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RIAA/MPAA vs. xMule Author, EarthStation 5
Two bits of news in the ongoing battle between the RIAA/MPAA and the rest of the internet: One P2P company, apparently based in Palestine, has thrown down the gauntlet to the movie industry. Meanwhile, a developer of another P2P tool who unwisely chose to live in the USA has been shut down (mirror) by the RIAA.
No other press releases that I can find on prnewswire.com have had their company website URL link made inactive. Looks like the MPAA/RIAA can strongarm Prnewswire to remove what they allege are offending links from press releases, even if its a corporate website.
Watch out Apple, your press releases may be next to have links disabled.
Edith Keeler Must Die
From the website, it seems they do have their privacy ducks in a fairly neat row:
;)
ES5 #1 goal is to protect its users from intrusions to their privacy by providing encrypted traffic, random ports and IP anonymity:
ONE CLICK PROXY SERVER - Users can send connection requests through intermediary proxy servers located throughout the world so that the download destination of a file cannot be traced by any entity whatsoever. There is nothing for the user to set-up, just right click to enable the proxy server.
SSL - SECURE SOCKETS - Prevents monitoring of a user's uploading or downloading activity. Users can automatically deploy SSL by right clicking.
UDP -USER DATAGRAM PROTOCOL Using UDP makes it impossible to reliably scan a useras computer to determine if ES5 is running. Also, unlike TCP connections, UDP traffic can not be easily blocked by ISPs.
ES5 SECURITY KEY - ES5 utilizes a standard HTTP server to transmit files, but deploys a special "security key" so than only ES5 users can access your shared files.
IP ADDRESSES - ES5 does not display user IP Address information.
DYNAMIC PORTS- Each ES5 node uses a randomly chosen port (unless the user chooses a specific port themselves). Therefore, ISPs will be unable to identify file-sharing traffic based upon port numbers and unable to throttle back the users bandwidth.
USER DEFINED PORT SETTINGS- ES5 provides users with "one-click" port setting options for ES5 to use port 53 (the port used by DNS) or port 37 (the port used by time service) therefore rendering all blocking attempts hopeless.
MULTIPLE POINTS OF ENTRY - ES5 uses multiple methods for connecting to the ES5 network including IP Multicast, Usenet Articles, Web Sites, Node List Files and a several other undisclosed methods.
PENETRATING FIREWALLS - UDP allows seamless penetration of firewalls without inconvenient setting of firewall parameters. For users behind firewalls, ES5 uses UDP to request a PUSH, where the behind-the-firewall computer initiates the connection back to the requested user's computer. PGPDisk - As an additional security feature, to all P2P programs, is that ES5 integrates seamlessly with PGPDisk (which is a free program and will be provided by ES5 to its users) that lets you encrypt your disk drives to store your P2P content. No one except you will ever be able to see your files, not your kids, your spouse, your mother, your boss, the FBI, the KGB or anyone else!
So, the plot thickens. Whatever will the *AA do?
everything in moderation
It saddens me as a developer that you can't even deign to write a P2P add without the assumption that it will be used for sharing copyrighted materials and thus shut down by the RIAA/MPAA.
Sure you can. Grokster and Morpheus won their court case, remember?
The xmule situation is very unclear. There are three not necessarily related things happening:
(1) The guy got a subpoena. That's basically a court order saying "come talk to us". He is not under arrest and so far hasn't been charged with anything. Hysterics about federal jails and moving to Mexico seem to be quite uncalled for.
(2) His ISP cut him off for "unacceptable use". Looking at cable providers' Terms of Service, it seems you can't do anything but browse the web anyway, so I am sure he broke some clause there. Likely he's been running a server on his connection which most ToSes prohibit. Tough luck. Dump the cable and get a DSL line instead.
(3) He is getting close to his bandwidth limit. Well, that's the consequence of popularity. Nothing earthshattering there.
Kaa
Kaa's Law: In any sufficiently large group of people most are idiots.
