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Megaupload down, FBI Charges Seven With Online Piracy

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Re: Megaupload down, FBI Charges Seven With Online Piracy

#161

Post by scintill76 »

AlexMuir wrote: post #39

At the risk of megadownvoting here... Megaupload never complied with DMCA requests - I made several as part of some research and never received any response. The site charged for access to, and provided advertising around, pirated content. The site paid people (users/staff - it's a fine line) to provide popular content. It went to extraordinary lengths to hide the identity of its operators. Now if people believe that…

I think this _case_ can be seen as an anti-SOPA posterchild, because it shows that existing laws can already be used to successfully prosecute piracy.

There are some other comments about precedents that this may be setting (i.e., _stretching_ existing law). I'm curious to see how this plays out -- will SOPA-like provisions be "read into" existing laws by the courts?

Re: Megaupload down, FBI Charges Seven With Online Piracy

#162

Post by miek »

noonespecial wrote: post #95
AlexMuir wrote: post #39

At the risk of megadownvoting here... Megaupload never complied with DMCA requests - I made several as part of some research and never received any response. The site charged for access to, and provided advertising around, pirated content. The site paid people (users/staff - it's a fine line) to provide popular content. It went to extraordinary lengths to hide the identity of its operators. Now if people believe that…

First they come for the sites that are 90/10 pirate to legit. Seems reasonable. Then 80/20. Then 70/30. Now they're getting the process streamlined. How far will they go? 20/80? 10/90? When will it be too much? When does it become un reasonable?

I agree with your thought process-- however, there is no reason to talk about what % of the service was used for piracy and what % wasn't. Non-owner/operator users should be viewed as completely separate from the owners and operators' and their actions. It doesn't matter if 99.9% of the users are pirating content, as long as the owners & operators were not engaging in illegal activities (including knowingly aiding pirates). The issue is that MegaUpload does't have the ability to determine what a user legally owns.

With that said, even if MegaUpload complied with legally-sufficient take-down requests, I imagine those who were arrested could easily be nabbed for simply having pirated content on their personal/work boxes... that's probably the fallback plan.

Side note- Google hosts a lot of pirated content on Gmail. It would be interesting to know how much pirated music is sent through Gmail in a day.

Re: Megaupload down, FBI Charges Seven With Online Piracy

#163

Post by SomeCallMeTim »

e1ven wrote: post #52
AlexMuir wrote: post #39

At the risk of megadownvoting here... Megaupload never complied with DMCA requests - I made several as part of some research and never received any response. The site charged for access to, and provided advertising around, pirated content. The site paid people (users/staff - it's a fine line) to provide popular content. It went to extraordinary lengths to hide the identity of its operators. Now if people believe that…

I'm more upset with the precedent than I am with the particular site. I've never made a DMCA request against them, but my understanding from the DoJ presser was that they did comply with the letter- They removed the links that were sent. They just didn't necessarily remove all other links to the same file. When you filed yours, did you follow legal procedure, and go through their registered DMCA agent with paper mail…

Regardless of precedent or merits on this case, the fact that it exists at all makes it harder to justify the existence of SOPA or PIPA.

They didn't need either act to be passed to arrest a bunch of people in New Zealand, after all.

Re: Megaupload down, FBI Charges Seven With Online Piracy

#164

Post by stsanders »

skymt wrote: post #123
bri3d wrote: post #18

Hosting files is a dangerous business - the line between being shut down for infringement and not being shut down seems to be drawn by who you know and what users you end up with, not any real actions, design, or technical differences in your site. The indictment of Megaupload actually uses their lack of search function and censorship of copyrighted material from their "top content" list as marks against them. This m…

Censorship of the top-content list is actually a valid point against them. It means Megaupload had some system to identify infringing files, but rather than flagging them for investigation or deletion, they simply removed them from the public list.

I disagree. Distributing copyrighted material to unauthorized parties is an issue. Storing it doesn't seem like an issue to me. 100% of cloud storage companies are grossly violating all sorts of copyrights if this is the case. Storing it but removing the ability for the internet at large to leech it seems legit to me. If someone distributes the private URL to such files, I think that counts as them distributing it, not megaupload.

It's not a straightforward issue though.

Re: Megaupload down, FBI Charges Seven With Online Piracy

#165

Post by randallsquared »

sophacles wrote: post #77
AlexMuir wrote: post #39

At the risk of megadownvoting here... Megaupload never complied with DMCA requests - I made several as part of some research and never received any response. The site charged for access to, and provided advertising around, pirated content. The site paid people (users/staff - it's a fine line) to provide popular content. It went to extraordinary lengths to hide the identity of its operators. Now if people believe that…

Now if people believe that anyone should be allowed to set up a site, fill it with full length DVD rips,and then charge $10 a month for access then no wrong has been committed. But I think most right-minded people would say that is wrong - otherwise we'd all be doing it. Just not true. I don't think there is anything wrong with videotaping police going about their business (without breaking any other laws, hindering…

I believe AlexMuir's implication was that things which are illegal are automatically wrong, since it's obvious that HN, in particular, has lots of users who don't believe filesharing is wrong.

Re: Megaupload down, FBI Charges Seven With Online Piracy

#166

Post by nickmolnar2 »

Can we just take a moment and note that Kim Dotcom had two Mercedes ML63 AMGs seized in the raid. One had the license plate 'Guilty' and the other 'Mafia'. He knew what business he was in: working around the law to facilitate massive scale copyright infringement.

If we want this anti-SOPA sentiment to stick, we need to draw a line in the sand somewhere. Even on a free and open web there are going to be some people who are just plain-old criminals. I'd prefer the line to be somewhere between me & Kim.

http://torrentfreak.com/images/megacars.jpg

Re: Megaupload down, FBI Charges Seven With Online Piracy

#167

Post by kruhft »

jrockway wrote: post #125
AlexMuir wrote: post #39

At the risk of megadownvoting here... Megaupload never complied with DMCA requests - I made several as part of some research and never received any response. The site charged for access to, and provided advertising around, pirated content. The site paid people (users/staff - it's a fine line) to provide popular content. It went to extraordinary lengths to hide the identity of its operators. Now if people believe that…

Why does megaupload have to comply with the DMCA; they're a Hong Kong company. The US simply has no jurisdiction over what they do.

> The US simply has no jurisdiction over what they do.

That doesn't seem to be the case anymore.

Re: Megaupload down, FBI Charges Seven With Online Piracy

#168

Post by aes256 »

freehunter wrote: post #133
noonespecial wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First they come for the sites that are 90/10 pirate to legit. Seems reasonable. Then 80/20. Then 70/30. Now they're getting the process streamlined. How far will they go? 20/80? 10/90? When will it be too much? When does it become un reasonable?

Slopes aren't always as slippery as you may believe. The point of this is that the site actively promoted and profited from piracy. This isn't Facebook with someone posting a few lines from a song, this is The Pirate Bay. Think of it like this: have you ever successfully argued to a cop that you only drive over the limit 10% of the time ? What matters is the deliberateness of the speed you were doing when you got cau…

How exactly has Megaupload "promoted" piracy?

Rewarding people for uploading popular files does not constitute promoting piracy.

Re: Megaupload down, FBI Charges Seven With Online Piracy

#170

Post by losethos »

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