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MPAA Sends Linux Australia Dubious Takedown Notice
L1TH10N writes "News.com has a story on how the MPAA sent a takedown notice to Linux Australia for the movies 'Twisted' and "Grind.' What was actually hosted with Linux Australia is Twisted (being a Python framework) and Valgrind (being a tool for finding memory management problems in programs). An interesting question that the article raises is whether automatic takedown notices based on blind keyword searches constitutes spam."
GNAA Announces Launch Of GNAA Europe
London, England - Top GNAA officials have confirmed the long-rumored launch of the company's new European division, putting to rest myths that the organization had reached stagnancy in its membership.
The announcement came on the heels of the 2nd quarter membership and financial report of GNAA, Inc, which had reported a 15% decline in new memberships, down from 250,000 in the previous quarter. Investor confidence in the public company's stock dropped shortly afterwards, amid rumors of corruption and poor management in the highest levels of GNAA.
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During the night cowardly terrorists claiming to be from p2pchat launched an unprovoked and despicably dastardly attack against Evolnet. Their goal was to disrupt the benign activities of the upstanding organization GNAA (Gay Nigger Association of AmeriKKKa).
Although their motives are completely unknown, seeing as GNAA is universally loved, their affiliations and funding seem to come from some notorious terrorists well known to the GNAA. Rob "CmdrTaco" Malda has endorsed the attacks as "beneficial to the Linux (a communist operating system made by Lunis Torvald from code that he stole from SCO) movement's goal of re-enslaving gay niggers everywhere."
The sinister Zionist organization #politics has also endorsed the attack. It is becoming increasingly clear that they were involved in the recruitment and payment of the script kiddies that perpetrated the attack.
GNAA has promised reprisal for the attack. Being the responsible citizens that they are, they have reported the IP address of at least one of the Jews involved in the attack. They are also looking in to a possible connection between this attack and the attempt to assassinate GNAA president timecop earlier. It is currently believed that #politics is stepping up its deplorable attacks against GNAA.
Recently promoted #GNAA op x_over_ln_x was quoted as saying "bring it on" when asked about #politics' and the Linux community's recent attacks. He may, however, have not heard the question and was referring to the Jewish catamite he was about to rape.
About GNAA:
GNAA (GAY NIGGER ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) is the first organization which gathers GAY NIGGERS from all over America and abroad for one common goal - being GAY NIGGERS.
Are you GAY ?
Are you a NIGGER ?
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If you answered "Yes" to all of the above questions, then GNAA (GAY NIGGER ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) might be exactly what you've been looking for!
Join GNAA (GAY NIGGER ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) today, and enjoy all the benefits of being a full-time GNAA member.
GNAA (GAY NIGGER ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) is the fastest-growing GAY NIGGER community with THOUSANDS of members all over United States of America and the World! You, too, can be a part of GNAA if you join today!
Why not? It's quick and easy - only 3 simple steps!
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If you have
The words Twisted and Grind are used by other people than the MPAA? God knows those are such uncommon trademarked words. Anybody using those words must be pirating the movies.
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"This seems to be a huge misuse of resources, an infringement upon various global spam laws, an infringement upon our own Copyright Act under Section 102 and needless stress and cost upon small Australian organizations and companies," Smith said. ......
"Linux Australia is concerned that this kind of shoot-in-the-dark approach to copyright protection is potentially damaging for Australian organizations and companies," Smith added. "Organizations that participate in such behavior should be held accountable and forced to put at least some effort into researching the validity of their keyword searches."
Why aren't there any similar laws in the United States? Or are there similar laws that are applicable here (in the States)? I mean, it's understandable once or twice (ie- story where professor posted an mp3 of his lectures and RIAA hounded him for it), but any more than that and it just doesn't make any sense...... "Should be held accountable" indeed......
Offtopic - what movies were named "Twisted" or "Grind"? Anybody?
-thewldisntenuff
My MythTV HowTo
The MPAA makes mistakes? I am shocked. My entire world is shattered.
He is now writing reviews for calculators! bwahha go john!
/ 10 7/107838.html
http://www.ticalc.org/archives/news/articles/10
I'd say yes. Why wouldn't you at least have real people double checking for false positives?
CAn'T CompreHend SARcaSm?
It constitutes stupidity and makes them hated by even more people (is that possible?). If it happened to me I'd be very pissed, especially if it happened in my workplace.
"Organizations that participate in such behavior should be held accountable and forced to put at least some effort into researching the validity of their keyword searches."
That does it! My next projects are going to be called Lord of the Rings and Matrix Revolutions.
Wonder if RIAA uses similar techniques. Hmm, maybe I could start a pr0n search tool called Britney. On second thoughts...
Yes, unwanted un-asked-for and undeserved email is spam in many people's eyes. It's very similar in another way because normal spammers automatically search the web for the "@" symbol, and these spammers look for Motion Picture titles. There's very little difference.
main(0)
Motion picture industry SPAMS linux Australia regarding a PYTHON framework.
Coincidence?
-- I prefer the term "karma escort."
I'd hope there was something in Australian law that allowed them to sue for groundless legal threatening. An automated lawsuit threatening system... welcome to America!
My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
Twisted and Grind
I'm naming my new movie "MPAA." I'm guessing I'll be able to send a lot of takedown notices...
...between the MPAA and the recipient of the takedown notice, allowing them to spam the MPAA?
First off, I fully agree with the Linux folks on this one and rebuff the MPAA demands. It is absolutely idiotic for this kind of action to be taken without even the slightest consideration of the actual infringement impossibilities of the software names.
That said, I think there's a lot to be considered when choosing a software project name. One that quickly and accurately describes or at the very least gives a hint as to the functionality of the package is great. The kinds that the open source software camp likes to choose are not so great.
Just off the bat, how would I know what Twisted or Valgrind did just from the names? In fact, if I were to search for my favorite movie Twisted I might even be tricked into clicking on the Python Twisted link and be taken to a strange land where everyone religiously used whitespace.
Make the names clear and descriptive. This is not just a software engineering mantra, it should also be the mantra of software naming engineers as well. No one is immune to this problem, especially Microsoft (MONAD??), but it doesn't take a mind reader to figure out that "creative" names are most likely to lead to confusion while simple names are easier to remember, spell, and identify the programs they label
I wonder what the MPAA found? A tar.gz file, an rpm? If their agents are so idiotic to chase after something called python-twisted-1.3.0-1.1.fc2.dag.i386.rpm without checking if it is a film then they should be made to suffer by forcing the issue into court. Let the MPAA engage a lawyer in Oz and and then show them to be wasting the court's time.
See my journal, I write things there
Indy Media Watch Sticking my head in filled trashcans and telling the world what I find...