I've been boycotting the music industry since 1996, not because of the RIAA, but because I don't care about music enough to buy it. Nor do I care enough about music to go through the hassle of downloading it, I'll stick to just listening to brainless pop or classical on the way home if I happen to get tired of NPR and the BBC.
"The problem is that the entertainment industry is using dropping revenue as proof that they need to implement tighter controls to prevent file sharing. So any boycott may be backfiring!"
They can use it as proof, but that does not make it proof. It is very easy to show that with the increased popularity of Napster that Music sales went up, but when Napster was shut down music sales went down. I don't think that is proof that file sharing increases sales of music, but it certainly shows that their proof is garbage.
And from this mans blog :
So I just tried installing ES5 on my Windows machine. The first thing
it did is attempt to connect to an IP in the Gaza Strip. The
administrator for that IP block is someone with an earthstationv.com
email address. Then my keylogger warning program popped up and
complained that the program had attempted to hook to my keyboard. I
killed it, and ran an uninstall. The uninstall failed because some of
its DLL's were still 'in use' despite no matching processes. I rebooted
and was able to do a successful uninstall manually. Afterwards, I
checked my registry and removed a fresh entry from "Intertrust," a
company that makes DRM software.
Overall, an entertaining experience.
Below is a copy of my letter to my senator, McCain, of Arizona. Feel free, indeed encouraged, to email your own senator (or even others!) and representatives. You can find their addresses at http://www.senate.gov/ and http://www.house.gov/
With respect,
Un-Thesis
=====================
Dear Senators,
Some of you have . It affected me personally on 17-Aug 03. I am the main developer of one of the few person-to-person filetrading programs for UNIX (Linux, FreeBSD, etc) machines and MacOS X.
Apparently I was struck without warning by some DMCA clause for downloading 'copyrighted material.' In other parts of the law, you need habeus corpus, search warrants, judicial review, warning, etc. With the DMCA they merely terminate you, with no warning, with no appeal, with no representation, with no pretense of jurisdiction, based upon evidence that was 100% obtained outside the framework of any noticeable governmental or 3rd-party oversight.
In short, it is an apparently open fascist policy prone to rampant abuse, supporting the rights of the Establishment over the People.
My life revolves around the marvelous information transport technologies collectively referred to as the Internet. I attend a part-time university online (www.accis.edu), near 95% of my contact with my friends and family is online, 100% of my employment is online (via rentacoder.com), and my personal hobbies (www.xmule.org) and political activities (www.fearlesszippy.com, wakeup-people.com, etc) are online.
In short, terminating my internet without warning has seriously halted my life. It is time we make the right to chat online a fundamental human right. The government should be allowed to restrict a person's movements (prohibit uploads, downloads, etc) by placing restrictions on the amount of data a 'criminal' should be able to send online in a given day or so (500KB should be sufficient for email, chat, etc). Such bandwidth caps are already implemented by teh vast majority of broadband suppliers throughout the nation adn would be just about as easy to implement and enforce as the current DMCA suspension of accounts.
I just wish there would be *some* judicial process involved in the DMCA. I should have my constitutional right to a fair trial. This is above and beyond the reasons why most people download movies. People overseas download movies and music because of artificial monopoly regulations that delay the international exportation of American media by weeks and even months.
People in America download media because they are either too poor to purchase the overpriced media, and also primarily to see if a given media is of good enough intellecutal quality to warrant purchasing, due to the unequal consumer rights 'laws' which prohibit the returning of open media.
Generally, people download not out of nefarious intent, but because they lack real alternatives to verify the intellectual quality of any given electronic Media before purchasing.
Thus, more consumer rights laws, less 'illicit' copyright infringement.
Sincerely,
Theodore R. Smith
Promote freedom; fight fascism.
Israel has never once started one of the wars that it has participated in
Sorry, I think you must have forgotten about the six day war in 1967 (OK so it was a "preemptive strike". Name a war where the first person to attack hasn't claimed that). You also seem to have overlooked the 1978 and 1982 invasions of Lebanon -- the last one being condemned even by the US. So by my counting Israel was invaded twice in the last 55 years: the 1947 independence war and the 1973 Yom Kippur war. Perhaps you were confusing Israel with Lebanon, which has never started a war but has been invaded three times in the last 30 years (by Syria in 1976, Israel in 1978 and 1982).
