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Mininova Starts Filtering Torrents
Dreen writes with this snippet from TorrentFreak: "Just a few days before their court appearance, Mininova, the largest BitTorrent site on the Internet, has started to filter content. The site is using a third-party content recognition system that will detect and remove torrent files that link to copyright-infringing files."
Let us know how that works out for you.
Mininova collapses. How Mininova went from being the largest BitTorrent site to being the smallest.
I saw the headline, and just immediately deleted my bookmark. I hardly ever used it anyway, but that makes them completely irrelevant to me.
Sounds like they don't want any hits anymore. Meanwhile, alternatives like the Piratebay, isohunt & torrentreator are likely beefing up their infrastructure to accomodate the increase in traffic. There has been speculation on dutch tech sites that they only did this to appease the dutch copyright vigilantes, so they are making a half-assed effort to filter some stuff out. Let's face it, a torrent site without any "illegal" (under dutch law, downloading music & movies is LEGAL!) content is about as useful as a 3-legged, dead dog. With a nasty case of fleas.
Will wank off Linus Torvalds for fame.
Biological weapon for a trebuchet.
A bullet may have your name on it but splash damage is addressed "To whom it may concern."
Yes they are - but now they can more-or-less show 'good faith' to the judge.
Currently mininova - knowing full well the reason why people use their site - simply go by the strict laws.. if a copyright holder / representative tells them they're hosting particular copyrighted content, they'll take it down.
Of course it will be back up there 5 minutes later. This is pissing the Dutch interest groups off who are trying to slap the mininova people around a bit with other laws / more loose interpretations.
But now they can say "ahh, but look.. we installed a filter.. it's not our fault that them sneaky pirates find ways around those filters.. it would be *impossible* for us to manually go over each and every upload!".. then hope to exit the court grinning while their main page continues to display top 10 lists of every popular category with scarce 'legal' torrents (I think the Windows 7 Release Candidate was the only one when I checked yesterday and yes, I know there's nothing illegal about a torrent file itself.. splitting hairs over technical details is what they'll be doing in court).
... hiding the body after you've been accused of murder, hoping that you'll then not be convicted?
THE HONOUR OF THE KNIGHTS - CC Licensed Sci-Fi Novel
Depends which category you fall into.
Personally, I use NNTP.
There are a few ways you can go here.
I use www.bitnabber.com - for the monthly fee, I get the NNTP service, but also access to the download library - verified Music/Movie/TV/Games/Anime downloads, with full info (source, quality, reviews,etc) - makes browsing for a movie to download a breeze. Also supports streaming on downloading (try doing that on a torrent..)
The other way is to get yourself a cheaper NNTP account: usenetserver.com / giganews.com are the best.
From there, you can trawl NZB sites to get the NZBs for what you want to download.
There are some good ones out there, the best being newzbin.com - but it's invite only, hence why I went w/ the top option.
yeah, cos it worked for TPB didn't it...
I think the Windows 7 Release Candidate was the only one
I'm too lazy to double-check, but I would be mightily surprised if MS had consented to unregulated 3rd party distribution of any version of windows. Just because MS lets people freely download it from their own servers, and possibly those of a handful of designated 3rd parties, doesn't mean they've given permission for just anyone to distribute it.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
Mininova can not technically be an alternative to a Bittorrent tracker (like TPB etc.), since Mininova is not a tracker - it's just an indexed repository for .torrent files.
Apparently it's not very effective... http://www.mininova.org/search/wolverine/seeds
There's a difference between the Mininova defense and the TPB defense:
Mininova: "These are copyrighted, yes, but we do our best to remove content when flagged and we've even installed a filter to remove it automatically. It's not our fault if people still try and get around that."
TPB: "These are copyrighted, yes, but we don't fucking care. Ahahaha, losers."
I'm sure you can pick up the subtleties...
"It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him." - Tolkien
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Downloading is in fact legal in many jurisdictions. But the problematic thing with Bittorrent is that it makes you an uploader as well, and that decidedly isn't legal in many jurisdictions.
And it only took the RIAA + friends what? 4 years to kill Mininova? It must be frustrating to know there are literally hundreds of other torrent sites, all of which will be happy to take the 'refugees' from this minor inconvenience.
In any event being able to bully torrent sites into submission through legal means isn't what I'm worried about. I'm much more worried about them coercing ISP's into their little self-regulation schemes, as if it's somehow an ISP's responsibility to protect Sony BMG's copyrights. It strikes me as being just as misguided as expecting the people who maintain our roads to be responsible for people smuggling drugs across the border. Sorry guys, if you want to cling to the old IP system in the information age you should be prepared to do all the hard work yourself. If you don't like it I'm sure we can come up with some new, fairer systems to try.
