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LokiTorrent vs. MPAA
ravenspear writes "It seems that the attack on torrent sites is continuing strong. This time Lokitorrent is being sued by the MPAA. Unlike Suprnova and most of the previous sites however, they aren't planning to just roll over and die. It will no doubt be a dificult fight, but they plan to stay up for the time being. Also, they are asking for donations to cover their legal expenses. So far they have raised $8,755 out of a needed $30,000. "
Loki is the god of mischief, so the names says it all. Now if it was Odintorrent, I'd side with them.
Since I submitted this they updated the site and have now have received $9,940 in donations.
Also, they posted an image of the of the complaint they were served with here.
Dear AIMUser304921, It has come to our attention that on December 12th, 2004, you had an AOL Instant Messenger conversation with AIMUser201192 about how some of your buddies have a bootleg copy of Spiderman 2. To avoid legal action, you must cease and desist communicating with anybody ever again about anything possibly illegal. That, or be ready for us to sue your pants off.
Because we disagree with the law.
Now that it's on slashdot, I'm sure they'll need that $30,000 for bandwidth bills :(
Just FYI, their paypal address appears to be support@lokitorrent.com. If you're going to post a story about a site taking donations to fight a lawsuit, at least include a way to donate AFTER you Slashdot their site to hell and back.
Because this is about defending the right to say "There's a guy over there in that place illegally distributing software", not about getting access to said software. LokiTorrent wasn't distributing software, they were just hosting torrent files that pointed the way to people who were.
This is like suing Google for finding a link to a site distributing software illegally. It's silly, and it's a chilling restriction of the concept of free speech.
So far they have raised $8,755 out of a needed $30,000.
Actually, since they're attempting to take on the MPAA in court that really means that they've raised $8,755 out of a needed $infinity.
Good luck nonetheless, guys.
The strategy is the same as if you were to sue Google for providing links to torrent files (like this: google link to search for harry potter).
I suppose one could make the argument that the fact that Lokitorrent is a tracker makes them very much different, but since Trackers only facilitate the exchange of information [they don't actually contain any pieces of any of the infringing works themselves], it's difficult to sue *them* for copyright infringement (since they aren't distributing or in illegal possession of any of these copyrighted works).
Now, if there *were* a law that said that if one knew about copyright infringement they would be legally obligated to report it to the authorities, Lokitorrent would certainly be illegal. I'm not sure there is such a law.
I'm not saying what Loki is doing is *morally right*, I'm just saying it might be defensible.
All the sudden they want to stand up for our rights? Why didn't they do so when MS contacted them and demanded they stop tracking MS related torrents?
Any and all Microsoft software and XBOX games are "banned" from the site. Check their upload page.
http://www.lokitorrent.com/torrents-upload.php
Here's an idea: write MPAA and tell them to spend their lawyer money on tsunami relief.
IAAL, and darned proud of the modern justice system...
1. Everyone accused of anything in court has a right to defend themselves and make the accuser prove it. This system protects every other right you have.
2. The folks at LokiTorrent want to exercise that right. In order to do so they need financial assistancec.
3. We all benefit from NOT having a system whereby a well funded organization cannot assume it will win because it can afford lawyers, a system where the big money always wins.
4. Ergo we all benefit from LokiTorrent exercisisng its rights. Why then should we not help them out if we are able?
All your base are imagining an ad-hoc beowulf cluster of old korean overlords welcoming YOU!
Trying to use sarcasm in text-based forums does not work.
2600.com had a similar case where they were ordered not to link to any site that had decss. Never mind the fact that google and pletny of other sites did and still do.
They lost the case.
What you're referring to is called "Contributory Infringement". Basically through your actions you're allowing/facilitating copyright infringement to take place by someone else.
2 89 goes into more detail too.
http://www.crblaw.com/GetFAQAnswer.asp?id=49 has a blurb about it.
http://www.chillingeffects.org/piracy/faq.cgi#QID
It'll cover the drugs and hookers, that's for sure.
There's something really weird in the FAQ. In the part that tells copyright owners what to do if material that they own is being traded and they want the post removed, they say:
I sympathize with their desire to get people to talk to them first, in a civil tone, before sending take-down notices to their ISPs, but this is perfect nonsense. Reading the FAQ doesn't bind anybody to anything. This is the kind of garbage we expect from Microsoft. What is it doing on a torrent site?There are so many here hammering the "it's illegal - it's piracy - " meme injection that I strongly suspect the MPAA has hired astroturfing agents to dominate the thread. Holy Scientology, Batman.
Answers for their contentions, all at once:
It's not "piracy"; it's copying without permission. If you sell copied films, then you're a pirate.
Copying without permission wasn't a criminal matter until the content producers bought such laws. It was a civil matter, and conviction required evidence of monetary loss on the complaintant's part.
Copyright was a compromise in U.S. law. One faction in the constitutional convention wanted NO copyrights, another was more of the current IP ilk's way of thinking. Compromise: copyrights were to exist for a limited time, to get the best of both worlds -- enticement to produce new works, and the graduation to public domain of old works for the common good.
