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P2P Operators Plead Guilty
Bootsy Collins writes "In the first such criminal convictions in the U.S., two peer-to-peer hub operators have
pled guilty
to conspiracy to commit felony copyright infringement. The two men were subjects of raids last August after Department of Justice investigators downloaded content valued at US$25,000 retail from their servers, the Movie Room and Acheron's Alley. They face sentences of up to five years in prison, and up to US$250,000 in fines, in addition to the possibility of being forced to pay restitution to copyright holders.
They did commit copyright infringement. How is that conspiracy?
Are those movies or something? Where do they get the $25,000 figure from anyways? FP!
Anyone have a torrent ? ;)
If you don't like the law, work to change it. Don't think that you can get away with breaking it because you don't believe in it.
If there is so much demand for being able to download movies/tv episodes, then why the hell don't the distribution companies take advantage of it and let poeple downlaod things legally at a fair price?
Wasn't this reported yesterday too?
It's free as in beer and free as in freedom!!
Maybe I missed it in TFA, but how was this p2p? The statment "The two sites offered a wide variety of computer software, computer games, music, and movies in digital format, including some software titles that legitimately sell for thousands of dollars, the DOJ says." seems to indicate non p2p pirating activity. Calling it a p2p hub seems to be FUD unless there was an explanation of the technology used.
...new BitTorrent sites are appearing at the same time others are closing. One of these sites is mininova, which is the follow-up of the well-known SuprNova.
A full list of torrent sites can be found here.
to get my Battlestar Galactica episodes?
"Those who steal copyrighted material will be caught, even when they use the tools of technology to commit their crimes," U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft says in a statement. "The theft of intellectual property victimizes not only its owners and their employees, but also the American people, who shoulder the burden of increased costs for goods and services."
How many times do we have to say it's not stealing????
Aren't these items selling at record levels????
When I tell an object to delete this, am I killing it or telling it to kill me?
Can anyone clarify US law on that matter?
"Empathise with stupidity, and you're halfway to thinking like an idiot." - Iain M. Banks
How is this any different from say, selling a car? Could you go to jail because someone took the car and ran someone over with it, on purpose?
It doesn't make any sense at all.
Next then I know, I'll be arrested for "Conspiracy to download porn"
Seriously though, I can understand that turning a blind eye to something is not good, but if you're running a hub, then surely you're just negligent, not malicious?
My UID is prime. Is yours?
Sure. What's going to happen? Are they going to mow the lawns of all those poor copyright holders to make the money to pay them off?
These people are ridiculous. The more they pass these ridiculous laws, the more they keep these lawsuits up, the more they will have the control they so obsessively desire slip through their grasp.
It's no longer on me to obey your outdated copyright laws. It's up to you, the content provider, to make me want to buy your product. Oh noes!
Surely Copyright infringement is only a civil matter.
Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
IMO, a good proportion - certainly the majority - of the material downloaded would never have been bought.
I also find that when something good is downloaded, it is sometimes the case the original retail item is then purchased.
These two factors are ignored, I suspect, when valuations of "harm done" are reckoned.
Certainly it is entirely improper to take the retail value of all material and multiply by the number of downloads.
In fact, it may be the case that the various copyright enforcements bodies do not know what is in their best interest; this is often the case in more complex and subtle environments.
--
Toby
Fantastic! Just go "HEY WE DID IT!", the RIAA/MPAA will use this case as evidence in the future and fuck over everyone else with it.
Tomorrow on Slashdot : Suprnova returns
The day after tomorrow on Slashdot : MPAA, RIAA, Superman and several zealous religions sue suprnova for point to torrents hosting music, video, comics and several different religious books.
Day after that : MPAA/RIAA point to this case and use it as evidence of how illegal it is, obviously if someone admits it's a crime that applies to everyone else too no?
I like muppets.
If you steal stuff, or substantially contribute to it, you pay the price.
Unless you are a government. When I grow up I'm gonna be a government.
The belief in a biblical god is an ignorant one
...thank God the FBI is doing its job.
We must be alert to the danger that public policy could become captive to a scientific-technological elite. - Eisenhower
Presumably they pled guilty as part of a plea-bargain. There's very little reason to plead guilty to anything unless it gets you better treatment that you think you would get by fighting the charges.
My Photography - http://ian-x.com
The Deathlings (comic) - http://thedeathlings.com
It's interesting how the value of the media is calculated.