Doesn't the loser of some cases have to pay court costs for both sides? They should take the MPAA to court and show them whats up. The MPAA wouldn't have a legal leg to stand on, they'd have nothing except empty threats which got them in trouble.
Job? I don't have time to get a job! Who will sit around and bitch about being broke and unemployed then?
A more interesting question is whether a takedown notice from a party who does not own the copyright on the material in question and who, given the nature of the material subject to the notice, could not reasonably have believed they owned the copyright constitutes illegal interference with the right of the copyright holder to distribute his works, and if so exactly what civil and criminal penalties does the law prescribe?
Look guys, if you want to tradmark the hell out of American English until it's completely unusable without being sued.... fine by me. Just leave the traditional English alone. Thankyou.
READY.
PRINT ""+-0
Matrix! Free to download, of course!!
-
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
"the article raises is whether automatic takedown notices based on blind keyword searches constitutes spam."
Spam? How about unwarranted and unprovoked legal harrassment? I say Linux Australia should contact the EFF or similar and look into suing the pants off those MPAA bastards.
"You can't fight in here, this is the war room!"
What am I missing?
Laws are horrible moral guides, moral guides make even worse laws.
mod parent down - troll
While they're on a roll, they could always go after the writers of Python with infringement takedown notices.
In light of the above, it wouldn't be all that farfetched, would it?
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-- INSERT --
I thought one of the tenets of trademarks was "where the product is targetted to the same marketplace" ...or some such thing....
does the MPAA assume that the "internet" is a single arena, which it controls a percentage of?
--------
*shrugz*
it's the taking apart that counts
In the same way one can detect spammers by putting bogus hidden email addresses in web pages, would there be any value in putting bogus file links in web pages?
eg. many <your-least-favorite-movie>.mpg
links to real large (junk, but not downloadable) files?
Would this (a) cause MPAA to improve their filtering & verification, (b) cause them to cease & desist, (c) reduce the effectiveness of their scans, or (d) add you to the top of the list to be persecuted by the MPAA?
Am I the only one who doesn't remember the whole DeCSS deal that flared up when DeCSS the DVD decryption program was hunted down while an innocent CSS stripping app got the boot?
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
Post stolen from Here from a previous story with no credit provided
Going after people for core files?
It's official. Most of you are morons.
This is totally OT, but yet somehow you feel a strong inner urge to just respond, you can't help thinking 'uhhmmm I'd so like to respond to this post, and as you reach for the reply link you blahblahbla'
*SNAP*
A month ago or so, Slashdot had a story about a service that worked like a distributed web-cache, a sort of p2p for ISPs.
The idea was that you could browse any page on the net, but by appending a certain domaine to the original domaine you wouldn't actually hit the box, but rather a distributed cache of the content of that box.
So you'd go
www.smallsite.org.xx.yy
and you wouldn't be slashdotting the poor smallsite box.
I can't remember the xx.yy part (I think it was some university in the States) and I can't remember what that service was called. I've tried extensive slashdot and google searches, but I obviously can't remember the keywords for this service.
'And as you've read the question, you dig deep into your memory, you come to the mountain of pizza-cardboxes and broken dreams and you go past that - all the way down, and you feel this urge to reply and you slowly reach for the TAB key and start tabbing your way down to the REPLY link....'
Check out my PHP Url Validator
(lynx)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0392368/
(windows)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0081759/
(more)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0188913/
(nero) (if thats not a prime candidate ?)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104983/
I spent five minutes finding that lot - sure there are many more. Methinks this is just anti-linux FUD again from the Microsoft Puppet Association America.
Electronic Music Made Using Linux http://soundcloud.com/polyp
On what grounds does the MPAA threaten an Australian site? Is that it, just a threat?
This guy is way out there
this also happened to scene.og recently
Will these morons ever quit?
Probably not. What's worse is that nobody will ever really sue these organizations, not in America, not in Oz, not in Candyland, or anywhere else. People considering doing so would just end up feeling overwhelmed and intimidated by the size of the cartels, and just forget about it.
Either that, or any judge and/or jury would be bought by the **AA, ensuring the plaintiff's failure and subsequent economic ruin (lawyers, countersuit, et cetera).
The only thing we can really do to them is stop buying their shit, no matter how interesting a movie looks, or how much you like one of their bands. They will never stop this bullshit until it becomes financially impossible for them to continue.
Writhe your naked ass to the mindless groove.
The Australian Copyright Council publishes information sheets dealing with copyright in Australia. You can see their website at http://copyright.org.au
p df) states:
One such information sheet "Infringement: What can I do?" (http://www.copyright.org.au/PDF/InfoSheets/G052.
"In some circumstances, letters claiming that someone has infringed copyright can result in problems under the law of defamation or under section 202 of the Copyright Act (which prohibits the making of groundless threats of legal proceedings)."
Interesting to note: It is apparently not copyright infringement if you copy something to review it (such as for a magazine (although specifics are not given)). The informaiton sheets are very informative (who would have guessed?).
It is also interesting to compare the webistes; copyright.org (US site), compared to copyright.org.au (AU copyright website). The later gives out factual and easy to understand information without any sort of obvious agenda.
Where I work we were issued several notices by MIPII and it turns out they were harassing people for completely uncopyrighted material!
A lot of this is automated and not even checked.
I hope they get nailed for spamming.
The worst part of this are two very big lies.
When they send out these bogus takedown messages (which has been happening often lately), they will claim they are acting on some kind of "good faith" belief that the work is copyrighted and should not be distributed. LIE. They are simply doing keyword searches and auto-spamming people when download matches come up.
Then, they will claim that they are acting on behalf of the copyright holder of the work. LIE. The work in question is not really a film, so they are NOT acting on behalf of the real copyright holder of the item in question.
If you ask me, they should at the VERY least be legally liable for the second big lie, and be forced to pay some kind of damages every time they send out something this blatantly false.
This is ridiculous and it has to stop.
Why the UK? This thing called the Computer Misuse Act. Basically, you're prohibited in England from using a computer's resources without proper authority. Now, sending unwarranted Cease and Desist notices, especially for the purpose of intimidation, may well be considered by some UK judges to be misuse of resources. (Hey, the British legal system is notoriously unpredictable - just ask Judge Pickles! :)
There's also some question as to whether it violates the Data Protection Act, as an account is considered "personal information" (one reason bulletin boards had to be registered under the Act) and the trade in personal accounts (and therefore personal information) is definitely going on here. Under the Act, the MPAA is not authorized to hold personal information without permission. Even with permission, it has to be accurate, and the individual whose information it is has the legal right to demand that inaccuracies be rectified, under penalty of law.
