Megaupload discussion

[H2oskiKerbal]

>:(um the download link is down FIX IT!!!! >

Sorry to say brah Megaupload was cracked down because somthin with SOPA or PIPA

[ping111]

>:(um the download link is down FIX IT!!!! >

Ah, the next meteorite101.

Welcome, young doucheawan. You have much to learn.

[Cepheus]

Actually, let me be the nice guy for a change. People on this forum don\'t respond well to orders (unless they\'re in jest, of course.) Try being a little bit more mature, would you?

Here ya go, buddy.

[ping111]

Sorry to say brah Megaupload was cracked down because somthin with SOPA or PIPA

[s20dan]

....piracy ring....

Thats rather vague and their solution feels like this:

Thats someone cracking a nut with a sledgehammer... it works but nobody gets to eat the nut at the end.

I see yet another example of overkill.

[H2oskiKerbal]

Thanks for pointing it out

[Tiberion]

Thats rather vague and their solution feels like this:

Thats someone cracking a nut with a sledgehammer... it works but nobody gets to eat the nut at the end.

I see yet another example of overkill.

Not really, their entire business survived on the traffic generated by people downloading pirated content (which their other sides served links to, thus the ring part)

I feel a little bad for the innocents who used it for legtimate file hosting, but it was pretty clear the site was all about the pirated stuff

There is a reason it was a top 10 site on the Internet, and it wasn\'t videos of someone\'s kitten doing something cute.

[Capt'n Skunky]

So far all we have is the word of the DoJ that the site was used in this way. The US government can produce all the evidence in the world, I will remain skeptical.

Arrr!

Capt\'n Skunky

[Tiberion]

Lol, you don\'t need proof, if you ever browsed any pirated content (like in the 4chan \'download\' forums) you KNOW where most of the non-torrented copies are hosted.

Megaupload and Rapidfire.

When I read about Megaupload, I wasn\'t surprisied or outraged. I rolled my eyes and thought 'I can\'t believe it took them 5+ years'

[Capt'n Skunky]

I fear for anyone that has you on their Jury.

[Tiberion]

Give me a freaking break. You seriously think that Megaupload didn\'t actively encourage piracy?

[feanor]

Give me a freaking break. You seriously think that Megaupload didn\'t actively encourage piracy?

Yes. If not, please give me source. Remind yourself that we live in a society where you are _innocent_ untill proven guilty, and that noone has seen the proof the DoJ claims it has, or how they have gotten it.

In fact, I\'ve written papers about this. Unless there is written evidence that they supported piracy ( ie internal email - of which law enforcement has gotten legitimate access - where they expressly support piracy and take measures to support it for money ) there is _nothing_ illegal about hosting a file sharing website. I can\'t stress this enough - there is _nothing_ illegal about it. They even support take downs of non-judiary requests from various companies that SAY that they have found something that they would like to take down, without the possibility of the uploader to revert the decision without spending a lot of money.

Even the Pirate Bay - which I assume you think actively supports piracy - does _nothing_ illegal. Various media companies and lobbyists would want you to think otherwise, but it\'s just not the case. All they do is provide a platform for users to share 'torrent' files, which are indexes for other files that are created by users.

'supporting' copyright infringement is not a crime. It should not be a crime. Saying it is a crime is stupid. A website / forum / imageboard is _not_ responsible for what it\'s owner\'s do, say or remove. They can remove it, if they are asked or ordered to by a judge, but they should not be held liable if they don\'t remove it without such a discussion.

Whether a capability for something is used for legal or illegal means is irrelevant; the capability is not legal or illegal because of this.

This is why a capability ('uploading of large parts of data') is not illegal, even if it used as such.

And this argument doesn\'t even go against the very core of the issue - whether piracy is good or bad. I personally am convinced it is in fact a good thing, and that copyright as it exists now is stupid, does not do what it should do, and in fact is even immoral.

I live in the Netherlands, where downloading is, in fact, legal. Yes, legal. We pay an added tax on hard drives, empty CD\'s and DVD\'s. The government uses this money to support artists. By logic removing the ways to pirating but still paying this tax the government makes people pay double - pretty dumb, right?

Alas, I urge you to read up a bit more about internet, copyright law ( what it\'s intention is, and what it currently does )- And look up the song 'happy birthday', that\'s a real succes story copyright-wise. Keep in mind the original intention of copyright, the various positive impacts pirating has on culture, entertainment and the economy, and the overlap between piraters and media consumers.

