Slashdot Mirror
Was the Lokitorrent Suit a Hoax?
kamhp writes "Recently earthreactor.com published an article
stating that the whole Loki Torrent suit was a fraud and that it was all staged to collect donations toataling in the tens of thousands then sell the domain.
"It seems that the owner of LokiTorrent decided to take the donation money and run, and to cover his tracks, scare the hell out of the entire p2p community. The scare tactic was probably nothing but a decoy to convince intelligent people not to ask the right questions" "
But is it illegal to collect money in that fashion? And should I feel bad about the people who gave to such a cause, if the allegations are true? First pizzle
If I recall correctly, wasn't there a Paypal donate button? Fairly sure they can find out each and every person that donated to that POS. Glad I didn't give him my $0.02.
A criminal can't be trusted?
Shoot him.
I've been looking for a good example of pure capitalism to follow. Now I have my new religion :)
If it's such a hoax what exactly do you call this? (Google's HTML Version)
"The MPAA's efforts to date have resulted in a 40 percent reduction in the number of servers that continue to operate. One such site that will no longer exist is LokiTorrent?one of the largest BitTorrent host servers. The operator of that site, Edward Webber, agreed to not only pay a substantial settlement with even greater financial penalties for any further such actions, but by Court Order must provide the MPAA with access to and copies of all logs and server data related to his illegal BitTorrent activities, which will provide a roadmap to others who have used LokiTorrent to engage in illegal activities."
The premise of the article is based entirely on the fact that there is no documentation from the MPAA--but indeed there is such documentation. I know we'd all love to believe the MPAA created that release to capitalize on this so-called hoax but no doubt that would be subject to legal action for such blatant lies.
The article also states "If LokiTorrent.com had been sued in Dallas Federal Courts, then some type of public record would appear. NO ONLINE RECORD APPEARS WHATSOEVER!"
So...if it's not on the internet, it must not exist right....right!?
Did anyone bother contacting the MPAA for a comment on the Lokitorrent case rather than providing more fire to the rumor mill?
...There's no honor among thieves.
Don't take a knife to a gunfight, or even a knife to a knife fight. Take a gun to a knife fight.
Where can I find these intelligent people? I have a bridge to sell to them...
The owls are not what they seem
why has nobody noticed for such a long time?
See pictures of tits
Purveyors of Bittorrents can be unscrupulous?! WTF!! Where's the honor amongst thie^^^^H content aggregators!?
"Moderate drinking can help prevent amputated limbs" -- Abigail Zuger, NYTimes, 12/31/02
because in teh internet ur anonymus & supr leet.
Its disgusting as to how some people make money by stealing from the very people who decided to help them out. I'm yet to do my research on the authenticity of this news bit.
fuvoo: watch something
I think its smart knowing that the MPAA or RIAA will come after you next and just cut your losses and quit there. I think its really decietful to claim you are being sued to raise money so you can live in the Carribbean. A mixture of knowledge and deciet. He sounds just like a corporation.
Just goes to show, you can't cheat an honest man.
Your organization's Internet use policy restricts access to this web page at this time.n ame=Forums& file=viewtopic&p=2146
Reason: The Websense category "Adult Content" is filtered.
URL:http://earthreactor.com/index.php?
Gee, am I in trouble now...
LOKI TORRENT LAWSUIT :: A HOAX
:: Sedo.com
:: Explanation
Written by: SharePro
At the end of December 2004, the RIAA and MPAA began an international rampage in efforts to close down major bit torrent and ed2k file sharing sites.
Some sites like Suprnova.org, Youceff.com, ShareTv.com, and others went down without a fight while other sites, including ShareConnector and Releases4U were closed down by authorities.
The lawsuits set off a wide spread of panic and dismay within the p2p community as many of the veteran ed2k and torrent contributing societys soon found themselves "homeless" and their works "confisquated" by investigative authorities.
During the turmoil, one such MPAA targeted Bit Torrent site claimed it was willing to stand up against the evil powers of motion picture media thugs by fighting the legal issues in a court of law. LokiTorrent.com began accepting donations from the p2p community to support what they called "necessary legal fee's".
According to a Slyck.com - January 3, 2005 (Slyck.com promoted people to donate to Loki Torrent), within two weeks (5 days public) of announcing their fund raising campaign, Loki Torrents was only $710.00 dollars away from reaching their initial goal. At the time of writing Slyck.com's initial article, Loki Torrent claimed to have raised an impressive $29,290.00 from the p2p community.
Today, just weeks after the initial Slyck.com interview with Edward Webber, owner of LokiTorrent.com, the entire p2p file share community is back in turmoil.
Quote:
A) Are the logs of Lokitorrent.com in the hands of the MPAA?
B) Where is the money that was donated to the legal fund?
C) Can P2P'rs who uploaded / downloaded torrents be tracked down via the logs.
The above and more were the initial questions most p2pr's had in mind when news broke that the MPAA had gained control of Loki Torrent.
