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Feds Shut Down Popular File-sharing Website Megaupload!


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This guy is class A dirtbag, he has done nothing productive in his life or so it seems. Everything related to him are scams or shady deals. He is smart no doubt but he might also be a sociopath.

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What exactly did he do, since rapidshare does the same and so many others?

 

 

This is the "Everybody is doing it defense".

 

Newsflash- It didnt work with my mom when I was 13, and when I went to law school, I realized it wasn't much of a defense in grownupville either.

 

 

You ever go fishing?

 

You sit out on a lake with thousands, hell, maybe millions of fish all doing the same thing. If you're lucky, you catch one and the rest get away. No matter what you do, you can't catch them all.

 

 

Today, he's the unlucky fish.

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You ever go fishing?

 

You sit out on a lake with thousands, hell, maybe millions of fish all doing the same thing. If you're lucky, you catch one and the rest get away. No matter what you do, you can't catch them all.

 

 

Today, he's the unlucky fish.

 

Great analogy!

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Look at his history.

With his cv no wonder the Feds were after him and now they have a bad guy in custody that started the website it makes it easy for the media to put these types of sites in a bad light.

 

"this hacker has started this website that has copyright material which means tax revenues are being lost blah blah"

 

Should be interesting to see how his court case actually turns out in 4 years time...

 

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The new legislation in Congress seems to be well-intentioned in terms of stopping the pirating of content, but the end result would be controls on the Internet that are too far-reaching. The problem is the old media business models are dying out and the companies are trying to hold on. When the VCR first came out in 1976, Hollywood sued, saying it infringed on copyright, because it allowed people to record television shows, which meant people no longer would tune in as much when certain movies and programs were aired, which could mean a great loss of advertising revenues.

 

A California federal court shot down the lawsuit, so then Hollywood appealed to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals who overturned the California court and upheld that the VCR was unconstitutional. It went to the Supreme Court, and in 1984, in a 5-4 decision, the Court ruled the VCR was not unconstitutional. Had the ruling gone the other way, we would have a much more limited World Wide Web and media today than we do. There'd be no DVDs, iPads, Youtube, etc...like we have.

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Ohhh I remember.... He was gonna also do a gum ball style race that had a purse of 1 million dollars, he came here promoting it looking for people to enter. I think cost was gonna be like 50k and several of us here were gonna do it until we started to research him. Then we called his dumb ass out. He said the race was gonna be epic and we were all fools. He collected deposits. Race never happened.

 

"The Ultimate Rally."

 

Had an SSC Aero as the flagship car. Followed his forum carefully for months. Had a ton of loyal fanboys and then it all disappeared overnight.

 

Can't believe this is the infamous "Kimble".

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he might also be a sociopath.

 

Might?

 

I don' think there is any might about it, I think its a totally foregone conclusion.

 

doesnt mean he might not have been a fun guy to hang around with, looks like he partied 24/7

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What exactly did he do, since rapidshare does the same and so many others? There is something else to it/going on.

There is, extortion and money laundering... That's the serious charges. Just running an upload site would not cause this much commotion.

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Shutdown doesn't have anything to do with SOPA, except may be political timing.

 

If this guy is guilty so are the Youtube co-founders. The difference being that Youtube is now owned by a company that can spend billions on legal fees and fines.

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This is the "Everybody is doing it defense".

 

Newsflash- It didnt work with my mom when I was 13, and when I went to law school, I realized it wasn't much of a defense in grownupville either.

 

 

You ever go fishing?

 

You sit out on a lake with thousands, hell, maybe millions of fish all doing the same thing. If you're lucky, you catch one and the rest get away. No matter what you do, you can't catch them all.

 

 

Today, he's the unlucky fish.

 

 

What's your take on the whole SOPA thing?

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What's your take on the whole SOPA thing?

 

 

Im torn on it... Why were we able to shut this guy down? Because he was operating out of another western country with whom we have reciprocal copyright treaties. Basically, every major western nation has agreed that they want to provide their creative citizens protection for their artistic works.