Looking at internal emails, statements from lobbyists and CEO\'s of the various agency\'s involved, the laws they pass and the response from people in the relevant fields, add to that some knowledge about digital security / obscurity and technical details of pirating - well, I for one can\'t draw any other conclusion then that the MPAA / RIAA nickname MAFIAA is quite correct...

[s20dan]

You seriously think that Megaupload didn\'t actively encourage piracy?

Personally I don\'t recall ever downloading pirated material from there, the majority of folks would use torrents.

IIRC the majority of stuff I ever got from there were game patches and/or mods so from my perspective this site is not invloved in any nefarious activities.

Rapidshare otoh

Remember in society you are always given enough rope to hang yourself with, but you don\'t have to... Its called free-will. (Meaning that not everyone will use the site in the same way)

I live in the Netherlands, where downloading is, in fact, legal. Yes, legal. We pay an added tax on hard drives, empty CD\'s and DVD\'s. The government uses this money to support artists.

I\'ve heard of this, you guys do a lot of things right

well, I for one can\'t draw any other conclusion then that the MPAA / RIAA nickname MAFIAA is quite correct..

Yep you got it in one.

[Tiberion]

So that was a lot of text, when all you had to say was 'I don\'t think piracy is wrong, and companies don\'t need to do any policing of it themselves'

I quit lying to myself a long time ago trying to push off that 'piracy is good for everyone' non-sense, and that is just what it is.

The positive effects on society on consumerism? How about what Mp3 pirating caused? When you bought a CD, you owned it. When you download on iTunes or anything now, you are paying for a limited use license for a long as the service thinks you deserve it. And this is the case across the board now, from movie viewing to downloading software. Soon, you\'ll be paying 99cent a minute to listen to a song. And radio play? Forget that.

These content-making companies are NEVER going to give up their rights, and they will continue to bludgeon their customers to curtail their losses.

As for Megaupload - If your own experience with the Internet and what content was in their site isn\'t enough to clue you in, then even the public details about the FBI bust should do it. 2 minutes of research found detailed lawsuits about their failure to properly enforce DMCA requests by only killing hotlinks to hosted pirated material and leaving the offending file in place with other active links. Links which they themselves propagated on their sister sites without user intervention.

But yeah, they were innocent. Mean ole\' FBI.

Also: Paying extra taxes to your government to be able to pirate, instead of just buying content. Do you not grasp how.. ridiculous that sounds?

I realize I am wasting my own time here, I won\'t ever convince people to give up the golden goose. But every time you launch into a rage at the increasingly harsh tactics being used to fight piracy, at least realize its partially your own fault.

[Kryten]

Yes. If not, please give me source. Remind yourself that we live in a society where you are _innocent_ untill proven guilty, and that noone has seen the proof the DoJ claims it has, or how they have gotten it.

That\'s because you didn\'t bother looking.

Here is the indictment.

Look at page 30 onwards;

On or about April 10, 2006, VAN DER KOLK sent an e-mail to ORTMANN asking “Do we have a server available to continue downloading of the Youtube’svids? … Kim just mentioned again that this has really priority.â€

On or about April 10, 2006, VAN DER KOLK sent an e-mail to ORTMANN indicating “Hope [Youtube.com is] not implementing a fraud detection systemnow… * praying *â€.

On or about August 31, 2006, VAN DER KOLK sent an e-mail to anassociate entitled “lolâ€. Attached to the message was a screenshot of a Megaupload.com filedownload page for the file “Alcohol 120 1.9.5 3105complete.rar†with a description of “Alcohol120, con crack!!!! By ChaOtiX!â€. The copyrighted software “Alcohol 120†is a CD/DVDburning software program sold by www.alcohol-soft.com.o.

On or about November 13, 2006, VAN DER KOLK sent an e-mail toanother individual that contained 100 Megaupload.com links to infringing copies of copyrightedmusical recordings by the artist Armin van Buuren

On or about February 5, 2007, VAN DER KOLK sent an e-mail to ORTMANN entitled “reward paymentsâ€. Attached to the e-mail was a text file listing thefollowing proposed reward amounts, the Megaupload.com username, and the content they uploaded:

100 USD [uSERNAME DELETED] 10+ Full popular DVD rips (split files), a fewsmall porn movies, some software with keygenerators (warez)

100 USD [uSERNAME DELETED] 5845 files in his account, mainly Vietnamesecontent

100 USD [uSERNAME DELETED] Popular DVD rips

100 USD [uSERNAME DELETED] Some older DVD rips + unknown (Italianserries?) rar files

1500 USD [uSERNAME DELETED] known paid user (vietnamese content)

Looks pretty clear-cut to me.