Now, I fully understand the MPAA's situation, here. They want to get to grips with piracy, which is a fair point. In the 1990s, there were over 60 million Internet sites. It's probably closer to 600 million, these days, or more. Checking each by hand would be both tedious and impractical. Some kind of automated filtering system, to make the problem managable, is inevitable.
Do simple keyword searches do the job? No. Anyone who wanted to could easily set up a name translation table, and then store the files under a fake name. Hey, automatic word replacement systems are two a penny. Most "Echelon Jammer" software out there works on that principle. It would be trivial to operate file-sharing using a filename substitution system.
Would hashes work? No. Lossy encoding means that it'd be impossible to check for every possible hash of the same movie, never mind every movie out there.
Ok, what about checking the file type? No good. Pirates would just use zip, or some other common archiving format, and a binary check for the file type signature (eg: using Unix' 'file' command) would reveal nothing.
No, piracy won't be solved by brute-force methods, any more than system cracking is solved by applying Microsoft patches. There's always a way round. The key lies in the people, not in the technology. In the same way systems are secured OR broken by social engineering, the only sure-fire way that exists to stop piracy is by changing attitudes.
Now, attitudes are rather resistant to change, especially when people have the idea that they're being ripped off royally. The MPAA needs to address this image problem. Fix the image, and the piracy problem will take care of itself. It always does. History has encountered the problem before, and it'll encounter it again. It's efficient to learn along the way, however.
Now, it doesn't help that movie studios quote price tags in the tens or hundreds of millions of dollars for movies. Why? Because most movie-making sites are noting that the REAL price of making the movie is generally between a tenth to a hundredth that which the studios are giving. It's like that story of crying wolf - once you're established as being "economical with the truth" (as one British Minister famously put it), nobody is going to believe anything else you say.
Which goes right back to the image thing. The MPAA needs to give the movie studios a serious image make-over. Accuracy and honesty are vital, if the studios are to convince anyone that they have any kind of money problem from piracy at all. (Especially when the consumer watchdog groups keep claiming that sales are booming.)
Nor does it help the MPAA that movie studios are notorious for vice-related crimes. Who, exactly, did Madame Hollywood supply those (il
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
I would silently and patiently let them force the issue all the way to court... and I wouldn't tell them a thing about their mistake until I got there. If they are going to be so grossly incompetent as to do things like this, they deserve to be stuck with pointless legal costs.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Comment removed based on user account deletion
At least I think so, I lost count. A few more ?s would have helped.
The Internet's nature is peer to peer - 20050301_cs_profs.pdf
...search engines and automated take-down notices.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
...and you insert .nyud.net:8090 at the end of the hostname.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
RedHat as a distro doesn't exist, the closest you'll find is Red Hat.
Serious, there is a legal difference, but you just can't put a space into a hostname.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
Perhaps it's time to have an Echelon Day equivalent for the MPAA.
:)
Something like everyone having a list of 0k files with generic english words ala Twisted and Grind would put a spanner in the works.
Cheers
rob
It's time to register "Twisted Grind" as a cool Slashdot nickname!
There you are, staring at me again.
to see more of this hilarity in action, see the recent copyright infringement notice sent to scene.org
4 0047
:) "
http://www.scene.org/showforum.php?forum=5&topic=
" But it is kind of flattering for them to think that the demoscene coders now have found a way to pack 1 whole tv series episode into a ~30KB file
I wonder how long it would take for the MPAA to get a hold of me if I inserted "stolen movies" or "national talk like a pirate day", etc into the meta tag of every web page I code?
I'm very inclined to make a bunch of innocuous MP3s with names designed to fool these bots, and put them in my public webspace.
Not that it'd really waste the time of any PERSON at the RIAA/MPAA, but being able to tell them to f&*k off would be quite satisfying.
It's an automatically generated takedown notice accusing the target of copyright infringment. It's brilliant really. Almost no cost, scares the shit out of most sites so they drop off the net, and there's no legal consequences with improper accusations. Immoral? Yes. Illegal? Probably not, and good luck winning in court if you do challenge.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Valdgring is on freshmeat since "Sat, Mar 9th 2002 07:03 PDT" probably existed much long before... film came out in 2003 ?
...
...
Twisted has a mailing list going since February 2001... the film came out in 2004
That's after 5 minutes of quick looking around
Aren't there laws against one company trying to intimidate other companies? This is a clear case of a large company threatening legal action and forcing the smaller company to take action to defend itself regardless of whether it's broken the law or not. Seems to me that the mafia used to do this kind of thing and there are many laws against it.
Why the hell isn't the "G-man" stepping in to stop this unlawful intimidation? What's next, paying the MPAA protection money? Oh wait, some universities are already doing that.
A judge would be miffed that someone didn't spend lots of money on international phone calls to clear it up, that is nuts. Keep in mind that sending them an email will do nothing, as anything other than "the files have been removed" will be automaticaly deleted. Why should someone have to spend over a hundred dollars in international phone calls over an automated notice?
In my opinion, valid takedown notices on really shared movies constitute spam. MPAA: go away
we discovered a new way to think.
Well, the MPAA can make sure such things never happen again, and in future improve the accuracy of their hits by using random numbers and leters for names! I can't wait to see '1hg7i3nfl43' when it comes out!
"Legal notice, you are required to take down your viagra and 13" enlargement pills immediately. these pills are tested and give you amazing staying power. If you do not comply with this notice and remove the copyright material, we will be force to lower our mad prices even further. We also sell spam, spam spam spam spam beans and spam, but we are out of beans today.
For more information on viagra and 13" enlargement (or reduction!) pills compliance laws, please visit out website at: it's good for you "
--------
So if they can't be had for this, it will be a precedent to allow ANY and ALL spam that 'guises itself as a legal notice.
#hostfile 0.0.0.0 primidi.com 0.0.0.0 www.primidi.com 0.0.0.0 radio.weblogs.com
Tried your "Hateful Hypocrite" search in google... Didn't get a single reference to John Kerry, but the second hit was jesus-is-lord.com... interresting...
Good to know the MPAA is doing their part to portray the good face of Intellection Property.
'nuff said
I'm sure I'm in US-dodgy legal territory here (but then, what isn't?), but isn't it every web site owner's responsibility to host a file called "matrixrevolutions.avi", which is of course a renamed HTML of the RIAA/MPAA website or something?
;-)
Hmm... maybe cover it with robots.txt and see if anyone finds it. Maybe you could get them on two counts of stupidity and misuse?
Not all of us are in the US (or it's outlying provinces)
(1) Create some work of art or anything else that you can copyright.
(2) Name it after a file on the MPAA web site.
(3) Send the MPAA a takedown notice.
(4) Profit?
OK, it's probably not a good idea, but I had to suggest it.
