The company, Trycho Music International, sells MIDI music sequences of popular tunes on diskette. For the past two years, Trycho and its principal, Steve Kern of Murietta, CA, have been filing an increasing number of lawsuits for copyright infringement against sites that offer MIDI sequences on the Internet, claiming that it is Trycho sequences that are being offered. Sites that have been targeted include MidiFarm and its creator, Curtis Fluegel, Deb's MIDI Haven and its creator, Debra Ackley, and more than 30 others.

Many of these sites, including Deb's and Laura's MIDI Heaven, have been shut down. Now, even WebTV users with MIDI sites are finding themselves in Kern's and Trycho's sights. The creator of a GeoCities website (now removed), a WebTV user known as bradentontom3, posted the following message this week in a WebTV newsgroup:

(Toms Favorite GIFS - MIDIS and More!)

I was just interested in knowing if you or anyone you know.....has been sued by Trycho Music for copyright infringement? I received a registered letter today from Microsoft (as my primary account is with WebTV). It reflects Trycho Music supeona to Microsoft to relase personal imfo...ie Name, address, phone etc to them as per lawsuit filed agains John Doe (which is me when they get my real name and info from Microsoft). I spoke to the person at Microsoft who generated the registered letter and she said they have to release all my personal info to Trycho Music no later than Oct 13th.

I assume I will then be issued a summons regarding a court trip. Trycho filed the lawsuit in Los Angeles court...and I live in Florida. I would really like to speak with someone who has/or is going through this process. I know it is the situation that I have been reading about in the newsgroups. I have a non-commercial MIDI site....but Trycho has copyrights on thousands of tunes in MIDI format. Before I shut down my site, I would like to find out if anyone else is in this predicament? I have visited the MIDI Relief Site, but I am interested in some feedback on what to do.

Thanks for a listening ear; and hopefully some feedback! Tom

Website owners who use MIDI music of popular songs on their homepages have long been at risk that the music industry would cause much of the available MIDI music to disappear from the Net. Net4TV Voice wrote about the possibility that the publishers of the underlying music, in the story, "Where Oh Where Have the MIDIs Gone? In fact, the Harry Fox Agency, which handles licensing for much of the music industry, was able to have the International Lyrics Server closed because of its distribution of copyrighted song lyrics.

But in the case of Trycho, it's not the copyright to the music that's at issue, but rather Trycho's claim to own the copyright on the music sequences -- the MIDI files that were posted. On its page about piracy, Trycho states:

Over the past five years, Trycho has filed numerous copyright infringement lawsuits against companies and individuals that are illegally pirating our midi recordings. Additional lawsuits are pending and in some instances, the FBI has been asked to initiate criminal investigations. Be aware that any type of distribution of Trycho midi recordings, whether or not for a fee, is a violation of U.S copyright law. Statutory fines for infringement are substantial and we actively prosecute all instances of infringement of our recordings. We provide case information to the publishing community for secondary prosecution of Defendants by owners of the compositions. Be aware that Federal statute does not allow a defense based on the supposition that a person did not know the law was being broken.

Trycho isn't exaggerating about the "numerous" lawsuits, although from the records that Net4TV Voice has been able to locate, only two of the suits resulted in a judgment for Trycho and both of those were default judgements -- that is, the defendant did not show up to contest the case. Many of the cases are still pending, and a number of them have been filed against "John Does," the way to get a subpoena to reveal the real name and address of an Internet user from his ISP.

Resistance From the Grass Roots

A group of MIDI fans and homepage builders, under the name Music Relief Association, have been attempting to fight back by publicizing the legal actions by Trycho. The site, which includes a list of the lawsuits filed by Trycho through mid-August, 2000, copyright resources, and details of sites that have been closed, argues that copyrights that apply to music recordings do not apply to the MIDI musical sequences.

The argument may have some merit, at least against Trycho. Computer software can be copyrighted (and MIDI recordings certainly are computer data, if not software programs); if it were the composer of the music who was the plaintiff, they would likely argue that MIDI is the digital equivalent of sheet music and therefore, as copyright holder of the original, they would have standing. But Trycho and Kern are claiming that these are sound recordings, and Trycho has apparently used the sound recording (P) copyright registration, not the copyright form for software. Although, in general, copyrights do not have to be properly registered (or indeed, registered at all) to be valid, proper registration is required in order to recover the "statutory damages" -- losses beyond the direct and actual economic damages that result from the infringement. Net4TV Voice is continuing research on the legal issues involved.

The Music Relief Association site also claims that Kern and Trycho are using the courts to bully small website builders by filing the lawsuits in California, often thousands of miles from the defendant's home. Some of the people who have been targeted have questioned whether or not Trycho even owns all the sequences for which the company is claiming infringement,

"Many of the sequences on the Net have no copyright information," another MIDI sequencer told Net4TV Voice. "In some cases, the copyright notices may have been removed by someone, but there are many versions of the same songs out there, and they're different sequences created by different people. Kern seems to think that if you've got a MIDI of the same song that he has, then your MIDI must be one of his, even if you sequenced it yourself. "

Net4TV Voice contacted Trycho by telephone, but the company refused to comment on its pending lawsuits and simply referred to their website.