on june 30, 2009, the recording industry association of america prevailed in its fight against usenet.com, in a decision, that the u.s. district judge harold baer of the southern district of new york ruled in favor of the music industry on all its main arguments: that usenet.com is guilty of direct, contributory, and vicarious infringement. in addition, and perhaps most importantly for future cases, baer said that usenet.com can't claim protection under the sony betamax decision. that ruling states that companies can't be held liable for contributory infringement if the device they create is "capable of significant non-infringing uses". furthermore, the parties are now headed to federal court for damage assessments and awards, which could amount to several millions of dollars for the music industry.