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To: Barry Grossman who wrote (109106)	9/1/2000 7:42:34 AM
From: Road Walker	Respond to of 186894

Aimster Says It Has Talks with Intel to Forge Ties By Sue Zeidler LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Aimster, a new Napster-like program that piggybacks on America Online's Instant Messaging service and could be the biggest nightmare to date for studios trying to stop film and music swapping online, said it has held initial talks with Intel Corp. (NasdaqNM:INTC - news) to forge ties. ``Intel has contacted us and said they thought we had a great thing in this space. We're hoping to meet with them soon and enter into a strategic partnership with them,'' said Johnny Deep, a spokesman for the Troy, N.Y.-based group of 14 software developers who created the program. Deep also said that Aimster next week plans to announce that it has attracted 1 million AOL users less than one month after the program was launched on Aug. 8, among an estimated 60 million users of the AOL Instant Messaging system. Intel had no comment, but last week announced it formed an industry working group to foster standards and protocols for peer-to-peer (P2P) computing for use in businesses. It said its venture capital arm was preparing to invest in P2P start-ups. ``Peer-to-peer computing could be as important to Internet's future as the Web browser was to its past,'' Patrick Gelsinger, chief technology officer, Intel Architecture Group, said at the time. An alliance between Intel and Aimster would be a significant turning point for the evolution of file-sharing communities, like Napster and Gnutella, which have for the most part been reviled and sued by the entertainment industry for allegedly facilitating copyright infringement. Intel sees the programs as creating strong demand for greater computing power that in the long-run could bolster sales of personal computers that run on its microprocessors. Deep said he would hope to eventually reach a partnership agreement with AOL, as well. But analysts said AOL may not be entirely receptive and that Aimster could also wind up in court like other file-sharing services. ``We are aware of the program,'' said Andrew Weinstein, an AOL spokesman. ``And we are currently looking into it.'' Trade groups representing some technology giants filed briefs on Monday to a federal appeals court expressing concerns about an injunction issued last month by a U.S. District court against song-swap company Napster Inc. In filing these ``friend-of-the-court'' briefs, groups like the Computer & Communications Industry Association (CCIA), which represents technology giants like AT&T Corp. (NYSE:T - news), Oracle Corp. (NasdaqNM:ORCL - news) and Yahoo Inc. (NasdaqNM:YHOO - news), said the courts need to reinterpret and revise some of the models for intellectual property protection. Unlike Napster, which uses central computers known as servers to link people swapping songs, Aimster and Gnutella require no central computer and can be used to swap picture and video files as well as MP3 music files. This decentralized file-sharing method makes it harder to crack down on potential piracy. The Aimster service, which attaches a Gnutella browser to AOL's Instant Messaging service (AIM), puts AOL again in an unusual position with its soon-to-be merger partner Time Warner Inc. (NYSE:TWX - news). Time Warner, the world's biggest media company, is among several entertainment industry giants such as Sony (6758.T) and Bertelsmann AG(BTGGga.D) that have sued file-sharing companies like Scour and Napster for copyright infringement. Earlier this month, AOL had to remove a search engine that locates music files on its Winamp music player, citing concerns about intellectual property rights. And ironically, engineers at AOL's Nullsoft unit were behind the creation of Gnutella, released onto the Web in March. AOL subsequently shut the Web site down but copied versions have proliferated as the court cases against Napster continues. ``The music and movie industries are trying to cut the head off Napster when underneath what is about to emerge is much nastier. A Gnutella network on top of AOL makes Napster look like kids' stuff. If you can use the AOL network to share files, its pretty enormous,'' said Bruce Forest, director at Viant Corp, a Boston-based developer of digital business. He added that more programrs will figure out how to attach file-sharing technologies to other platforms, extending the impact of such tools to an ever wider audience. But, he said leveraging the file-sharing market would create a whole new revenue stream for content companies. Deep said Aimster believes it is insulated from lawsuits because it can be used for many non-infringing purposes. And, Aimster users share files only with people on AIM ''buddy lists'', which gives it a legal advantage over Napster, which lets users download from anybody else on the service, he said. Deep said on Tuesday, Aimster released a new version of the program that could handle up to 10 million users at once and that next month it a still newer version would be able to handle a nearly unlimited number of users.