Or, you know, just bribe politicians until you get your way. I guess that works too...
Murphey's fighting Occam, and we're in the stands.
http://www.mininova.org/tor/2569928
This is one of their "featured torrents". It's called "How to bypass mininovas copyright filter". I'm mildly amuzed.
I went to mininova just now, and on the front page I found:
Featured torrents:
"How to bypass mininovas copyright filter"
After Mininova implements this fully, how much content will be left?
I guess the open source stuff will still be there, and any software that is in the public domain. How about those e-books that are nowhere else to be found, except on torrents?
A picture is worth exactly 1024 words.
If I say that Google shouldn't have to actively search out and filter content (which they don't, nor do they have to by US law), does that mean Google is predominantly used for copyright infringement? I don't think so.
Your argument is a straw man anyway. I don't think anyone would deny that bittorrent is mainly used for copyright infringement, but the issues are whether search engines should be liable. Also consider that even though something is copyright infringement by law doesn't mean it is unethical - e.g., someone downloading something they already bought in another format, or a BBC licence payer in the UK downloading BBC produced content, and another example would be using it as a form of timeshifting, downloading a show you just missed on TV you pay for. Consider, in the UK it's copyright infringement to copy a CD you've bought onto your own mp3 player. So it would be accurate to say that "MP3 players are used almost entirely for copyright infringement" - however that's not really a fair statement, and doesn't mean people are downloading things they haven't paid for.
No, he's right. The behaviour of the sites in question has a huge impact on the outcome... Mininova is at least attempting to appear as though they're cooperating with copyright holders. TPB, by contrast, has a long history of replying to C&D letters by telling them things like "This is Sweden, you've got no jurisdiction, silly American coroporation, so fuck off" and then posting said takedown notice on their site so that everybody can read their ridicule.
There's a slight difference. And the copyright laws aren't really *that* different in Sweden when compared to the Netherlands.
If you believe everything you read, you'd better not read. - Japanese proverb
I know it's a wiki, but it's a carbon copy of the real lawbook, it's just the only page I could find that allows me to directly link to the article.
Let me translate something for you:
"Als inbreuk op het auteursrecht op een werk van letterkunde, wetenschap of kunst wordt niet beschouwd de verveelvoudiging welke beperkt blijft tot enkele exemplaren en welke uitsluitend dient tot eigen oefening, studie of gebruik van de natuurlijke persoon die zonder direct of indirect commercieel oogmerk de verveelvoudiging vervaardigt of tot het verveelvoudigen uitsluitend ten behoeve van zichzelf opdracht geeft."
Which you can translate loosly to:
"It is not considered copyright infringement if a copy is made solely for the purpose of own practice or study without direct or indirect commerical gain, and when the copy is only meant for himself".
If you want to read it yourself, here is a shoddy google translation: here
In short, under Dutch law, it's legal to make copy's of copyrighted works (be it a movie, music or a piece of text), only if it's for yourself and does not give you a commercial gain. This rule was originally built to support people making back-up copies for them selves, but applies to the internet too. What you CAN'T do is upload copyrighted files (uploading = distribution), and this whole legal blurb doesn't apply to applications (uploading or downloading of software is both illegal).
Your turn.
Correct - usually these sites are targeted under a "facilitating [whatever]" type thing;
"Hij benadrukt daarbij dat er, volgens hem, niets grijs is aan illegale torrentsites en trackers. 'Zij faciliteren de inbreuk en de torrents zijn ook een onmisbaar bestanddeel van de inbreuk. Dat is onrechtmatig, en een strafbaar feit,'" - citing Tim Kuik, BREIN (kinda like the riaa and mpaa and whatnot rolled into one).
To translate..
"He stresses that, according to him, torrentsites and trackers do not operate in a gray area. 'They facilitate the infringements and the torrents are a necessary part of the infringement. That is unlawful and a criminal act,'"
So regardless of whether mininova hosts the data, or even hosts the torrent files, if BREIN so wishes, they can sue under Dutch law.. and they are suing (court case upcoming). Whether the judge will agree with BREIN is another matter - but realistically, he would, and the arguments would be more about what damages are to be awarded.
That will prove to be 99.9% of their traffic, and revenue... .....have you seen any ISOs around here lately?
well it was fun while it lasted, now on to the next one!
(crouches down as if on a hunt)
And I know it's difficult for you to comprehend, but it's possible, even likely, that I'm not an American, and that I haven't set foot in the USA in more than a decade. The closest I've been to the US in recent memory was a flyover while I was on my way to the Netherlands Antilles (CuraÃao) for a vacation in January.
When have I said it's about breaking copyright laws?