However, it should be noted that there has never been a strike against an unimportant figure.
I suppose that depends how you defined important figures. Even if you count any suspicious looking palestinian as "important", I don't see how you can include people like James Miller, a british reporter, or Iain Hook, a UN aid worker. Of course the Israeli army admits these were "mistakes", but does that exonerate them?
Never do you see in the news: Israel kills busload of Palestinian schoolchildren. Why?
Because the Palestinians don't have the option of sending in helicopter gunships to assassinate Israeli politicians. I'm not condoning suicide bombings, but your comparison is laughable. In a conflict, each side will naturally make use of the means at its disposal. Moreover israel's "targeted assassinations" invariably kill many more people than just those being targeted -- but obviously a 6-year-old girl who happens to live next door to a Hamas leader doesn't matter as much as a 6-year-old killed in a suicide bombing.
The author of this post asserts his moral rights.
You can share with your friends (instead of 60M people) so it's less guilt factor. Plus it is over an RSA encrypted link. The best of all P2P worlds.
http://waste.sourceforge.net/
"There are laws that enslave men, and laws that set them free. " - Sean Connery as King Arthur
Exactly. More students die each year in football accidents than they do in school fights, but we don't see 'zero tolerance' foolishness implemented on the field.
Dyolf Knip
download.es5.com. 10m36s IN A 213.152.119.5
[me polymorph]# dig -x 213.152.119.5
213.in-addr.arpa. 2H IN SOA ns.ripe.net. ops-213.ripe.net.
In other words, download.es5.com's IP address is "owned" by ripe.net. http://www.ripe.net/ripencc/about/ states in part:
A traceroute from my desk shows (again, in part)...
11 bpr1-so-0-0-0.sanjoseequinix.cw.net (208.173.54.65) 50.889 ms 51.496 ms 55.282 ms
12 208.173.54.74 (208.173.54.74) 55.430 ms 51.065 ms 50.517 ms
13 so-5-0-0.gar1.sanjose1.level3.net (209.244.3.137) 51.761 ms 52.379 ms 55.816 ms
14 so-7-0-0.mp1.sanjose1.level3.net (64.159.1.73) 62.741 ms 58.862 ms 51.160 ms
15 unknown.level3.net (64.159.3.254) 114.017 ms 113.364 ms 111.183 ms
16 so-2-0-0.mp1.london2.level3.net (212.187.128.137) 188.881 ms 189.685 ms 188.827 ms
17 so-2-0-0.mp1.amsterdam1.level3.net (212.187.128.26) 195.189 ms 193.874 ms 194.465 ms
18 gige10-2.ipcolo1.amsterdam1.level3.net (213.244.165.99) 191.791 ms 192.253 ms 195.587 ms
19 unknown.level3.net (213.244.164.18) 192.521 ms 193.254 ms 192.870 ms
20 213.152.119.253 (213.152.119.253) 193.077 ms 192.419 ms 193.005 ms
21 213.152.119.5 (213.152.119.5) 193.729 ms 192.124 ms 194.005 ms
So download.es5.com looks to be housed in Amsterdam (gige10-2.ipcolo1.amsterdam1.level3.net).
Just my take on the situation.
I've helped beta test for them (they have public beta testing). It does what it says it does. You can go to their forums and ask people about it all. Is it a hoax? It certainly could end up being one, but so could all of the other p2p programs out there.
I don't help in the beta testing anymore though. A few of the developers who are regulars on the board acted moronic any time I submitted a bug to them. I had to tell them what my problem was quite a few times before they finally understood what I was talking about. I'd show my bug report to friends who hadn't used the program before and they perfectly understood what problem I was having.
I really don't like using the program either. For me, it's a memory hog (uses 16 MB), and I don't have the money to upgrade from 128 MB. Plus, it looks really bulky. Though, if I want a more secure p2p app, I know where to look.