Lime Wire has blocked the LimeWire service from the Gnutella peer-to-peer network via an isolation technology the company covertly installed.

The move is as the result of a court-ordered injunction which ordered the P2P outfit to disable 'the searching, downloading, uploading, file trading and/or file distribution functionality. Lime Wire spokeswoman Tiffany Guarnaccia told PCMag.com that the outfit will be reborn as a copyright-friendly service, but the code will probably be rewritten from the ground up for that purpose.

According to PCMag.com  Lime Wire was working to develop a "new music service." Limewire's  Basic peer-to-peer program hit the Internet in 2001 using the Gnutella decentralized peer-to-peer network to share a variety of legal and copyrighted files, including music. It has millions of users, although it has been eclipsed by the BitTorrent protocol.

The shutdown is a consequence of a June suit filed by the National Music Publishers' Association (NMPA), following a similar suit by of 13 record labels and the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), which also sued LimeWire for copyright infringement. The RIAA wanted the site shut down immediately, but the judge gave LimeWire two weeks to sort itself out. Since then Lime Wire developed a digital music store with support from the recording industry, where Lime Wire sold individual tracks and albums directly to the consumer.