As the writing of this article began to gain momentum, many inconsistencies began arising that clearly show that Lokitorrent is not in the hands of the MPAA (At least not because of a court order), nor we're the owners fined a million dollars.
1) LokiTorrent never provided the name or details of any lawyer representing the internet site. No federal judge's name has been listed anywhere throughout the so-called proceedings. Texas courts have no record of any filed judicial proceedings on behalf of the MPAA against Loki Torrent and/or Ed Webber.
2) During the same period of time that Loki was making tens of thousands of dollars monthly via donations, the owners of Loki Torrent were also actively trying to sell the domain. LokiTorrent.com for Sale
In effort to convince p2p'rs to continue donating and not to believe Loki's intent to sell, this is what the owner published in his defense:
Loki Torrent's Selling on Sedo.com
Quote:
If some guy offers me $75K for the domain name, he's more than welcome to it, and I'll simply move the site to a different domain. Selling the entire site will never happen. I have way too much of myself in this site to sell it for any price (well, 2 million could get me to part with it, lol.. but let's live in reality).
3) The only reports of this so-called "law suit" are based entirely on the front page of the LokiTorrent.com internet site. The MPAA and Texas Federal Court list no public record of a lawsuit nor is the MPAA or the courts willing to back up Lokitorrent claims of being ordered to hand over webserver ip logs and pay a 1 million dollar penalty. J. Borland of News.com (and other related news resources) apparently based their entire news articles by information received directly from Mr. Ed Webber (the owner of LokiTorrent.com). This information was received by calling Mr. Webber directly at telephone number (207) 752-3481.
4) Was LokiTorrent ever actually sued by the MPAA? According to the initial reports published via various websites, most people were led to have believed that the
Bit torrent sites are set up to help people steal other people's property (C'mon, like you go there to get Linux distros or other GPL'd stuff) making this scam kind of funny.
"Bast*rd took my money!" - Should have used that money to buy the stuff you downloaded to begin with.
Find 'em. Beat the living shit out of 'em. Post torrent with play by play pics.
If done correctly, everyone that donated shoud feel they at least go their money's worth ^_^
Michalangelo Progr
Could someone please tell me why are you all acting so shocked every time a torrent gets shut down? Are you saying that music and movies should be traded freely? IF so, can you tell me where's the profit in that? No movies or music (worth of publishing, anyway) would be published if there wasn't any profit in it.
Hey, my office's web filter say the link is bad (sex, drugs, guns, violence or some such nonsence) any chance for a mirror or repost?
-Rick
If people have SO much money to donate why didn't they just buy the stuff instead of paying Lokitorrent so they could steal it.
So...if it's not on the internet, it must not exist right....right!?
I can be googled, therefore I am.
You can't take the sky from me...
Tough luck friend. You need to hit that submit button faster
fuvoo: watch something
...Are you taking about Lokitorrent or the RIAA?
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
There's a link to the related press release on the MPAA's website.
tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
Someone found a business model to get pirates to pay for content!!
Step 1) set up torrent site
Step 2) claim MPAA takedown
Step 3) collect money from torrent downloaders, then run away and PROFIT !!!
The process probably can't be repeated too many times, though... do you figure they made more money than they would have through advertisements ? I'm guessing they did...
The site is blocked for "sexuality" by websense. Thanks
?
Seems to me like the earthreactor website is hungry for hits (and is also cheap when it comes to servers).
I'd rather find out this info from the MPAA, not some lame editor.
OK, so many, many LokiTorrent users coughed up cash to the owner of the site. I've no problem with that, and the owner of the site looks to have come out of it for something like 30K.
Seems fair enough to me.
the sites dead already!
Can we add a Nigerian email to this story, please?
I am sure that this kind of fraudulent act could also hurt Open Source community who get donations...
buffering...
quoting from this mpaa press release:
/. tradition of journalistic excellence, we'll probably see this same "story" reposted several times in the next few days.
"The MPAA's efforts to date have resulted in a 40 percent reduction in the number of servers that continue to operate. One such site that will no longer exist is LokiTorrent -- one of the largest BitTorrent host servers. The operator of that site, Edward Webber, agreed to not only pay a substantial settlement with even greater financial penalties for any further such actions, but by Court Order must provide the MPAA with access to and copies of all logs and server data related to his illegal BitTorrent activities, which will provide a roadmap to others who have used LokiTorrent to engage in illegal activities."
took all of like 3 seconds to find this.
in keeping with the usual
I have on often used lokitorrent in the past to get some TV shows that i enjoy(I'm living in Germany ) ,So this doesn't really effect me.
and are not available or are dubs only on German TV
however i have spoken to many users who were far more worried about the fact that they could be taken to court soon.
If this was all a hoax then i know a lot of people who will be in equal measures overjoyed and enraged
The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
We must shoot first and ask questions later!
As the saying goes, I sleep with gay guys but the jokes on them because i'm not gay!
