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IsoHunt To Court: Google Is the Bigger Problem
Krystalo writes "isoHunt is still fighting its legal battle with the MPAA. In the latest episode, the torrent website filed a reply brief to the US Court of Appeals in which it suggests that Google, and not IsoHunt, is the largest BitTorrent search engine on the Internet."
Everyone here thinks they have Asperger's when it's probably well below 5%. Fortunately not everyone here is socially awkward and trying to make excuses for it.
Let's see now what the MPAA intends to do with this information.
Google is how I find the stuff I want at IsoHunt et alia. Their own internal search engines are crap.
Being the largest search engine on the internet by the margin Google is means that it's the largest search engine for nearly EVERY category. Still, some engines were created for torrents, and Google wasn't.
Real lawyers, and lots of them.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
IsoHunt and PriateBay do not distribute ANY content, other than .torrent files. That's the point. They should not be held accountable for what users seed. Don't sue MIT because someone picks your lock. Don't sue Microsoft because someone sent you a death threat using Outlook. Same principle.
Another new account and troll post by the poster known as devxo, balls of steel, Billy the Boy, and divxio.
Google isn't solely made and used for distributing copyrighted content illegally. IsoHunt, as well as The Pirate Bay, is.
The Mob isn't exclusively used for selling counterfeit goods, so I guess they're not guilty of it?
Claiming Google isn't doing anything illegal but isoHunt is because it's all they do is crap. It's just that isoHunt doesn't have the deep pockets of a Google, Bing or Yahoo. If the MPAA thought they could win they'd be suing the big search engines too.
(1) They shouldn't have modded you down to (0). Everyone, even idiots, are entitled to express an opinion.
>>>Google isn't solely made and used for distributing copyrighted content illegally. IsoHunt, as well as The Pirate Bay, is.
(2) Clearly you've never used isohunt. Isohunt doesn't distribute material. Nor *.tor files. It doesn't even provide a tracker! It's simply google with the "filetype torrent" tag.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
Google isn't solely made and used for distributing copyrighted content illegally. IsoHunt, as well as The Pirate Bay, is.
Wrong.
It's a common problem with people who have Asperger's syndrome...
I'm starting to see why people repeat themselves a lot around you.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
Back in high school, the cops did a drug sting on campus. They busted the drug dealers AND the people that told them how to find the drug dealers. being part of the problem means you are part of the problem.
Behold, this dreamer cometh. Come now, and let us slay him... and we shall see what will become of his dreams.
>>>We need copyright so we can have successful companies like and products like Canonical and Microsoft
"There is not, in nature, a right to protect your ideas from copying..... just as you may light your taper by my fire, without diminishing my heat, so may you copy my ideas without diminishing my use of my invention." - Thomas Jefferson, 1780s
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
Erm, that was exactly his point - that it doesn't *matter* about the precise technical details. The legal system cares more about intent.
Google 'colour of bits'.
Google isn't solely made and used for distributing copyrighted content illegally. IsoHunt, as well as The Pirate Bay, is.
Wrong.
Now convince any court of that. I don't think IsoHunt can.
What matters legally isn't what's technically true; what matters is what you can prove (or, more accurately, sell/persuade.)
Is everything related to the internet suddenly lumped in with the Cloud now?
What matters legally isn't what's technically true; what matters is what you can prove (or, more accurately, sell/persuade.)
Fair point. Ah, that's what the other poster was saying... I responded too quickly, I guess I have Aspbergers. :)
My bad.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
Which, is pretty reaching considering in some places it's pretty hard not to know who is dealing, and knowing to stay away from them can be a valuable skill.
That would be like arresting people who can plainly point out which are the crack houses -- it's kind of obvious, and simply knowing where they are doesn't mean you were in any involved in it.
And, they wonder why people aren't always keen to cooperate with police.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Don't sue Microsoft because someone sent you a death threat using Outlook.
Yeah, but what if they wrote it in Word, too?
torrents aren't solely made for distributing copyrighted contents ether. i use them regularly to download software that is not illegal. they are a faster and robust mechanism to download anything. although this arguments is not valid for sites whose sole purpose is to provide illegal content, but there are a good deal of sites that dont fit that category. i could use pirate bay to post my own legal video is if i wanted to. it should be notated that the supreme court hasn't found this an adequate argument in the past though.
Yes, but IsoHunt willy facilitates copyright infringement and to act like they don't know that people are posting torrents to download copyrighted works is extremely naive and would never stand up in court.
>>>IsoHunt willy facilitates copyright infringement a
WRONG. Isohunt doesn't distribute torrents. /b> Why can't people pull their braisn out of their anuses, and WAKE UP? Isohunt.com is not a tracker. It used to be several years ago, but not anymore. Now they are identical to google - just providing links.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
Which, is pretty reaching considering in some places it's pretty hard not to know who is dealing, and knowing to stay away from them can be a valuable skill. (...) And, they wonder why people aren't always keen to cooperate with police.
Well being a sting people didn't know they were talking to cops. The second part is the difference between knowing and sending them business, I guess it depends on how they asked. It's one to thing to comment on it in conversation, but if you're asked "Dude, do you know how to get some pot around here?" and you say "Look for that red-haired guy who hangs out down by the C building, he always has good stuff." you've done more than comment on what looks like a crack house.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Isohunt isn't made for distributing copyrighted content illegally, nor is any other site, including google.
It's not their job to determine what is illegal and what isn't, nor to police what people are distributing. I think you forget that little section 230 thing.
>>>IsoHunt willy facilitates copyright infringement a
WRONG
Oh. So you are saying they don't facilitate copyright infringement?
just providing links
Oh. So they are facilitating copyright infringement. What was your point?
Consider that if you're having to try to split those hairs and argue that point here, IsoHunt's chances of successfully arguing it to an almost certainly non-technical judge are not good.
I though isoHut was only a search engine and didn't even host the torrent files but indexed other torrent sites.
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
I thought google owned v0rtex.appspot.com, a torrent search engine. .torrents... demonoid is the flavor of the week, im told.
whois doesnt agree...