Is a high-compression DIVX of a shaky video of screen in cinema valued the same as retail 4-DVD "special edition" release?
Is a rip of a 4-CD game squeezing it into 300MB calculated as the same game, with a T-shirt and a manual in the box?
Is software that was released 10 years ago valued at the prices of its release or at current "bargain bin" prices?
Is a mono MP3 made through hand-hacked cable from a poor quality cable counted the same as a new audio CD album?
I don't think the real value is taken into consideration. They just match title-price and neglect quality altogether. My friend was caught. The value they calculated on his software was something like $30.000. The real value of the crap if he wanted to sell that, was around $500.
Anagram("United States of America") == "Dine out, taste a Mac, fries"
One of the points of Orwell's 1984 was that you could subtly influence peoples opinions by changing the language they used to talk about such things.
The trouble with that statement is that copyright infringement is not theft. The dictionary tells us that you have to remove something in order to steal it. The laws in the USA defining theft don't mention copyright infringement. The laws in the USA defining copyright infringement don't mention theft. The Supreme Court definitively ruled that copyright infringement was not theft in Dowling vs US, 1985 . They are fundamentally different actions. There is simply no basis whatsoever for misappropriating the word "theft" to talk about copyright infringement.
The question is, why is Ashcroft trying to tell us that copyright infringement is theft? The only other people who do that are the RIAA, the MPAA, and Slashdot trolls.
When does the protest start? When are we going to stand up against our corporate masters and demand reasonable copyright laws?
What a retarded thing to say. What on earth can a normal American do to change the law? We're not talking about Walt Eisner or Bill Gates. Most people have absolutely ZERO power over the law, other than to engage in civil disobience -- which is exactly what you're saying they shouldn't do.
You see that brine there? That's my brine.
Hereby I announce Samzenpus as the new king of the hill! He just swept the last Michael's story off the main page and now 0wn0rz /. index.
A rare thing, comparing to Michael usually nuking all the other eds off the index...
Who's this samzenpus person anyway?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
euuuuuuuuuwwww
And the people shall be oppressed, every one by another, and every one by his neighbour Isaiah 3:5
"100GB of material, the equivalent of 250,000 songs," Wouldn't 100GB be about 25,000 songs. The iPod 20GB advertises 5,000 songs can be stored on it. So wouldn't 100GB be 25,000. Just a little technical inaccuracy I found.
Time and Again the RIAA and MPAA have missed the obvious fact that every download is NOT a lost sale.
I personally buy lots of DVD's and CD's - but not before I try them first.
The issue they are facing now in the music industry is that they promote talentless artists who create one 'hit' through sheer brute force marketing. If you hear anything long enough you will grow to like it. People have cottened on - instead of buying an album for one track, they are downloading it for free...after all, by next week it will no longer be the "in" thing.
Music sales will be strong for proper artists; no one wants to rip off people who they actually like and whose talent they respect (if you do , reconsider..).
Same thing with movies. Bland movies that people want to watch once or twice and forget because they are incredibly shitty. Its not the price thats the issue, its the fact that the majority of products produced are shit.
All the courtcases in the world won't make up for a lack of common sense and a lust for the greenback.
from article:
During an investigation, government agents downloaded 35 copyright works worth $4820.66 from Chicoine's site and more than 70 copyright works worth $20,648.63 from Trowbridge's site, the DOJ says.
Okay...So if I use my calculator, the first one hosted copyrighted work worth an average of 137.73$, while the second one hosted files worth an average of 294.98. And that's an average. So, they must have hosted a lot of high end profesionnal software to get to that, even if the article seems to point that they were mainly hosting songs/movies/games which to be honest do not retail anything near that price.
What were they hosting to bring the average that high?
If you steal stuff, or substantially contribute to it, you pay the price.
No, I'm pretty sure you're the only one that shucked out the $20.00 to buy 28 Days Later on DVD.
These people who get caught act too big without big tools or big sense of security.
Someone should start to collect money into some kind of 'sholarship' for the p2p-laysuit-victims.
Oh get over yourself. An act of civil disobedience invloves openly and blatantly breaking the law, so that the inevitable arrest is very public, in order to garner public sympathy for their cause.
A couple of guys hiding behind the (assumed) anonymity of the Internet, breaking the law for their own personal gain doesn't quite pass the civil disobedience litmus test.