I mean, if I were paying a thief, I'd expect him to be honest with me.
Mercy was given to me by Christ...I must give the same to others.
I suggest thinking twice before giving your money away to any website.
Or not at all, judging by the quality of his post.
As a number have already pointed out. There is proof that the lawsuit was not a hoax, but this story is
What's the real "scare" here though? It's just a drop in the bucket for Torrent sites, and the only way they could turn themselves from a drop in the bucket to a nuclear blast was to make everyone believe that their world was going to end. I almost donated the last $5 I have in my PayPal, but I realized that the MPAA probably wouldn't really sue them. Call it intuition, but something told me that the MPAA wouldn't take action, seeing as how the MPAA can't catch absolutely everyone, namely a bunch of anonymous people running a Torrent site.
That go around sticking "You can click but you can't hide" images on sites. I know that's authentic, but there's a chance the MPAA most likely feels it can post false articles as well. It's all about scare tactics for them. They should figure, "Why not?"
Norse god of, among other things, practical jokes.
Hmmmmmm....
668: Neighbour of the Beast
How to phish geeks:
1) become an illegal distributer of content
2) get sued by the industry that the target(s) hate (or at least despise)
3) Collect donations for your legal defense
4) run like hell..
In a way, it does kinda seem like a prince of (insert third-world country) trying to smuggle cash thru your bank account etc etc...
Like so many here, IANAL - but how exactly would you mount such a case?
"Your Honour, I used this website to knowingly violate copyright law, and then gave the owner of said site some money in the belief it was in order to defend a case against him, and therefore keep the site up. I want my money back, because no such case existed".
Response:
"So, you gave money in exchange for the possibility of continued use of an illegal service"
It would be very, very hard to argue that you gave money without previously using the site to download illegal material, or that when you parted with your money you had no hope at all it would result in the continued usage of the illegal service LokiTorrent provided.
Donate X amount or more and win some prize. It was innovative and I may use it in the future myself. As to the hoax? I got nothing.
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
Yeah, but $10 says he'll get modded to at least +4
Why don't people who start these sites in the first place register them as a corporation. That way when the RIAA et al. come knocking on your door you can just let the company take the fall.
Limited liability people.
...it's in the form of a question.
/. editors would be complicit in the execution of a Fox News tactic.
What a crock of shit. To think
You can say anything you want without fear of reprisal as long as it's in the form of a question. You people don't fact check a goddamn thing, and just publish away. Never mind that the author of the original "article" is in bed with the MPAA.
So unless the MPAA is also in on this hoax (which wouldn't really surprise me), there are some issues with this story.
ya know i thought something seemed wierd when this first happened. cause none of the other torrent sites where over ran with mpaa/riaa propaganda after they closed down
As I remember, the same thing was pulled by ShareReactor owner. The guy asked for donations for a new server equipment, received thousands in donations, then announced being arrested, etc...
http://www.mpaa.org/CurrentReleases/2005_02_10_Bit TorrentLokitorrent.doc
To link to a article about someones opinion is one thing but to support and spread lies and slander is just plain wrong
Personal Website
> So...if it's not on the internet, it must not exist right....right!?
"If an item does not appear in our records, it does not exist." - Jocasta Nu, Attack of the Clones.
- sigs are for wimps.
How many people out there break their neck trying to get a site that is popular for people to use. This guy probably could have made a hella of a lot more than he just stole. In fact it amazes me how someone could just piss away such a good opportunity for a bad one. The only explanation I can think of is that he is some kind of self choosing looser, or maybe like one of those people who win the lottery and then blow it all and commit suicide. Fear of success? Major personal problems? Couldn't handle the responsibility? I don't know, I won't feel sorry for him though when his future opportunities dry up. There are plenty of struggeling people in the world who will gladly take his place. I'm sure whatever he gained is only temporary, he clearly cant think thru the consequences of his choices and will probably blow anything he took on useless short term persuits.
In the spirit of point / counter point.
Jane, you ignorant slut!
Taco, you ignorant twat! If you would stop playing with your imaginary friend's [Cowboy Neal] willy long enough to open your eyes, you'd see in an instant that you are the one that was hoaxed.
I call it a news story in a Word document. I'd rather see a copy of the court order.
It's just "powered by love".
Isn't Earth Reactor an Earth Station 5 satelite site? With all the unsubstantiated anonimity claims (amid clients with remote file deletion exploits), and a long history of mud slinging. Why are they a credible news source?
paul reinheimer
Remember Loki, the norse trickster god and a master of deception.
Not saying anything about the truth of these accusations, but maybe this guy's choice of domain name could (ironically enough) turn out to be fitting...
I would think that if the **AA really put up the website on lokitorrent they would have a link back to theirs or there would be other sites p0wn3d by the **AA I'm on drugs what do I know!
Good luck with a class-action lawsuit these days. Thanks to our president, class-action suits go to federal judges, which are very unfriendly to them. Voila, pesky lawsuits on behalf of consumers go away.
http://www.rootstrikers.org/
yes.