With the Sonny Bono Law, the deal was destroyed. No compromise. Copyright for life of author plus 75 years for an author, a HUNDRED years for a corporation. And no guarantee at all that future congresses would keep extending the terms for ever and ever and ever...
The deal is over. And we didn't break it, the "intellectual property owners" broke it - savagely, permanently. Now works are owned for all time. No public good. Just private. No derivative works allowed. And corporate "owners" can use their profits to buy larger and larger blocks of "property" indefinitely. We may see a small handful of chummy corporations eventually owning all the published works of mankind - science, art, literature -- everything.
The law broke the deal. The corporations wanted anarchy. They got it. They have guns on their side. The Scientologists are peeing themselves with glee.
What we have here is more than downloading copies of movies or music. If copyright lasted only 20 years, I would honestly be fighting alongside the owners so that they could make a profit from their works. That is, if the artists actually owned the copyrights, rather than the corporations they signed rights over to.
But this is not what copyrights is about. It isn't about property. That's a 20th century legal fiction. Music and images are not "property"; items are property. Copyright was about licensing copies.
Fair Use law mandated that the public could copy even without paying, within limits. THAT'S out the window. If it's illegal to break encryption, you can't copy within those rights.
I will not accept the shutdown of the Constitution's purpose of copyright. I will not accept the death of Fair Use. I will not countenance the elimination of the Deal. I will not watch the works of man fall under the eternal control of immortal corporations. Science and art as we know it cannot survive the imprisonment-with-conditional parole of human endeavor. If copying files annoys them and shakes their control, then let it be so. I want this regime of control shaken and stirred until such day we can install real limits on copyright once more.
I don't know about you, but I don't have thousands of dollars to spend on movies and software, therefore it would be impossible for movie and software companies to lose thousands of my dollars.
:::cough cough wink wink::: and people get to 'own' :::cough cough wink wink::: DVD's for a short amount of time for a net of 50 cents a pop.
If I go down to the local Chevy dealer and take a new Corvette in the middle of the night, they have lost actual property they could have sold to someone else and I would have an actual Corvette. If because of all their advertising I want a Corvette really bad but can not afford one so I take a picture of the Corvette down at the local dealer, print it out life size, and tape it to a cardboard box I put over my Chevette then they can still sell that Corvette to someone who can afford it, they certainly didn't lose the money I didn't have to spend in the first place, and I don't really have a Corvette.
Just as Chevy sells cars and not licenses to drive Corvette shaped vehicles, when you buy a movie on DVD you are not buying a license to watch that movie. You can't go to a theatre and present your DVD to gain enterence, nor can you present your movie stub at Walmart to pick up a copy on DVD. If your DVD breaks, so does your ability to watch the movie. You buy a DVD with a movie on it, you can sell the DVD with the movie on it. You can even sell the DVD for more than you paid for it, which then not only did you watch the movie for free, you got paid to watch the movie for free, completely legal. Yet if you download some fuzzy, jumpy, blurry copy of that DVD to watch on your 17" monitor with 1" speakers you're a thief, even though nobody has lost anything.
Personally, I subscribe to Netflix. It's easy, affordable, and I can watch movies just as fast as my mailman can drive. But if Netflix didn't exist, I sure as hell wouldn't buy DVD's for 20-30 bucks a pop. I also wouldn't rent from Blockbuster anymore after they sent a collection agency after me over a 10 dollar late fee. I hate going to the movies, I don't want to spend 20 bucks on a small Coke to stare at the back of someone's head while the person next to them explains every part of the movie. If it weren't for Netflix I'm sure I would get my movie fix on HBO and P2P.
In that case, if Kill Bill Vol. 3 were 'Coming next month to HBO...', and I downloaded it tonight, would I be a thief forever, for a few weeks, or not at all? How about this, Kill Bill was on last Thursday but I missed it, am I a thief if I download it off the net?
What really pisses me off is that Hollywood makes so much damn money off every piece of crap they put out yet they aren't content so they spend millions suing people.
If you really want to stick it to the MPAA, instead of file trading you should be DVD trading with everyone in your family, office, and neighborhood.
Or how about this, open used DVD stores across America, where you sell DVD's for 20 bucks and buy them back for $19.50. Completely legal, the store makes 50 cents on every 'sale'
Wow, you guys are sure doing the job here!! Shutiing down those torrent sites, sure is slowing them up!!
But there is the thing, now normally you would hire some consultant that would cost you thousands, but I will give it to you gratis. You are in the same position that your cousin the RIAA was with Napster. See they cut the head off the dragon too - but then they found out, that it was no dragon, indeed it was a Hydra. For every head they cut off 2 more rose in its place. Now mp3's are everywhere. You may slay this beast yet, but expect encrypted clients, trackers and hosters in countries that don't care about you, and other things which I can only imagine. You have an oppertunity here like your cousin did, it seems that you are going down the same path. I have something to tell you, you are not going to like it, expect failure.
Sera
Slashdot, where armchair scientists get shouted down and armchair theologians get modded up.
These people who are suing poor technophiles, could have spent that money researching ways to utilize the technology to their advantage rather than trying to stifle new innovations!