Sites shut down after selling Beatles songs

Two websites that sold songs by The Beatles for 25 cents apiece should remain shut down indefinitely, a US federal judge ruled.

US District Judge John F. Walter issued a preliminary injunction against BlueBeat.com and Basebeat.com at the request of music company EMI Group.

The injunction prohibits the sites and their owner, Hank Risan, from streaming or selling songs by the Beatles and other popular artists, including Lily Allen and Coldplay.

A hearing in the case had been scheduled for tomorrow, but Mr Walter decided the issue based on pleadings by attorneys for Mr Risan and the music label.

EMI Group sued Mr Risan and the sites earlier this month to stop the sites from streaming or selling its music.

It claimed the sites were selling high-quality versions of copyrighted songs, including Beatles music, which has never been legally released digitally.

Mr Risan argued in court filings that he had re-recorded the music and inserted artistic touches based on a technique he pioneered called “psycho-acoustic simulation”.

The process involved re-recording store-bought CDs and improving the quality and trying to simulate how a live listener would hear the music, Mr Risan explained in filings.

Attorneys for the music label dismissed the explanation in a filing as “technobabble and doublespeak”.