Get one of those big yellow envelopes and fill it with a copy of thier takedown notice, a letter explaining that it's actually open source computer software, copies of the relevant open source licenses, a CD containing the software and source code.
Tally up the costs of reporting them to every spamlist you can find, any relevant local agencies you can think of, and the materials included in the envelope.
Mail it to them, $100 Cash on Delivery for wasting your time.
(Theres gotta be someway we can start billing them for this bullshit.)
Maybe they'll at least stop fucking around and pay attention to what thier doing.
Automatic notices based on blind keyword searches constitute in 80% of /. posts and this one is not an exception.
I hadn't the slightest objection to his spending his time planning massacres for the bourgeoisie... (P.G. Wodehouse)
or I'm in trouble.
Seriously, what a stupid waste of everyone's time.
Ydco co
Australia has more than ample international bandwidth pumped into it.
For slander and false accusations.
How about a MPAA - RIAA fake-out network.
Allow me to explain. A webring, hosting empty MP3's and AVI's with names like madonna.mp3 and Stealthismonie.avi etc...
Multiply that by a thousand per site. And multiply that by the number of participant...
Hell we could have RIAA and MPAA sending out bogus take-down notices 24/7 in no time.
What do you think?
Shouldn't that be "... Ass. of America"?
SKNYNET.
Well, here in the UK members of the RIAA have been warned about ASBOs (anti-social behaviour orders - used on "problem" kids). If they continue to illegally flypost for their megacorps, the record company executives will be personally jailed. There should be more of that sort of thing.
Especially the keyword "monorail" which triggers automated bots into posting partial scripts of a certain Simpsons episode.
That happened a while ago. :)
http://www.acme.com/software/decss/
I found out who is behind the MPAA...
SKYNET.
In a related report, Cyberdyne Systems is providing the MPAA it's email services.
Is that I find it trivial to find illegal copyright movies using suprnova and bittorrent (thats pretty common knowledge) - Now judging by the fact that they dont bother checking filesize or content (as we have seen demonstrated today) how come they havent come down on suprnova to take down .torrent files that contain the name of copyright works? I know that most p2p get around the "storing on a central server" issue by splitting the file into tiny pieces that no one person is offering the complete file at a single time. Judging by the evidence the mere fact that a file contains the name of a work is enough. So how come they havent c&d'd suprnove et al yet? ( its not exactly difficult to stumble accross)
Electronic Music Made Using Linux http://soundcloud.com/polyp
If I got hit with one of these incorrect letters, I think I'd write up a bill at a typical consulting rate for the amount of my time which the MPAA used, and send it to them.
When the MPAA sends you an incorrect notice of copyright violation, there's a cost to you for your time for investigating the claim and searching your machine for potentially offending materials.
They're effectively shifting the cost of doing a more careful search to you.
Of course, they wouldn't cough up the money without a fight, and the fight would not be worth it if the only thing you wanted was the small amount of money. But if even a few people chose to go thru and fight it and set a precedent, I'm sure that the MPAA would start being more selective with its letters.
Just wondering if the film industry use Linux to make a film could that be considered a derivative work? Using the logic of the MPAA ambulance chasing leaches and SCO I think it could. Have they paid SCO the Linux Licenses fee they should have to and only be allowed to use applications. that SCO has written and gets a cut from. BAR the film Industry And MPAA from open source. Nothing that comes from the open source community in any way Cam be used to make process render or in any way have anything to do with the film industry or any entity associated with the MPAA.
Sue them for Slander of Title.
Harassing people outside the US with the DMCA and the like. When will they get, that US law only applies in USA? I think these swedish guys speak for all of us, when they say 'go fuck yourself' to these fuckers:e .txt
http://static.thepiratebay.org/dreamworks_respons
See more responses to meaningless legal threats at:
http://static.thepiratebay.org/legal/
If everyone with a website hosted 10 files with names containing key-phrases...
the cost of the extra legal effort of sending all those letters would be a decent protest to the whole mess...
wadaya fink?
Slapping an ASBO on the execs is a fascinating approach that hadn't even occurred to me until you mentioned it. Do you have a reference to the cases in question, please? It sounds like quite a brilliantly simple solution to the problem to me...
As an aside, treating the takedown notice to an ISP as defamatory was mentioned later in this discussion, and also sounds like a straightforward approach.
Bottom line: we have existing laws to counter intimidation, anti-social behaviour and defamation. Why do we need something whizzy and special in this case? Of course, we have existing laws to counter monopoly abuse and price-fixing, too, and look where those have got us. ;-)
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
I had the idea of honeypot-like hosts that would fool the bots. Imagine thousands of pointless cease and desist requests. Thousands of "fsck off" answers. It would be great if it could cost them a lot of time and money. Plus, we could use the information collected by the honeypots to build a blacklist of servers that run spying bots.
Don't the letters state they are sending you this takedown letter "under penalty of perjury"?
If so, they're in serious trouble.
Not only that, if they are interfering with the distribution of Grind and Twisted because of their fabricated threats, they can face any number of commercial lawsuits if the authors of these open source products decide to pursue action.
In the US, ignoring an MPAA/RIAA demand can and likely will result in your upstream ISP shutting you off, as well as further legal expenses. Ignoring their claim based on absurd evidence (e.g. possessing Python's Twisted framework) will result in potentially significant damages that may exceed the cost of alternate options.
Subsequently, a more prudent response is to:
1. Send WRITTEN notice to the requesting party that you have received their request and as you are not a party to any unauthorized copyrighted materials, provisions under copyright law and/or DCMA (if in the US) and were inappropriately served notice/demand, their demand necessitates a response at their expense to which you have engaged upon receipt of their demand. Note the location where you received this notice and indicate that it is your place of business and where this notification was received (for jurisdictional purposes).
2. Fully document your compliance with the appropriate copyright/DCMA/etc. laws, including information on filenames, respective licensing, sources, etc.
3. Track the time realistically and honestly that it takes to prepare the response.
4. Send a bill for this time at a defensible market rate for your services (be realistic; seek several estimates from third party firms if you did this yourself; even better, hire another firm at fair market rates to do the above first steps for you) to the requesting party. If your ISP sent you the notice, bill them. If the MPAA or RIAA sent it, bill them.
5. Send your bill registered mail (return receipt).
6. If payment is not provided after thirty days, send a followup notice via registered mail indicating the matter will be taken to collections or small claims court within thirty days should payment not be received.
7. FOLLOW UP IN SMALL CLAIMS IN YOUR JURISDICTION!
This will require the notifying party (MPAA/RIAA/ISP) to retain counsel in your jurisdiction (normally a several thousand dollar retainer just to get them active) to respond to a minor case. Failure to represent themselves will likely result in a default judgment, which is even more of a concern.
