It's a pirate eat pirate world

Subsequent to Sharman Network's recent Google-bullying exploits, the company responsible for developing the only file sharing client your granny can put a name to, have been moralising once again on the subject of copyright infringement. This time round they've succeeded in having the hacked client removed from the most eminent peer to peer sites and hammered the final nail in the coffin by blocking its further development by lodging a complaint with the DMCA.

Download sources across the globe vanished overnight and the official-unofficial home of Kazaa Lite has been replaced with an off-the-peg 'no-one's home message'. Though it will still be possible to distribute the client via peer to peer networks, K-Lite fans will be flogging a dead horse (while they possibly should be riding a donkey) as Sharman only have to make minor changes to their protocol in order to lock them out of the network.

Now that pilfering pest, Random Nut, has been taken out of the equation, Sharman Networks will be free to sell their $29.95 piracy licenses to decent, upstanding members of the file sharing community, and quite rightly so. At least for the time being, non-licensed Kazaa users can download the ad-and-heaven-only-knows-what-else-ware version of the client and decontaminate it using Diet Kazaa, though I wouldn't be at all surprised if the architects of this gem have already been tattooed with Sharman's infra-red crosshairs.

More adventurous file seekers may like to jump ship whilst sailing on the same ocean, if you catch my drift.