If you actually read what I said, you'll notice that I said that it's appearances that matter. Mininova is trying to appear as though they are trying to help the copyright holders keep their rights, by removing copyrighted material when asked, and by trying to develop a filter. How effective that filter turns out to be is completely irrelevant. TPB responded to takedown requests by laughing at them and posting them publicly.
In other words, Mininova is trying to appear as though they are inhibiting the infringement, whereas TPB was trying to appear as though they were facilitating it. It's got nothing to do with whether or not the site itself is infringing on copyrights by linking torrents, and everything to do with how the site reacts to requests from copyright holders.
And appearances are all that matters. Mininova could implement a completely innefectual filter, but from having put it there in the first place, they can still claim that they're trying to help, and escape the kind of punishment that TPB has earned.
While I prefer not to flame, I feel I should point out that if you want any credibility, it helps to actually read what the person you're replying to is saying. This being Slashdot, however, I can forgive you for not doing so.
If you believe everything you read, you'd better not read. - Japanese proverb
His point stands, I think. A big "Fuck you guys" is gonna get you on the shitlist of pretty much any judge, court, or (probably) jury.
I'm sorry, you're wrong. The attitude of the person has to be kept separate from the crime commited. The crime must be treated unbiased. The law doesn't say "It's illegal to break copyright laws, and if you're a bit of a middleman it's illegal if you have a nasty attitude, otherwise it's ok". In Sweden (which I guess differs from the states in this sense as you seem to think that everything works as it does in the US) you should be able to flip off the judge and shit on his desk if you want. You'll get sentenced for indecent exposure but this should have absolutely no impact on the initial trial. That's called a fair trial.
I am the lawn!
...that this is yet another opportunity to come up with a way of making a distributed lookup system part of the bit torrent spec. Sure, it wouldn't be as quick, but if your client can listen for other nearby clients and query them for a list of files that they've accessed (not just ones being seeded by them, but ones they've connected to recently or are currently connected to). I'm sure this would greatly limit the number of seeds you find, but with a proper system of distributed "well, I've heard this guy has this" and "I'm seeding this right now and I've transfered it to this guy who might also be seeding" and such would give you a fairly decent list of seeds that you can probably get a good speed to (since they're somewhat 'local'). This would have the benefit of not needing a search site, nor needing any centralized repository.
On the other hand if this worked and was really successful, the RIAA would just try to ban the protocol from ISP's.
-=JML=-
I've often wondered if a list of indexed DHT URI hashes would be any stronger in court.
I figure at some point we will have sites that don't link to or have torrents but just indexed and categorized DHT URI links.
I'm sorry, you're wrong. The attitude of the person has to be kept separate from the crime commited.
It "has to"? Are you certain? Did you write those laws, or are you merely providing your opinion? Well, obviously you either have no understanding of the pragmatics of law, or you choose not to agree with the way laws are carried out. Just because you don't agree with something doesn't make it less true.
Pretty much every criminal trial encounters the word "remorse" at one point or another, which shows that courts do take attitudes into consideration.
In the United States, yes. The Robed Nine wanted a way around a few irritating constitutional restrictions, so they reasoned that by brewing beer and drinking beer at home, you were impacting the market for commercially-produced beer and therefore were subject to regulation as a commercial beer producer.
(Really? No. The real case was about growing wheat, not brewing beer, and the subject was "interstate commerce", not "commercial". But the reasoning was the same.)
Whether the Dutch have followed that sort of tortured reasoning is another question, but I'm sure the US doesn't have a monopoly on it.
Have you ever heard of "mens rea"? A required element of almost every crime is a culpable state of mind of the actor. There's a huge difference between doing the actions required for a crime (like, taking someone's stuff) with a reckless state of mind, as opposed to a purposeful statement of mind. (Recklessness would be if one knows there's a good chance that the stuff they are taking doesn't belong to them; purposeful would be if one took the stuff because it didn't belong to them.)
For most crimes, negligence isn't a culpable state of mind. If you didn't know the stuff you took didn't belong to you, but a hypothetical "reasonable person" in your situation would have known it probably didn't belong to you, then you're negligent. But you didn't commit a crime. On the other hand, if you were reckless about it (and the prosecution can prove that beyond a reasonable doubt), then you did commit a crime.
The parallels to copyright infringement (if it's a crime and not just a civil cause of action) by torrent sites should be obvious. The Pirate Bay was clearly at least reckless - more likely, knowing, which is more culpable - where as mininova is probably trying to show that they were just negligent, and that their action in putting up a filter is an attempt to correct that negligence. The judge might interpret the filter as reducing their culpability from recklessness to negligence.
This is all based on American criminal law under the model penal code, not civil law, and not dutch law. IANAL, YMMV, infringement isn't stealing, etc.