Otherwise, I know no one who uses google to get
My school had a "C" building, so this response made me jump. :)
Amusingly the buildings were out of order; C was between "A" and "B". :)
Mini-me, you complete me!
CONTEXT KingMotley. "people are posting torrents to isohunt" is what the original poster claimed. Except that's wrong. You CAN'T post torrents to isohunt.
Jeez.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
Sounds like the MPAA is suing IsoHunt not Google. What Google is doing doesn't matter as far as this case is concerned; they aren't a party to the case. Maybe the MPAA will go after Google next (not likely).
This is a typical infringer strategy: tell the court that some one else is doing it and more of it. Hasn't mattered in the past and will not matter in this case. The MPAA gets to choose who it wants to sue and when.
There can be no denying that torrents are speech. Torrent files in and of themselves are only contact data.
The supreme court can rule that giving money to political causes is free speech but publishing the phone number of a hooker isn't?
>>>section 230 thing.
"No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider." It does not apply to federal criminal law, intellectual property law, and electronic communications privacy law.
http://www.eff.org/issues/bloggers/legal/liability/230
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
This is the Google homepage:
http://www.google.com/
It has no mention of any particular search terms at all, let alone intent.
This is the IsoHunt homepage:
http://isohunt.com/
It mentions the last 10 searches - which aren't exactly searches for Linux distributions - and what's that in the top right? Oh! How lovely, I can click through to the latest Video, TV, Game, etc. releases. What's more - I can add a release!
Even if I search for "Toy Story 3", these are Google's first page results (I'm logged out, so no personalized search):
Now let's try that at IsoHunt.
"But, AC," you say, "if you add filetype:torrent in the Google search, then you'll also get a bunch of these types of results".
Well no shit - that's partially the point though, isn't it? With Google, I have to explicitly tell the search engine that I'm looking for something a little more specific, generally associated with copies/rips/cams of whatever I'm looking for. With IsoHunt, I don't have to.
It may seem like an insignificant difference, but to the courts in various jurisdictions, all of these 'insignificant' differences add up to intent.
Anybody trying to argue that there's no difference between sites like IsoHunt and Google - either philosophical or technical - needs to be hit over the head by a clue-by-four and some sense of reality.
But here's to hoping that the judge finds they have a strong case and either the industry has to back off from these sites and we can all do the Information wants to Free-as-in-beer dance, or the industry will just have to poke at Google and get a deal from them (already happened for YouTube anyway) and then eye these sites again for further lawsuits demanding either a deal or shutdown.
You pull up Canonical, as to say that we need copyright law to enforce the GPL?
That is correct. However, it is so because the law is the tool available for enforcing the philosophy of *sharing*. I'm sure RMS would be ok with a law that did away with copyrights and said that all code and culture that was distributed should be freely shareable.
Some of my favourite people are from th US; Vonnegut, Chomsky, Bill Hicks.
1. Asperger's and being a geek are not mutually exclusive... not even remotely. In fact, it is closer to true to say "Asperger's is to Geek as Square is to Rectangle"
2. We do not need Copyright to have successful companies like Microsoft and Canonical. In fact, copyright on software is simply a misapplication of copyright law. Software has all sorts of properties that is not typically identified with things which are copyrightable. Books are copyrightable. I can own a book and do all the things I want with things I own except reproduce it for the purpose of sale. With software, we don't own it, we get a license to use it. Also, copyrighted materials don't usually also share the qualities of being patentable or otherwise appear to be "an invention" rather than an artistic creation. Software is a unique convergence every type of intellectual property that I can think of. It has the ability to hold trademark, copyright, and patent protection.
(You might as well stop reading here... this could go on for a long time... but I will get to a "point 3" or maybe a "point 2.1" later on)
Is software a "service"? No. It's a list of instructions for a processor to execute. The instructions were already written and I can maintain a copy of those instructions which is independent of a vendor. Is software a creative work? My programming background says "yes, sort of" because it takes a certain degree of creativity to build interesting and useful software, but it is not an expressive art so it's more like engineering and architecture. (architectural and engineering drawings are copyrightable, however) In any case, SOURCE CODE is a work of "authorship." But wait, we don't usually run source code -- we run binaries... compiled (constructed) machine-readable instructions which vary based on the architecture it was compiled for. So if buildings and mechanical devices (which are the compiled/constructed outcome of engineering and architectural drawings) are not eligible for copyright protection, then software shouldn't be eligible either. After all, all OTHER copyrightable works are able to be experienced by people through their senses. This is not the case with software -- people only get output generated by the list of executable instructions most often based on another source of data or input.
I suppose I could go on and on about software and patents as well, repeating the same points that have been repeated here for working on ten years it seems. But if software is worthy of patent protection, then so is entering "100" on a microwave oven. After all, that too is a series of instructions for operating a machine. It doesn't make "a whole new machine" does it? And neither does software -- software is an implementation of tiny elements of functionality of an existing invention. If I used a can opener as a screwdriver or a fingernail cleaner, did I just "invent" something? Sure it might be a novel use for something, but it is also "obvious" and so is the use of a series of instructions which are fully and completely documented by the inventors of processor units. Lego is patentable, but a "Lego thing" is not... or, well, should not be in my opinion. (This fits in nicely with nearly everyone's beef with the notion of patenting old things by adding "over the internet" to them... it's kind of the same thing!)
2.1. So why are Microsoft and Canonical successful? Producing copyright protected software is not the reason. If that's all they did, starting today, they would be out of business within five years. No, they provide services and support. And you don't need copyright protection to run a business which consists largely of services and support. And without the services and support, they would not exist. If software ceased to be recognized as having copyright protection, they would STILL be in business within five years.
Swords are made for killing people, so they should be illegal right? Well, no... I like the way they look and I think they look great hanging on a wall.
>>>Jefferson actually supported IP laws
Considering this long and lengthy argument from 1786, I don't know how can you reach that braiddead conclusion. Note the final bolded sentence.
"Stable ownership is the gift of social law, and is given late in the progress of society. It would be curious then, if an idea, the fugitive fermentation of an individual brain, could, of natural right, be claimed in exclusive and stable property. If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it.
"Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me.
"That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density in any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property."
