Major Piracy Bust Against Top Providers

An anonymous reader writes "It appears the German copyright authority has launched a massive offensive against top warez providers. According to Slyck, GVU (the German version of the RIAA/MPAA) coordinated a wide spread effort that included the seizure of 20 servers and 30 arrests in 5 countries - Germany, Austria, Holland, Poland and the Czech Republic."

Comments

Police raid at GVU-headquaters

[ga53n]

The interesting part ist, that according to Heise News http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/68760 (in German) the police raided the GVU offices in Hamburg. It is assumed that the GVU paid some people for administering warez-servers. Maybe they used it at a honey-pot, but is was illigeal participation, if it is true.

Like, duh

[Dekortage]

From the article: Initially, these raids may place a damper on spread of pirated material, however the allure of public recognition is simply too great for many to avoid. With time, their role in the online warez community will most likely be replaced.

This is news? It's been like this since way, way, way before the World Wide Web was invented. (Yes, children, there was software piracy back in the days of 5.25" floppy disks.)

Of course, with the Internet, all the other warez sites on the planet can easily fill the void left by the ones that were just shut down.

Re:Like, duh

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

(Yes, children, there was software piracy back in the days of 5.25" floppy disks.)

However, even further back, in the days of 8" floppy disks there was hardly any piracy because it was mostly all Free Software to begin with.

Re:Like, duh

[Xemu]

in the days of 8" floppy disks there was hardly any piracy

I think you're on to something.

8" floppy disk: hardly any piracy
5.25" floppy disks: some piracy
3.25" floppy: lots of piracy

Similarly,
LP: hardly any music copying
tapes: some piracy
CD: lots of piracy

and it holds true for video too!
laserdisk: no piracy
vhs tape: some piracy
dvd: lots of piracy

Clearly, the smaller the media becomes, the more copies are made. The MPAA should make a note of this and make pizza-sided Blu-Ray media.

so much for obscurity

[2TecTom]

thankfully, this type of tyranny will only result in better anonymity

if software was reasonably priced, there would be very little piracy

Dare I say?

[twitter]

Of course, with the Internet, all the other warez sites on the planet can easily fill the void left by the ones that were just shut down.

Dare I say that free content is making warez redundant, even second rate? Free software works better than commercial software. Free media, such as can be found at places like the internet archive or http://magnatune.com/">Magnatune is better than RIAA/MPAA crap. Give your money and mind share to those who deserve it!

Allow me to pimp the Radiators, one of the best jam bands to come out of New Orleans. There are hundreds of hours of their concerts available that you can share with your friends without charge or greed.

Remember kids!

[beacher]

Don't copy that floppy!

-B

T34|\/| \/\/4R3Z

[Odiumjunkie]

When warez groups begin to realise the effects of publicity, maybe we'll start seeing scene releases without file.names.that.are.redundantly.long.and.tagged.wi th.the.Gr0uP_N4ME.rar and juvenile NFOs filled with ASCII art that looked outdated ten years ago.

In groups that are dedicated to the free distribution of other people's content, why are they so keen to show that a release is "theirs"?

Re:T34|\/| \/\/4R3Z

[CaptSisko]

Because for the 'real' groups that are out there, it's not so much release itself that counts, but beating the rival groups to the punch.

Nice try

[the-amazing-blob]

This time, they went for the big boys. Straight for the top. Too bad the ranks will just fill back up within a month.