RealNetworks is putting pedal to the metal in its attempt to save its DVD-copying application. Even as the RealDVD trial prepares to conclude next week, RealNetworks has launched a legal counterattack, suing six motion picture studios for antitrust violation.

RealDVD was launched last year but almost immediately shut down by a court injunction. In the last few weeks, the matter has come to trial. The studios allege that the PC program has no purpose other than to violate copyrights by defeating the minimal anti-copying protection built into the DVD format. Real retorts that the program allows only a single backup copy and is intended for "fair use."

With the case unfolding before Judge Marilyn Patel, the judge who shut down the original Napster, it seems the studios have the advantage. They've already convinced the judge to throw the press out of the courtroom, preventing public glimpses of the goings-on, on the thin pretext that technical secrets would be revealed.

Now Real is taking its battle to another courtroom, saying the studios' campaign against RealDVD is a form of collusion that violates the consumer's (limited) right to copy. Real wants an injunction to stop what it calls anticompetitive behavior and is also demanding monetary damages.

See The New York Times.