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
"Google isn't solely made and used for distributing copyrighted content illegally. IsoHunt, as well as The Pirate Bay, is. Us geeks have to learn that such things matter in court."
So a otherwise gainfully employed part time drug dealer is is not doing anything illegal?
Intent, purpose, gain or even knowledge of the law are of little interest to the court's except at sentencing, which only occurs after the actual guilty/innocent verdict
Cops can arrest you for pretty much anything what, what count's is what happen's in court and would be very interested to see if a single person who told them were to find drug's was convicted if they did not stupidly plead out. Somehow i doubt it
Well kid, two wrongs don't make a right...
Maybe you missed the memo, but the world got more complicated than that after kindergarten.
Motorcycles, Robots, Space Gossip and More!
Sue Google. I can't wait to watch you and your bullshit case go down in flames faster than the fucking Hindenburg.
If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can't be taken on its own merits
...if ISOhunt changed their search engine for a day, so that any searches were just forwarded to google with a filetype:torrent string appended?
It wouldn't make any difference to the legal case of course, which is more about ISOhunt being poor and accessible (and therefore prosecutable), unlike google. It'll also show users what magic incantations they need to mutter if/when torrent aggregators are closed, and maybe then we'll see MPAA vs. Google.
I don't torrent myself, I just buy lots of DVD's (except when I can't get a hold of a work by legitimate means - I'm not aware of anyone who's able to sell Dunvavi Karatan Adam for instance), but there are plenty of people at work who do (well, torrent and newsgroups), and every so often you'll come in and find an unmarked 500GB drive on your desk. People who don't contribute to the drive but copy stuff from it have to buy the first round at the pub. People who bring in a drive are excused from buying rounds next time at the pub. Works remarkably well for groups of 5-10 people.
P.S. I'm told rounds aren't that common outside of the UK, but I'm thinking that, seeing as they're obviously a facilitator of illegal file sharing, they should be banned. http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BritishPubs
Moderation Total: -1 Troll, +3 Goat
On the contrary, it's a brilliant move. They essentially just named Google as a co-defendant (not really, but the effect is similar), which means now Google is providing lawyers and cash towards their side, if only to preemptively defend themselves. Google vs MAFIAA is a much fairer fight than IsoHunt vs MAFIAA.
Of course, that doesn't mean the argument isn't childish. It just means that your nephew likely has a career in law ahead of him.
I remember something similar happening at a party at uni. There were a couple of guys in their mid 30's drinking soft drinks at a student party filled with 20 year olds. They kept going around asking if anyone could sort them out any drugs, or if they knew the name of anyone who could - but with a kind of zeal that your average person simply wouldn't have. They stuck out like a sore thumb, so everyone had twigged they were police well before the inevitable raid happened (by which time, anyone with anything, had already gone home). In the end, all they found was the rest of the party racking up lines of sugar on the kitchen table ;)
Well kid, two wrongs don't make a right...
You went the wrong way with it.
The assumption is that what google does is not wrong.
The point of IsoHunt's defense is not that "two wrongs make a right", but rather that google is doing nothing wrong, and that isohunt is really just a search engine like google, and therefore, like google, isohunt is not doing anything wrong.
To paraphrase your analogy:
"They sound like my 8 year old nephew who protested the other day when he was chastised for calling his little dog a "bitch", because he heard a veterinarian call his dog a bitch so why couldn't he?"
Frankly I'd be proud if my 8 year old made that argument. Its a good argument.
You're missing the point. They're still arguing over whether or not what they've done is illegal. Paramount to your nephew calling his little sister "Beach," getting in trouble, and arguing that it's a nickname that even the teacher uses when referring to her. Isohunt: What I did is not illegal. Court: Yes it was, this is what you did. Isohunt: No, that is not illegal. See, Google does it and you don't prosecute them. Precedent for its legality.
But that stretches the analogy to the point where it doesn't apply. As much as I'm pretty sure I'm on your side, you're strawmanning, dude. The GP was talking about drug dealer referrers, not merely people who knew who drug dealers were. And obviously IsoHunt doesn't know about torrents in order to keep away from them!
Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
I couldn't agree more. The increasing fad among geeks to self diagnose themselves as mildly autistic ever since some report came out a few years ago has really tended to turn my stomach. What the fuck is wrong with you that you go around wanting to have something be wrong with you? Or is it just a desperate clinging on to an explanation for a few awkward personality traits that can be blamed on something beyond your control?
Ten and fifteen years ago, everyone went around saying they had ADD and ADHD. Now they go around saying they have Aspergers. You don't have aspergers, you fucking drama queens.
The point is Google provides links to torrents as well. And on a magnitude greater than isohunt. So why isn't Google in trouble? That is, I believe, the point. 2 companies both doing the same thing, yet only one has trouble because of it.
"But this one goes to 11!"
...if MPAA found IsoHunt through Google to begin with.
What do I know, I'm just an idiot, right?
Compare the ratio of links to pirated material on Google to that on IsoHunt. IsoHunt loses.
Compare the response of Google to a takedown request to that of IsoHunt. IsoHunt loses.
Google makes at least a minimal attempt at not being a part of the distribution chain, IsoHunt on the other hand makes no attempt. IsoHunt loses.
You can argue that IsoHunt isn't doing anything wrong all you want, and you'll be a part of the small minority of idiots who think they'll win this battle. Good luck with that.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
And you would be wrong. Pleas and convictions all around. Knowingly Aiding a crime is a crime in its own right.
Behold, this dreamer cometh. Come now, and let us slay him... and we shall see what will become of his dreams.
Ten and fifteen years ago, everyone went around saying they had ADD and ADHD. Now they go around saying they have Aspergers. You don't have aspergers, you fucking drama queens.
I nominate "being a man" as the next hip disorder to have.
What, I slaughtered and butchered that donkey and went to all that work and now you're saying I'm not allowed to have ass burgers? Jeez, you jerk!
When you're afraid to download music illegally in your own home, then the terrorists have won!
It is.
That doesn't mean it's wrong, but it is a crime. What makes it a crime? Laws written that say it is.
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
As with TPB case, this is about Intent.
Google is not meant for searching for pirated material.
