Megaupload Founder Dodges Jail Again; Wife Under Investigation

New submitter xenn writes "The linked article, titled by TVNZ as 'Kim Dotcom bail appeal dismissed, funds released,' somehow doesn't quite capture the drama the lies within... 'Meanwhile, it emerged today that U.S. authorities are investigating Dotcom's pregnant wife, Mona Dotcom, as part of a world-wide sting on Internet piracy. Toohey said she had received a preliminary application from the U.S. indicating that Mona could have been involved in Megaupload.'" Torrentfreak adds that U.S. attempts to put Kim Dotcom back in jail failed, and he's been granted access to his bank accounts to cover essential expenses (to the tune of $30+k per month).

Comments

30K/month is probably "essential"

[Anonymous Coward]

30K is not that much to pay the lawyers...

Re:30K/month is probably "essential"

[Anonymous Coward]

Given the summary "$30+k", it depends on the value of "k".

Re:30K/month is probably "essential"

[Forty Two Tenfold]

$32+k

Re:30K/month is probably "essential"

[SplashMyBandit]

Well, in the New Zealand news it said he initially asked for NZ$220 / month (nearly quarter of a million kiwi dollars). That's a lot of cheezeburgas!

Re:30K/month is probably "essential"

[Anonymous Coward]

No it isnt, 220k NZD is about enough for a birthday card

Re:30K/month is probably "essential"

[RivenAleem]

30+1.3806488(13)×1023 is not a lot really. Odd stipulation though, was it though up by the same people that Google had bidding on patents?

Re:30K/month is probably "essential"

[RivenAleem]

1.3806488(13)×10^-23

Silly formatting.....

It's a witch hunt

[Anonymous Coward]

The feds should be going after the users that upload the content, not the hosts.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[Anonymous Coward]

A good way to stop the popular demand for drugs, too. Worked for Mao.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[GameboyRMH]

Because that's less of a witch hunt...

Re:It's a witch hunt

[Anonymous Coward]

Wait... stop going after the guys at the top and go after the uploaders? Wouldn't that be MORE of a witch hunt?

Re:It's a witch hunt

[spidercoz]

no, it'd be a wild goose chase, just ask the RIAA how it's working for them

Re:It's a witch hunt

[Anonymous Coward]

Regardless, I still think he should be locked away for a long time, honestly.

Not for the piracy, no, but because he was enough of a fucking douchenozzle to change his name to "Dotcom".

Seriously. That shit should've died back in the 90s with the tech bubble.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[sjames]

The problem is they're going after the shop keeper who might or might not have actually known that some of his customers were witches.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[Beardo the Bearded]

It's more like them putting Sony Execs in jail because a Walkman might play non-licenced MP3s.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[Gilmoure]

Or ducks. You can't always tell.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[g0bshiTe]

I heard Tech Bubble was his cousin.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem is they're going after the shop keeper who might or might not have actually known that some of his customers were witches.

If that were true, I'd be upset too, but they claim to have evidence showing they not only knew what was going on, but participated. If it's true that the staff at Megaupload was downloading illegal copies from their own system, then there is no "might" about it. It's more like the shop keeper who is a witch and caters to witches and goes out and does witchy things with them. Now, the government needs to prove their case, but they say they have e-mails showing the people involved sharing links to "pirated" data. Sounds pretty open and closed, not "might" to me.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[Znork]

The Feds should be going after the MAFIAA execs for fraudulent accounting, withholding taxes, racketeering and corruption.

But it seems they've got a lot of dirty cops and bought judges on their payroll these days.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[ArhcAngel]

Gotta nuke em from orbit...It's the only way to be sure.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[sjames]

I might be a bit more sympathetic to their position had they not burned the shop down before even beginning to hold a trial.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[Anonymous Coward]

Only problem with this is that court documents point to an informant giving info to the U.S. attorneys that points to the people behind Megaupload (which includes Kim "Dotcom") shared links to infringing content (to download and use themselves), as well as UPLOADING infringing content.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[Anonymous Coward]

I think we should just banish ALL content. If no one was allowed to produce it, then no one would be able to copy it or share it. Problem solved, we could go back to living without the threat of criminal offense for using technology.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[Anonymous Coward]

His name was Bubble... The Tech Bubble!

Re:It's a witch hunt

[Digital Vomit]

No, the fed should not be wasting its time on something which should no longer be against the law and should go back to investigating actual crimes which have a negative effect on society.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[westlake]

The feds should be going after the users that upload the content, not the hosts.

Megaupload was paying bounties for hot files.

That takes you light years distant from being an innocent host ----and it means that the uploaders whose rewards can be traced are toast --- the only question is how long it will take before they feel the burn.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[Anonymous Coward]

LOL

when they used to do that, people like you whined like children that they should go after the hosters, not the downloaders. Try and get your anti-copyright story straight, at least.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[mywhitewolf]

also, there is a lot of water between the country who's laws he broke and where the server is and where he lives. i can understand the shutdown, but the arrest is a real stretch of jurisdiction.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[mywhitewolf]

crimes which have a negative effect on society.

I think you're underestimating the consequences of the next Kardashian show getting canceled! lives are at stake people, this is serious business!

Re:It's a witch hunt

[justforgetme]

As an afterthought, maybe they should do that?

Re:It's a witch hunt

[tehcyder]

The problem is they're going after the shop keeper who might or might not have actually known that some of his customers were witches.