 

The problem is CHINA.

 

Copyright piracy by CHINA has been a problem for 30 years now. OK.... so 30 years ago, it was the job of Customs to search for, and confiscate, pirated materials as they came into the country, or were distributed here. It was easy to search a shipping container inbound from Shanghai. Or grab a guy selling bootlegged DVDs in MacArthur park.

 

Now the stuff is coming in on the internet. COMPLETELY under the radar, and in a way thats impossible to intercept. And its costing billions. If Ford was having hundreds of thousands of cars stolen off its assembly lines every day, there would be no controversy about the governments efforts to STOP THE THEFT. We have no way to reach these pirates.... Theyre in China. So the kneejerk reaction is "Police the internet like we do our borders and dont let the materials come into the country."

 

At the same time, Im not crazy about the idea of shutting down ISPs based on what third parties are using them for.

 

The answer of course is to go after the END USERS. The CONSUMERS of pirated materials. But nobody wants to do that either, because, THEY ARE OUR KIDS.

 

The problem is a systemic one. We've bred an entire generation of morally bankrupt, self absorbed, children, who dont care about right and wrong. I want something. I take it. Because its my right to get everything I want. And the fact that that means some other guy who worked his ass off to create the thing I feel entitled to, wont be able to keep his job -sucks to be him.

 

 

Personally, Ive seen the effects of a generation of piracy. Yes, the industries are still very profitable... But I think that profitability under the losses of piracy has had a cost... And I think that cost has been QUALITY. I don't think the modern entertainment product is of the same quality as what was produced in the generations prior to guaranteed wholesale piracy. There are probably some other factors involved in that devolution, but I think piracy has certainly been a factor in it.... And as a lover of GOOD entertainment, I think its sad.

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Shutdown doesn't have anything to do with SOPA, except may be political timing.

 

If this guy is guilty so are the Youtube co-founders. The difference being that Youtube is now owned by a company that can spend billions on legal fees and fines.

 

 

I have to be honest.... Ive never been to this guys site before.... I can sort of ASSUME how his site worked from what Ive read here and in press reports, and it sounds like he was very MUCH violating the law...

 

I can tell you a couple of things for sure:

 

1. I am an EXPERT on U.S. and International copyright law. And I mean that in the LITERAL sense. I could walk into any courtroom in the country tomorrow morning and be qualified as an expert witness on the subject.

 

2. I use Youtube A LOT.

 

3. Youtube does NOT violate copyright law. Not from what I've seen.

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I think part of the problem with piracy has been availability of legit ways to acquire content which is finally catching up with pirated content. Before if I wanted a CD for example, I would download it for free because it was easier than going to the store to purchase it. Now it's just as easy to buy that CD on iTunes so I do that instead. Technology and times change, so it's up to everybody participating to innovate and stay ahead. I don't think for example music piracy is a bad thing as it forces artists to engage more with fans. You can't download the experience of going to a concert.

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the piracy debate really has me confused, especially when it comes to music.

 

because now if i want to listen to a song, i just go to youtube and listen to it, and its almost always been put on there by the actual artist or recording studio. that way i can hear the song without having to get it off itunes, hear it on the radio, or buy the CD. its even easier than it has ever been IMO.

 

in fact there are so many add ons you can just copy that content from youtube to your PC and then voila you have it at your disposal even easier than those days where you had to use Edonkey and all that other crap that required you to setup your ports, firewalls etc.

 

so my confusion now sits with, how can they complain about copyright when they are providing it through a medium that means everyone can listen to it for free anyway (im presuming they're happy with the google ad's etc they get from it?)

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The only company I know of that is consistantly going after trademark, copyright, patent violators in China is Nike.

And that is a daunting task, as they shut one factory down, a week later another opens.

Profit margins are high enough here so that some companies don't even bother chasing the pirated clones (cough Apple cough). Until the Chinese government steps in, the cheap copies will keep coming, and THAT ain't happening. There's no way the Chinese government is going to stop that train.

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the piracy debate really has me confused, especially when it comes to music.