IsoHunt is a website designed and intended for sharing pirated material.
Just because some people use a crowbar to break into a house doesn't make a crowbar inherently evil, but put the crowbar in a Burglar's Toolkit, and then you've got a kit intended for crime.
As with TPB, I hope the IsoHunt guys win, but let's not kid ourselves into thinking their argument is justified, and they're on a par with google- their argument is a pedantic technicality.
In fact, it is closer to true to say "Asperger's is to Geek as Square is to Rectangle"
... or to put it bluntly Aspergers are square.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
Your comment made no sense whatsoever. You want to ban fully automatic weapons because they are more efficent? Why not also ban semi automatic weapons as well then. Should we ban double action revolvers also? Might as well just go back to muzzle loaders.Assault rifles make up something like 1% of gun related crimes. Also how does banning ANY weapon prevent its use in crimes. Do you think a criminal will be like "i wont use this gun its illegal"
And? I believe that was idiotic as well.
being part of the problem
Assuming there's a problem at all, that is.
Filthy, filthy copyrapists!
Since all IsoHunt does is INDEX other website's torrents, how can one reasonably assume that the INTENT of IsoHunt is to find copyright-infringing material? I can build a website with the INTENTION of indexing images from a variety of sites, how would it then be my fault if Website X (that my website indexes) begins a child pornography section, and the images are picked up by my indexing software? Same concept here - my INTENTION is to provide a legal image repository of images gathered from the web, yet through no fault of my own illegal images get indexed. This is why we have DMCA takedowns and places like ChillingEffects.org (the organization responsible for assisting with removing exactly this type of thing from Google's results). So long as IsoHunt would abide by DMCA, etc. requests, they should not be legally accountable for content hosted at other places. Period.
Actually isohunt is solely made to search other websites for torrent files. Torrent files are not illegal, and they are not copyrighted. The content that a torrent file points your bit torrent client to, may be illegal, or it may be legal.
Back in high school, the cops did a drug sting on campus.
Thankfully, copyright infringement is not a criminal category yet.
They busted the drug dealers AND the people that told them how to find the drug dealers.
By that reasoning, we could lock up most politicians. They've been telling me there's child porn on the internet for years.
being part of the problem means you are part of the problem.
Are you sure?
That argument is essentially "don't punish me because THEY DID IT TOO". All that does is get both of you in trouble.
If they decide to go after Google, that's a separate court case....and of course we all know that the winner in court is usually the one that can afford the most expensive lawyers and Google has a *LOT* of cash.
What % of IsoHunt searches are used for finding illegal torrents? What % of Google searches are used for finding illegal torrents? That's what will matter to the court.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Use Google to search for torrent files. Thanks for the heads up. :) Honestly though Torrentz have jumped the shark so to speak. Most people I know have moved on to other means of file sharing. Anytime I download a torrent file I get a nasty email from my ISP stating that I was flagged for copyright infringement by a third party.
[rant]As for the people at isoHunt I wish them well and hope they aren't treated to badly. I say that because the powers that be seem to really over react to what they were doing. I think a lot of it is that they don't understand what it is so they fear it. On the other side of the coin technicalities aside they had to know that they were doing something that was not completely legit. Should they be publicly executed hell no. Should they be put out of business perhaps. That should be determined on the merits of sharing other peoples work without monetary compensation.
We may justify downloading some things that we haven't paid the asking price for by saying I can't afford it anyway so I am not hurting them. But if it is free what motivation do we have as a society on a whole to get out there and earn the asking price so we can afford it. I really think the music industry especially shot themselves in the foot by gouging in the 90's for CD's. If they had lowered prices instead of raising them I doubt the majority of their customers would have even given file sharing a second thought. Except for the occasional sneaker net sharing it would have been something that only happened on college campuses. They could have kept customers by innovating like including collectible coins or 3d album art that could not be easily scanned. But no they raised the prices even more and then start litigating. [/rant]
I agree the fines they charge file sharers are ridiculous and I realize isoHunt is not even actually sharing the files just pointers. I think their argument is meant to point out that what they are doing is not that different from Google. Honestly if they can implicate Google then some really good lawyers are most likely going to be coming to bat. The name does not imply illegal torrents ISO's are disk images that could be anything. Many Linux distributions are legitimately available through torrent as ISO files.
"The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget." -Thomas Szasz
The increasing fad among geeks to self diagnose themselves as mildly autistic ever since some report came out a few years ago has really tended to turn my stomach. What the fuck is wrong with you that you go around wanting to have something be wrong with you?
Most likely it's mild autism.
I think the point of these comments about "I have asperger's" or "I Have ADHD" is that there seems to be an exploded in recent years. Now every kid who doesn't pay attention has ADHD, and every kid who is antisocial has asperger's. I seriously think that had I been born in 2000 instead of 1980, that I would have been branded as having some kind of level of ADHD or Asperge'rs. I've seen kids who were diagnosed with ADHD or aspergers, and It amazes me how similar some of our behaviours are.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
while torrent is a valid way to distribute something like Linux, isoHunt is hardly where a person looking for a Linux distro would go to find it
Bullshit, I do it all the time. Way faster than clicking through websites to find a download link.
Hey, I finally got my first freak! Took you long enough!
I don't think it's Isohunt's fault that the majority of things that third parties choose to share via torrent are illegal.
Hey, I finally got my first freak! Took you long enough!
The guy who tells you how to find an assassin is still considered a criminal, even if he doesn't do the killing...
Hmm, I wonder what a Linux-equivalent of an assassin is like.
Democracy is for the people; you only vote once per season and we'll do the rest of the work for you don't have to.
Thankfully, copyright infringement is not a criminal category yet.
Haven't you read the front page?
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/11/03/16/1441221/White-House-Wants-New-Copyright-Law-Crackdown
It doesn't seem to matter what % of the time I speed vs. what % of the time other people speed when I argue against my speeding tickets.
Check out my lame java blog at www.javachopshop.com
I know there's laws for facilitating criminal law crimes, I wasn't aware there was a similar law for civil matters.