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
I'm curious... Were these guys running a pay service (ala, "Pay me money, and you can download my warez"), or was it a public p2p ring?
Sounds like a private/pay system, which is how you get busted. If however, it was a public system, this could be a bad thing for technology as a whole!
From wikipedia:
"More recently, in the 2000s, people have used civil disobedience to protest....the Digital Millennium Copyright Act."
An act of civil disobedience invloves openly and blatantly breaking the law, so that the inevitable arrest is very public, in order to garner public sympathy for their cause.
A couple of guys hiding behind the (assumed) anonymity of the Internet, breaking the law for their own personal gain doesn't quite pass the civil disobedience litmus test.
Somebody needs to correct that entry.
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
Ok, so I bought a CD/DVD, so I have the right to listen/watch. Now HiDef-DVD comes along, and I want the HiDef version of a movie picture, for which I already have the right to watch becaus I own the DVD/VHS. Now, can get the HiDef movie just for the price of the HiDef-media? 'cause the right to watch it, I already own...
There's a hell of a lot more demand for something that is free than almost free. That is why micropayments never got anywhere. It doesn't really matter how much of a pittance the payment is, it'll drop demand like a stone.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
A couple of guys hiding behind the (assumed) anonymity of the Internet, breaking the law for their own personal gain doesn't quite pass the civil disobedience litmus test.
So, what about back when they were burning printing-presses to suppress communication? Some people continued to produce flyers, essays and commentaries with forbidden printing presses that were hidden away and distributed them under the cloak of anonymity and stealth to affect change in government and society.
So you're saying that stringent copyright isn't an issue of social importance? Being under the thumb of corporations with politicians in their pockets isn't of social importance? Price-fixing and monopolies aren't of social importance?
How about fair-use? That is (or used to be) legal. Making a photocopy of a book for class or a mix-tape or duplicating a casette-tape for your best friend or sharing a tape of a TV show are (or were) protected actions, though they were certainly for "personal gain". Does that mean fair-use shouldn't exist either?
You're oversimplifying things. And for the most part, everything is for personal gain - even exercising your civil rights.
Read my post again. All I said is that hosting a website illegally distributing copyrighted materials for personal profit does not qualify as an act of civil disobedience.
You're grasping at ridiculous points to counter an argument I never even made. It's not like the FBI is lurking around libraries waiting for people to make copies of a book pages.
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
How's about you get over yer muther, dimbulb. Who the fuk do you think you are to say what is Civil Disobediance and what is not? One man's act of defiance, doncha know...
Hah! That's good for a laugh. Get a clue, dumbass. That little tidbit never was true, and belief in it is a good 10 years out of date - unless you're, say, the RIAA or some equally techless bunch of losers, thugs, and criminals.
What you're saying there is that the guys who were running these servers were as stupid concerning that workings of the network as e.g. you which they obviously were not, since they were running servers and could not possibliy have been so naive as to believe in the fairy tale of "anonymity on the intrenet".
Jeez, where'd you pick that up, some "introduction to the Internet for hoplessly paper-bound law clerks?
"The Internet is made of cats."
Well I'd just like to offer these guys some spiritual support... I think you guys were doing the right thing! (if you weren't making money off it). We'll try and clear this copywrite business up and get you out of there...
Your civil disobedience is appreciated.
Only on /. can comparing the civil rights movement and copyright infringement get modded up as insightful.
Sheep with mod points are easily startled.
I'm sure "SlashdotMedia" will improve on all the wonders that Dice Holdings blessed us all with
But where is the profit? If I download a song over gnutella, what profit did the guy sharing the file make from my download?
Fuck, even the attorney general doesn't understand the simple concept.
"Those who steal copyrighted material will be caught
Copyright infringement is not the same as theft.
"The theft of intellectual property victimizes not only its owners and their employees, but also the American people, who shoulder the burden of increased costs for goods and services."
If I download a movie, how am I increasing the costs to the rest of the world for that product? In fact, if I download a movie and watch it, how am I increasing the costs anymore than if a buddy lent me a copy of his DVD? Either way, I'm still getting the material without paying for it which, according to the AG, RIAA and MPAA is theft and causes an increase in the cost of those products.
You suggest I'm grasping at straws, but you're making accusations that are simply not true. Such as these guys are personally profiting from people sharing this copyrighted material. Perhaps I missed something, but I didn't see anything in the article that said they were selling these products or selling access to the website. Stop associating some kids using P2P or private FTP servers to share content with organized crime producing actual copies of media and selling them for profit in place of the actual product.
