Napster, Inc., will review the 300,000-plus names that Metallica [ tickets ] drummer Lars Ulrich and the band's attorney delivered to the company’s San Mateo, Calif., offices this week, and may bar those named from using the site if they are found to have violated copyright laws.

Metallica delivered the list--which the band claims identifies specific people who illegally transferred the band’s copyrighted music using Napster between April 28 and April 30--to the company in 13 boxes on Wednesday afternoon (5/3). The band had invited members of the press to attend the delivery of the 60,000-page list.

“If the claims are submitted properly, the company will take the appropriate actions to disable the users Metallica has identified,” Napster counsel Laurence Pulgram said in a statement. “Of course, if the band would provide the names in computerized form, rather than in tens of thousands of pages of paper intended to create a photo opp, that would expedite the process.

"It is important to understand that Napster does not itself make available any MP3 materials over the Internet,” the statement continued. “Napster merely provides computer software that allows its users to choose which files to make available to each other, and which files to download. As we told Metallica's lawyer on April 20, Napster is able to respond to claims of copyright infringement by disabling the access of identified users, not by excluding particular songs or artists. So the upshot of Metallica's notice may be to prevent its fans from using Napster at all.''

Napster founder Shawn Fanning, 19, said: “I'm a huge Metallica fan and therefore really sorry that they're going in this direction. If we got the opportunity to explain to the band why Napster exists and why fans enjoy Napster, perhaps we could bring all of this to a peaceful conclusion. Napster respects the role of artists and is very interested in working with Metallica and the music industry to develop a workable model that is fair to everyone while unleashing the power of the Internet to build enthusiasm for music.”

Metallica filed a $10 million copyright infringement lawsuit against Napster in April. Rapper-producer Dr. Dre filed a similar claim a short time later. (Both acts are represented by attorney Howard King.) The Recording Industry Association of America has also filed suit against Napster.