Check out my lame java blog at www.javachopshop.com
It's like starting up a site called HunterHunt. Not the site owner's fault that 99% of hunters on that site hunt humans you don't like in exchange for a few thousand in cash.
Want to improve your Karma? Instead of "Post Anonymously", try the "Post Humously" option.
That's probably true. But we've seen several court verdicts (Piratebay, Limewire etc) that show the courts consider it's the intent that's important, which would give Google a much better chance in court than Isohunt and the like have.
Isohunt, TPB, Limewire run their business on providing access to copyrighted content, take that away and 99% of their users aren't interested anymore. Google providing access to torrent links is more like an accidental side-effect, and 99% of their users wouldn't even notice if all torrent links were removed from Google tomorrow. Perhaps Slashbots think that shouldn't make a difference, but the courts seem to think it does.
Intent isn't very relevent for speeding, because you're required to monitor the speed of your vehicle. Intent matters in many other areas of the law (though sadly a great many recent laws specifically exclude intent, which is pretty messed up).
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
random but why is Toyota on your Corp Blacklist?
'...if only "Jumping to a Conclusion" was an event in the Olympics.'
let's look at it a different way... if someone who has never dealt with illegal material before wants to look, which is more likely the first place they go?
I'd say google most likely.
"I do illegal stuff, and more than he does, but as a percentage I don't do it as much as he does!" isn't a very good defence.
Let's face it, there's only one reason the media industry is going after the small players and not google, and that's because google would likely put up a much better fight.
out of curiosity, do you think google would have a better chance of arguing exactly the same point to the same judge? and if so, why?
Fortunately for the point he was trying to make, exclusivity isn't the issue--he just got that little detail wrong. Actively promoting illegal activity is the issue (or an issue). Grokster lost when they tried the Sony Betamax defense ("substantial non-infringing uses") because they were actively promoting the illegal uses of their system. Google has never crossed that line. I don't know if IsoHunt (or Pirate Bay) has crossed that line, but the question is likely to be key.
The intent of Google is to be a general-purpose search engine, as evidenced by the % of its searches that are questionable.
The intent of IsoHunt is to be a special-purpose search engine for people who seek to violate copyright, as evidenced by the % of its searches that are questionable.
I'm not sure why /. has such a hard time getting that "intent matters" every time a new place where people go for copyright violations hits the news. OTOH, I'm sure you're right and the MAFIAA would sue Google too if they thought they could.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
I missed the part where the Pirate Bay wasn't still up and running...
Modding someone down does not stop them expressing an opinion. It does not even stop people who want to from viewing that opinion. Modding down is not silencing people, censoring them, or violating their freedom of speech.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
Which just goes to show drug-dealers still don't have their shit together. He should have said something like, "Look for that red-haired guy who hangs out down by the C building. He always has good stuff. Tell him referral code #24C67."
"Believe me!" -- Donald Trump
Intent matters only in sentencing. We aren't there yet. So far they are arguing as to whether or not being a search engine for a specific type of file that is in itself only a link to another file that may, or may not, contain illegal content.
The question is, is it illegal? if so, then google is guilty of the same offence as isohunt. Sentencing can decide what penalties should be associated with that. But the point is that if someone commits an illegal act, we shouldn't overlook it just because they can afford better lawyers, or conversely, we shouldn't select who to prosecute based soley on who can't afford to defend themselves properly.
Google has never actively promoted the illegal uses of their system. That clearly puts them in the safe area between the exception to contributory infringement laws carved out by the Sony Betamax case ("substantial non-infringing uses") and the limits to that exception defined in the Grokster case ("no active promotion of the illegal uses"). Can IsoHunt say the same? (I honestly don't know.)
No, the Sony Betamax decision established that mere percentages of illegal use are not relevant, but the Grokster decision established that how you promote your technology is. With those precedents, the case is likely to come down to the question of whether IsoHunt ever actively promoted the illegal uses of their system—something Google has never been accused of.
If it does, as you suggest, come down to a matter of intent, how do they legally show intent in a courtroom?
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Well, that's stupid. Now, when the cops ask people for help, they won't get any. GG cops.
hookers and grits.
And what if one was diagnosed with it by a doctor? What does that make one? How does one tell the difference between people who were formally diagnosed with it and those who have self-diagnosed only?
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Well, increased awareness can be a vicious cycle with increased diagnosis.
ADHD overdiagnosis is a topic of some contention, of course, with many people believing that ADHD is overdiagnosed because some teachers (who are NOT medical professionals and should not be making medical recommendations) keep sending any student who isn't properly docile off until the parents give in and drug them.
Then again, having known an actual ADHD kid growing up, the difference between his behavior on and off meds was night-and-day. With meds, he could actually hold a conversation and do his homework. Off meds, he wound up after a few minutes running around pounding on stuff and traumatized the living hell out of his sister. So it's not that every kid with ADHD is misdiagnosed, either.
As for Asperger's... again, see "increased awareness." Is it possible that someone who are "merely antisocial" and "mild asperger's" may behave very similarly? Quite possibly. Could that lead to a misdiagnosis, or mis-self-diagnosis? Absolutely. Does it mean that maybe, they should see about at least an initial consult regarding the possibility? Not necessarily a bad idea.
Cops can arrest you, but the arrest might not stick if they don't have probable cause.
Without probable cause the cop risks being sued for false arrest.
Has ISOHunt ever received a DMCA takedown notice?
I didn't say anything about intent. I was talking about the portion of my activity which is in violation of the law vs. someone else's activity, which was in direct response to the GGP post.
Check out my lame java blog at www.javachopshop.com
umm..... Let's put your straw man another way...
I don't even think you have a clue what the hell they are... It's a sadly not decreasing fad amongst retarded people that they think anything different from them is somehow wrong and they are perfect arseholes. You are an arsehole, you are right.
They also appear to thing that those 'different' people aren't really different (lack of empathy and social understanding I'd expect, maybe ICD-10 Anti-social personality disorder), because they think themselves more acceptable if everyone else is an arsehole too.... just a retarded one who doesn't do the right thing.