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
But the money was still collected under false pretenses. He asked for a legal fund, and instead used the money to fund his settlement.
I say hang him.
does any one know or have a guesstimate on how much money we are talking about here?
"There is no flag large enough to cover the shame of killing innocent people."--Howard Zinn
Remind me again why we can't mod down stories? The submitter is an idiot for believing what an uninformed 12 year old wrote on some random site. The editor is an idiot for approving such a bullshit "story". We're all idiots for bothering to read past the first post linking to the MPAA press release.
this is getting old and so are you
blog
He is in a dumpster somewhere in a dark alley with a gunshot wound up the ass. It was buckwheats for him.
This article is written by SharePro of ES5 -- the same fellow who was threatening to post pictures and personal information about the bloke who found the 'remote file deletion' utility in the ES5 p2p program awhile back.
Take whatever this man says with a grain of salt and call me in the morning...
The Yasashii Syndicate ||
When you say "prizes," do you mean that everybody who donated a certain amount got the same gift, while supplies lasted? Or do you mean that everybody who donated a certain amount had a chance of winning something?
If the latter, then it constitutes an illegal lottery. It incorporates all three elements: Prize, Chance, and Consideration (money paid to enter).
Remember kids, "no purchase necessary" -- not because we're generous, but because it's the law! (In the U.S. at least.)
Breakfast served all day!
The new generation of hoaxes that label real events as hoaxes and hoaxes as real. Perhaps the above post is a hoax too?
Side note from the MPAA's war-cry page: "By deeply cutting into revenues, movie piracy limits the choices for consumers at the box office. Sixty percent of all movies never recoup their production and marketing costs which average well over $100 million."
Sigh. The fact that most movies didn't recoup production costs in the decades before p2p, the Web or VCRs ever existed seems to have slipped under the radar.
http://www.mpaa.org/CurrentReleases/2005_02_10_Bit TorrentLokitorrent.doc /. spreading FUD
No story here, just
..was there all along in a way: Loki is the Norse deity representing deceit and under-handedness: the Sly One, the Trickster, the Shape Changer
I'm not good in groups. It's difficult to work in a group when you're omnipotent. - Q
"The scare tactic was probably nothing but a decoy to convince intelligent people not to ask the right questions"
Well you can guess where he learnt it from, it is a good thing he did not mention fear of "gay marraiges" or "abortions", he would have made billions.
1. compose good music (this is the hard part)
2. claim that illegal piratez and p2p freeloaders are ripping your shit and you cant feed your babies....
3. start collecting money and setup donation fund
4. profit....
i wonder why artists dont do a decent job and ask people to donate rather than mandatory pay them...
it works for all the rest of the world: called charity, donations, flood-relief-funding, human-behaviour.....
greedy economists and kapitalist system will come down pretty soon. this system wont have a future so better start exercising some other practices and trying out some other and better systems and values.
Never donate, never tip, never regret.
VCR, Tivo...
Suppose that the site owner told the truth, and the MPAA just decided to write what they did. Would there be any way to tell that situation apart from the current theory?
Here are your recent submissions to Slashdot, and their status within the system:
* 2005-02-24 11:37:48 LokiTorrent MPAA Lawsuit a Scam? (Index,The Almighty Buck) (rejected)
Anyways, I find the scam/hoax to be interesting. However why did it take this long for people to catch on to the possiblity?
Can't some editor edit the article to link to the MPAA paper? And explain tht this si slander?
It's perfectly real. I downloaded the court documents from Pacer (the online docket system of the US Courts) and put on my website. It includes the permanent injunction signed by the judge that closed the case.
Sif called. She wants her hair back.
If you don't have it you can give her hair made of gold instead.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
what kind of spinless jackass would let his enemy update his webpage to scare innocent users of his site anyway. I didnt donate and i never will because torrent files are not copywrighted material period!
I smelled a rat and i was right. fuck him and supranova.
It's a shame for the P2P "community" that the author of this bullshit didn't think about what he was doing before he wrote this opinion piece. What better outcome is there for the MPAA? Not only did they shut down a major Bittorrent site with a legal threat, but also managed to convince part of the opposition to turn against itself. While I agree that the owner of the site should have refunded the donations made thru paypal, I don't believe that he won't get some form of retribution for that in the end.
In another line of thinking, I'm wondering why a site owner would be willing to accept donations for the purposes of fighing a legal battle or maintaining a site that will probably become a target for the MPAA. I would think it possible that a lawyer could make a good case that the transaction of giving money to a service that enables copyright infringement could be closer to outright piracy than copyright infringement. All it would take is one pissed off witness willing to say that he paid money to the site owner so that he would be able to continue downloading copywritten works.
That's what they get for 'donating' to something with a questionable legality. The donations wouldn't have gone back to the donators if the whole thing collapsed anyway. Am I the only one that realizes that the RIAA isn't going to stop until they get a piece of every bit of media that moves on the Internet? Please, for the love of all that's digital, remove your heads from your asses! And for crying out loud, use a spellchecker!
