[GWHH]

http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2012/01/19/u-s-shuts-down-megaupload-charges-kim-dotcom-6-others-with-piracy/

Tech|1/19/2012 @ 3:47PM
U.S. Shuts Down MegaUpload, Charges Kim Dotcom, 6 Others With Piracy
0 comments, 0 called-out + Comment now
+ Comment now The U.S. Justice Department has charged seven individuals connected to the file-sharing site Megaupload.com, accusing them of a “massive worldwide online piracy” scheme that costed more than $500 million in damages and generated more than $175 million in profits, according to a Justice Department release Thursday.

The ring is allegedly led by Kim Dotcom, aka Kim Schmitz and Kim Tim Jim Vestor, a 37-year-old who is a resident of Hong Kong and New Zealand. Dotcom was arrested today in New Zealand along with associates Finn Batato, Mathias Ortmann, Bram van der Kolk. Kim Dotcom is German-born entrepreneur who has reportedly been convicted of credit card fraud. Three other associates are at-large.

The main site, Megaupload.com which has been shut down, is accused of infringing on copyright by distributing movies, television shows, books and software even before their release dates. The companies Megaupload Limited and Vestor Limited are accused of having a business model “expressly designed to promote uploading of the most popular copyrighted works for many millions of users to download.” The site provided financial incentives for uploading popular content, the indictment charges.

The 7 individuals were indicted by a grand jury in the Eastern District of Virginia on January 5 and charged with racketeering conspiracy and conspiring to commit copyright infringement, among other charges. Each person faces up to 55 years in prison.

The interest in this case is likely to be high as interest in SOPA has been at a fever pitch in recent days.

More on this to come soon.

[GWHH]

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/20/technology/indictment-charges-megaupload-site-with-piracy.html

January 19, 2012

Indictment Charges Megaupload Site With Piracy

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

McLEAN, Va. — Federal prosecutors in Virginia say they have shut down one of the world’s largest Internet file-sharing sites, Megaupload.com, and charged its founder and others with violating piracy laws.

An indictment accuses the company of costing copyright holders more than $500 million in lost revenue from pirated films and other content. The indictment was unsealed Thursday, one day after Web sites shut down in protest of two Congressional proposals intended to thwart the online piracy of copyrighted movies and TV programs.

Megaupload.com has claimed it is diligent in responding to complaints about pirated material.

The indictment says that at one point, Megaupload was the 13th most popular Web site in the world.

[Robert McNay]

There’s far more complete coverage behind the why and how over at Ars Technica

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2012/01/why-the-feds-smashed-megaupload.ars

[TC2]

Wow this is a crazy example of a future if SOPA and PIPA were to pass. The irony is, these bills have not passed yet the government is still going after these people.

Hmm… don’t tell me that now the gov’t is going to be able to still do SOPA activities without it being written first as a bill? If so, I can only imagine the backlash it’s going to generate from the public.

[FlakBait]

I read a couple of interesting articles that pointed out the timing of this raid seemed to be fairly convenient. Righter after internet sites launch a protest of SOPAPIPA and generate a fairly decent amount of good will in the government changing minds federal authorities pull a multi-nation raid shutting down one of the most popular sites on the internet. Given past reactions it was almost assured hackers, especially “anonymous” would do something big in retaliation, which they have, and may show the same officials that changed their minds that the internet is made up of nothing but anarchist pirates that can do massive damage to web based infrastructure if there is no law in place to prosecute and keep them in check. I really hate conspiracy theories but it does bring up an interesting question in this case.

[phenoms]

Wow this is a crazy example of a future if SOPA and PIPA were to pass. The irony is, these bills have not passed yet the government is still going after these people.

Hmm… don’t tell me that now the gov’t is going to be able to still do SOPA activities without it being written first as a bill? If so, I can only imagine the backlash it’s going to generate from the public.

While the timing irrefutably ties the legal actions against Megaupload to SOPA and PIPA in both public perception and implied intentional timing, it is simply existing law in action.

While Megaupload was popular, useful, and utilized by nearly all of us, the site was in violation of law and is now experiencing the repercussions that the company choose to risk. Much like with the war on drugs, the law is targeting not the end users (thank goodness for that), but a company that was one of the heads of the beast.

Loosing file storage websites is not new to end users. Some websites die and others fill the void. At worst, the loss itself for whatever the reasons is an inconvenience. Paid Megaupload subscribers will almost certainly loose the money they invested which is unfortunate, but ultimately a consequence risked transacting business of any kind.

Most of the outrage and upset comes because Megaupload was large, successful, and had a long and stable run for the nature of website that it was. Many such sites that have disappeared before Megaupload have fallen without intervention by law.

The real concerns at the loss of Megaupload have yet to be realized. Since this is the result of a large legal action against a company whose data holdings were immense, it becomes a case poised to set highly influential legal precedents.

SOPA and PIPA seek to overreach reasonable scope and suffocate an international Internet for the benefit of a well funded and vocal domestic minority. But the potential legal precedents that the Megaupload case may set are a much larger concern because unlike the overreaching and diffuse nature of SOPA and PIPA, these would be far more focused and specific legal decisions. Decisions that no matter the care taken by the judge will be difficult to define. When law is not defined well, that is when you begin to see real legal chaos occur as the aftermath.

Let us hope that the decisions made in the Megaupload case will limit their scope and define their intent with the sort of clarity that is typically only found through hindsight.

My Deviant Art Page (old stuff):
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[chris10000]

thats good news for the fbbs

[Danny]

thats good news for the fbbs

…… I’m not sure about that….. pretty sure in some small way everybody’s losing here, not just pirates

[GWHH]

it was a goverment scare tactis to give warning to those who would oppose big brother!

I lost 6 years of up loads BUT NO money!!

[Solarian, aka LordDaroth]

The End Days have come.

[Author]

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