[Last Update: 13.02.2003 14:53 GMT+1 | questions, feedback, updates, news articles? mailto: conspiracy@gmx.at]

Soulseek up and running again!

News
13.02. Soulseek up and running again
11.02. The old Official Slsk Forums have been replaced by: slskboard.savagenews.com
10.02. Soulseek Status Q & A
09.02. Posting from slsk-operator Nir Arbel
08.02. Soulseek Official Announcement, discuss this here.
05.02. A Mail from the slsk official forums moderator

If you want to stay in contact with the community during the offline-time, use the new Official Forums or IRC.


IRC-Chat
Download the mIRC-Client from mirc.com

Server: EFnet (any)
#soulseek (international)

Server: IRCnet (any)
#soulseek (international)
#soulseek.de (german)
#fastidis (italian)


General Slsk links
> slsk.org (main website, still offline)
> The Official Soulseek Forums (new url! that url is outdated)
> Slsk Records
> Italian website about the soulseek troubles/rumours
> Deutsches Soulseek Board
> soulseek - the unofficial FAQ
> August 25, 2002: Interview with soulseek creator Nir
> Jan 12, 2002: Another interview with Nir


Sites & discussion boards around Filesharing
> Slyck
> Napjunk Forums
> UniteTheCows


News articles (don´t believe everything you read)
11.02.2003 12:54 GMT+1 german giga.de Musiktauschbörse von Dancefloor-Queen killt
10.02.2003 10:19 GMT+1 german netzzeitung.de Künstlerin stoppt Musiktauschbörse
08.02.2003 20:32 GMT+1 german de-bug.de Soulseek versus Sapphirecut
08.02.2003 english p2pnet.net Soulseek RIP? Nope.
08.02.2003 17:12 GMT+1 english neowin.net Artist takes down Soulseek
06.02.2003 13:06 GMT+1 german giga.de Das Aus für Soulseek?
06.02.2003 10:59 GMT+1 german netzzeitung.de Musiktauschbörse Soulseek offline
05.02.2003 12:34 GMT+1 german de-bug.de Soulseek vom Netz. Vermutlich nur wieder ein Serverumzug
05.02.2003 11:36 GMT+1 german fm4.orf.at "For the near future SoulSeek will be down"
05.02.2003 11:21 GMT+1 german derstandard.at Soulseek macht vorerst dicht
05.02.2003 10:55 GMT+1 german heise.de P2P-Tauschbörse SoulSeek vorerst vom Netz
05.02.2003 german at-web.de Soulseek von RIAA zur Schliessung gedrängt
04.02.2003 english slyck.com Information on Soulseek

Soulseek Status Q & A
(10.02.2003, posted here)

Hi, everyone. First, we'd like to thank you for your patience through this week. It has been a rough ride for all of us, and certainly not what we would have expected. While it was unfortunate that matters took place in a way that we could have controlled better, we learned some things as well. All in all, it's certainly not a lost cause, and it had it's positive sides.

To get to the questions that are on the minds of most people:

Q. What day will Soulseek be back?
A. To be completely honest, we are not positive. We have simply been waiting on the new host all along, and with their paperwork there is not much more that we can do about the matter. We were told that it usually takes on average 2-3 days to re-assign an IP (this was on the Monday it went down), and by the end of the week, they were still processing paperwork. Ideally, it would be in the first couple days, but we can't make a promise of such.

Q. Will we have to download a new client / change our software?
A. You *MAY* have to change ports... we are unsure of that at the moment. Otherwise, everything else will be routed to the domain. The site will be the same, the address will be the same.

Q. What can we do to prevent this from happening again right away?
A. If it applies to you, or to someone you know, you can best help Soulseek by removing tracks by Sapphirecut from your shares. We do not suggest acting vigilant and tracking down users to tell them to do so, nor do we need any reports of who is sharing it. That's already well taken care of. Do not bother trying it to "see what the fuss is about" (you can hear them on her site if you are curious. http://www.sapphirecut.com). This is the best thing that can be done for the network.

Q. Why don't you just block / filter the material by this artist?
A. Due to the nature of the system, we are unfortunately not able to implement such.

Hopefully this answers some of the questions you may have, and we look forward to seeing you again soon. Thank you for your patience, and your support during a rough time. Your support make Soulseek the community it is. Cheers.

Sean Nelson / Proteus93
Soulseek Administration


Posting of Nir Arbel at Napjunk Forums
(09.02.2003, posted here)

Hi all,

Nir and Roz here , co-creators and operators of Soulseek. First we want to thank you all for your support and understanding as we go through this rough spot. We both enjoyed reading your comments on this thread very much icon_smile.gif We wanted to write this to give you all a closer look at what's been going on recently, and how things are expected to turn out.

Exactly as Proetus93 said, the trouble started when Sapphirecut filed a DMCA copyright infringement claim about a week ago to Verio. He own claim was followed by ones from musicians Adam Freemer, Tom Stephan (Superchumbo), Marie Claire Cremers and Peter Baily, all claims virtually identical except for the artist and track names listed. Now here's the thing -- while we did receive our Internet access from Verio, we weren't directly working with them. We actually work with CIFNet, who in turn buys access from Verio. What Sapphirecut and the other artists did by filing the copyright infringement claim was the first step on the road to lawsuit. Ideally, if we had known at the time, we would have filed what's called a DMCA counterclaim, where we deny the accusations made in the original claims and explain why. This would have been very easy, because the DMCA has a provision called "safe haven" that basically means if your service doesn't store or traffick illegal materials, you, the service provider, are legally exempt. Soulseek actually goes much further than that, and leaves the process of file transfer negotiation and search request distribution to a decentralized network made entirely of soulseek clients. Anyway, a decent Internet service provider would've politely informed us of the claim, and let us know of the counterclaim option so as to give us a chance to defend ourselves before shutting us down. Not verio, who supposedly has a long track record of treating its customers like dirt. Instead, Verio contacted CIFNet and demanded that we be removed from their service, under threat of cutting CIFNet off entirely! As this would've killed CIFNet, they had no choice but to do as Verio asked.