So it is true that there is no honour among thieves.
The idea of standing up to the man against something you believe in is admirable but in this case stupid.
However if the people who did donate stole more in software than they donated then they are still ahead. I mean 1 copy of Windows 2003 with 5 Cals which is the minimum I could find goes for $1000 CDN
Bit torrent sites are set up to help people steal other people's property (C'mon, like you go there to get Linux distros or other GPL'd stuff) making this scam kind of funny.
... and copyrights are not "property" in any true sense of the word. It is amazing how many people still dont get that.
When a situation gets strange, like this one, it's usually some type of setup.
I think you had a typo there. Isn't it spelled "Faux News" ?
I'm getting really tired of sensationalist articles that are all FUD. Someone needs to research this stuff at least a *little* or at the minimum read the article and make sure the summary is accurate before posting it. PLEASE!!
Even if everything in that article would be true, how do you explain the takedown of torrentz.com and uk-torrents by MPAA and after they were took down, they were linked to lokitorrent.
I guess MPAA didn't want to bother with uploading 2 images, they rather linked it to loki.
Anyway, THANK YOU SLASHDOT FOR PROVIDING ME WITH ANOTHER (bookmarked) ED2K SITE !!!! THANK YOU!
Thanks for the link about lotteries. Has I understood what they were doing it would fit the " If it is a sweepstakes, winners are selected in a random drawing from all eligible entries received." Exact details are now unavailable.
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
This is the first I've heard of this story, and I don't know what went on. However, I checked the Northern District of Texas's online docket system (PACER), and the lawsuit was filed, and was terminated with an agreed judgment. I have pdf copies of the amended complaint and the judgment. If someone has a place to host them e-mail me (tvanmeir //at\\ gmail //dot\\ com) and I'll send you a copy.
I thought this mock up of the warning site was funny. go Limewire./
http://www.doyousnap.com/portal/albums/7/151.aspx
Why are so many morons spouting stuff about honor amongst thieves and the context of the name Loki? Jeez, read at least a few of other people's comments before posting, and you'd see the interesting links between the article and a BitTorrent competitor and the fact that there is quite a bit of evidence out there contradicting the article. Too much knee-jerking, too little reading.
Ya know, I've heard time and again that Loki was a trikster God. But wasn't he more about trechery really? Turning sides and stuff? I mean, he's not the comic relief that Native American trickster gods were. Or is there something in the lesser or greater eddas that contradicts this? I don't claim to be an expert on Norse mythology.
___
It's the end of my comment as I know it and I feel fine.
Maybe the article is the hoax brought about by the riaa to stop donations so they can win by default due to the lack of money.
But who knows these days. Never know where the next hoax will lie.
Perhaps revealing, the MPAA website is not taking credit for taking down lokitorrent: there is no mention of loki on its website, and its recent press release on targeting torrent sites neither mentions lokitorrent, nor mentions interrupting the service of any website. It only mentions legal action taken.
Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
Earthreactor is down. They must have gotten sued. Watch out!
"Donate X amount or more and win some prize. It was innovative and I may use it in the future myself."
Innovative? That's ancient and over-done, not innovative. But, maybe you can see how the patent examiners miss so much, when you think that is innovative.
Are you trying to slashdot their phone lines too ?
Alas, calling there
"
Main Office Address:
Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA)
Motion Picture Association (MPA)
15503 Ventura Blvd.
Encino, California 91436
(818) 995-6600
"
or trying to find the number yourself (at the bottom) to see a slashdot effect vs mpaa would be, in my opinion, futile and somewhat childish.
Then again, this is slashdot...
We can hope 8p
It takes 40+ muscles to frown, but only four to extend your arm and bitchslap the motherfucker
Run a server from international waters! Watch out for pirates though!
Kill everyone in the *AA's. Problem solved.
This silly cat and mouse game needs to end.
Please send all of your donations to givemeyourmoney@paypay.com so I can collect the legal fees to go after this crook and fight him in court.
Tech News, Reviews and Tutorials
Eathreactor is Run by Sharepro the same sharepro who Ran the dubious Earthstation 5 forums so no news here if you go look at Slyck you will threads about this got closed of flamed out of existence.
.The Million dollar settlement was potetial losses the record caompanies claim he wasnt fined 1 millon . /. is getting bad if they post this crap
Loki has a out of court settlement that was notarised by the federal court judge
Or maybe they had the intentions of fighting it and went, "Hmm, holy ekki lokiman, we've got like 10g $_$ on our hands. Do we fight for some piracy ring, lose all of our money and go to prison, or do we bail with the money."
I think it's a no brainer.
I agree, the author of the article bears some scrutiny. SharePro doesn't exactly enjoy a high standing with many memebers of the filesharing community. It's interesting that Slyck.com is mentioned in this article. A critical commentary on the demise of Earth Station V (SharePro is the forum admin for ES5) was recently posted on that site. SharePro states that: "Slyck.com promoted people to donate to Loki Torrent". In the context of the recent article, it could be construed also as an attempt to tar Slyck by association.