One notable trait is the self superiority, or authoritarian and manipulative nature of such wannabe individuals. They may for instance think that people can't possibly know anything for themselves (since they rely on authoritarian learning and teaching methods and rational) and may use phrases such as 'The increasing fad among geeks to self diagnose themselves'
fad ... put down the other person... ... well can be seen as a put down.
geek
self diagnose themselves... well I don't know how you self diagnose someone else... but making them seem selfish and not obeying the authoritarian society they would like to construct with their sociopath ways.
opp's I diagnosed your self.
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
"Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property."
Men change.
Jefferson's position on the granting of patents changed through the years. In his article "Godfather of American Invention," Silvio Bedini notes that in 1787 Jefferson's opposition to monopoly in any form led him to oppose patents. But by 1789, Jefferson's firm opposition had weakened. Writing to James Madison, Jefferson said he approved the Bill of Rights as far as it went, but would like to see the addition of an article specifying that "Monopolies may be allowed to person for their own productions in literature, and their own inventions in the arts, for a term not exceeding --- years, but for no longer term and for no other purpose."
In 1789, while Jefferson was still in Paris...the first patent act was enacted into law April 10, 1790. Under the new law, the Secretaries of War and State and the Attorney General constituted a three-man review board, with the Secretary of State (Jefferson), playing the leading role. Two months after the law was passed, Jefferson remarked it had "given a spring to invention beyond his conception."
Jefferson continued to perform his patent office duties until the patent act of February 21, 1793...
[T]he new law made the granting of patents almost entirely an automatic matter; the three-man review board was replaced by an administrative structure. In 1802, Secretary of State James Madison created a separate patent office for handling all claims.
In 1836, the patent law was completely rewritten, effecting a compromise of sorts between the strictness of Jefferson's tenure and the free-wheeling acceptance of all patent claims during the intervening years. The 1836 law is still in effect today.
Guiding Jefferson while patents came to him for review was the belief that patents should be given to particular machines, not to all possible applications or uses of them; that mere change in material or form gave no claim; and that exclusive rights of an invention must always be considered in terms of its social benefit.
Quoting Jefferson on invention and intellectual property rights is not without irony.
Jefferson was notoriously spendthrift. Living his life one jump ahead of the sheriff, as a proper Southern gentleman should.
Jefferson's architecture and invention were - with the exception of an early moldboard plow - almost exclusively - meant for use by men of his own race and class.
This was not man who was going to invent bifocals, a lightening rod or a Franklin stove. This was not a man who was going to ignite an industrial revolution.
Jefferson's workforce was slave labor.
He was obliged neither to publicly acknowledge a slave's contributions or to pay for them - and any promises of emancipation he may have made would prove empty. He was bankrupt.
He was obliged to educate his workforce - and that in Virginia would become dangerous even before his body was cold.
But what difference does it make what Jefferson said?
What do you think?
As far as |I see it, copyright exists for a practical purpose. The Us constitution says it is "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts". The original copyright law - the Statue of Queen Anne described itself as "An Act for the encouragement of learning".
It's not about moral rights, and never has been, although it is true that the media cartels do present it this way. It's a practical measure to encourage the publication of creative works.
The pirate bay got shafted by judges on the MAFIAA's payroll.
A given torrent file has no purpose except for the distribution of a specific set of large files. If the file cannot be legally distributed, the torrent file has no legal use.
If outlook could only be used for sending death threats, then I suspect Microsoft would be in trouble.
asperger's is asocial not anti--social. egocentric but not egoistic.
anti social personality disorder is under ICD-10 and mutually exclusive, it's a theory of mind thing.
brain imaging on people with AS seems to show more empathy not less.
what's your theory?
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
Pirate Bay and IsoHunt's business models
Your failure is to assume that these websites have "business models" -- they're run by people (not for-profit corporations) who barely collect enough ad revenue to pay for the hosting costs.
Then you assume that the piracy comes first. I mean sure, The Pirate Bay, it's all about piracy, right? But the name is trying to poke fun at the problem, which existed before the site did.
And the problem is that anyone who refuses to censor their website on the say-so of anyone who claims without proof or adjudication to be a copyright holder, becomes a place where copyright infringement is common. So of course the response from Hollywood, who cares about copyright but not censorship, is that anyone who dares to wait for a court order before removing content is doing something wrong. As if "prior restraint" should be the default response from a website, rather than something of highly questionable constitutionality for the government to require.
So keep siding with them. We'll create a world where a take down is mandatory and fully-automated so that copyright can be enforced without the court system. Obviously no one will ever abuse that facility for censorship.
What % of IsoHunt searches are used for finding illegal torrents? What % of Google searches are used for finding illegal torrents? That's what will matter to the court.
Why would that matter?
Or, put it this way: What percentage of Google torrent searches are used for finding infringing materials vs. non-infringing? Do you think it's much different than the same percentage on isoHunt?
Intent doesn't just matter for sentening - I'm not sure why you would think that. Most criminal laws require mens rea to determine that a crime actually occured, as well as what degree of crime.
It's clear that IsoHunt in practice enabled people looking for illegal content to find that content - Google too. But if the intent when creating IsoHunt was to specificaly enable copyright violation, and the intent of Google wasn't, that's the important difference. Facts such as the predominant use of each system go towards intent.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Your logic makes no sense. You're saying that whether someone has done something wrong depends on what other people do. Is that even constitutional?
Here, try a hypothetical: All of Hollywood gets together in an illegal cartel to back a new Rupert Murdoch plan to make search engines pay to index their websites. So a large majority of "legitimate" websites set up their robots.txt to disallow the site from being indexed unless a search engine has paid. Then Microsoft signs an exclusive deal with the entire cartel for Bing. The amount of legitimate websites returned as Google search results thereby plummets, but the infringing websites are all still there because they aren't in on the cartel, which means they're now most of the search results. Is Google now on the same footing as isoHunt, from your perspective?
Speeding is what is called a strict liability offence. It does not require the intent, or more specifically the mens rea. The court only needs to establish the act, or specifically the actus reus.
:. Ultimate Control Dedicated/VM Servers
ADD and ADHD drugs are sought after stimulants. That's why it's over diagnosed. At my little brother's college the doctors at the school clinic give out Adderall like candy. About half his friends are on the stuff. The kids love it because its speed, and the school loves it because test scores shoot way up.
