Spinrilla, a Hip Hop mixtape website, has been forced to shut down after a judgment totaling $50 million was entered against the company and its founder.
Court documents obtained by Billboard revealed that Universal Music, Warner Music, Sony Music, and other major record labels filed the judgment against Jeffrey Copeland after he committed copyright infringement.
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Copeland — whose site streamed songs from the likes of Bob Marley, Kendrick Lamar, and Beyoncé before the judgment — is also forbidden from running Spinrilla or any other website like it in the future.
“The settlement this week stems from a six-year-old lawsuit filed by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) on behalf of UMG, Sony Music Entertainment, Warner Bros. Records, Atlantic Recording Corporation, and LaFace Records, alleging that Spinrilla and Copeland allowed users to stream and download unlicensed content,” reported Billboard, which also further revealed that U.S. District Judge Amy Totenberg found the website liable for more than 4,000 copyright infringement charges.
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Finally, Spinrilla is required to transfer its website domain registration to the property of the record companies — and the record companies have agreed not to use the site.
Spinrilla was first sued back in 2017 when the labels initially brought 21,000 counts of copyright infringements from the music that Spinrilla has available on its site. It claimed Kanye West, Kendrick Lamar, and Beyoncé are among those that have been featured without receiving compensation for their work.
“Through the Spinrilla website and apps, users with an artist account can upload content that any other user can then download or stream on demand for free, an unlimited number of times,” the RIAA’s lawyer James Lamberth writes in the complaint. “A substantial amount of content uploaded to the Spinrilla website and apps consists of popular sound recordings whose copyrights are owned by Plaintiffs.”
The RIAA issued its own statement on the matter as it is demanding actual or statutory damages and an injunction on the copyrighted material.
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“Spinrilla specializes in ripping off music creators by offering thousands of unlicensed sound recordings for free,” the company says. “Fans today have access to millions upon millions of songs from innovative platforms and services that pay creators — this kind of illicit activity has no place in today’s music marketplace.”