Why are you giving him a free present? He's a lawyer; he enjoys that sort of thing. Of course, he's on top.
Well, since it turns out there really was MPAA action, it's maybe more like "maybe we make a deal with the MPAA and bail"... in which case, it looks like the MPAA, through sheer dumb luck and legal muscle, managed to make some money off of p2p. Or, at least their lawyers did.
This is the best way of raising money !
Threathen to kill your rabbit if people do not donate!
http://www.savetoby.com/
In a stunning revelation, it was revealed today that not all P2P network users are 100% honest.
We cross now to Professor Obvious, live from the campus of Hoodathunkit U...
see the beautiful subject!
"...it's in the form of a question."
Or an opinion. For example, in my opinion all Anonymous Cowards are slack jawed, goat raping neo-nazi baby killers...maybe it's just me. Here, Billy!
... coming from somebody called "MoriaOrc".
It was just a quote, relax.
- sigs are for wimps.
That is the only logical conclusion I can come up with.
First Lokitorrent is created to host links to BitTorrents and not the files themselves. While sharing the files may be a crime, one has to reason is sharing the BitTorrent files that link/track to files on someone else's hard drive (Not on LokiTorrent) does not fall under piracy directly. Lokitorrent is technically not sharing files, or even having them stored on their server, they are simply providing links to other people's hard drives. Sort of like having a list of links to Movie or Music downloads on your web site, but not really having the files on your web site.
Now then we have the MPAA contacting (not suing, issuing a warning letter from lawyers) telling Lokitorrent to cease and disist from hosting Bit Torrents, and threatening a lawsuit.
So Lokitorrent asks for more donations to fight off a lawsuit that has not yet happened, and they don't know how much it will cost to defend, but they have a ballpark figure.
Lokitorrent panics, offers the domain for sale. Makes up a story as to why it is for sale.
A judge hears the case, decides if there is any merit to it. Preliminary hearing or whatever. Not the trial itself, Lokitorrent panics and then settles out of court.
As agreed, the Lokitorrent site is taken down and replaced with a warning by the MPAA. An undisclosed sum of the donations made to Lokitorrent get paid to the MPAA for damages. The web site does not change hands yet, but the BitTorrent tracker and BT web portal are now offline.
Some angry fan of BitTorrent, gets upset that LokiTorrent got so much money in donations and still "Sold out" to the MPAA, that they make a hoax story.
While not exactly giving the MPAA the Lokitorrent web site, maybe the IP logs, the domain name, and hosting is still owned by LokiTorrent, but the hoax is we are to believe that the MPAA owns the site and is tracking all visitors to it.
Meanwhile millions of BitTorrent users are freaking out that the MPAA might actually have their IP addresses and downloading habits and filing a suit against them right now.
Yet another story is posted to Slashdot without the facts being checked first.
Remember, Slashdot does not have a -1 disagree moderation, and no, troll, flamebait, and overrated are not substitutes.
Female Prison Rape in NY
hrmm let's see, MAYBE, just maybe, he used the money to settle out of court?! GEE, DID ANYONE EVER THINK THAT? Shit, this site needst o find real news articls, but all it does is find conspiracy theories to report on and make fact.
In all honestly, the US government probably loves slashdot because you all are so willing to believe any crap that's posted here.
I think news here should be researched beforehand.
"Actually, no. I think what needs to happen is that people stop bying movies and music for a month. Pick a month, like July, and advertise the "NO MPAA PURCHASE MONTH", and buy only independents and so on. The press will eat that up as "Public Decries MPAA Tactics, Boycotts DVDs!""
Like your thinking. Follow this through, post "warm up" posts to slashdot.org, kuro5hin.org etc, give me a couple of months notice to rally friends and I'll do it.
What kind of lawyer uses spelling like "presidence" and "dilligence"?!
Author, Shell Scripting : Expert Re
Can somebody explain bittorrent a little better? My understanding is that you download a small file, that basically gets you in touch with other peers on the network that have the pieces to reassemble the content you are requesting.
.tor file != copyrighted material, does it? What kind of info is actually in the server logs?
The torrent websites do not host any copyrighted material (or at least they do not have to), they simply host these instructions for assembling content from a network.
If I understand correctly how could MPAA RIAA or whoever sue endusers? It would be virtually impossible to PROVE you completed the download wouldn't it? The
But I am just guessing because I really don't understand how BT works. Can someone explain it better?
Man I would love to see a month long or even a week long DVD boycott. It would be great the for the first couple of weeks of December. Hell we should also take a week off from going to the movies while we're at it. Maybe some group should start collecting donations to organize and promote a boycott. Hit the in the wallet....
Ok, WOW, MPAA put out a press release! It must be TRUE!