[Capt'n Skunky]

You can point to the governments 'evidence' all you want, it doesn\'t mean shit until vetted by experts in a court of law. I could present all kinds of 'evidence' that showing you traffic child porn. That doesn\'t make it true. Would you like to be vilified for that before your day in court? No you wouldn\'t, nobody would. This is why we have a presumption of innocence in this country.

Our government is not beyond fabricating evidence, they\'ve done it before and will do it again. Rather than just take the governments case at face value, I am taking it with a grain of salt. Unfortunately, if the US wants to lock someone up, regardless of the reason, they will. Ever heard of Guantanamo? I bet you can spot a guilty person just by looking at them, right?

Just because people are defending the principle of innocent until proven guilty does not mean they support piracy.

[feanor]

So that was a lot of text, when all you had to say was 'I don\'t think piracy is wrong, and companies don\'t need to do any policing of it themselves'

no, there was more in that - notably that a capability to do something illegal is not illegal, that enabling ( without direct help ) someone to do something illegal is not illegal, that there is due cause, etc etc.

I quit lying to myself a long time ago trying to push off that 'piracy is good for everyone' non-sense, and that is just what it is.

So did I. I pushed off the 'piracy is stealing' non-sense pushed by corporate entities that do not care about society, morals or common sense.

The positive effects on society on consumerism? How about what Mp3 pirating caused? When you bought a CD, you owned it.

You never did. You owned the physical entity, not the music on it. You where not free to remix it, change it, publish it, or whatever without consent.

When you download on iTunes or anything now, you are paying for a limited use license for a long as the service thinks you deserve it. And this is the case across the board now, from movie viewing to downloading software. Soon, you\'ll be paying 99cent a minute to listen to a song. And radio play? Forget that.

This is no diffirent then from the introduction of copyrightable mediums, such as reprinting of music sheet, making mixtapes, or recording video on VHS.

Also, these effects are clearly caused by piracy, not by let\'s say the greed / reckless crushing of common sense by certain lobbying groups, right? Or dumb measures that won\'t help anyway, only drive more people to pirate ( because it\'s easier, more efficient and you don\'t get attacked with all sorts of EULA\'s )

These content-making companies are NEVER going to give up their rights, and they will continue to bludgeon their customers to curtail their losses.

Yes. Let\'s not fix the root cause, but instead try to fix the effects with ever-increasing, misguided draconian measures.

Their losses do not exist, by the way. A lost sale by pirating is not something that entitles you to money, not even a little amount. A sale entitles you to money. You gain sales by providing good service, a good product, and setting a price point that is reached by competition.

As for Megaupload - If your own experience with the Internet and what content was in their site isn\'t enough to clue you in, then even the public details about the FBI bust should do it.

They do not.

2 minutes of research found detailed lawsuits about their failure to properly enforce DMCA requests by only killing hotlinks to hosted pirated material and leaving the offending file in place with other active links. Links which they themselves propagated on their sister sites without user intervention.

This is a false argument. Because 2 diffirent people upload a zip with the same video in it, and only one is requested per removal, megaupload should actively check all the zip files ( password encrypted or not ) of their CLIENTS - which may include personal photos, homevideos, papers, tax return backups - for illegal content?

The privacy issue trumps copyright concerns every single time.

And of course, just as strong an argument; its not their position to check what people upload. This is levied onto them by phrases such as 'actively encouraging' which means they didn\'t stop them fast enough to the liking of various corporate entities.

But yeah, they were innocent. Mean ole\' FBI.

They are innocent. They are untill they reach the end of the legal pathway. If you not agree to this, you should review the whole base of the legal system.

Also: Paying extra taxes to your government to be able to pirate, instead of just buying content. Do you not grasp how.. ridiculous that sounds?

Agreed! It was a dumb idea, but it\'s even dumber to ask both that AND fight against pirates.

I realize I am wasting my own time here, I won\'t ever convince people to give up the golden goose.