By the way, I bet the same blue-haired bitches that think this is theft don't think it's theft if I go to the streets of New York and buy a knock-off Prada purse (normally $600+) for $60, even though that is exactly what piracy is.
Aha! And you don't go to the library, either! I knew it...
"The Internet is made of cats."
Give me a break, here. What it means is that not only is one party stealing, but they're insisting that in order to get access to the stuff they stole, other people must also steal something, and provide others with access to that stolen material.
Insisting on some sort of stolen-intellectual-property equity between thieves doesn't magically cancel out their deliberate efforts to gain copyrighted materials without honoring those copyrights, and without compensating the people that produced the material. Rather, it shows the depth of their hypocrasy: they want to be sure that people benefitting from their "effort" in facilitating the access to the stolen goods "pay" for that by broadening the selection of the same. In fact, the very nature of the "I'll show you mine if you show me yours" arrangement further highlights the criminal intent and awareness that they were up to no good. That they were insisting that others bring similar stolen offerings to the table indicates that they are aware that the material of which they're facilitating the theft has real value. That they elected to define their own private economy/currency to realize that value doesn't change the fact that no-one in that circle of crooks actually produced any of the value. They're parasites, they know it, and they were looking for other parasites to join in on feeding off of the hosts: you, me, and anyone else that actually creates things or goes to the trouble/expense to legitmately acquire what we want.
Whether or not Sweden's laws vary from the US approach is irrelevent. What about the basic principles here? Should the people who create things have a say in who gets to have them and how? Check in with engineers at Volvo, or software developers at Haglöf or Telelogic AB about what they'd think if it was their work that was being passed around in exchange for an MPG of a classic Ingmar Bergman film. In fact, check in with Ingmar's family on that one, too.
Oh, and just because some of my family roots are in Norway doesn't mean I don't like Swedes. That's my wife's family, so I have to be at least somewhat nice.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
I say, fuck them! All good americans can come to Europe. The rest (99%) stays there and annoy each other.
Technically "theft" or not, there are federal statutes that specify what felony copyright infringment is, based on certain dollar amounts of product involved, and apparently these guys conspired to commit this felony.
t m
For the DOJ website: "The reproduction or distribution of 10 or more copies of 1 or more copyrighted works which have a total retail value of $2,500 or more constitutes a felony, with a maximum sentence of three years imprisonment and a fine of $250,000. The reproduction or distribution of 1 or more copies of 1 or more copyrighted works which have a total retail value of more than $1,000 constitutes a misdemeanor, with a one-year maximum sentence and a fine of up to $100,000."
See http://www.usdoj.gov/criminal/cybercrime/netsum.h
--Slashdot: News for Turds. Stuff that Splatters.
If the investigators downloaded copyrighted material in order to prove that these guys had said copyrighted material, then isn't that itself a violation of the law? And if the police violate the law in the course of their investigation.... such as performing a search without a warrant, or questioning someone without reading them their rights... Isn't that grounds to dismiss the lawsuit?
For example, if an undercover officer in the course of their drug investigation actually smoked marajauana in order to gain the trust of the people they are trying to capture, would that be legal?
I have to assume that there is some provision in the law which allows officers to legally PURCHASE drugs which are illegal to posess or purchase, because they do that all the time...
Dear god. Felony copyright violation charges? *blink* That has to be a misprint.
Maybe I don't understand what the word "felony" means or applies to. My understanding is that a felony charge is given for causing life-threatening or altering harm to another person.
What kind of things get classified as felonies? Is grand theft auto a felony? How about breaking and entering? I don't think inciting a riot is, or in many cases even something like attacking another person (non-lethally). Drunk driving isn't a felonous charge unless you -really- fuck up.
This isn't a violent crime, has not even the slimmest chance of harming someone's livelyhood, and about as harmless as some guy on the street in Mexico selling "Timex" watches on the street for $15. Maybe less so.
It just seems incredibly draconian and fascist to have laws that protect corporations to the utmost while punishing the violators with a life-destroying sentence. Copyright law is a fucking civil issue. The parties involved should have the option to take them to a civil court, and nothing more. Now, if these people hacked into systems to store or acquire their warez, sure, prosecute them federally. But this is just rediculous.