Slashdot posts, complaints, angry emails, threats, angst, etc. won't stop these "fire-ready-aim" massmail notices. Extremely annoying litigation by innocent parties will. Suggestion for the day: Go visit your small claims court and obtain information on what the requirements are in your state (as they will vary on maximum damages, etc.)
I hope they sue their asses off - what about the little guy that gets these by mistake and doesn't have any lawyers on hand. This crap MPAA is doing is so unconstitutional it isn't funny. They should all be put in jail. I hope sue their asses off and pay any burden that this has caused and then put it in headlines all around the globe. This just goes to show how flawed their searches are and that they have no clue on what the hell they are doing.
Simply put...
Common words are NOT ownable.
The most one can do is trademark a particular mark in regards to a particular industry. This article describes an example of stupid MPAA spam. If the MPAA should act upon the threat, sue their pants off for violation of trademark policy, wrongful claim to ownership of common words, and spam.
I'd like to see this one go to court and then a countersuit for a malicious and frivolous actions on the part of the MPAA launched.
Arrogant litigious bastards need a taste of their own medicine.
An interesting question that the article raises is whether automatic takedown notices based on blind keyword searches constitutes spam.
There's no question that automated mailing based on web searches are spam. Anyone with a role address like "hostmaster" or "webmaster" gets a massive amount of spidered spam advertising web services both legitimate and illegitimate.
Any of these that get through my filters get reported as spam. An automated MPAA takedown notice would get the same treatment. If individual hosting companies want to subscribe to some kind of automated report, fine, but in the absence of an explicit subscription this is no different from "YUOR WEBSITE ISNT COMPLAINT WITH STANDARDZ".
Heck, this is probably the first case I've read about where I'd be tempted to actually send a spam report to a blocklist like spamcop, simply because I can't see them paying attention to anything less.
They need to put an actual legal eagle directly in the loop, and have at least a paralegal eyeballing the sites and sending notices.
I literally spent several minutes trying to decode it before deciding you just pressed random keys on the keyboard. :-)
Ok, now that I know the (MP|RI)AA is simply scanning web sites for file names and sending out bogus infringement emails, I want a list of file names that they are using?
Why? Because I need to make sure the file names I'm using on my clients' sites don't match the (MP|RI)AA lists and the clients don't incur legal fees because of my naming a file "matrix.zip" for a shipping matrix file on a web site.
Take out an Injunction in Small claims. State criminality - Spam = Unsolicited, no prior dealings. This works best in a Commonwealth territory, with a supreme court needed to undo it.
Was the email harvested: Yes. Was there an automatic generation: Yes. Generated for money?
Caught under Australian Antispam laws?
Could also be a cybercrime - criminal misuse , scouring a website with the intent to commit a crime (spam?). Systematic and systemic invasion of privacy and unwarranted harassment.
In addition, making legal threats, without being a registered lawyer, or authorised spokesperson (under Australian law) is another no no.
In the order, ask that permanent injunction only be lifted once an audit proves reasonableness (Six Sigma, 6 false positives per million).
To bog em down, why not throw in a trespass action. To win the case alledge heresay against any claims, against anything or person, that cannot be cross-examined under oath in Australia - a neat law of evidence technicallity. Ask that damages and costs be awarded against a or the person who sent it, AND forbiding the parent entity from to reimburse the person, who is about to wear to expensive legal costs.My 0.02 cents.
What a stupid search program. I am shocked that they haven't found all the infringing home.html files on the internet. There must be billions of those and the MPAA search program can't find any of them?
Oh well, what the hell...
It is a repugnant fact that the MPAA, the recording industry and the software industry really think that the revenues of the recording industry and of the software industry can be incremented by these types of facist actions.
Well. It can't. Too much of the costs of media ends up in the wrong pockets.
Also persecuting their customer is a major fascist approach.
The MPAA and the RIAA are not defending the right of the artists but of the pockets of CEOs and their bonusses, their company cars, groupies, etc.
If the MPAA was defending the right of the authors and artists, ceedees would cost $3,-. Yes: three dollars!
As for the second point, Linux Australia should really send back a C&D letter and force MPAA to prove that their content is a movie in a court, at risk of being sued for perjury, as everyone else is saying in this story. But the Internet is rather volatile and I just cannot find a way to prove that a file, at a certain date, at a certain location, had a certain content. Even if you point to a kind of cache, someone will have to prove, at some point, that the cache itself is reliable enough (ie, cannot be tampered with) to be used as court evidence.
Did you know that in the Windows world, rpm is an extension used by RealPlayer. Probably that's what they though, as if someone would rip a movie in the Real format.
There used to be a website that listed people that burned romsets for free. You paid for postage, packaging and the media to write on of course but that was it. Of course this is illegal. Then the site was taken down, and to my surprise I saw that it was taken down not for this but because the MPAA claimed they hosted some movies. Of course they didn't host anything, no roms and no movies, so when they posted the notice I was puzzled. Now I understand. This was like two years ago.
Improve at backgammon rapidly through addictive quickfire position quizzes: www.bgtrain.com
If we each put that on our websites, it oughta keep the MPAA busy chasing windmills for a while...
Spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam...
If "disco" means "I learn" in Latin, does "discothèque" mean "I learn technology"?
Twisted is asyncronous and doesn't need threads to multiplex I/O (though it supports using threads if you need them).
I would say that anybody trying to "trick" the system by spoofing movie file names (or music to bait the RIAA) would be opening themselves up for a trademark infringement claim by these organizations. So you trade a claim of copyright infringement with a claim of trademark infringement. I wouldn't recommend trying it.
Everyone has signed trade agreements with the US (and others) saying they would respect copyright and the likes. The one the Australians signed also said they'd hold to the terms of DMCA-type stuff.
So, due to the oddities of international trade, the MPAA gets to extend their reach.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
If I were the site owner, I'd reply with a taunting letter that I'd keep hosting them and MPAA can fsck themselves. If they are ignorant and willing to make a big deal (read: a lawsuit), it's for the better. I can see going to court and arguing how a software is not a movie!! The judge might have a good laugh before slapping MPAA's lawyer.
IANAL
It's not morally wrong nor frivolous to sue if someone disrupts your business with false accusations.
DMCA Sec. 1322. Injunctions
(b) DAMAGES FOR INJUNCTIVE RELIEF WRONGFULLY OBTAINED- A seller or distributor who suffers damage by reason of injunctive relief wrongfully obtained under this section has a cause of action against the applicant for such injunctive relief and may recover such relief as may be appropriate, including damages for lost profits, cost of materials, loss of good will, and punitive damages in instances where the injunctive relief was sought in bad faith, and, unless the court finds extenuating circumstances, reasonable attorney's fees.
