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In UK, Oink Admin Cleared of Fraud
krou writes "The BBC is reporting that Alan Ellis, who ran music file sharing site Oink from his flat in the UK, has been found not guilty of conspiracy to defraud. Between 2004 and 2007, the site 'facilitated the download of 21 million music files' by allowing its some 200,000 'members to find other people on the web who were prepared to share files.' Ellis was making £18,000 a month ($34,600) from donations from users, and claimed that he had no intention of defrauding copyright holders, and said 'All I do is really like Google, to really provide a connection between people. None of the music is on my website.'" Reader Andorin recommends Torrentfreak's coverage, which includes summaries of the closing arguments.
The big question is...
Now that he has been found innocent, does he get his 300k back?
Or am I mistaken in assuming that his assets were seized?
I do not know exactly how oink works (worked?), but from the quote
All I do is really like Google, to really provide a connection between people. None of the music is on my website.
Wouldn't that make exactly the same defence valid for Pirate Bay and other torrent sites?
--
"I'm surfin the dead zone
In the twilight, unknown"
"Conspiracy to defraud"
Defrauding seems a bit of an odd charge to lay for this. It suggests that he was taking wealth from the record industry for direct personal gain.
The money cam from subscribers. They were not making any money from the file sharing. Even if he had a website that was explicitly dedicated to getting people in contact to fence actually stolen property I'd have thought this would be hard to make stick.
Doesn't UK law have anything along the lines of conspiracy to facilitate copyright infringement?
OiNK will never return. The content is outdated, nevermind the fact that the majority of the major seeders dumped all their OiNK torrents as soon as the site went down. Alan would be starting the whole place from scratch. I, for one, can't be bothered to re-upload my library again. Been there, done that. And it's not like the IFPI is going to just forget about him now that he's been found not guilty. The simple fact is that, like you said, the waffles are tasty. The sites that have sprung up in replacement of the pink palace have surpassed what Alan had built. It would be like taking a step backwards in progress. It's really time for everyone to stop living in the past and get on with their e-lives.
Nobody's proven that filesharing has the "capacity to threaten the actual profitability of a book that much" either.
You are welcome on my lawn.
the waffles have been great but i hope this gets us back to bacon.
WHAT'd you say?!
what?
sticking with the book idea; a list of things to make money on that are not the physical book
1) Movie rights
2) Signed physical copies
3) Posters, action figures, scarves, etc.
4) Speaking events.
5) something else i didn't think of in the last 3 minutes.
so no the [e]Book need not be your only source of income. see mike masnicks CWF+RTB stuff for more examples.
All of the above was encrypted with a Quad ROT-13 method. Unauthorized decryption is in violation of the DMCA.
I thought the windmill metaphor was an excellent one.
I also disagree with your contention that pirates live off the rest of us. You don't pay any more as a result of someone else not paying. You already pay as much as the content producers think they can gouge out of you, and far more than the product is actually worth because its price is artificially inflated through corrupt legislation.
Or perhaps you think that someone should be earning millions a year for a piece of work they did 45 years ago, and that it's criminal to expect them to actually do some more work if they want to earn more money. Me, I find myself short on sympathy.