I can see it now. School cops will start looking for CDs and removeable hard disks when they search through students' lockers now, and burned CDs will first be an automatic 2-week expulsion, followed up by a $20,000 fine the second time and 6 months imprisonment at the county jail. Then, it's pound-me-in-the-ass prison.
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
However, the laws also allow for retribution, which generally means you turn over any profits to the copyright holder...
Hey, since those profits are in the form of media (you know, that part where they say that you've profited to the tune of $3 hojillion bucks because you've scored 300 mp3s), does this mean you just need to share your collection of Britney Spears and goat porn with them?
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
One of the more famous examples is Dr. David S. Touretzky's "Gallery of CSS Descramblers", which contains more than 20 different examples of code that is (assumed to be) illegal under the DMCA.
The page also prominently displays Dr. Touretzky's name, email address and a photograph of him. It was explicitly created to draw attention to the absurdity of the DMCA law, through civil disobedience:
I guess that does it for my US visit. I spend a year in northern California and I wanted to visit my host parents. I also wanted to visit some friends in New York and my girlfriend really wants to go there.
5 years in prision? I mean I do a little p2p here and there. Nothing big, but would You take that chance?
With all the good work the FBI is doing here to bust those dangerous file-sharing pirates; did they ever arrest whoever was behind the Anthrax attacks of 2001 ?
I thought not.
What post of mine are you quoting? I said none of what you are apparently quoting me as saying.
Quick economics lesson: Demand is a function of price. There is a lot of demand for songs from the iTunes store, because the price is fairly cheap. There are always people willing to pay for ease of use...
And so would it be for a TV episode store. In fact I watch little enough TV I'm sure I'd be better off with such a store - which is the real reason they do not have one.
Just as the thought of people downloding individual tracks without the filler leaves record companies unwilling to sell singles online (they have been forced into it) so to do the broadcast companies not want to to be able to just download shows you like instead of being coerced into staying longer than you meant at the Tube.
The really sad thing is that it would greatly increase ratings if everyone had a real option for when to watch a show and did not have to remember to tape or TIVO it at a specific time (Tivo users obviously better off in that regard).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
How do the courts come up with what an appropriate fine should be? Obviously in this case, $250,000 USD is 10 times the amount that was allegedly pirated.
So the AC is calling others cowards?
Klein bottle for rent - inquire within.
These guys could get 5 years?!
My Corrections professors told the class about somebody who got 1-2 years for date rape. Under what system of morality is copyright infringement worse than drugging somebody and raping them?
"Do I dare disturb the universe?"
Market value is the only true value. Why isn't someone screaming this in the courts?
When you buy a CD or piece of software, you get the support... the nice packaging... the printed manuals... the fancy CD... the liner notes... The legal serial number.
When you download media, you only get the media itself, and usually a much crappier version of it (if it's video) or a mildly crappier version of it (if it's sound) or a version you are forced to read on a screen (if it's a PDF of a book).
Not to mention that there is no proof that every download is a lost purchase... I'm telling you, most of these people are merely into collecting and hardly have time to "consume" the media or software.
Mod parent up!
In fact, it is the case that the various copyright enforcements bodies do know what is in their best interest; this is often the case too obvious.
When you turn on your TV, or listen to the radio, or go to the movies, do you see any independent works? Only one in a thousand? What a surprise! This is the economics of distribution control. In other words, the entertainment cartels dictate what you will consume and prevent you from selecting their competitors' products, for obvious reasons. Moreover, P2P has proven little on the impact of sales.
You are wrong. I have something more powerful than all the money a company can throw at lobbiests: an informed vote. Money works in politics because people can be bought with pretty adds on TV. If you become an informed voter to whom ads do not matter you scare all polititions because you have the power to vote them out, and they cannot influence you easily.
In most elections the difference between the winner and looser is only a few thousand votes. IF you work at it next time around you can change that many people's vote without spending a penny!
Become an informed voter and get your friends to become informed. (Or if they won't become informed, tell them to stay home rather than vote for the guy who looks better on TV!)
Yeah, I think AllOfMP3.com also illustrates the whole price/demand thing pretty well. Basically the parent seems mostly to be saying there's no point in a pay service since there are zero-cost offerings, making any pay service undesirable. But as you noted it's more of a true curve where you have some demand even for something expensive (like $1 a song) , and huge demand for something close to free ($40 a GB).