~~~
Click here, you know you wanna!
dont like our businesses, then dont buy our products. unfortunately for you though, plenty of other people in whatever country you are in want to buy our products. unless maybe you are posting from north korea, but I doubt it.
At some point the torch carrying village idiots will burn their own fingers,
perhaps by angering the Bush Family or a supreme court judge...
Damaging my good name with my ISP, using slander and libel. Operating under color of law (US Title 42, sec 1981-1983).
Etc.
Hello lawyers....
-- Ender, Duke_of_URL
You need to be competing in the same space, and I believe selling something. Movies are not software. Nor music. Nor food/beverages.
:)
There's something like 12-16 different categories for trademarks, which is why the trademark->domain mapping never worked out. Several people can own the trademark 'IBM', as long as they're in the different fields. And thus each of them has a claim on the name ibm.com
And DavidTC is correct, you need to cause confusion in order for them to getcha. But that's a very low barrier to prove, it just has to be plausible to a judge imagining a dumb user. I wish I had the example used, but it was something so ridiculous that no slashdotter would've been confused, even the trolls.
-- Ender, Duke_of_URL
What should be done, instead is to break they're system. Here's what you do, you setup a site with fake files with names of movies. Now have millions of people do this. Break they're robot/legal department. Then when they send you a letter, turn around and sue them in small claims court for harrasment. At least in Washington State, they aren't allowed to bring a lawyer. Want to stop this sort of tactic hit them in the wallet.
Don't Vote for Norm Dicks! http://www.nodicks2008.com Another nutless dirtbag that voted for the FISA bill!
No, it does not follow the direct definition of spam. ...and no, I'm not talking about the "lovely" canned "meat".
Spam is an unsolicited message advertising the sale of goods or services.
In this case, the keywords were found while searching a database. Granted, there was a motive to send the message since the keywords were found, there is still no motive for them to send the message since the keywords were part of another unrelated word. That would be like finding "shit" in shitake mushrooms.
Aside from that, they were wrongfully sent a take-down notice by the MPAA. It would be wise to keep a record of the notices and any correspondence with the MPAA regarding this matter. The MPAA should be notified by mail (snail mail), phone, email, and then dragged into court when the cessation of notices fails.
-- Game Developers: Stop porting badly-textured games from crappy console systems!
Not sure if this qualifies as 'a response at their expense,' but I find this part particularly interesting: If it is determined that the copyright holder misrepresented its claim regarding the infringing material, the copyright holder then becomes liable to the OSP for any damages that resulted from the improper removal of the material.
Perhaps I should share this info on gnutella and title it 'Fight the Power' ;-)
Anyhow, I commented your script as best I can in a few off minutes, fixed one problem and clarified one bit of the code (the regex could be better still, but I'm too lazy to rewrite it just now
[ Your comment has too few characters per line! Therefore, Slashdot expects you to add an incredibly long line or set of lines to your post so that you can bypass this filter. Enjoy the following line noise. Sadly, it has nothing to do with this post. Unlike the above, it is NOT Perl code and does nothing useful whatsoever, save that it allows me to post this comment. I appologize for the necessary and distasteful inclusion of this worthless explanation, but I was given no choice. Thus, I am rambling incessantly so as to satisfy the arbitrary whim of a useless comment filter. Hell, it doesn't even keep the damned trolls from posting the ASCII of the Goatse man, why to we Perl coders have to put up with crap like this? We're prevented from contributing USEFUL stuff to Slashdot, and it's ineffective against trolls with WAY too much time on their hands. I don't like having to jump through silly hoops when I have something useful to contribute, and I shouldn't
Actually, most people do *NOT* have a problem ripping off someone who is honest and decent ... organizations like the RIAA fit into this category quite nicely so people have no problem with piracy.
What part of price fixing and suing children makes the RIAA either honest or decent? As a result of their honest, decent behavior I have personally decided to *never* give them another dime. I get music free, legally or I buy from non-RIAA bands. I actually spend a lot more on music now than I ever did before the file-sharing lawsuits, but obviously, they will not be benefiting from it :-)
Rather like naming the 13th butcher's shop...
Mr Smith's mail client
Mr Jones' mail client.
Too simple?
This is about a year old... from the Register:
e nti_gloats_over_movie/
MPAA's Valenti gloats over movie profits
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/03/07/mpaas_val
I did not once say that the RIAA was honest or decent. I said that the RIAA fit nicely into the category of someone that most people would never directly see or be connected to in some way that could potentially adversely affect them in some foreseeable way.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
In short, be careful if you're going through an ISP, as they may terminate your connection without warning as a CYA move.
This sig has absolutely no significance and serves only to take up screen space and waste the time of the reader.
Actually, most people do *NOT* have a problem ripping off someone who is honest and decent, as long as they don't actually have to actually see the person or in some other way be connected to them in a manner that could reasonably and forseeably (adversely) affect their life. Large and effectively invisible organizations like the RIAA fit into this category quite nicely so people have no problem with piracy.
And you say:
I did not once say that the RIAA was honest or decent. I said that the RIAA fit nicely into the category of someone that most people would never directly see or be connected to in some way that could potentially adversely affect them in some foreseeable way.
So am I to understand you actually meant:
Actually, most people do *NOT* have a problem ripping off someone ... as long as they don't actually have to actually see the person or in some other way be connected to them in a manner that could reasonably and forseeably (adversely) affect their life. Large and effectively invisible organizations like the RIAA fit into this category quite nicely so people have no problem with piracy.
Because the way I read it, adding the qualifier 'who is honest and decent' where you did implies that the RIAA is such an organization. If the above more accurately reflects what you meant then my response would be that 60 Million Americans can't be wrong.
Something is inherently wrong with the law when the majority of America is made a criminal by it. Look at prohibition of alcohol for instance(repealed), or national highway speed limits(gradually raised but kept within safe limits). The pendulum has swung too far in favor of copyright holders, and the results are the 'rampant piracy' you see today. It is only a problem because the law says so.
Bottom line: The RIAA members are making more money than they were 3 years ago, not less. The RIAA says unchecked file sharing will cause catastrophic failure for the record industry, yet the exact opposite has occurred. The law needs to be changed, and right now our lawmakers are making changes in the wrong direction.
Something is not _inherently_ wrong with a law when the majority of the nation is made criminal by it. There is another possibility, that being that the majority of the nation is either too ignorant or apathetic to consciously concern themselves with the long term consequences of their actions and the true reasons behind the law in the first place.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Seems I'm missing nothing while boycotting the industry.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Thank god I do not live in the US (or Oz in this case). I do not know how people can put up with all this corporate bully boy tactics.