We know for a fact the MPAA doesn't have any laywers. None of whom would be able to make the statement sound all menacing and convincing.
What we know for a fact is lokitorrent douche struck a deal with MPAA. We also know he collected money. We also know MPAA would probably have shut him down eventually.
The issue here is:
- all the collect money!
- did he have a deal with MPAA all along?
- how much money did he pocket?
He settled with the MPAA instead of the intended path of fighting this out in court.
So in a sense he did "fight" the MPAA, but not the way that those who donated though he would.
Wonder what ammount of cash he has left over from his deal with the MPAA. He could buy a lot of nice stuff with the remainder of donations he got.
I Emailed that guy a few weeks ago, and he responded about the lokitorrent thing. I received a letter from my cable company after downloading half a movie from bittorrent. (never actually completed, but that's a whole other story). Anyway, I just checked my email to see what the headers were from his email. There you go. Anyone who was burned? here's his host name, and IP address. Go bananas. cpe-204-210-72-122.maine.res.rr.com [204.210.72.122]
Hmmm,
I want to watch a movie..... YOU CAN'T, IT'S STEALING, YOU'RE DIRTY, YOU'RE WORTHLESS, YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR MARTIN SCORSESE GOING HUNGRY, YOU MORALLY DEFICIENT EXCUSE FOR A HUMAN BEING, HOW DARE YOU EVEN THINK ABOUT DOWNLOADING MOVIES, YOU'LL BE A HEROIN ADDICT SOON.
I want a cigarette... SURE, GO AHEAD, HAVE A WHOLE PACKET, IT'S AFFORDABLE, YOU'LL ATTRACT GORGEOUS WOMEN, YOU KNOW IT'S GOOD FOR YOU, WE ARE YOUR FRIENDS, WE LOVE YOU, YOU ARE THE BEST, TRUST US, WE'VE BEEN DOING THIS FOR YEARS, YOU WON'T DIE, IT'S ALL A MYTH.
And somehow I'M the fucking criminal?????
See this site. -- Will
Becoming a tax-evader is usually the ultimate sin, no matter how liberal your government.
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
"By deeply cutting into revenues, movie piracy limits the choices for consumers at the box office. Sixty percent of all movies never recoup their production and marketing costs which average well over $100 million."
Yeah what a scam, placing two true facts together in such a light that it appears one is the cause of the other when its NOT. Talk about rich uni snobs 'tricking' the masses which they think are dumb-asses.
Funny how lawyers/politicos use those tactics outside of court, but never can inside court.
Shame on you, get a real job where you CREATE something.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
It is just you, Cock-noose. How can an opinion be expressed in the form of a question?
Opinions are declarative, not interrogative. We'll wait whilst you look those up...
Okay, I think I have it figured out here.
Ed Webber got nabbed by the MPAA. He got fined for hella cash. So he put up a beg-page on his site. But he couldn't say "I've gotten a huge judgment against me, please help me pay it off"; nobody would help him out. So instead, he said "I need legal-fee money to keep LokiTorrent up", which got him the money to pay off the recording industry.
Diabolical! Sound plausible to anyone else?
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
The truth of the matter is, you could stop buying CD's today - EVERYONE - and it wouldn't matter. The licensing alone on music is what really funds the industry.
Besides, people aren't going to buy from indies when all the teenie-boppers know is what plays on MTV. Appealing to 13 year old Amber/Ashley/Amanda probably won't stop her from listening to Ashley Simpson (although something should).
"Leik, OMG! I just want 2 listen 2 music, k?"
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=134349&cid=112 15728
The silly thing is the MPAA should look at this and realise that people are willing to pay. What they don't like is paying someone/something that they perceive as evil. If the MPAA played nicely they'd actually have lots of P2P people paying for the content they've been downloading.
As an experiment they (the MPAA) should set up an honour system with a couple test movies. Make the movies available, DRM and threat of prosecution free on major p2p networks. They could encode the movie with a short ad at the start saying something like "If you enjoy this movie please show your support by contributing. If this method proves successful we may continue releasing movies this way. You can pay whatever you feel appropriate using ..." And detail how you could pay (eg: a paypal account or something).
Then they could see just how many people actually do pay and just how much people are willing to pay. If it actually made a decent amount of sales then they could scrap worries about DRM and whatnot (napster) and just upload their own movies and wait for profits. And people would still go to the cinemas or buy DVDs because they give a different experience to a downloaded MPG/AVI.
"So, almost two-thirds of Hollywood's output loses money...if I were the CEO of a company that had a track record that poor I'd expect to be relieved of my duties, and have the straps cut on my golden parachute just before being pushed out of my top floor office window."
Not in the venture capital world. 33% success rate there is killer.
Not that Hollywood is exactly analogous, but there are numerous similarities, if you consider each movie to be an independent business venture. Like VC, the quantity of projects is less important than the cumulative net profit. Obviously Hollywood is doing just fine there if they can afford to spend so extravagantly to protect their revenue streams.
but as others have suggested a perfect business model: donate to the site and have your information removed from our logs. $10 usd a month or $100 for a year. donate now! the mpaa and riaa will never catch you!
was the flamebait mod a result of a capitalist being insulted or a religious person being insulted?