Personally I am uncomfortable using AllOfMP3.com as I feel not enough goes to the artist - I still stick with iTunes for that reason, they get around $.10 a song which is not too bad (especially considering I'm mostly just buying singles).
I do wonder though what the sales charts would look like if all music stores added in sales from AllOfMP3 - I'll bet even the ITMS would be a sliver in comparison, despite the much loswer price at AllOfMP3!
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Dictionary.com:
restitution ( P ) Pronunciation Key (rst-tshn, -ty-)
n.
1. The act of restoring to the rightful owner something that has been taken away, lost, or surrendered. See Synonyms at reparation.
2. The act of making good or compensating for loss, damage, or injury; indemnification.
3. A return to or restoration of a previous state or position.
The most common definition can't apply, since nothing was taken away, lost, or surrendered in the act of copying.
The second also can't apply, as copying causes no loss, damage, or injury - except in the manner that a butterfly's wings flapping "causes" tsunamis.
#3 is obviously impossible in the case of IP publication.
This is punishment (destructive preventative), not restitution (creative restorative).
from tfa, Ashcroft: "The theft of intellectual property victimizes not only its owners and their employees, but also the American people, who shoulder the burden of increased costs for goods and services."
What about the big entertainment companies' "victimizing" the American people by charging $30 for something that costs $1 to produce? What about the cost of entry for talented individuals into the world of professional entertainment being so enormous that it banks on people being brainwashed into longing for human-manufactured super-star gods (rather than actual talent or substance of real everyday people)?
I think these are more direct causes of the "cost burden" that mainstream entertainment causes the American people to "shoulder." The people who aren't aware yet of entertainment alternatives such as independent film or local music are not simply getting stuff for free because they can. They are getting the stuff because it isn't, and has never been, available for a fair price. But they are so hooked on mainstream entertainment, like it's crack, that they can't resist.
Watch one of those real police shows that's so popular some day. In either case, buying or selling, the police have to be careful never to make the request or offer. They can't offer to sell you drugs, just act in a manner to suggest they are the kind of person that would. If you ask, they can tehn proceed. Same with buying, they have to wait for you to offer before they can buy.
The reason is because, espically in the case of buying from them, you could argue they enticed you to do something you wouldn't do, entraped you into breaking the law. You could say (and it would stand legally) that your intent was NOT to buy drugs, however when they offered, you couldn't say no. Law enforcement can't do that, it's entrapment.
That's the big thing with entrapment, is that they ahve to let you initate whatever is going on. Once you do, they can play along, but you have to make the inital move to start the illegal activity. It's a good law, over all, because it does ensure they police don't try to pressure you in to something illegal just to make an arrest.
I mean most people would say that if someone offers you drugs, and you buy them, you intended to do so anyhow. It's not like if someone randomly offered me crack I'd buy it, I am simply not in the market, doesn't matter how cheap. However if they can do that, how hard a sell are they allowed to give you? Can they follow you, use high pressure sales tactics on you, harass you, etc? The courts would be full of arguments as to where the line is drawn and if it was crossed in this particular case.
So the line is quite clear: The suspect must iniate the transaction. They have to make the offer, make the request, etc. The officer can position themselves as to appear as to be the person to talk to, for example by dressing and acting like a drug dealer, and haning out at a known buy location, however they cannot offer until you ask. It makes the line of demarcation very clear and just clears up a lot fo legal problems.
Yep its criminals like these we need to rid the world of, hang em from a tree I say! 5 years ain't enough! video cameras in cinemas can get you more than this! Im strongly for a Saudi Arabia type legal system where not only would they get prison and fines but they would also loose a hand!
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
Easiest troll ever!
Under what system of morality is copyright infringement worse than drugging somebody and raping them?
Uh, that would be capitalism.
Now if they had lots of money, wore suits and drove around in limos the DoJ wouldn't even have arrested them. They would have probably just got a C&D letter in the mail or a call from their lawyer. Maybe next time they'll think ahead and sell their stolen movies for the millions it takes to avoid legal problems. Cuz we all know millionaires never break the law.
Yeah, no kidding. I mean, a felony copyright violation charge? FFS!
:-/ What's the US coming to? :(
On the other hand, it makes you wonder how abusive the charges levied against them were if this was their plea bargain.
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
The gov't bastardized the laws to redefine getting copyrighted works as financial gain, even when they aren't making any money (which is an integral part of the definition of financial in any normal context).
