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One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

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Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The culprit -- whose copyright agent doesn't respond to DMCA takedown notices unless they come on law firm letterhead -- is none other than Amazon.com. That's illegal. There are well-defined bullet points that make a valid DMCA complaint that must be acted upon, and I doubt Amazon would open themselves up to liability based on "big sticks". They'd lose safe harbor for not complying, which is extremely bad news for…

It's not illegal , you just can't claim the benefits of the limited liability section if you don't register a copyright agent and respond to DMCA notices.

The DMCA is a law. Not following the rules of OCILLA is not acting according to law, which is identified by the word illegal. Illegal has nothing to do with criminality.

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#33
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Never once have I had a DMCA notice not result in the material taken down within 24 hours I have! The culprit -- whose copyright agent [edit]appears not to[/edit] respond to DMCA takedown notices unless they come on law firm letterhead -- is none other than Amazon.com. (I've caught scumbags selling books of mine online as ebooks via the Kindle store. Amazon don't listen unless you carry a big stick. My solution was t…

> The culprit -- whose copyright agent doesn't respond to DMCA takedown notices unless they come on law firm letterhead -- is none other than Amazon.com. That's illegal. There are well-defined bullet points that make a valid DMCA complaint that must be acted upon, and I doubt Amazon would open themselves up to liability based on "big sticks". They'd lose safe harbor for not complying, which is extremely bad news for…

Legal or not, it's what they're doing. And it's not just me:

http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/012933.html

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#34

You'd also think a cisco engineer up to such shenanigans would know enough to use an anonymous/proxy whois registration.

Or use someone else's name, which may be what the owner of the site actually did. How can we know that the whois information is valid?

I wouldn't be surprised if the advertising provider requires and checks for real whois info. If not, there's probably a business model in there somewhere.

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#35

I would've just sent the DMCA notice. It's not a "whole process", it's a couple lines of text you copy/paste, put in the URL of your site and the copy, change the date, and email to the host. It'll take you a few seconds to modify and send out. Most web hosts have a specific mailbox for DMCA notices on their contact page or in their AUP. Subject: DMCA Notice of Copyright Infringement The copyrighted work at issue is…

I deal with companies ripping off GPL software. Not a single company -- or the webhosts they use -- have ever responded to a DMCA request.

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#36
This guys website is just others content, HE is taking flash games created by others and publishing them on his website FOR PROFIT. I spotted some friends games on there that they are unlikely to gave permission to put on there.

Also, he has taken a popular t-shirt design, copied it and then is selling it for profit here http://www.cafepress.co.uk/playitontheweb as advertised on his website.

If the guy who posted this is reading, where do you get the games from you're posting? Are you downloading them from other flash game sites and uploading them? Are you scraping those sites? I bet it's the latter. You're only slightly less shameful than this guy you're attacking.

irony eh.

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#37
post #8

one sneaky thing you could have done is to modify your site very slightly so that his site would load your ads instead of his. He wouldn't have noticed ;)

Just adding some javascript that just made sure the right ads are showing would have been a much more subtle response.

I wonder if there is a possibility of a JS library that could detect this type of scraping and reserving automatically. Would probably leads to an interesting arms race with the scrapers.

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not illegal , you just can't claim the benefits of the limited liability section if you don't register a copyright agent and respond to DMCA notices.

The DMCA is a law. Not following the rules of OCILLA is not acting according to law, which is identified by the word illegal . Illegal has nothing to do with criminality.

Sorry, but no. The DMCA simply says "A service provider shall not be liable...if the conditions set forth...are met". It does not compel ISPs to make those conditions true. They're not "not acting according to law" by not actively creating the circumstances in which the DMCA provides the limitation of liability.

http://www.copyright.gov/legislation/hr2281.pdf

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#39
post #16

It'd be interesting to hear the technical details of how the switcheroo was accomplished

Agreed. The vigilante content of the switcheroo is whatever. I want to know how he actually pulled it off. The not-so-over-the-top-vigilante-ish alternatives are pretty endless.

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#40
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The culprit -- whose copyright agent doesn't respond to DMCA takedown notices unless they come on law firm letterhead -- is none other than Amazon.com. That's illegal. There are well-defined bullet points that make a valid DMCA complaint that must be acted upon, and I doubt Amazon would open themselves up to liability based on "big sticks". They'd lose safe harbor for not complying, which is extremely bad news for…

Legal or not, it's what they're doing. And it's not just me: http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/012933.html

If someone were to pursue it further and remind Amazon that not following OCILLA means being liable for every single copyright infringement that they host, whether on EC2, S3 (looking forward to that one!), or the Kindle store, they might change their tune.
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