Whether you think he's morally right or not, it is a bit fucking pathetic to try to pretend that Kim Dotcom may not have known that megaupload was being used for pirated material.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[tehcyder]

Seconded. He is guilty of an appalling lack of taste, so he should be barred fromf his gentleman's club, his military rank stripped from him, and be forced to resign his seat in the House of Lords.

The man's a cad, a bounder, and a general all round tick.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[tehcyder]

No, the fed should not be wasting its time on something which should no longer be against the law and should go back to investigating actual crimes which have a negative effect on society.

While there is still a law against, you cannot blame law enforcement for enforcing that law. You need to get the law changed.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[xenobyte]

The feds should be going after the users that upload the content, not the hosts.

The uploaders did very little wrong either. They just re-uploaded data found elsewhere on the net, and that's basically just copying a lot of ones and zeros. They have no way of knowing it's actually copyrighted material - they have never seen the source and its attached copyright notices.

No, it's the scene groups that do the actually ripping - those are the ones with copyrighted material in hand that actually infringe on copyrights.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[sjames]

I didn't know bits could fuck!

I'm sure he knew in the abstract that someone would abuse the service in the same way we know that not everyone buying a crowbar has good intentions, but that's not a crime.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[Anonymous Coward]

They have no way of knowing it's actually copyrighted material

Yeah, see here I have this file named "Avatar.mp4". It seems to have some basic CGI and 'actors' that look an awful lot like Sigourney Weaver and Sam Worthington. Must be something a few college pals cooked up in their basement.

Plausible deniability: File Not Found.

Re:It's a witch hunt

[KingBenny]

yea, this week here a guy gets busted for uploading a kaiser chiefs album pre-release ... cops bust into his house, find a lot of movies and such stored on some hard disks , result : 65k, thats sixty five thousand euros to pay, the guys life is ruined, average joe could make that in about four years i guess, if he didnt eat. Now me, being an ex-convicted masscriminal i got fined for selling dope : 5000 ... (not going into my case) if you think up and downloading warrants ruining someones life, i can see why you would post that as an anonymous coward. To them its pretty simple, they get about what he could have spent in a whole life on cds perhaps and then they're gone, what they SHOULD do is find ways to re-think everything, piracy as its called is not something new, i'm gonna repeat my same thing again : with the cassette recorder and everyone taping at home the music industry was going broke, now its this, in ten years its something else, these are extortion tactics and they are destroying peoples lives. What's needed is some solidarity : IF excessive fines are given, nothing from that label should be bought anymore, collectively, until they take it back, that is the only possible reply

Re:It's a witch hunt

[Anonymous Coward]

-1, Red Herring

EVERYTHING is copyrighted. If you create something, it is copyrighted automatically by default.

What GP should have said was, the uploaders have no way of knowing that any particular copy of the file was being distributed without the permission of the copyright holder.

And before you assume that just because they found it online, it automatically is without permission... no, it's not. The author could have released it online. The author could have even leaked it anonymously online for the publicity. If so, that's not an unauthorized copy, and it is not a violation of copyright to reupload it.

Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[CajunArson]

If this were a CEO, doctor, or lawyer who made less than half of what this guy makes and were arrested for something that wasn't related to infringing IP rights then the usual lynch mob would be out screaming about how all "rich" people are evil and we need to destroy Wallstreet and kill all the Republicans, ban Faux News, etc. etc. [insert administration approved Media Matters talking points here].

When the perpetrator is a guy who got rich by getting kickbacks to facilitate piracy, however, he's suddenly some Robin Hood hero who takes from the evil rich music & movie companies to give to uh... himself. Suddenly he's no longer an evil 1%er and is our new personal hero just like Michael Moore & Bill Maher.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Trepidity]

Are we reading the same Slashdot? People around here love rich technologists whenever they do anything that the Slashdot crowd considers good/interesting/cool. Kim Dotcom is hardly the only rich person to get plaudits; people can't fall over themselves fast enough with praise whenever John Carmack is mentioned, and Elon Musk (Tesla, SpaceX) has a large fanbase as well.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[leonardluen]

We like him because he is sort of our "Robin Hood". he takes from the big media companies and gives to the media-poor...

the audience of this site typically hates MPAA/RIAA they are like the sheriff. and we don't entirely like most IP laws and think they are too restrictive.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Anonymous Coward]

30+k does seem excessive, unless this amount also includes money to be spent on legal council, at which case you could easily blow through that in a single month. Fucking lawers are expensive.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Anonymous Coward]

Difference between a 1%er and Dotcom is that the guy actually spends money at something close to the rate that normal people do, rather than gathering more and more and more and more while changing the rules of society in order to gain more and more and more.

If all the 1%ers were like him then there wouldn't really be such a big issue.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[MozeeToby]

Yeah, how dare they complain about wealth disparity that's barely higher than it was during the Great Depression, the nerve of those people.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Talderas]

Unless the rich technologist is Bill Gates.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[MozeeToby]

If he has a mortgage on his $5 million house that alone will eat into most of that amount. And there are good reasons the fabulously wealthy would have a loan rather than pay cash, namely the fact that once you get to a certain amount of money, using it to generate more money is pretty easy. You'll probably come out better off with a loan with a crazy low interest rate (since you have the cash and income to cover it times 10) and invest the same money in something else (if you make even a 7% profit you come out well ahead).