They ran the hubs so they could get warez, movies, etc for free. That doesn't sound like "financial gain", as they got copyrighted works, not money. And they weren't planning on making money reselling any of those works.
The law shouldn't redefine the term financial gain to try to mean something it doesn't - if they want to criminalize activity done for the sake of receiving copyrighted works they should be required to say so in the law directly - not use these tactics to make the law seem less draconian because it only criminalizes activities for "financial gain", hoping that people don't realize that term in the law means more than people expect it to.
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
- "copyright infringement is theft", 523
- "copyright infringement is not theft" OR "copyright infringement isn't theft", 544
I did not probe any farther.Wait a second... the FBI violates copyright laws by downloading $250,000 worth of material and this guy is blamed for it? Serving it up is shady, but the act of copying it off the server when you do not own the material is illegal. This kind of sounds like entrapment to me.
bash-2.04$
bash-2.04$yes "Don't you hate dialup connections?"| write USERNAME
If not, these guys are idiots. If they don't get any consideration for pleading guilty, they should at least try to fight. Who knows, they might get jury nullification.
"Do I dare disturb the universe?"
I have a quote from ashcroft on my blog
As today's pleas demonstrate, those who steal copyrighted material will be caught, even when they use the tools of technology to commit their crimes. The theft of intellectual property victimizes not only its owners and their employees but also the American people, who shoulder the burden of increased costs for goods and services.
As you may have heard, State Senator Kevin Murray has introduced a bill (SB 96) to fine or jail people that write and distribute P2P software. Express your opinions on this bill at: http://www.aroundthecapitol.com/billtrack/billdir. php?bill=SB_96.
Many legislators and legislative staff visit this (disclosure: my) site for their political and legislative news.
Firstly, they weren't hosting a website, but DC+ hubs.
They were not distributing material but allowing others to find each other and request files from one-another.
I do think that a lot of the p2p movement is civil disobedience. - personally I believe that the laws regarding copyright need to be reconsidered, given the changed technological situation. I believe that it is wrong to create scarcity in order to inflate prices - the cost to copy a tune or video is now virtually nil, and business pricing and distribution-systems should reflect this change.
The intent of many who run p2p systems is not to collect material without paying the asking-price, but to make interesting material more available and to force the copyrighted industries to update their business models.
You may say that p2p is trivial, but so is which seat you sit in on a bus. - There is something much bigger going on here.
The creation of a global multimedia library which all can contribute to and consult should be celebrated, not attacked.
>Especially these days where having a map of a
... and I have seen this before in my own country of Romania. As absurd as it sounds, you could go to jail (for a very very long time) simply by having a dangerous ... typewriter. That's right! I'm not saying that, regarding civil liberties, you'll become the equivalent of a 1980's communist state, but you are heading down that road. ...assuming there's a grain of truth to what you said, of course.
>government building and a few pounds of
>fertaliser in the shed means you're conspiring
>to commit acts of terrorism. For which you'll
>definately do some hard time.
As I read I got this strange feeling, like I've seen this before
If people in the P2P community are activists participating in civil disobedience, then why aren't they out in front of the offices of Sony, BMG, etc. with a laptop burning copies of music CDs and handing them out to bystanders?
The whole point of civil disobedience is to openly defy the law you are fighting against, with the expectation that you will be publicly arrested (and thereby garner support for your cause).
That isn't happening here.
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
In Dowling VS U.S., it was NOT specified that copyright infringment is not theft. Dowling was being prosecuted for theft in conjunction with interstate transport statutes, in particular, with moving albums containing bootleg Elvis music across state line. The point of Justice Blackmun's statements was not that copyright infringement was not theft in any sense, but rather it was not theft with regards to interstate transport.
"Interference with copyright does not easily equate with theft, conversion or fraud. The Copyright Act even employs a separate term of art to define one who misappropriates a copyright: "Anyone who violates any of the exclusive rights of the copyright owner..." [...] The infringer invades a statutorily defined province guaranteed to the copyright holder alone. But he does not assume physical control over the copyright; nor does he wholly deprive its owner of its use. While one may colloquially like infringement with some general notion of wrongful appropriation, infringement plainly implicates a more complex set of property interests than does run-of-the-mill theft, conversion or fraud."
While music piracy may not "easily equate with theft" and "plainly implicates a complex set of property interests than does run-of-the-mill theft", in no where does Blackmun categorically state that it is NOT theft.
