the "we had nothing to do with this Pirate Edition" angle.
The caution is certainly understandable (though unlikely to deter someone who goes by the name "MetaPirate"). LimeWire now operates under a tough injunction (PDF) that bars it from (among many other things) "directly or indirectly operating or assisting in or supporting the operation of any computer server or website or distributing any software in any way related to the LimeWire System and Software, or any other Comparable System and Software that enables, facilitates, permits, assists, solicits, encourages, or induces" the unauthorized sharing of copyrighted works.
With a hearing on damages coming soon, the last thing LimeWire needs is for the judge to wonder whether it is "directly or indirectly operating or assisting" something like LimeWire: Pirate Edition, which uses the (open) LimeWire source code but strips out all elements of centralized control and adds in all the "pro" features that LimeWire used to sell.
We checked in with "MetaPirate," the hacker behind LimeWire: Pirate Edition. He has no plans to change what he's doing.
"Given the legal pressure that LimeWire is under," he said by e-mail, "it's understandable that they would urge us to stop distributing LimeWire Pirate Edition—but under the terms of the GPL, we have the right to continue doing so. LimeWire Pirate Edition is free software in the most irksome sense of the word."
As for the issue of his own liability, MetaPirate isn't worried about the recording industry coming after him personally. "Good luck, I'm behind seven proxies," he said.