Slashdot Mirror

here's a partial transcript from Live Chat with an IX Webhost Rep (be warned. there's a lot of incoherent rambling because the customer service rep is from Ukraine, and i think there was a slight communications barrier):

you: ok, i just have one more question
Evgen Voznyak: Sure please go on
you: if we hosted our music on our site
you: would you shut us down like you did Quote Unquote Records?
Evgen Voznyak: We could suspend your account by Copyrights for your music if it is illegal
you: but we own the copyrights to our music
Evgen Voznyak: In this case everything is fine
you: then why was Quote Unquote shut down?
you: they held the copyrights to the music they put up
you: or did someone file a complaint against their site?
Evgen Voznyak: Please read about Our Terms of Service http://www.ixwebhosting.com/index.php/v2/pages.tos
you: ok, i just read the section about IP and copyright
you: but i still have qustions about how the Quate Unquote Records site came to be shut down
you: are you allowed to discuss the details with me?
Evgen Voznyak: Yes I am allowed
you: ok
Evgen Voznyak: Let me explain
Evgen Voznyak: If we found some warez on Illegal information which is phishing material, we automatically suspend your account with request delete your content, also adult content is not allowed.
you: is that what you found on their site?
Evgen Voznyak: We search such content on our customers sites
you: and what did you find on Quote Unquote Records's site?
Evgen Voznyak: If we found that your domain getting many querries for users and it has been overloaded we suspend account
you: you're not telling me anything about the Quote Unqoute site
Evgen Voznyak: Please clarify what do you mean about Quote Unqoute
you: ok, there was this new article recently about your company
you: basically it talks about an Independent Record Label (like the one i work at) being shut down by you guys for "copyright violations"
you: but the violations your company accused them of were for songs that they held the copyrights to
you: so you basically shut down their site for posting their own songs up
you: you can read the news article here: http://torrentfreak.com/record-label-infringes-own-copyright-site-pulled-081019/
you: i don't want the same thing to happen to our website because we post our own copyrighted music and music videos on our site too.
Evgen Voznyak: If you have your own copyright this will not happens with you
you: but that's exactly what happened to Quote Unquote Records
you: i just want to know how you determined that they were violating copyright laws
Evgen Voznyak: I will give you example mail which you need to write for us
Evgen Voznyak: Thank you for notifying us of a client who may be infringing on copyright materials. As we would like to work with you to resolve this issue, there may be several supporting documents we need in order to continue. All information must be received via Federal Postal mail and delivered to the following address:
Evgen Voznyak: Company Name
Evgen Voznyak: PO BOX 1599
Evgen Voznyak: Hopkinsville,KY 42241
Evgen Voznyak: Please send a copy of the registered copyrights from the USPTO or other governing legal entities for the concerned material. If the text or images are located in a certain area of our client's website, please let us know where we can find the resource as this will assist us in a quicker resolution.
you: so who notified you that Quote Unquote was infringing on copyright materials?
you: did they include proof that they held the copyright to the materials being infringed?
you: did you investigate whether the claims were true?
you: and was their a court ordered injunction that required you to shut down their site?
you: or did you just shut down the site without verifying whether any law

This is rich: "I Will Guarantee You With My Own Money That You Will Not Be Dissatisfied."

That is the arrogant boast of IX Webhosting's CEO, Fathi Said:
http://www.ixwebhosting.com/index.php/v2/pages.ourPromiseToYou

I'll wager I know of one customer who wants to take him up on that bet... after they've slapped him around a bit for good measure.

>Fair enough

Not fair at all. First of all, if the blog and myspace post are accurate, then the ISP is citing their TOS as the agreement that requires this. The TOS here dated June 16:

http://www.ixwebhosting.com/index.php/v2/pages.tos#q21

says *nothing* about copyright registrations being required or any other provenance for hosted content. If they don't have some other reason for the service outage, I'd speculate that they're making up the "terms" as they go.

>why record label dude doesn't simply register

I see no indication of how many files we're talking about. Depending on how it's structured, $35/file could add up to cash that a struggling artist does not have. They probably would not be needed later either, as I think most folks are inclined to respect CC license provisions.

Still, it's hardly a problem going forward. If the label's report bears scrutiny, then the IX brand is toxic.

If we can /. them from a link in a comment, they shouldn't be used by anyone to host pretty much anything.

While trying to retrieve the URL:

http://www.ixwebhosting.com/

The following error was encountered:

* Connection to 98.130.254.114 Failed

The system returned:

(111) Connection refused

You were saying?

It's probably a good time to ask them about it:

http://www.ixwebhosting.com/index.php/v2/pages.LiveChat

The web hosting company is IX Hosting, and I certainly hope they get Slashdotted into a smoking crater, and that their support folks get a whole lot of input from various sources about the idiocy of their policy...

http://www.ixwebhosting.com/index.php/v2/pages.customerCenter#top

--
Tomas

And in case anyone was wondering, it looks like their host is IX Web Hosting.

I have had good experiences with ix Web Hosting since I started hosting my domains with them. The only real 24/7 tech support that I have found, with nice american (as in, not indians speaking engrish) techs the few times I have had a problem with site configuration.