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Megaupload: A Lot Less Guilty Than You Think

cyberlaw.stanford.edu

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Re: Megaupload: A Lot Less Guilty Than You Think

#101

Post by Zirro »

fl3tch wrote: post #39
cookiecaper wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another excellent argument to use encryption. It seems every couple of weeks there is another high-profile incident where a lot of trouble would have been saved if people had taken the time to set up Enigmail. I would also love to see some advances in client-side steganography that could be usable as easily as GPG. Probably the closest thing we have now is TrueCrypt hidden volumes but that doesn't really work for ema…

Encryption is not so foolproof. A judge in Colorado has ordered a women to decrypt her laptop. The authorities will find ways to plug the loopholes that technology creates. If they can't break mathematics, they can break your will.

Do you have a source on this? Isn't there such a thing as "you have the right to remain silent" in court as well?

Re: Megaupload: A Lot Less Guilty Than You Think

#102

Post by powertower »

Natsu wrote: post #98
powertower wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> MegaUpload links were not public unless the uploader published them somewhere. They were publically accessible (as in no authentication was required) regardless of how you want to spin it. But if that's not good enough for you... It's my understanding that megaupload (and it's other sites) links were of the form: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=XXXXXXXX I could be wrong, but the links I've found so far all have 8 char…

Eight characters is about the length of an ordinary password. Exactly how far does blame extend, then? I've seen more than a few people who honestly believe that keeping a URL secret somehow protects the content. I can understand if you're mad about copyright infringement, but why does that person who recorded all of their child's sports matches deserve this merely for using MU? They were sharing their own movies wit…

All my premises have been that 1) MU was one of the top piracy sites on the net, 2) profited from piracy, and 3) was designed for spreading piracy.

Instead of edge-cases, how about a common one? Or does that not count?

So yes, if any of the above is true, what happened to MU was good.

And as far as that loaded question about the person losing his child's sports matches... You can frame it however you want, it does not change the facts we know about MU. MU was most likely a criminal enterprise.

Re: Megaupload: A Lot Less Guilty Than You Think

#103

Post by powertower »

dekz wrote: post #99
powertower wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> MegaUpload links were not public unless the uploader published them somewhere. They were publically accessible (as in no authentication was required) regardless of how you want to spin it. But if that's not good enough for you... It's my understanding that megaupload (and it's other sites) links were of the form: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=XXXXXXXX I could be wrong, but the links I've found so far all have 8 char…

> MegaUpload was designed for sharing. So it youtube, I don't see your point here. > Notice it's a somewhat easily searchable space. What is shady/illegal about this? 8 Characters are memorable and easily accessible. Just because someone puts their wallet in their handbag doesn't give me the right to take it if I can. It would be nonsensical to store two copies of the same file as a service like MU or Dropbox. That f…

> What is shady/illegal about this?

In of itself? Nothing.

In combination with all other factors. Everything.

> Just because a DMCA takedown request was filed against user B's link doesn't mean user A should lose their legitimately owned file.

As a copyright holder, that's not my problem that 1 in a million decided to upload some questionable copy of my work to a publicly accessible pseudo-sharing site that violates my copyright over and over and over again.

If you upload it to MU, then cry to someone else when that same criminal enterprise gets shut down and you lose the one copy you had.

Your right weren’t violated. Mine were.

Anyone crying about this is just playing a victim card here after making a bad decision. Or can't come to grips with reality after assuming that since copyright infringement is so easy to do, it must not be a bad thing to do, and it must be part of your entitlement.

Re: Megaupload: A Lot Less Guilty Than You Think

#104

Post by dekz »

powertower wrote: post #103
dekz wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> MegaUpload was designed for sharing. So it youtube, I don't see your point here. > Notice it's a somewhat easily searchable space. What is shady/illegal about this? 8 Characters are memorable and easily accessible. Just because someone puts their wallet in their handbag doesn't give me the right to take it if I can. It would be nonsensical to store two copies of the same file as a service like MU or Dropbox. That f…

> What is shady/illegal about this? In of itself? Nothing. In combination with all other factors. Everything. > Just because a DMCA takedown request was filed against user B's link doesn't mean user A should lose their legitimately owned file. As a copyright holder, that's not my problem that 1 in a million decided to upload some questionable copy of my work to a publicly accessible pseudo-sharing site that violates…

But as a copyright holder do you have the right to take my legitimate, bought and paid for copy down?

I know of someone who may or may not have used a site like UU to get recent episodes of the show X. Once UU stopped sharing links, this person looked for other ways to get the recent episodes of X. She tried purchasing them from iTunes, but to no avail; She tried purchasing from Amazon Streaming but to no avail. Her only option is to wait for the DVD to come out or pirate.

There is a case where money is lost due to piracy. The answer is not to sue the pirates but to provide distribution methods.