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[DeadDecoy]

I think the problem here is not that he's rich and probably of questionable morals, but that there is an imbalance of justice that is being applied. Here, there is a concerted effort to pursue an individual who is key in distributing probably millions of dollars worth in copyrights. Meanwhile, the justice system couldn't give two shits about prosecuting bankers for predatory loan practiced or curtailing insider trading among congress critters. As such, this event doesn't demonstrate one guy getting nailed for doing something wrong but rather one rich group going after a slightly less-rich individual to protect their profits. This activities of the former even extend to the non-rich individuals. Given this, it's hard to be cheerful when justice is not being applied for justice's-sake but rather for moneyed interests.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[forkfail]

The problem with your argument is this: you assume that those who see a problem with the distribution of wealth think that we should not reward merit at all.

This is not the case.

What is the case is that the disparity of wealth, when it grows too extreme, does not drive industry; it does not build a middle class, and it rewards existent wealth as opposed to rewarding hard work, diligence and innovation. Especially when so much of it is hoarded in offshore accounts.

An extreme disparity of wealth leads to a third world economy (see also Mexico) and destroys the middle class. And historically, when it gets bad enough, it causes a nation to rip itself apart.

Furthermore, it leads to corruption of democracy, as we've seen in this country. From Citizens United to the "private fundraisers", too much of our system is bought and paid for by the concentration of wealth that we've allowed to develop in the hands of the very few. It warps both the social fabric, and

Are all successful people in the 1% evil? No. Are all of their gains always ill gotten? No. However, the concentration of wealth in this nation, the disparity of income for effort, has grown so extreme that it no longer furthers those things that capitalism is supposed to be good at promoting: hard work, merit, innovation and the rest of the values that it is supposed to drive.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone who sees him as the good guy is wrong. He is an evil 1%'er. The RIAA and MPAA are evil too. Just like in politics, you cheer for the lesser of evils.

Who in their right mind would consider Michael Moore as anything more than a blowhard buffoon? He is an idiot, and anyone who thinks he's a hero is also an idiot. I have no idea who Bill Maher is, and I don't care enough to find out, so I won't address his heroism.

I believe that the vast majority of /.'ers would agree with me on these points, and you give us far less credit than we deserve.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[MozeeToby]

[...] while changing the rules of society in order to gain more and more and more.

To be fair, rather than changing the rules he just chooses to ignore them, or at the very least interpret them in a way that allows him to make millions of dollars at other people's expense. I completely agree that the current copyright and patent system is broken and unrealistic in a modern world, but that doesn't mean I think people should be able to become multi-millionares by helping people distribute other people's work.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Dunbal]

The beauty of politics is that there is always a mob willing to scream about anything. Success is determined by how you are prepared to use that mob.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[spidercoz]

He got rich by having no ethics, just like wall streeters. Fuck him AND the horse he rode in on. And it pisses me off that I have to defend this piece of shit against the questionable-at-best tactics that have been used against him by law enforcement. Two wrongs don't make a right.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah actually kim schmitz is a complete prick and he probably deserves everything he gets. I suspect this is why he was targeted *first* because after he gets convicted then it will set prescient to destroy other more ethical characters in the same business,

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Beardo the Bearded]

Yeah, the rich technologist Bill Gates who has blown his billions on malaria research, HIV/AIDS research, composting toilet technology, etc.

What an asshole.

Come to think of it, Windows machines might be used for piracy. Maybe they should be investigating some folks in Richmond...

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[C0R1D4N]

Whats Virginia got to do with it?

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[dgatwood]

People around here love rich technologists whenever they do anything that the Slashdot crowd considers good/interesting/cool.

Unless the rich technologist is Bill Gates.

When, exactly, was Microsoft good, interesting, or cool?

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[g0bshiTe]

The 1%'rs usually make their money off the backs of the other 99%.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[g0bshiTe]

^ Mod funny.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Anonymous Coward]

You're getting slashdot confused with reddit. Remove idle from the main page, and then you can tell them apart.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Urban Garlic]

> When, exactly, was Microsoft good, interesting, or cool?

In the mid- to late 1980s.

In those days, IBM a monopolistic corporate behemoth that suppressed innovation to protect their market, and we all suspected that their long term strategy in the PC marketplace was "embrace and extinguish", in favor of the more lucrative mainframe trade that restricted computation to people who could pay a lot.

Microsoft, on the other hand, had a reasonably well-documented OS with lots of hooks to hang extensions on, and decent development tools that weren't too expensive. MS-DOS opened up the machine and gave you convenient access to it at many levels, you really felt like you could do anything with it.

You may vacate my lawn at your convenience.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[billcopc]

Kim Dotcom isn't a hero, he's a fraud artist. That said, if he has the resources and visibility to pry the lid off the copyright system and its hordes of legal goons, I'll at least give him partial credit. It's less about the actual money, and more about what you do with that money. Right now, copyright is largely used as a "rich get richer" weapon, in part because it is an expensive system to maintain and enforce. If someone halfway around the world decides to upload my app to RapidShare, I have to pay some suit-wearing prick a few thousand in legal consultations, just to get the ball rolling. So for the sake of a $20 piece of software, enforcing copyright makes my lawyer $2000 richer, and me $1980 poorer - assuming I even get my $20 back which is very unlikely.

Your Robin Hood comment is spot-on. Yes, I think Dotcom is a scumbag, but he's less of a scumbag than the thousands of executives behind Disney, Viacom, Sony, Time Warner. He'll also be much easier to take down, even after he takes a bite out of those media cartels. Or, as we radicalist nutbars say: "the end justifies the means".

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[scot4875]

Doctors and most lawyers aren't rich. Many are well off, but few are rich.

--Jeremy

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[misexistentialist]

The billions were made through assholery: laundering the money through a personal charity to pretend that a clean asshole is not an asshole is just another way of shitting on the world.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[dthx1138]

Meanwhile, the justice system couldn't give two shits about prosecuting bankers for predatory loan practiced or curtailing insider trading among congress critters.