Ah, but if you had arguments you could convince me. You haven\'t even started at the root cause of copyright, which is to encourage diversity and the creation of new products. Take that as a goal and try to devise a system of laws to achieve this. Keep in mind the enormous value ( both cultural as well as monetary ) of remixes, parodies and reactions. Add the ever-increasing easyness with which new content of a high quality can be created, and how this should reflect in your system of laws.

But every time you launch into a rage at the increasingly harsh tactics being used to fight piracy, at least realize its partially your own fault.

This is a logical fallacy. Because I do something, someone else reacts in a certain way. That is my fault.

By this logic, noone would ever be convicted of anything, because they can claim that their parents\' actions made them what they are.

Furthermore, it equates my own personal actions, morals and arguments with that of a wide and varied group of people who have their own actions, morals and arguments.

We should change this discussion to my thread, it could use all these nice bumps and responses

[feanor]

Also, talking about that email evidence presented by the FBI;

I wonder how they got access to that?

That seems to be private email - I wonder if that might be a breach of privacy.

Also, the claimed amount of damage incurred always make me smile; nice calculations they have there.

[Kryten]

Rather than just take the governments case at face value, I am taking it with a grain of salt.

Then what\'s the point of even saying anything? You\'ll just say the judges and experts are government stooges, that the witnesses are being pressured, etc. etc.

Why not just let the people who aren\'t cripplingly paranoid have a conversation?

[feanor]

Then what\'s the point of even saying anything? You\'ll just say the judges and experts are government stooges, that the witnesses are being pressured, etc. etc.

Why not just let the people who aren\'t cripplingly paranoid have a conversation?

A grain of salt does not mean that everything they say is incorrect.

Your argument is a logical fallacy. Reversed, it looks like this:

Original statement:

I trust the government.

Conclusion:

-The government speaks the truth and only the truth. Guantanomo Bay is a legal operation. Entrapment as used by the government is a valid and moral tactic. The 500 million dollars of damage mentioned are a correct number of real-world losses. The pirate bay, by this calculation, has cost the US a few years of total economic troughput.

For a non-violent crime it is totally correct to pay a few years in jail.

[Guest TonyZ]

All I\'m going to say is I followed several links today to legitimate (user created) FL Studio project files... All hosted on Megaupload.

[Kryten]

He said he wouldn\'t believe them if they \'produced all the evidence in the world\'.

I didn\'t say anything about not having a logical level of scepticism about the claims, my problem is simply with Capt\'n\'s automatic and apparently unshakable government=LIES position.

I didn\'t mention the (farcical, as always) loss-of-revenue calculations, I simply have no reason to assume that they\'re outright manufacturing direct evidence, in the form of the e-mails.

EDIT: After all, this would be criminal perjury. Where\'s your assumption of innocence there?

[Kryten]

All I\'m going to say is I followed several links today to legitimate (user created) FL Studio project files... All hosted on Megaupload.

So? How does that affect, at all, the claims about the non-legitimate content?

[feanor]

He said he wouldn\'t believe them if they \'produced all the evidence in the world\'.

I didn\'t say anything about not having a logical level of scepticism about the claims, my problem is simply with Capt\'n\'s automatic and apparently unshakable government=LIES position.

I didn\'t mention the (farcical, as always) loss-of-revenue calculations, I simply have no reason to assume that they\'re outright manufacturing direct evidence, in the form of the e-mails.

Claimed evidence is not evidence untill it is admitted and contested as such.

I don\'t believe they would fabricate evidence either; misrepresenting it is a somewhat diffirent matter, though.

Or getting acces to it without going through the proper channels, taking into care privacy, etc etc.

So? How does that affect, at all, the claims about the non-legitimate content?

It provides an argument against taking down providers of a capability - however that capability is used. Because of the actions of others ( presumably uploading material and then giving the links to others ) this legitimate user no longer has access to his files. How is that fair?

[Kryten]

It provides an argument against taking down providers of a capability - however that capability is used. Because of the actions of others ( presumably uploading material and then giving the links to others ) this legitimate user no longer has access to his files. How is that fair?

The \'others\' are the owners and operators of the website. How are you supposed to remove them from the organisation, and still provide the capability?

Or getting acces to it without going through the proper channels, taking into care privacy, etc etc.

There\'s no improper channels in this case.

The moment someone outside of the U.S. (e.g. VAN DER KOLK, a Dutchman) is involved, out comes the warrentless wiretapping, completely legally.