Napster puts faith in plans B and C

A court-appointed mediator is currently negotiating a deal which would allow the music-swapping service to continue operations without violating copyright laws, according to reports.

Former federal judge Eugene Lynch was appointed last Monday by US District Judge Marilyn Hall Patel to conduct discussions between Napster and the major record companies after an appeals court upheld a ruling in favour of the Record Industry Association of America (RIAA), which found Napster guilty of copyright infringement.

Hank Barry, CEO of Napster, has pointed to the membership-based deal it struck with BMG last year as a blueprint for a 'legitimate' way forward.

In a statement delivered after last week's ruling, Barry said: "We have been saying all along that we seek an industry-supported solution that makes payments to artists, songwriters and other rights holders while preserving the Napster file sharing community experience."

Many industry insiders have already expressed fears that the shut down of Napster would merely spawn alternatives far harder to control.

Napster itself runs via a central server, meaning shutting down the site would be relatively straightforward, unlike rival Gnutella, which has servers distributed over various locations.

Speaking on silicon.com's The Big Question programme, Chris Setz, director at NPA, said: "Napsterisation will continue through Gnutella and other peer to peer services, but Napster itself will shut if it charges money for something people want for free."

Also on the programme, Dr Neil Barrett, technical director at International Risk Management said: "There is a huge groundswell of support for the large community and from artists themselves. There will be quite serious attempts to shut Napster down, but I don't think they will."