It has been the music court battle of the decade. OK, so the decade is only three months old but the Pink Floyd vs.EMI court case will have major implications on the way in which music is offered for sale digitally in the future regardless of how it plays out in the next few weeks.

The details of the case that was settled in the High Court this week are complex but the basic gist is that EMI had been selling Pink Floyd’s songs digitally without the band’s permission. The last contract that had actually been signed between the two parties was completed prior to the advent of digital music and so did not mention it but it did state that EMI could no sell their music without express permission. This had led to a £10 million dispute over royalties.

Although EMI has yet to be told that they cannot sell the Pink Floyd tracks digitally anymore, they are likely to be told that in the future, which would of course mean that digital music services may find themselves with no Pink Floyd content at all.

However, EMI are still hopeful of finding some sort of resolution to the problem, as is evident in the following statement:

“Today’s judgment does not require EMI to cease making Pink Floyd’s catalogue available as single track downloads, and EMI continues to sell Pink Floyd’s music digitally and in other formats. This litigation has been running for well over a year and most of its points have already been settled. This week’s court hearing was around the interpretation of two contractual points, both linked to the digital sale of Pink Floyd’s music. But there are further arguments to be heard on this and the case will go on for some time.”

Something tells me we have not by any means heard the end of this yet!