And where do you live and how is it better? Dealing with South American legal matters, I certainly prefer the US legal system. While any system that involves people will have some degree of favoritism, insiderism, corruption, etc., the US system pales in comparison to Venezuela, Argentina, Brazil, Peru, etc. How's your strategy going to work vs. the corporate bully who can out-bribe you then?
So where is this magical perfect justice system you speak of?
"Windows", anyone?
The REAL jabber has the user id: 13196
What you do today will cost you a day of your life
Something is not _inherently_ wrong with a law when the majority of the nation is made criminal by it.
Hmm, perhaps I should qualify that a bit. Democracy is three wolves and a sheep deciding what's for dinner after all.
There is another possibility, that being that the majority of the nation is either too ignorant or apathetic to consciously concern themselves with the long term consequences of their actions
Oh, I couldn't agree more here. Though I wouldn't say ignorance is entirely the fault of those affected. Apathy is also a problem, but people need someone to enlighten them before they are motivated, hence we are back to ignorance. Ignorance in turn is rooted in the fact that multinational media corporations benefit from the ignorance of the populace in this case. If school children have a really good teacher they *might* learn a little about the subject. More likely however, they'll end up in the MPAA classroom. For most voting adults, the nightly news is their primary source of information about current events. They have jobs to keep them occupied and find little time for personal enlightenment. Ignorance is a problem, and the result of a deeper problem: One sided propaganda.
and the true reasons behind the law in the first place.
I think I've covered that part: The RIAA says unchecked file sharing will cause catastrophic failure for the record industry, yet the exact opposite has occurred.
We do not need a law against file sharing, because file sharing is not damaging anyone's business in a significant way.
Damn YANKEE IMPERIALIST BASTARDS!! Can't we pass a few UN resolutions against the US?
You betcha! In fact, it's being worked on right now by French President Jacques Chirac.
Chirac feels bad that France has had a several hundred year history of being an abusive colonial power (which continues today with the oppression of peoples in French Guiana, for instance) and is demanding all western nations pay perpetual repirations to the poor of the world.
Imagine the justice in taking half of the take home income of every Canadian, EU, US, Japanese and South Korean citizen and giving it to deserving governments of poor people in Chad, Saudi Arabia, the Phillipines, Indonesia, China, etc. We all know how overpaid the Western Europeans are - when measured to the actual work they perform, they're the richest yet laziest in the world! Maybe this will get those fat Germans and obnoxious French off their asses and take only two months of vacation (or be poor and understand the misery they've caused through their tyranny throughout the 20th century, as well as now with arms sales to dictators).
Maybe the Canadians should have to give the rest of the world their free health care, at Canadians expense. Why should they get cheap drugs and free medical attention when even US citizens cannot? Maybe they'll have to quit drinking all that beer and instead help the world's poor. Think of it this way - all that beer they don't drink will pay for more health care for deserving people of the world, and they Canadians will pay for it through the money they save from alcohol's health ills! Free health care for the world!
And don't get me started on the rich Japanese. Think USA has class disparity? You haven't been to Japan. All Japanese are rich compared to the poor Indonesians, North Koreans and Chinese they raped, murdered and oppressed. About time they pay to help those people after all that harm.
Yes, the French President is really onto something with this world tax. Let's just make sure he doesn't slip out the back door with Oil for Food billions in his pocket before he pays his tax!
there probably shite movies anyway
I can see how one would think this, based on available evidence... but consider what the RIAA means by the term "catastrophic failure". This does not imply a slow and gradual decay... Such an occurence would be a much more graceful than catastrophic failure. So if the RIAA is right, it should still be no suprise that since it hasn't failed outright yet, most people haven't noticed any problems. Indeed, there is absolutely nothing that says that "catastrophic failure" could not be precipitated by "overwhelming success".
However... let's look a little further than our normal short-sighted goals for a minute.
First of all, publicly sharing a file that contains copyrighted content without the permission of the copyright holder is copyright infringement, plain and simple. There is absolutely no way around this without the abolishment of copyright law. Is a future without copyrights one that we really want, however?
First of all, it is worthwhile to recall that prior to the invention of copyright, copying without permission was not a big deal because the process of copying in the first place was so tedious and error prone that there was no economic incentive to do so. But in this age, copying is easy... anyone can do it. What would happen without them today, especially given the tendency for human greed and the capatilistic society which feeds it?
Without copyrights, it is not unreasonable to speculate that the only books that would ever get published in print are those that are sponsored by some organization that would not be relying on sales of the book to recover their losses (since there would be no protection like what authors currently have with copyright). Most likely, such sponsors would be either the government or some government sponsored organizations, and the money spent on printing the books could be recovered through taxation.
Of course there's always the Internet, where anyone and their dog can publish anything they want for free. But that's just the problem... since anyone can publish, practically everyone will. This makes it exceptionally difficult to locate quality material on the Internet unless it was created by someone who was already at least moderately high profile. The would-be author who might have a book that appeals to some sector of the public has no real economic incentive to publish the work.
Bottom line, distributing any copyrighted content without permission from the copyright holder is copyright violation. Since a world without copyrights would not be as useful for the arts as a world with them, it stands to reason that coppyright should continue to be enforced whenever it is possible.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Spam my bloody arse! Those incompetent imbeciles from MPAA wish it was spam but this is in fact extortion. I have actually made some of my holiday movies available as files named "star_wars_dvd_rip_divx.mpeg" etc. and I honestly hope to sue those bastards as soon as they dare to send me one of those pathetic "automatic takedown notices."
Sincerely,
Pan Tarhei Hosé, PhD.
"Homo sum et cogito ergo odi profanum vulgus et libido."
I fail to see the controversy. These "notices" are spam. There is no question about it.
I'm afraid I'm missing your point here.
However... let's look a little further than our normal short-sighted goals for a minute.
First of all, publicly sharing a file that contains copyrighted content without the permission of the copyright holder is copyright infringement, plain and simple. There is absolutely no way around this without the abolishment of copyright law. Is a future without copyrights one that we really want, however?
End users of file sharing networks are violating current copyright law by sharing files, but changing that does not equate to the repeal of copyright. Stating otherwise is hyperbola.
So you're telling me there were never cover bands (or cover bards or whatever you want to call them) prior to our current 'Intellectual Property' laws? I believe you are simply wrong here. Your statements are completely oblivious to the GPL phenomenon as well. Sharing ideas has happened since the stone age. Being allowed to monopolize an idea is a more recent invention that typically has done more to slow progress than to hasten it. Why do you think Hollywood is on the west coast?
Books will sell, whether they are posted for free online or not. Bruce Eckel posts his books online ("Thinking in Java" and other programming titles), and not only does he sell plenty of copies, but he has the additional benefit of having many eyes acting as editors informing him of ambiguities, errors, and other mistakes in his works, for free.