Two things: One, the predatory lending practices and other shady shit that wall street did prior to the financial collapse was for the most part perfectly legal. That was the problem, and we don't do ex-post-facto laws around here. AFAIK, in the cases where there were illegal actions, investigations are ongoing (also, congress managed to change the laws for next time. See Dodd-Frank).

Secondly, the justice department has no control over insider trading in congress. Again, that's a legal activity which some congressional members are trying to make illegal by passing a bill. Separation of powers, my friend.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[DeadDecoy]

You're right. Those are bad examples. I guess the point I was trying to make is that there is a lot of imbalance that exists, which those in power do not pursue with the fervor. Megauploads, does not explicitly distribute copyrighted materials but enables it, putting it on some darkish-gray line with respect to the law. Meanwhile there are other practices which fall in some similar gray area, but little effort is made to correct for them.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[misexistentialist]

that doesn't mean I think people should be able to become multi-millionares by helping people distribute other people's work

That's pretty much how it's done. The owners of your company don't pay you royalties. Bust just like them, the guy who owns one of the most popular websites in the world deserves to be rich.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Anonymous Coward]

If this were a CEO, doctor, or lawyer who made less than half of what this guy makes and were arrested for something that wasn't related to infringing IP rights then the usual lynch mob would be out screaming about how all "rich" people are evil and we need to destroy Wallstreet and kill all the Republicans, ban Faux News, etc. etc. [insert administration approved Media Matters talking points here].

When the perpetrator is a guy who got rich by getting kickbacks to facilitate piracy, however, he's suddenly some Robin Hood hero who takes from the evil rich music & movie companies to give to uh... himself. Suddenly he's no longer an evil 1%er and is our new personal hero just like Michael Moore & Bill Maher.

It's more a case of why isn't he being prosectuted for breaking New Zealand laws. As a New Zealander I couldn't give a toss if our courts sentence him to 50 years, being Americas lacky is what grinds my gears. I bet David Lange would turn in his grave, the only leader we have ever had to tell America to go fuck itself.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[styrotech]

In the mid- to late 1980s

DOS was never interesting or cool - even in the mid to late eighties. Just about every other personal computer patform around at the time was far more interesting and way cooler - Amigas, Apple Macs, Atari STs, Acorns etc.

In those days, IBM a monopolistic corporate behemoth that suppressed innovation to protect their market, and we all suspected that their long term strategy in the PC marketplace was "embrace and extinguish", in favor of the more lucrative mainframe trade that restricted computation to people who could pay a lot.

Microsoft, on the other hand, had a reasonably well-documented OS with lots of hooks to hang extensions on, and decent development tools that weren't too expensive.

MS-DOS opened up the machine and gave you convenient access to it at many levels, you really felt like you could do anything with it.

I can see how that might've seemed good (although not exactly interesting or cool) to the corporate Lotus 123 crowd though.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[tqk]

... because after he gets convicted then it will set prescient to ...

How the !@#$ did you end up with prescient there?!? Are you idiots using auto-completion now? Well, STOP IT!

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Anonymous Coward]

It's the new prescient auto-completion - it knows what you're going to type.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[cdrguru]

Do notr forget that IBM was one of the first companies distributing source code for all their software products. You licensed the product, you got the source code.

Originally, nearly all of it was in straight Assembler language. Except the Fortran IV complier which had substantial parts written in POP, a custom language for writing a Fortran compiler. Later on, they introduced PL/S which was far less usable.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[LordLucless]

I completely agree that the current copyright and patent system is broken and unrealistic

that doesn't mean I think people should be able to become multi-millionares by helping people distribute other people's work.

That *is* the current copyright system.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[LordLucless]

in the cases where there were illegal actions, investigations are ongoing

Well, yeah, but they didn't seize all their assets and shutdown their business before beginning the investigation did they?

congress managed to change the laws for next time

Yes, that's part of a problem. The difference between law and morality is becoming more and more obvious to more and more people.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd even put early '90s into the "Microsoft stuff rox".

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[painandgreed]

Yeah, the rich technologist Bill Gates who has blown his billions on malaria research, HIV/AIDS research, composting toilet technology, etc.

His billions or Warren Buffett's and other people's? The Bill Gates Foundation has spent billions. Besides the initial seed money of a couple of hundred million, I can't really find any record of the amount of his own money Bill has put into the Gates Foundation as well as the money that others have. If you have a link, I'd like it because I've been wondering how much exactly he has put in. Warren Buffett's donation of 1.5 billion is pretty well documented however.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[chronoglass]

they are the 15%! and make their money off of the backs of the other 95% of us! (+- 10%)

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Anonymous Coward]

"If you cured cancer and AIDS next week, you would still owe two presents."

-- Kyle's cousin to Eric Cartman.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Anonymous Coward]

While they're there they may as well go after Altria

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Anonymous Coward]

Yet as the government gets larger & more regulatory & confiscatory the disparity grows. The problem isn't how much the rich have (although if their enterprises aren't allowed to fail it is a problem) but how the middle class and poor are getting poorer. The rich can only do basically 3 things with their money: successfully invest it, lose it, or buy the influence of a corrupt bloated government. If the people choose a small government that third option is removed because the only government that can't be corrupted and bought is one small enough and therefore powerless enough not to be worth corrupting and buying. The people continue to choose a large "helpful" government that continually reams them in the ass.