Through all this, CIFNet kept very close contact with us to let us know exactly what was going on (Verio never contacted us directly), and have been working since last monday to move us to Cogent, another service provider CIFNet works with. Cogent says they usually take about three days to process an IP allocation request, but so far they're taking their sweet time. So we wait.

Anyway, what does all this mean? We can't be more than a few days before getting our new IP address, and as soon as that happens we'll restart the Soulseek service. There is very high likelihood that sapphirecut and co. would repeat the process with Cogent, but we already have a prepared counterclaim we'll fax Cogent *as soon* as that happens, and long before we get disconnected. Beyond that, once we do we open ourselves to lawsuit, but we've ascertained our legal options, and we're certain these guys have no real case.

Verio may not be an easy target like Sapphirecut is, but it's really the big villain here. When all this DMCA crap is behind us, I'm going to release a full public disclosure of the exchange between Verio and CIFNet, and try to get it exposed as well as I can to illustrate exactly just how unprofessional and unreliable they are.

In the meanwhile, thank you all for hanging in there! We promise we'll be back as soon as possible!

Yours, Nir and Roz


Soulseek - Official Announcement
(08.02.2003 08.30 GMT+1)

OFFICIAL ANNOUNCEMENT - Re: Soulseek Status

This is to provide the official status of the Soulseek network as Friday, February 7th and onward. I have spoken to Nir and Rosalind Arbel on the matter over the course of this week and prior to this event taking place, and this notice is being offered on their behalf.

The artist calling herself Sapphirecut previously made a complaint towards Soulseek regarding the sharing of her material on the network. When she had contacted Soulseek regarding the matter, she failed to state which material was in question. There was no information provided, aside from her being "Sapphirecut". Therefore, acting on such, a global message was made to users not to share the artist's material, and a notice was made upon entering chat rooms of the same.

Unfortunately, this was not satisfactory, and the artist went on to file a complaint against Verio - Soulseek's server host, stating DMCA Copywrite Infringement. Verio, in return did not conduct a formal inquiry into the situation. Rather, they acted rather quickly, requiring the server, and site to be pulled. Thus, there was no warning that such was going to take place. This not only applied to the users of Soulseek, but to Nir himself. On sudden notice, he was required to seek out a new host for the server.

To calm the air of panic, this does NOT mean that Soulseek is down forever. The RIAA did NOT have an injunction against Nir, as rumours have stated. Soulseek WILL be returning shortly, and this unfortunate delay was not expected. A new potential host has been found, however they are working through the paperwork for such, and have not completed such as quickly as we would have expected. At this level, it is out of Nir's hands as they have to simply go through the process of completing it. That said, we apologize again for the delay and hope that it does not last a great deal longer.

It is important to note that Soulseek can not and will not condone any actions towards the artist that may cause her or her affiliated labels harm. Such actions would include defaming emails, defacing, or otherwise damaging her website or the site of her affiliates, and other further actions which may be damaging. Such actions will simply result in further problems for the network, as the artist will direct complaints towards Soulseek itself. Those wishing to show their support for Soulseek will best do so by simply NOT sharing any files by this artist. The files in question include:

1.Free Your Mind, Megan’s epic mix.

2.Free Your Mind, Sapphirecut's Original mix

3.Action-Reaction by Sapphirecut (in any form)

4.Any music that has Sapphirecut on it except the Illustrious track “I’d Say Yes”, which is a remix.

We thank you for your patience and support through this situation, and we look forward to seeing all users back on Soulseek shortly. Users who wish further information regarding the DMCA are directed to browse to http://www.chillingeffects.org. All information needed regarding the act can be read or studied there. Cheers.

On behalf of Nir and Rosalind Arbel,
Sean Nelson / Proteus93
Soulseek Administration


A Mail from the slsk official forums moderator
(05.02.2003 15.45 GMT+1)

"hello, my nick is pudstah on slsk and i moderate the official forums (which are down at the moment). a mate of mine who is an admin on soulseek has been speaking with nir.

soulseek is in fact moving to a new host and will be back online within a few days. this is due to delays between hosts.

the information provided by soulseek.de.vu is completely inaccurate and the rumours surrounding RIAA injuctions are absurd, uneducated and premature assumptions. there have also been postings by users impersonating nir which state that the RIAA has shut down soulseek. this is also quite ridiculous and ultimately false.

the official soulseek forums were shut down by jaren80's (owner of remmelt.com where the forums are hosted) ISP due to excessive traffic. this has been confirmed in an email he, himself, has sent to me. as he has been away on holiday, the official forums will be back online later this evening.

for ACCURATE information regarding the soulseek server status, users are urged to visit #soulseek on EFnet (irc).

fellow p2p developer meth, who has been happily getting his XS client up and running recently, is more than happy for people to continue sharing and chatting via the XS beta client until the soulseek servers are back online. the XS client, still in beta testing, can be downloaded from www.methlabs.org"