Bertelsmann passes the buck for Napster Nazi content

Bertelsmann has been told by the German interior ministry to put measures in place to prevent the exchange of Nazi music on Napster.

By Suzanna Kerridge, 20 December 2000 15:37

NEWS The German media giant and Napster reached an agreement last month to end a long standing legal battle, providing an alternative downloading system was set up. In addition, Bertelsmann lent the company money to acquire a portion of Napster's equity. Rudiger Hesse, spokesman for the government agency, claimed Napster was promoting anti-Semitic music and inciting racial hatred. He said Bertelsmann must put controls in place to prevent users downloading racial material. However, Bertelsmann rejected this claim, stating it is responsible only for its own content and not for Napster's. Andreas Schmidt, director of ecommerce at Bertelsmann, said "The music found on the Napster network is not stored on a central computer but in the computers of more than 40 million users."

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