--Slashdot: News for Turds. Stuff that Splatters.
The vision I had was that you could download shows from an affiliate, so national ads would already be placed, and affiliates could insert ther own ads - just like today.
I think however that long-term advertising will lean more toward product placement.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Hmm, let's see about that. According to dictionary.com
"theft" = "The act or an instance of stealing; larceny."
"stealing" = "To take (the property of another) without right or permission."
According to Dowling vs U.S. (the same ruling that the "infrigement does not equal theft" crowd likes to cite) explicitly refers to copyrighted works as "property": "While one may colloquially like infringement with some general notion of wrongful appropriation, infringement plainly implicates a more complex set of property interests than does run-of-the-mill theft, conversion or fraud."
--Slashdot: News for Turds. Stuff that Splatters.
I feel safe, too. Arrest those damn worthless, ugly, sweaty nerds!
I though copyright infringement was a civil offense?...or is there such thing as a felony civil offense?
The law does not agree with you. For a summary of U.S. federal law and practice: Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section CCIPS
For NET Act changes to Title 17 and Title 18: The No Electronic Theft ("NET") Act
As I understand it, conspiracy is actually a more punishable offense then actually committing the crime. A buddy of mine had a weekly poker game, for which they usually bet money. Well word got out(one of the loosers squealed) and the feds investigated it. He would have gotten something like 7 years for planning to hold the card game, but only 2 years and a fine for actually playing. So the goverments stance on this: If your going to conspire actually follow through and we will give you less jail time!
Sex offender gets released after 3 years due to prison overcrowding
DESERVES TO BE GANG RAPED BY A PACK OF RABID HYENAS. HOW MOTHERFUCKING STUPID CAN YOU FUCKING MORONS BE?
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While it was (in theory) intended to go after bootlegger types (e.g. folks selling ripped CDs on streetcorners), the law was made such that certain for-profit copyright infringement activities became felony charges. The NET (No Electronic Theft) then made it clear that the expecation of getting other copyrighted works in return was a form of profit (e.g. so the other charges could apply). Now, IANAL, and there are a lot of other bits that affect how this all works, but I can tell you that they have tried to lower the bar on infringement such that they could start charging your average teenager with felony counts of copyright infringement and related charges (much to the chagrin of both Slashdotters and reasonable people).
You may believe that copyright infringement is analgous to theft or not, but I suspect that sending a large proportion of the 16-18 year olds from the local community off to serve 3-5 years in a federal penitentiary would leave a rather bitter taste in more than a few peoples' mouths, and only the fact that it's infeasible to do more than selectively enforce these laws prevents that sort of thing, particularly if the bar to what constitutes criminal infringement were as low as the certain MPAA/RIAA association types would like to make it. Personally, were it ever that low and were I the poor sod responsible for enforcing those provisions, since I'd have to enforce it selectively (it's simply not feasible to bust every infringer one might find, especially those in other countries), I'd go after any of those in the family of the politicians who voted for said laws. Given how common underage drinking is, and what a fuss the tabloids made when the Bush girl did it, I can only wonder what the senators and congressmen might think were they to have to answer to their own families for writing the laws that threatened them with jail time.
Actually, even without this, I wonder just how many of those authoring these bills practice what they preach? I suppose that some are too technically clueless to even use a computer, but I wonder still how clean they keep their own houses?
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The opinions expressed herein are my own and not those of my employer.
TV episodes I download off of various bittorrent sites are often HIGHER quality than what my cable provider delivers.
PDTV (pure digital rip, mpeg stream from the box straight to the computer) HDTV rips are commonplace for scene releases and are better than broadcast, better than analog cable, better than non hi-def digital cable.
Three names: Goodman, Schwerner and Chaney.
Jury nullification in murder cases brought against the Ku Klux Klan poisoned the well. There isn't a federal judge of any political persuasion that would tolerate talk of nullification in a criminal trial.
The No Electronic Theft ("NET") Act Signed by Clinton in 1997.
With copyright infringement becomes a felony, calling it theft gives fair warning to those who are playing with fire.
Sure, if you have come up with a way I can download the actual Britney Spears through the Internet, I will gladly go to jail for that.
Please FTP her (Female Transfer Protocol) to my cell, and keep the doors locked so neither of us can get out. A few months with me, she'll be a new woman.
Whoops! "She did it again" hee hee hee
... to folks who Xerox books without permission?