I wasn't aware there was a fad of self diagnosing Asperger's. I know two people who do have Asperger's and I wouldn't describe them as geeky, just painfully socially awkward... except they are not, at least not anymore. They went through years of therapy and more or less overcame their disability.
Cool art gallery, if you're into that sort of thing.
Put it this way, if the majority of the links at isohunt were linking to legally shareable media, then they wouldn't be facing this legal battle. Ergo, Google is fine.
It's dispiriting to read all the geeks and "smart" people who would rather prove how clever they are by putting down isohunt than actually help or, you know, care. Whatever technical BS arguments you may want to make opposing the RIAA/MPAA scams should be a duty that takes precedence over quipping on how much "pirate" this or that.
You KNOW how computers work (they are copying machines) and you know how hypocritical is the quest to protect the "content" or "IP" of the very richest only.
Stupidity is its own reward.
Of course I do!
How else can I get my Hug Box paid for by Medicare?
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
Back in November last year:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1874644&cid=34278914
- Sometimes this crap is to easy
So, we can hope this bill is harmless and holds up in court for real copyright infringement cases (if it passes the house which I hope it doesn't), or we can assume lawyers will use this to basically shut down the internet, or at least the search part of it, I mean, Google is an information company, which provides a massive search for illegal files, I can see it in court now
Google Lawyer: "But your honor we do not target these rouge servers with illegal files, they are just massively linked and our engine lists them automatically"
DA: "No sir, I did a search for "warez" on Google.com and it said displaying 25 of 5,019,193,012 sites.. which proves they just provide illegal software"
Judge: Point taken, shut them down! Who's next!
This is so obvious it hurts..
You don't have aspergers, you fucking drama queens.
Maybe not, but you probably do.
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
Ten and fifteen years ago, everyone went around saying they had ADD and ADHD. Now they go around saying they have Aspergers. You don't have aspergers, you fucking drama queens.
I nominate "being a man" as the next hip disorder to have.
Yeah, pretty soon 90% of slashdotters will claim to be male and Seumas will be just as incredulous.
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
I've seen kids who were diagnosed with ADHD or aspergers, and It amazes me how similar some of our behaviours are.
There's a good chance you actually have (an undiagnosed case of) one or the other.
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
Pirate Bay and IsoHunt's business models depend directly on people breaking the law, and to that extent they advocate and actively endorse such activity by others. If they did not, they would simply cease to exist, fading rapidly into obscurity.
By that logic, anyone company that makes a car capable of going faster than the speed limit is guilty.
No. Anyone making a car that people would only want to buy in order to drive it faster than the speed limit is guilty. You need to work on your analogies.
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
If the cops arrested you for apostrophe abuse, you would be convicted.
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
Back in high school, the cops did a drug sting on campus.
Thankfully, copyright infringement is not a criminal category yet.
Since when? Willful copyright infringement on a commercial scale has been a crime for a decade and a half, at least.
They busted the drug dealers AND the people that told them how to find the drug dealers.
By that reasoning, we could lock up most politicians. They've been telling me there's child porn on the internet for years.
Only if the politicians told you specifically where to go on the internet. I'm assuming they didn't bust people merely for saying, "There are drug dealers somewhere in Jefferson High School."
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
Intent matters only in sentencing.
What? Wait...what? *boggles at the absurdity*
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
What % of IsoHunt searches are used for finding illegal torrents? What % of Google searches are used for finding illegal torrents? That's what will matter to the court.
Well, that and the fact that IsoHunt marketed itself as a way to find pirated content, whereas Google markets itself as a general-use tool.
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
I know there's laws for facilitating criminal law crimes, I wasn't aware there was a similar law for civil matters.
Commercial copyright infringement is a crime under the US criminal code. It is at the combined discretion of the copyright holders and the US DOJ whether to prosecute or to sue (or neither).
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
facilitates copyright infringement
You say that like it's a crime.
Knowingly and intentionally facilitating commercial-scale copyright infringement is a crime.
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
If outlook could only be used for sending death threats, then I suspect Microsoft would be in trouble.
That would be a truly awesome product.
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
Actually isohunt is solely made to search other websites for torrent files. Torrent files are not illegal, and they are not copyrighted.
Actually, the torrent files are illegal if their sole purpose was to facilitate an illegal act (that is, transfer of infringing material). Furthermore, torrent files are copyrighted (automatically) by whoever created the torrent file.
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
They have actively been promoting illegal use. Search by filetype.
A huge proportion of certain filetypes are known to be very likely illegal to download. Google knew damn well what they were doing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IsoHunt#DMCA_takedown_notices
"You are only young once, but you can be immature forever." -www.animemusicvideos.org
I've seen kids who were diagnosed with ADHD or aspergers, and It amazes me how similar some of our behaviours are.
There's a good chance you actually have (an undiagnosed case of) one or the other.
Maybe something in the drinking water there? :P
The reason was the articles of Adrian Lamo, who was diagnosed with the "geek syndrome".
"Asperger’s is a mild form of autism that makes social interactions difficult, and can lead to obsessive, highly-focused behavior" /. geeks are socially awkward and have been highly focused - obsessed even - with computers for many years? (Certainly includes me for as long as I can remember!)
Seriously, how many of the
>>>Jefferson actually supported IP laws
Considering this long and lengthy argument from 1786, I don't know how can you reach that braiddead conclusion. Note the final bolded sentence.
Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property."
Jefferson's position seems pretty clear to me. He does not believe that the rights to ideas and inventions are property rights. Thus, there are not fundamental rights in the same way that property rights are (in the Lockian philosophy which underpins the US constitution). However, he does recognize the economic importance of protecting the creator's interests in "productions in literature, and [...] inventions in the arts" for a limited time through legislation.
This is in contrast to how many view "intellectual property" today. These people see the the ability to control the use and dissemination of ideas and expressions as a fundamental right which the law protects, rather than an artificial right which the law creates.
Be careful. People in masks cannot be trusted.
Emphasis mine:
You clearly haven't read enough RFCs! Otherwise, you would know that "should" means "maybe" which devolves into "fat chance, sucker!" as soon as the first asshole shows up.