To clarify: A government large enough to keep the rich "under control" and "paying their fair share" will always be subverted by some of the rich and just fuck over everyone else. Government is the problem.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Confusador]

Bill gates is an asshole; all the charity work in the world doesn't change that. That doesn't mean I'm not glad he's doing it, but since there are plenty of charities that are not run by assholes, his foundation is never going to be in the running for my money.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Confusador]

I think the "prescient" was in reference to his knowing how the trial will end, the rest was just bad grammar. ;)

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[purpledinoz]

If this were a banker who stole $1.2 billion of customer's money, there would be no prosecution. Jon Corzine, the CEO of the now bankrupt MF Global, "lost" (ie - stole) $1.2 billion of customer money, and is not is jail. But the Feds are throwing everything they have at Kim Dotcom.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[tehcyder]

I can see how that might've seemed good (although not exactly interesting or cool) to the corporate Lotus 123 crowd though.

There's no snob like a geek snob.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[tehcyder]

We like him because he is sort of our "Robin Hood". he takes from the big media companies and gives to the media-poor...

He breaks the law in order to earn a lot of money. The guy's a fucking criminal.

I know everyone here's in favour of legalising pot (and the rest). That doesn't mean that drug smugglers and drug dealers aren't criminal wankstains.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[tehcyder]

the guy who owns one of the most popular websites in the world deserves to be rich.

Not if he's doing it by breaking the law. In that case, he deserves to go to prison.

Just because you use a computer to commit a crime doesn't excuse that crime, or make it cool and interesting.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[tehcyder]

Yes, having no government at all would certainly keep those rich bastards in their place.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[tehcyder]

If someone halfway around the world decides to upload my app to RapidShare, I have to pay some suit-wearing prick a few thousand in legal consultations, just to get the ball rolling. So for the sake of a $20 piece of software, enforcing copyright makes my lawyer $2000 richer, and me $1980 poorer - assuming I even get my $20 back which is very unlikely.

That is just an argument to make copyright infringement a criminal offence so that there is a meaningful deterrent.,

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[cylcyl]

She cried Wolfe

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Anonymous Coward]

Bill Gates is like the old joke about the school/church/townhall builder that is only known as the goat fscker.

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[Anonymous Coward]

thank you for the accurate assessment of mr gates. wealth hasn't changed that

Re:Uh oh-- it's a 1%er!

[leonardluen]

The RIAA/MPAA don't seem much better than criminals themselves most the time.

can't say i feel sorry for them because some other criminal is ripping them off.

"There is no honor among thieves"

Premature

[Anonymous Coward]

Have to wonder if the US over-played its hand in this case. Seems very little is going the way they've hoped.

Anyone know the score, btw? Is piracy, err.. unauthorized online archiving stamped out yet?

Re:Premature

[whoever57]

Have to wonder if the US over-played its hand in this case. Seems very little is going the way they've hoped.

No, I don't think so. The desired result has already been achieved -- they have wrecked his business.

All that is happening now is after-the-fact justification for wrecking the business and to avoid accusations that the sole purpose was not to go after a criminal, but to wreck a business that some powerful people did not like.

Re:Premature

[tehcyder]

I still don't understand the slashdot hivemind theory that it is OK for someone like Kim Dotcom to make a business earning millions off copyright infringement, but it is somehow evil for the actual copyright holders to make anything on principle.

Re:It's a witch hunt!

[El Torico]

The feds are using the classic witch hunt methodology as explained by Monty Python-

BEDEMIR: Tell me, what do you do with witches?
VILLAGER #2: Burn!
CROWD: Burn, burn them up!
BEDEMIR: And what do you burn apart from witches?
VILLAGER #1: More witches!

Don't worry, they'll be going after the other witches/uploaders/pirates once they go through Megaupload's servers.

$30,000 a month

[acedotcom]

well he is a big guy so thats gonna be one heck of a food bill.

Re:$30,000 a month

[oldmac31310]

His head must weigh fifty pounds on its own.

Re:$30,000 a month

[Kalriath]

You know, it's because he has Diabetes or something like that right, not because he eats a lot? (He has lost 16kg in jail though, for what it's worth).

Re:$30,000 a month

[Tim C]

While I make no comment on how much he may or may not eat, I do feel the need to point out that your argument would be rather more convincing if you sounded like you actually knew the cause of his weight.

Re:$30,000 a month

[Kalriath]

It's been reported in one or two articles from the early days of the trial.

Re:$30,000 a month

[Anonymous Coward]

You know, having diabetes could be due to his shitty eating habits and obesity right, not necessarily the other way around?

Let's play a game of "what if"

[Adrian Lopez]

What if the entertainment industry had never contributed money to the Obama campaign?

Would Megaupload have been shut down? Would Kim Dotcom have been arrested? Would ACTA have become an international agreement? Would ISPs have volunteered to adopt a "six strikes" policy against customers accused of copyright infringement? Would the culture of IP maximalism so evident in the Obama administration exist at all?

Re:Let's play a game of "what if"

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes.

Re:Let's play a game of "what if"

[Anonymous Coward]

No.

Re:Let's play a game of "what if"

[Anonymous Coward]

No, the real question is "What if Kim Dotcom had donated to the political campaigns of both parties?"

The Real Story

[Talderas]

Guys. Guys.

The real story here is the name of his wife. Kim Dotcom. Really? She was willing to take that last name?

Re:The Real Story

[Dunbal]

Wouldn't be the worst thing a woman has done for money.

Re:The Real Story

[Anonymous Coward]

Guys. Guys.

The real story here is the name of his wife. Kim Dotcom. Really? She was willing to take that last name?

