Usenet Group Sues Dutch RIAA

eldavojohn writes "With the Pirate Bay trial, it's been easy to overlook similar struggles in other nations. A Dutch Usenet community named FTD is going on the offensive and suing BREIN (Bescherming Rechten Entertainment Industrie Nederland). You may remember BREIN (along with the IFPI & BPI) as the people who raided and cut out the heart of eDonkey. This is turning into a pretty familiar scenario; the FTD group makes software that allows its 450k members to easily find copyrighted content for free on Usenet. The shocking part is that FTD isn't waiting for BREIN to sue them. FTD is refusing to take down their file location reports, and is actually suing BREIN. Why the preemptive attack? FTD wants the courts to show that the act of downloading is not illegal in the Netherlands. (Both articles have the five points in English that FTD wants the courts to settle.) OSNews has a few more details on the story."

Comments

Re:Recollection

[Dan667]

Actually it does. If more groups start doing this, it will tie up all the RIAA legal resources defending themselves.

Re:RIAA??!!!

[Darkness404]

But most Americans, even many /.ers have no clue about the rest of the world. The main lobby group for music and copyright in the USA is the RIAA. In the Netherlands they have BREIN. They both have the same essential functions. Its like calling the English Parliament the congress of England, sure, its not correct, but its something that most Americans can identify with.

Downloading is legal in the Netherlands

[hkz]

A small difference with, say, the USA is that downloading music and films is legal in the Netherlands, but uploading is not. So even if BREIN's assertion that FTD is aiding and abetting downloading is correct, that does not in itself mean that anything illegal is going on. In fact, the reason FTD is suing BREIN is because they are fed up with the slander against them; BREIN has publically accused them of illegal behavior, and now FTD wants to get a legal ruling that tells them to go piss up a rope.

Re:Downloading is legal in the Netherlands

[Twisted Willie]

It's not just that they are fed up with the slander.

The FTD software used to have what they called an 'NZB Button'. On the page with the information about the content you were looking for (filenames, size, description, etc.), there'd be a button which if clicked on directed you to an external usenet search engine, with the correct search terms already filled in. After talks between FTD and BREIN, FTD decided to remove this button, and to not allow their users to post direct links to nzb files, or nzb search engines. FTD did this to prevent BREIN from coming after them, they are not linking to any content whatsoever anymore. There's just users telling you what filenames to look for in which newsgroups.

So, here's FTD talking to BREIN, agreeing on taking these actions, taking away any shred of doubt that what they're doing is completely legal under Dutch law, when Tim Kuik comes along and happily continues to call them criminals.

In all fairness, there are third party plugins to the FTD software that re-enable this NZB button, but those are beyond FTD's control.

Re:RIAA??!!!

[kripkenstein]

How the hell is BREIN the "Dutch RIAA"? They have no links to each other, no affiliation, no hard relation whatsover.

"Dutch RIAA" doesn't mean they are affiliated with the (US) RIAA or that they have any relationship. All the phrase means is that they are the equivalent of the RIAA, in the Netherlands. In other words, that they have a similar purpose and so forth.

Re:Recollection

[multisync]

and of course, the lawyers always win

So lawyers make money. Big deal. So do doctors, and auto mechanics, and the geeks for chrissakes.

Imagine that, people who have specialized knowledge make money, even when idiots wreck their cars, bring disease upon themselves with their lifestyle choices or use litigation as a business model.

Many also do pro bono work for people who are in need of legal council but can not afford it. Despite this, nearly half of litigants in my country are forced to represent themselves, straining the court system and usually resulting in justice denied for those too poor to pay for an attorney.

But I'm sure organizations like the RIAA would welcome your lawyer bashing, and encourage you to continue spreading the myth that it's the lawyers - not the executives - who are at fault.