Really, if you donated money to a site dedicated to IP theft then you got what you deserved. There's a line between harmless and reasonable sharing of files and that of IP crime, and the line is money - don't cross it. Share with your mates, but don't donate to obviously unscrupulous people.
All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
Don't get into that RPG stuff, it's dangerously addictive. I have a little crack I'm not smoking now I'm playing WoW, maybe I could mail it to you ;->
All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
What ever happened to honor among theives?
Har Har
Even people that believe in pre-destiny look both ways before crossing the street.
Or in this case, lowest loss. If he's following the money, then he's following the money. You'd better make sure he doesn't get a better offer...
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
So how the hell does this work... Lemme see.
Computer A sends spoofed UDP packet containing encrypted" data. Packet goes over network. Computer B sniffs network data to find unknown packet that its not expecting and doesnt know the ip address of. Computer B finds packet by sniffing, and looks at unique codes, in the packets.
So, given the information that is here, there is in no doubt in my mind works PERFECTLY across a local area network, granted
A) network is hubbed
B) MAC broadcasting is used (switched network)
C) every client arp poisons (switched network)(kills legitimate traffic)
or
D) you use the specific clients MAC address (switched network)(which is no longer anonymous)
Now, every situation here works, but its done like a complete jackass.
You obviously brought this up because you believe this could somehow be used to create a "secure" torrent distrobution network.. I am sorry to inform you that it wont work, at all, period, using this method.
Are the routers outside of your home network supposed to magically recognize these "codes" and then route to the secret computer that these codes refer to? Or how about when the smart ISPs who drop packets with IP adresses that dont belong anywhere near them? Shit out of luck I guess.
And this is all assuming this is the protocol alone.
Now, if its inside an SSL tunnel? Why the fuck not just use an SSL tunnel? Its encrypted, so people (or "the man") cant see what youre sending. So congradulations, youre hiding your super anonymous data.
This type of tactic will just encourage more rediculous law suits that have no reason to be filed. They will just say "Hello web site that gives out links to torrents. You let people connect to your server with a fancy tunnel that allows them to send super secret forged UDP packets containing data that might somehow be ours, no? How about we sue you so you give us your SSL tunnel logs, and well track those IP addresses and sue them for possibly downloading material that is copyrighted, even though we can't directly prove it." Thanks for destroying the judicial system.
Not to mention how fucking SLOW this would be if actually implemented. Best case scenario, you get to anonymously share your porn at LAN parties. Don't want anyone knowing that YOU like that kinky shit. Sorry if I crushed your dreams...
This still does not answer any of the 3 questions in the article.
A) Are the logs of Lokitorrent.com in the hands of the MPAA?
B) Where is the money that was donated to the legal fund?
C) Can P2P'rs who uploaded / downloaded torrents be tracked down via the logs.
So there is still a next chapter. Specially the B question is interresting since it was al going so quickly.
Not sure why everyone is having an issue with believing Loki wasn't really sued and forced to give up the domain. Here's the release from the MPAA: http://mpaa.org/CurrentReleases/2005_02_10_BitTorr entLokitorrent.doc
Seems like it's more real than anyone wants to believe.
My sig of choice is Marlboro
I donated $5.00 to the loki fund, and I don't really give a shit if the owner buys crack and hookers with the money. I got my $5.00 worth of shit off that site so I say more power to the guy.
How is it licenced, and where is it available if it's open-source? I'm quite interested in seeing it.
Mail me to coder (at) rrmail (dot) com if you wish to contact me in private.
--Coder
Man. I only read the +5 funny moderated replies and skim the article to try and understand the jokes.
This has got to be the funniest thing I've read all year. Thank you, Lokitorrent guy, if this is true, because it's made my day.
I have the right to that content because I have been endowed by my creator to view that content. The drafters of the constitution would have a fit if they could see the state of the union. Benjamin: Yo! Tommy! Take a look at this shit. Americans piss their rights away cauze a corporations tells them to! Thomas: Well why the fuck did we even bother! Benjamin: Hell I don't know. Thomas: Lemme see that Musket Benji, I'm gonna replace my brain with lead. Fucktard.
I am making a new tin foil hat, this is a great little consiracy, starring P2P, nasty corps, gullible donators, and a rambuncious kid getting rich!
RIAA haven't got a clue who they sued, for all they know they might have sued him, but don't know.
Or they thought, heck, we know we aren't suing him, let him do this, and it'll save us the legal costs! Heck we can tell our tax man we *did* sue him, and then maybe another one of our films can scrape by into the black?
Notice your quote doesn't say they actually sued.
#hostfile 0.0.0.0 primidi.com 0.0.0.0 www.primidi.com 0.0.0.0 radio.weblogs.com