*He* is Kim Dotcom, she is Mona Dotcom. But yes, she did take his last name, apparently.

Re:The Real Story

[NonUniqueNickname]

He's Kim Dotcom. She's Mona Dotcom.

Re:The Real Story

[s7uar7]

I can't think what attracted her to the millionaire Kim Dotcom.

Re:The Real Story

[eam]

Hell, it probably isn't the worse thing she's done for money.

Re:The Real Story

[misexistentialist]

"Schmitz" is better?

Re:The Real Story

[Ihmhi]

A ha ha ha ha... oh man, I lost it at that one. That was perfect.

Re:The Real Story

[nstlgc]

As in "she's in it for the mona".

Re:The Real Story

[mickwd]

The original - a classic.

Re:The Real Story

[oreiasecaman]

Well, what if her name was Mona Dotnet? See, it could be worse...

YES! I came

[Anonymous Coward]

Take that thieves! Next stop the library.nu founder, I hope they hold a public hanging instead of some boring behind-the-doors execution

Oh man this is going to be great.

Uh oh-- it's a partisan hack!

[Anonymous Coward]

If this was a story about a government official dodging jail time for their crime and corruption, the usual lynch mob would be out screaming about how all government is evil and down with welfare and scrap the regulations and vote Ron Paul, etc etc

When the story is about some private individual dodging jail time for a crime related to copyright (a government regulation, btw), however, let's instead use the story as an attack on the bias in the slashdot community, who just won't admit to be dirty thieving pirates!

So where are the dozens of replacements?

[mark-t]

Wasn't the big argument against going after hosts like these that when they brought one down, some 20 or so others would pop up all around the world to take its place (what happened right after napster at the turn of the century being a prominent example of this), and trying to stop them all would be like playing an eternal game of whack-a-mole, where the total number of moles keeps getting larger every time you hit one down.

Not that I've gone looking particularly hard - I never had any reason to use megaupload in the first place, but I'm sorta curious... where are all the replacements that would have been predicted to surface?

Re:So where are the dozens of replacements?

[Anonymous Coward]

Does it count if there were twenty times too many before MU was ever in danger of going down?

Re:So where are the dozens of replacements?

[icebraining]

The replacements already existed before MU was shutdown, they just get used more.

Re:So where are the dozens of replacements?

[boast]

mediafire, putfile, etc... all jumped in usage. Check google news. It only slowed down piracy for like a week.

Re:So where are the dozens of replacements?

[tehcyder]

Similarly, just because we jail people for murder, rape and burglary, there are still murders, rapes and burglaries.

Re:So where are the dozens of replacements?

[Anonymous Coward]

... It only slowed down piracy for like a week.

Where?

I used to frequent a site each morning that had MegaUpload links only for all the scene releases that happened during the night (and older). The morning when MegaUpload vanished it took me less than 5 minutes to find another site with similar content, only the files were hosted elsewhere than MegaUpload.

No change. I can still wake up in the morning and go to my computer and download the newest episodes of the shows I'm following in minutes. The stupid "mega-shutdown" didn't impair my ability to find the stuff nor the speed which I'm able to download it. It obviously had no impact on the spread of the releases either as the stuff was equally fast out there, available everywhere.

Re:So where are the dozens of replacements?

[Anonymous Coward]

A lot of other hosts did get scared after the initial arrest and blocked US IP addresses.

Funds

[mseeger]

While he got 30K US$ released for the next 3 weeks, he has asked for 180K US$ for "expenses" ;-). Not a shy guy...

Re:Funds

[Time2303]

While he got 30K US$ released for the next 3 weeks, he has asked for 180K US$ for "expenses" ;-). Not a shy guy...

"This sum included $24,000 for security, $29,000 for staff wages and $28,678 for general costs. Among the general costs was a monthly power bill of $8500 and $6000 per month in phonecalls." http://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/local-news/6501320/Dotcoms-expenses-through-the-roof

criminals

[amoeba1911]

It's sad that we root for a scumbag like Kim Dotcom. It's sad, because he's an underdog criminals in a system of super criminals. Chris Dodd is no less scumbag criminal mastermind than Kim Dotcom, but Chris Dodd bribed the right people to make it seem like he's legit. Don't get me wrong, I also root for Kim Dotcom, but let's not forget he's a scumbag... he's just not as big scumbag as the "legal" scumbags that currently rule the world.

Re:criminals

[Anonymous Coward]

The enemy of my enemy is my friend.

Re:criminals

[misexistentialist]

"Scumbag"? You probably just envy his success.

Re:criminals

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah, one of the great things about The Sopranos - making you realize you could feel empathy for a scumbag...

Re:criminals

[Anonymous Coward]

You should really read up on his doings during the gumball race a couple of years back ( illegal streetvrace in europe for the super rich). Driving at 100'km/h+ speeds in 50 zones, when one of his buddies hit a pedestrian during the race his reactionnwas not to call 911 but to stand over the poor women filming her and laughing ( made the news for that). Yeah... He IS a scumbag....

Re:criminals

[deimtee]

"The enemy of my enemy is my enemy's enemy. No more and no less" - Howard Tayler (Schlock Mercenary).

Re:criminals

[tehcyder]

"Scumbag"? You probably just envy his success.

If you envy criminals' success, you are a sociopath or a moron.

Re:criminals

[Anonymous Coward]

Really? I thought it was the enemy of my enemy is a tool I can use against my enemy...

What does...

[ThisIsNotMyHandel]

What does the wife being pregnant have to do with possible illegal activities?