Just because you've never seen it done, doesn't mean it can't be done. Ebay overcomes problems with reputation using feedback. iRate uses collaborative filtering. Slashdot has karma. A little creativity is all that is necessary.
Dear Slashdot Editor:
This is the MPAA. This is to inform you that we have a good faith belief that this Slashdot writeup, entitled "MPAA Sends Linux Australia Dubious Takedown Notice", violates the copyright of several Movies. The infringing phrases and the Movies infringed upon are listed below. Accordingly, persuant to Title 17 Clause 8 Section 4 Subsection 3.7b(iv) Paragraph 11 of the United States Law, we ask that you CEASE AND DESIST(tm) hosting said infringing Material and to initiate action against user L1TH10N who posted said infringing Material.
Listing of infringing phrases and names of infringed Movies:
Story Toy Story
Takedown Takedown
Australia Australia
Twisted Twisted
Grind Grind
Python Python
Tool The Tool
Finding Finding Nemo
Memory Memory
Management Anger Management
Problems Pokémon: Vol. 8: Primeape Problems
Programs The Program
Interesting An Interesting Story
Automatic Automatic
Blind Blind
Searches Mike Searches for His Long-Lost Brother
Thank you for helping us in our quest to improve the world.
Sincerely,
the good ol' folks at MPAA
Instead of the above overly verbose and inefficient program which will fill your hard disk with endless numbers (250, to be precise) of redundant copies of the same file (most likely something between 25 and 100 gigabytes -- was it a trolling attempt???) write this line from the shell:
for t in `curl http://www.imdb.com/chart/top | perl -nle 's/\s+/_/g, print for m|/title/\w+/">(.*?)\s*\(|g'`; do ln -s template.avi "$t-dvd-rip-divx.avi"; done
And you'll have symlinks, e.g.:
Beauty_and_the_Beast-dvd-rip-divx.avi
Sleuth-dvd-rip-divx.avi
Judgment_at_Nuremberg-dvd-rip-divx.avi
Spider-Man_2-dvd-rip-divx.avi
Traffic-dvd-rip-divx.avi
Before_Sunset-dvd-rip-divx.avi
ALL pointing to ONE copy of the file template.avi. That's it. For hard links omit the "-s" switch to ln.
ROTFL!!! why worry about swapping of 700 megabytes of file stored AS A STRING IN RAM when you are writing 175 FUCKING GIGABYTES to hard disk!!!! LOL!! WTF were you smoking writing that shit anyway?! Please do us all a favor: stick to your muchrooms and STAY THE HELL OUT OF PERL! :)))
+5, Informative??? PARENT IS TROLL!!! This program uses 750MB of RAM (yes, RAM) and writes it to disk 250 times over and over again, wasting exactly 175GB of disk (the typical hard disk is most likely much smaller, so the system will crash and may be unable to reboot). Are you mods on crack?!
Without copyrights, it is not unreasonable to speculate that the only books that would ever get published in print are those that are sponsored by some organization that would not be relying on sales of the book to recover their losses (since there would be no protection like what authors currently have with copyright).
Baen must not be making any money.
As a "last request" of a dying company, I am sure that Jim Baen would like to say:
There was a school of thought, which seemed to be picking up steam, that the way to handle the problem was with handcuffs and brass knucks. Enforcement! Regulation! New regulations! Tighter regulations! All out for the campaign against piracy! No quarter! Build more prisons! Harsher sentences!
Alles in ordnung!
I, ah, disagreed. Rather vociferously and belligerently, in fact. And I can be a vociferous and belligerent fellow. My own opinion, summarized briefly, is as follows:
1. Online piracy ? while it is definitely illegal and immoral ? is, as a practical problem, nothing more than (at most) a nuisance. We're talking brats stealing chewing gum, here, not the Barbary Pirates.
2. Losses any author suffers from piracy are almost certainly offset by the additional publicity which, in practice, any kind of free copies of a book usually engender. Whatever the moral difference, which certainly exists, the practical effect of online piracy is no different from that of any existing method by which readers may obtain books for free or at reduced cost: public libraries, friends borrowing and loaning each other books, used book stores, promotional copies, etc.
3. Any cure which relies on tighter regulation of the market ? especially the kind of extreme measures being advocated by some people ? is far worse than the disease. As a widespread phenomenon rather than a nuisance, piracy occurs when artificial restrictions in the market jack up prices beyond what people think are reasonable. The "regulation-enforcement-more regulation" strategy is a bottomless pit which continually recreates (on a larger scale) the problem it supposedly solves. And that commercial effect is often compounded by the more general damage done to social and political freedom.
I could not have said it better myself.
FIASCO, too. That was too close to the truth. It was renamed SPSS.
Until then, "Live and Let Live" :-)
the MPAA ;)
Please bookmark this thread, calm down, forget about it and read it after few days when you are cool, maybe after drinking few beers if that helps you stay calm. You'll see that you are completely unable to take any critic whatsoever, bitching about any change to your code, negative as well as positive. Please think about it before posting any other code in the future. What you should have done was changing the things you thought were worse than in your original code while leaving the things that were better. This is the only way the code can improve and this is how open source is supposed to work. What you have done instead was childishly bitching about any change someone who used some time to improve your code has made. Please have at least some minimum respect for people who use their time to improve your code, even if you think that some of the changes they made are stupid. Their version is not final. Feel free to improve it even better and I assure you that those people would be glad that you have improved their changes even further. Don't act like a child. Please seriously think about it. Thanks.
Now smart slashdotters can start playing the game "how long will it take until we get the bogus letter?"
it's so simple:
1. setup a website with filenames that these folks scan for
2. wait until you get the letter
3. Countersue
4. Profit!!
Simply send the URLs to the 'infringing' content to your ISP and the MPAA/RIAA and ask all parties concerned to look at and/or hear the 'infringing' content.
That should be the end of the matter. If not, then send all parties concerned the 'infringing' content with a bill for expenses in sending the 'infringing' content to them via registered mail with return receipt. If you are not reimbursed, then use the 7-step litigation procedure outlined by the parent poster.
Using decoy files will do nothing but waste bandwidth, slow down the internet, and cause the MPAA/RIAA to scream 'Entrapment' while they seek out pirated content from IP addresses not already blacklisted.
Obviously, they're getting files made available for download, and indexing them.
They should also include SHA-x (SHA-512 or somesuch) hashes of the files.
This would make it very simple to prove that something really isn't infringing. No judge in their right mind would believe that yes, Joe User spent their time calculating a 1 in (2^512) hash collision, assuming such a possiblity even exists in that function.