by SHANE SINNOTT

There are rumblings on the Internet this week that the Weed Music Distribution Service (weedshare.com) will cease operations, allegedly due to bullying by Microsoft—look here: digitaldarkage.blogspot.com. Started in 2003, Weed is a music store/filesharing system that, ostensibly, attempts to share copyrighted music while kicking back money to the artists. A user can play a song three times for free, after which they have to buy it. You can also give the song to anyone else you want, who will in turn get the three-tries-then-buy offer.

It’s the next part that’s unique. If someone you gave the song to chooses to buy it, you get a kickback, as well as the person who gave it to you. The idea, it seems, was to blur music “sharing” with “marketing” and pay sharers accordingly, as well as collecting the bulk of the fee for the copyright holder. In any case, Microsoft—in a move you’ve gotta sorta like for its sheer use of force—has simply made Weed files unplayable in its new Vista operating system and Media Player 11. The allegation, according to an online petition that you can read at www.ipetitions.com/petition/music_holocaust, is that Microsoft’s Zune format is a direct copy of the Weed “business model” and they’ve rendered Weed unusable in order to protect Zune.

Astute readers will notice that the link to the petition uses the phrase “music holocaust,” which is offensive in a whole ton of ways. That, coupled with the fact that a recent exclusive track was a dance remix of Kelly Clarkson’s “Since You’ve Been Gone,” called, get this, “Since U Been Gone,” makes me think the disappearance of Weedshare won’t be a huge loss.

Remember our pal Gregg Gillis, aka Girl Talk? He’s recently been cited in a statement by U.S. Congressman Mike Doyle (www.house.gov/doyle) during a hearing about the future of radio. Rep Doyle argues that copyright law should go easy on Gillis types, arguing that it’s no different than Paul McCartney stealing a bass riff from Chuck Berry. Read the full statement here: lawgeek.typepad.com/lawgeek/2007/03/rep_mike_doyle_.html.

And I saw her standing there… ssinnott@gmail.com