Re:What does...

[RivenAleem]

Isn't it obvious? She's Pirating Kim.

Example me this....

[Anonymous Coward]

Are they going to realize these grand example making 'stings' no longer work? Not for "Piracy" anyway. Somalians have that market cornered anyway.

No one is scared. No one is impressed. They are annoyed at how '*IAA's bitch' the NA Govs have become though.

That said after learning who was running megaupload, I am sure happy enough to see him fall. Just not for the reasons I'm supposed to....

Not as much as you think

[Time2303]

The money that Kim Dotcom requested is used to pay for the mansion that he is renting (due to being denied purchasing land in NZ) which is somewhere in the vicinity of $20k per month and he also has to pay for the huge phone bill from calling the United States to his defence team - the cost of which is about $0.33/minute which makes 60 minute call cost $19.80. If he's on the phone for 3 hours a day, 7 days a week then in 30 days his phone cost is over $1600.00. The security guards, butler and nannies also need to be paid.

Re:Not as much as you think

[Anonymous Coward]

Can't do the time or pay the fine, don't do the crime. Simple really...

Re:Not as much as you think

[Anonymous Coward]

If only there was a cheaper way to communicate over great distances...

Re:Not as much as you think

[tqk]

If only there was a cheaper way to communicate over great distances...

One of his bail conditions is no Internet, and thanks to the evil Alan Cox and friends, that may rule out carrier pigeons as well.

Re:Not as much as you think

[Anonymous Coward]

And which crime is that, exactly?

Re:Not as much as you think

[mywhitewolf]

he could have payed the fine, they are controlling his money so its very difficult for him to mount an effective defense.

Someone think of the child!!!

[gsslay]

Everyone knows being pregnant makes it impossible for you to commit a crime. Your hormones won't let you. Therefore it is an outrage that she is being investigated. Won't someone think of the child!

It works the same with being disabled in any way, or being a grandmother. They are not so much "get out of jail free" cards as "certifiably pure as driven snow innocent" cards.

Re:Someone think of the child!!!

[mywhitewolf]

that, or excessive investigation by federal police could be traumatic to the mother which could cause problems with the baby.

Here, here

[ThatsNotPudding]

The only boats the contemporary US ecomony raises are yachts.

Where did the last US generation shop? Sears, Montgomery Wards, JC Penney. Where does this generation (have) to shop? Walmart and Best Buy. That ain't progress, people.

Re:Here, here

[chronoglass]

you forgot the true department store of our time

the internet.

see thread on handing it over to the U.N. pls

Re:Here, here

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not arguing the lack of progress, but I have to laugh loudly at your premise.

You know why this generation shops at Walmart and Best Buy?

Because it's the same quality of shit that you'll find in Sears and JC Penney, at a fraction of the cost.

Seriously, have you been in a Penney's lately? The clothing quality is fucking shit. Hell, even the 'LOOK AT ME I AM UPPER MIDDLE CLASS!" bastions that are Kohl's, Nordstrom and Macy's have clothing that's so laughably poor quality compared to what people were wearing two decades ago.

It's not like he's ever been convicted of a crime

[Anonymous Coward]

He has? Nevermind.

Gee, That's Too Bad...

[BlueStrat]

Sounds like a case of "Gee Citizen, you're fighting us legally and winning. It's too bad that now we'll just have to go after your pregnant wife, and possibly force her to give birth in jail. It's not very safe in those places. We certainly hope she doesn't get shanked! We also hope the prison doctor doesn't "accidentally" drop your son/daughter on their head.

Why don't you fire those bothersome and expensive lawyers, stop fighting our charges, and we can sit down and have a cozy little chat about it? If you sign this little piece of paper for us confessing to your evil deeds, we won't be forced to do something to your family and friends we'd rather not be forced to do. You can keep your wife and unborn child safe and be out of prison in practically no time at all if you'll just cooperate. Ve Haff Vays of making you [cough-cough] sorry, don't know where that came from..."

Strat

Re:Gee, That's Too Bad...

[Kalriath]

New Zealand isn't America. For anything beyond a painkiller or two, our prisons just stick you in a van to the nearest city hospital - she'd give birth the same place as everyone else just under guard, and the baby would likely be taken into protective services custody immediately after.

Re:Uh oh-- it's shill!

[Anonymous Coward]

If this were a CEO [...] who made less than half of what this guy makes [...] then the usual lynch mob would be out screaming about how all "rich" people are evil and we need to destroy Wallstreet and kill all the Republicans [...]

Uh, oh -- I smell strawman.

When the perpetrator [...] facilitate[s] piracy, however, he's suddenly some Robin Hood hero [...]

Uh, oh -- I smell shill

Look. Whether this deserves to be called piracy, whether just providing a tool is already a crime [Google, anyone? BitTorrent?] has been hashed to death here.

Just one thing. Dotcom may be a criminal, he may be not. I don't know, nor I do care much. The *AA methods, and FBI's methods are most definitely criminal -- and that's the point of discussion here.

When two TLDs love each other very much...

[ArundelCastle]

Am I the only one who secretly hoped his wife was named Kim Dotnet?

Re:When two TLDs love each other very much...

[Anonymous Coward]

Secret. I don't think this means what you think it means.
 
...and also, yes. Yes you were.

if you have money ...

[snemiro]

You should share it with "la familia"....otherwise, you will be prosecuted ... Check out the guys who stole billions from investors in Wall Street....they share some the profit with the "authorities", and now they walk free.... So, the lesson is.....are you with "us" or a "terrorist for the system"?