 

because now if i want to listen to a song, i just go to youtube and listen to it, and its almost always been put on there by the actual artist or recording studio. that way i can hear the song without having to get it off itunes, hear it on the radio, or buy the CD. its even easier than it has ever been IMO.

 

in fact there are so many add ons you can just copy that content from youtube to your PC and then voila you have it at your disposal even easier than those days where you had to use Edonkey and all that other crap that required you to setup your ports, firewalls etc.

 

so my confusion now sits with, how can they complain about copyright when they are providing it through a medium that means everyone can listen to it for free anyway (im presuming they're happy with the google ad's etc they get from it?)

 

 

The artists put their own tracks up to take advantage of the ad revenue and to engage at some level with fans, not so you can just rip it straight from youtube to your hard drive, but what are they going to do? No artist that is vocal against piracy is popular for doing so, much better for an artist to be pro-piracy and celebrate it along with all their fans at a live concert, while fence jumpers get their heads punched in by security.

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This is the "Everybody is doing it defense".

 

I'm not going to defend him, but if they have a case against Megaupload it should be really easy to take down rapidshare and other sites. :)

 

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the piracy debate really has me confused, especially when it comes to music.

 

because now if i want to listen to a song, i just go to youtube and listen to it, and its almost always been put on there by the actual artist or recording studio. that way i can hear the song without having to get it off itunes, hear it on the radio, or buy the CD. its even easier than it has ever been IMO.

 

in fact there are so many add ons you can just copy that content from youtube to your PC and then voila you have it at your disposal even easier than those days where you had to use Edonkey and all that other crap that required you to setup your ports, firewalls etc.

 

so my confusion now sits with, how can they complain about copyright when they are providing it through a medium that means everyone can listen to it for free anyway (im presuming they're happy with the google ad's etc they get from it?)

 

The word is COPYright. Yes performance and use are ancillary rights within the scope of it, but the big one is COPYING. You said it yourself.... THERE ARE "ADD-ONS" that allow you to copy the work. When you use those "add-ons" to copy it, you are violating the law. Its no different than saying "Why should I buy a book, when I can Xerox a copy I got free from the library? They've made it so easy with the invention of these copy machines!" "or "Why should I buy an album when I can record it off the radio with my tape player? They're just putting it out there!" Because its illegal. Thats why.

 

YOUTUBE PAYS the owners of copyright material for the number of hits they get (just like radio stations pay record companies). The fact that you, the viewer, dont actually PAY them yourself, is irrelevant to the equation.

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China is definitely not the problem when it comes to consumer good copyright infringement. It's more of a problem with respect to IP.

Hi... You dont know what the fcuk youre talking about.

 

IP means "Intellectual property". Copyright IS Intellectual property. The whole point is that websites can be hosted in countries that we dont have Copyright treaties with and who have the latent support of their own governments. The big billion person dog in that park has ALWAYS been CHINA. Listen... We're at a point where I dont thing anybody still gives a shit if the Chinese are bootlegging DVDs and selling them IN CHINA. Its when they rip off that product and try to sell it BACK HERE VIA BROADBAND, undermining the legitimate western markets, and undercutting the commercial value of the industry that people get freaked out.

 

 

The only company I know of that is consistantly going after trademark, copyright, patent violators in China is Nike.

 

 

How many businesses are you intimately familiar with the General Counsels of?

 

EVERY entertainment company that I know of has an ARMY of people who do NOTHING but try to stem the tide of predominately Asian based piracy. EVERY MAJOR clothing company is faced with the same challenges Nike has, and fight it as best they can. Just because you dont hear about it in the news, doesnt mean it isnt costing BILLIONS OF MAN HOUR DOLLARS, the price of which is being passed on to.... wait for it....

 

 

YOU- THE LEGITIMATE CONSUMER. The difference of course is, its a lot harder to ship a crate full of fake Louis Vuitton into the country, past customs, past DHS, etc, than it is to Download something off a website halfway around the world. One takes skill, and an organization, and a little bit of luck.,.. The other, any Jr High school kid can do.

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