Re: Megaupload: A Lot Less Guilty Than You Think

#105

Post by [deleted] »

powertower wrote: post #103
dekz wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> MegaUpload was designed for sharing. So it youtube, I don't see your point here. > Notice it's a somewhat easily searchable space. What is shady/illegal about this? 8 Characters are memorable and easily accessible. Just because someone puts their wallet in their handbag doesn't give me the right to take it if I can. It would be nonsensical to store two copies of the same file as a service like MU or Dropbox. That f…

> What is shady/illegal about this? In of itself? Nothing. In combination with all other factors. Everything. > Just because a DMCA takedown request was filed against user B's link doesn't mean user A should lose their legitimately owned file. As a copyright holder, that's not my problem that 1 in a million decided to upload some questionable copy of my work to a publicly accessible pseudo-sharing site that violates…

[deleted]

Re: Megaupload: A Lot Less Guilty Than You Think

#106

Post by rbanffy »

dekz wrote: post #100

From what I've read about Dotcom he seems like a shady guy. But in all honesty, how is he worth persuing over some drug cartel in a different country. (Note: I'm not making an opinion on whether drugs should be legal or illegal). Was it really worth the potential international relations fiasco, dollars spent on investigators; agents et al. All this wasted time and money to go after a set of people who have allowed in…

Considering some people will neither stop doing drugs nor sharing copyrighted files against the copyright holders' will, the authorities felt they could go against the folks who were least likely to shoot back.

Now, seriously, comparing the amount of misery illegal drugs cause with the amount illegal file sharing does is, at best, ludicrous. It's like all the more serious problems are solved and now they have to turn their attention to the copyright infringers.

Re: Megaupload: A Lot Less Guilty Than You Think

#107

Post by comicjk »

dmbass wrote: post #58
ryusage wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems similar, but one significant difference is that, in a drug bust, it's pretty cut and dry as to whether the targets are doing something illegal. The mere presence of drugs automatically makes it so. That's not really the case here. A judge could very well determine that Megaupload never broke any laws.

in a drug bust, it's pretty cut and dry as to whether the targets are doing something illegal That's way too subjective for law. The prosecution has to prove to the jury (NOT the judge) that what they found is, in a criminal case, beyond a reasonable doubt, an illegal substance.

Not exactly difficult. A chemist with a mass spec could prove it in 5 minutes. Proving willful noncompliance with the dmca is a whole different league of problem.

Re: Megaupload: A Lot Less Guilty Than You Think

#108

Post by Tangaroa »

ryoshu wrote: post #66
powertower wrote: post #53

If you think MU is the victim here and that the FBI are the criminals, you’ve got it backwards. They took down individual links only, while still keeping the infringing files on the server, and all the other un-reported links to that exact file (they also hashed each upload, so to detect duplicates, and complete the upload instantly and have 1 data file... a fingerprint system they never used to prevent re-uploads of…

Say I've legally purchased an MP3 from Amazon and I decide to use my UberUpload to host the file so I can access it from any device. UberUpload decides to hash the file so it can depulicate the file and save disk space. Some other user downloads a pirated copy of the file TheArrrrrrBay and uploads it to UberUpload. The file hash is the same, so instead of storing the pirated version, UberUpload points to the legal co…

"Say I've legally purchased an MP3 from Amazon and I decide to use my UberUpload to host the file so I can access it from any device."

You would be committing copyright infringement at that point. The rest is irrelevant.

Re: Megaupload: A Lot Less Guilty Than You Think

#109

Post by X-Istence »

Tangaroa wrote: post #108
ryoshu wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Say I've legally purchased an MP3 from Amazon and I decide to use my UberUpload to host the file so I can access it from any device. UberUpload decides to hash the file so it can depulicate the file and save disk space. Some other user downloads a pirated copy of the file TheArrrrrrBay and uploads it to UberUpload. The file hash is the same, so instead of storing the pirated version, UberUpload points to the legal co…

"Say I've legally purchased an MP3 from Amazon and I decide to use my UberUpload to host the file so I can access it from any device." You would be committing copyright infringement at that point. The rest is irrelevant.

So storing my music library on Dropbox is illegal?

Re: Megaupload: A Lot Less Guilty Than You Think

#110

Post by anamax »

powertower wrote: post #94
Natsu wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

MegaUpload links were not public unless the uploader published them somewhere.

> MegaUpload links were not public unless the uploader published them somewhere. They were publically accessible (as in no authentication was required) regardless of how you want to spin it. But if that's not good enough for you... It's my understanding that megaupload (and it's other sites) links were of the form: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=XXXXXXXX I could be wrong, but the links I've found so far all have 8 char…

> I could be wrong, but the links I've found so far all have 8 characters.

And all US phone numbers have 7 digits. (It's easy enough to figure out the relevant area code.)

Are you claiming that there are no private phone numbers in the US?

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