People on my side must be perfect

[bussdriver]

Progress is not worth having to read about or even mildly support if there are flawed people with shared interests fighting on my side.

My business should fail and we should be laid off because 1 of my coworkers is a jerk; that is only fair! Why should I work to prop up a business which employs a jerk even if it costs me my job? I have to set the threshold somewhere... so it might as well be at ZERO. ;-)

Re:It's not like he's ever been convicted of a cri

[SplashMyBandit]

He has been convicted, and was punished for it. In theory his slate was clean (apart from the record of the previous convictions). Now he tried to start a more legit business sailing *just* on the right side of the law. Was good enough for New Zealand but not good enough for the US Recording MAFIA.

Re:It's a witch hunt!

[Anonymous Coward]

You're quoting that from memory, aren't you? And you're apparently not familiar with the underlying Arthurian legendarium, either.

Bedivere. Sir Bedivere. In the original legend, Arthur's Marshal. In Monty Python's rendition, Sir Bedevere the Wise. (Note the variant spelling, which appears to come from the script. /shrug.)

Monty Python is srs bzns.

You have to hand it to Kimble: He sure has balls.

[Qbertino]

You have to hand it to Kimble: He sure has balls.

I've rarely seen such an obviously über-egocentric perpetualy mischief touting fraud get away with so much in such a succession. Ever since he appeared as the poster boy of the 2000s dotCom Bubble he's been continuosly rubbing his IT business non-sense and fraudulent practices into peoples faces and always has gotten away with it. To this very day. In a strange way, I'm actually impressed.

Kim DotCom Interview on the TV tonight

[Anonymous Coward]

There is going to be an half hour interview with Kim Dotcom on TV3 (Cambell Live) tonight. It will probably be available online from http://www.3news.co.nz/TVShows/CampbellLive/Home.aspx

You can have both

[phorm]

A person's actions don't have to be 100% evil or 100% good.
You can hate it when a so-called 1% abuses and manipulates the law to avoid taxes and create monopolies, but applaud when they do something philanthropic. Wealth creates power, and those with it can do evil, good, or oft-times both.

Some people are more well known for abuse than philanthropy, or vise-versa.

a lesson to your funds

[jago25_98]

I bet he regrets not:

-burying gold in his garden like a nutcase
-lending cash to friends
-'investing' in fake ID
-memorising a few bitcoin private keys, or burying a paper key in the woods
-opening a no name cash card
-generally being a honest citizen

re: kickbacks to facilitate piracy?

[King_TJ]

I don't know that a lot of people are holding Kim Dotcom up as an example of a hero or "Robin Hood" figure, really? But having followed this story for a while now (wrote a few articles about it on a blog I contribute to, in fact), I'd say it's complicated.

For starters, just before Megaupload was raided, there was a whole case underway regarding his right to upload a song ("Megasong") he paid a bunch of big-name artists to put together for him, advertising the service. In that instance at least, it sure seemed to be that Dotcom was the "good guy" vs. Universal Music Group, who immediately filed for a takedown of the video (using a back door we now know Universal cut a deal with Google to be able to use, vs. going the standard route of filing a DMCA takedown request with them, as most others would be required to do). Universal's only defense? They felt they basically owned the rights to the artists on their label, so Dotcom wasn't supposed to be making music with them, without going through Universal first!

Beyond that? I'm not really defending what he did, profiting from encouraging people to share copyrighted content on his servers ... but the current state of U.S. copyright legislation only encourages the behavior, vs. the original copyright law (pre Bill Clinton and DMCA law he signed into effect while President). Traditionally, you weren't guilty of criminal copyright infringement if you simply gave away some copies of a work. The intent to financially gain was a required component. Otherwise, all you had was a potential CIVIL case, if the actual content creator/owner wished to take you to court over it directly.

Now, it doesn't seem to matter if you're in it to make millions, or you just intended to share some music with your college buddies in your dorm, at your own expense. You're guilty of a felony crime either way. So why risk if if you can't potentially make big bucks out of the whole thing?

Kimbles newsgroup posts from 1996 - 2000

[killsome]

Kimbles newsgroup posts from 1996 - 2000, most of it is in German, but its a damn good read. Makes you realise what an idiot and ass hole he is.
http://arnold.babsi.de/KIMBLE.txt

Re:Kimbles newsgroup posts from 1996 - 2000

[Anonymous Coward]

I can't say someone I don't know is an ass, but regardless of his "character", if I had to pick a side in all this I'd choose his.

Re:It's a witch hunt!

[Anonymous Coward]

Cool story, bro.

MTV Teaches Us To Love Scumbags

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't get me wrong, I'm no Kim fanboy - but I love how much the media are assassinating this guy, whereas if you switch it over to MTV, you will see people who are just as big scumbags living lives just as extravagant, and yet we're supposed to worship those people.

Re:When I need to send files across the globe,

[mywhitewolf]

I use mega too,

now the thousands we spent on marketing the link to our program has been wasted.

Re:When I need to send files across the globe,

[tehcyder]

I use mega too,

now the thousands we spent on marketing the link to our program has been wasted.

If I were you I'd sue mega for having a criminal business model.

Re:It's a witch hunt!

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't worry, they'll be going after the other witches/uploaders/pirates once they go through Megaupload's servers.

I doubt it.

The intent is to protect expensive profit stealing commercial distribution companies. And convince the public that all cut-rate media exchange companies are involved in illegal activities and have questionable ethics. If they succeed in this, then there is no reason to bother the exchangers... who are the target market of the profit stealing distribution companies