Intent is at the heart of the consideration of relative guilt of Google vs. IsoHunt. It can be assumed that Google's low percentage of linked torrents (relative to total number of linked documents) indicates relatively honest[1] intent, whereas IsoHunt's high percentage of linked torrents (relative to total number of linked documents) indicates intent to aid copyright infringement. The percentage reasonably indicates intent because a judge cannot read minds, which is why IsoHunt will be screwed in court and not Google. The same logic (percentage implying intent to aid crime) does not apply to speeding.
[1] the notion of "honesty" is used pretty loosely in this context, with the assumption that most torrents exist for the purpose of copyright infringement rather than efficient distribution of Linux distros and World of Warcraft patches.
Are you suggesting that complex social situations render simple guidelines worthless? I don't care how complex the world can be; "two wrongs don't make a right" is always a good starting point.
So, if I'm a guy who can tell you how to find anyone on campus, I'm part of the problem as well, right? I can certainly tell you where to find the dealers, and even that they are dealers. That's Google in this case -- they know everyone and answer whatever you ask them
Or to make a more accurate point -- let's say I make a new "torrent search engine". All it does is search your terms +torrent +download on Google and scrape the results into a pretty page with my logo. How am I worse than Google?
The way you cut it off makes it sound like Jefferson thought IP was contrary to nature. In actuality, he thought IP had no natural justification but could have pragmatic justifications. If you want us to take you seriously, try being honest for once.
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
How is that relevant to my statement?
Hey, I finally got my first freak! Took you long enough!
We need copyright so we can have successful companies like and products like Canonical and Microsoft.
Like it, nice and subtle trolling.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Nowadays, they've got mild autism, dyslexia, ADHD and fuck knows what else, and their attention-seeking gets them sent to special schools, where their behaviour gets worse as it is excused away as being some sort of mental disorder, when in fact it is a combination of laziness, stupidity, inability to concentrate and stupidity, generally helped along by over-indulgent parents. And being stupid.
All it does is make it harder for people who genuinely have problems with autism, dyslexia, ADHD etc, as people just lump them intogether with the malingerers, wastrels and mummy's boys.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
I've seen kids who were diagnosed with ADHD or aspergers, and It amazes me how similar some of our behaviours are.
There's a good chance you actually have (an undiagnosed case of) one or the other.
No. There isn't.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
And what if one was diagnosed with it by a doctor? What does that make one? How does one tell the difference between people who were formally diagnosed with it and those who have self-diagnosed only?
The difference is that if someone actually has Asperger's (or whatever) people are willing to make allowances. When some obnoxious twat tries to excuse his bad manners, vile personality and appalling social ineptitude as self-diagnosed "Aspies" he's more likely just to get a smack in the mouth.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Back in high school, the cops did a drug sting on campus. They busted the drug dealers AND the people that told them how to find the drug dealers. being part of the problem means you are part of the problem.
Why would a drug user snitch on his dealer?
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
So guns DO kill people after all? And should be banned completely?
I don't think you can argue with the fact that guns do kill people (albeit not autonomously), the question is whether they have any other purpose.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Speeding is what is called a strict liability offence. It does not require the intent, or more specifically the mens rea. The court only needs to establish the act, or specifically the actus reus.
In the UK recently, someone got away without the customary licence ban for doing 110mph on a 70 mph limit motorway, because he claimed to be scared by the "foreign" lorry he was overtaking (i was on fark recently). Similarly, people have allegedly got away with speeding because they were taking their wife/child to hospital.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Intent matters only in sentencing.
Just say IANAL rather than wasting time writing nonsense to prove it.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
In the US it varies from state to state, but in most places the actual offense is "failure to control speed". It's often an "administrative citation" (effectively a tax), not technically a crime, as a work-around to the fact that the constitution gives you specific rights if accused of a crime. In any case, the cop is always supposed to use his judgement before issuing any citation - that's seen as a feature, not a bug.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
It goes to intent. As others have pointed out: how the service is marketed is more important in establishing intent, but the company's reaction to an obvious usage pattern counts too.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
That logic would make cars illegal "if their sole purpose was to facilitate an illegal act", as well as knives, guns, paperclips, pens, paper, peanut butter, the Stay Puft Marshmellow man....
You could also see it so that a torrent is a virtualization of it's contents, in other words, the same thing.
Well it should be an interesting case. Plenty of interesting arguments to be made either way.
I think technically speaking ISOHunt is in the right (abit shady), however the other side has political clout, which while it shouldn't enter the courtroom it probably will. There will be tremendous pressure on the court to find ISOHunt guilty of something.
Likely one of the arguments will be that ISOHunt links are 90% copyrighted products and therefor the intent is that in mind. If I was ISOHunt's lawyer I would then continue along the Google argument and say 90% of Google's links are porn, so they should be considered as that as their intent.
I don't know exactly, since I have no real data on the exact percentage of users which "stayed on", but www.mininova.com is still running after 1.5 years of only supplying legal torrents. So, the answer to your question would seem to be: yes.
All this is academic, since it is obvious to anyone who is technically knowledgeable that P2P is feasible without centralized servers, and this becomes more and more feasible as technology progresses. And even without that, the "sue-a-mole" strategy isn't working particularly well.
> but if you're asked "Dude, do you know how to get some pot around here?"
Unfortunately, in the technical world we're talking about, the question might actually be "Dude, do you have a file whose SHA256 hash is e0ef7229e64c61596d8be928397e19fcc542ac920c4132106fb1ec2295dd73d1"? And you could certainly be able to say "yes" without knowing squat about what is actually in that file (since it is encrypted, with some other means, say a darknet, or even just a forum totally independent from your file sharing site, being used to distribute the decryption keys and the correspondences betweens hashes and desired content).
I think they probably would, actually, just based on business reputation.
I'm not saying I think that's fair; I just think that's probably the way it is.
No, I couldn't.
A envelope is not a virtualisation of it's contents. An envelope is an envelope. Envelopes are not illegal, no matter what they are used for.
But a torrent is still a unique representation of the material, not just a blank, anonymous container.