Gabon Suspends Me.ga Domain, Dotcom Says "We Have Alternative Domain"
hypnosec writes "Kim Dotcom's plan to launch a 'bigger, better, faster, stronger, safer' Megaupload successor, Mega, is already in peril as Gabon's government has suspended the domain me.ga . Announcing his decision, Gabon's Communication Minister Blaise Louembe said 'I have instructed my departments... to immediately suspend the site www.me.ga' in a bid to 'protect intellectual property rights' and 'fight cyber crime effectively.' Dotcom revealed through a tweet that he is in possession of an alternative domain name and that the recent suspension 'demonstrates the bad faith witch hunt the U.S. government is on.'"
I know that he is trying to sound extreme and provocative, but for Gabon to shut-down a domain name of a yet-to-be-launched service that has only said that it plans to store things online is very-much a Witchhunt. Nothing is really known about me.ga and so the only reason they have to shut it down is because it's a 'successor' to megaupload and they have a vendetta against Kim Dotcom.
Wow. PreCrime is here. Apparently, you don't even have to be open for business or host any files to be a 'cyber criminal' who violates 'intellectual property rights.' Once you're accused by the US governments masters, you're done for, worldwide.
Wow, preemptively shutting something down on the basis that it might be used to infringe copyright before it's even launched?
Philip K. Dick and (to some extent) Scott Frank and Jon Cohen must be proud.
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most popular websites on Earth, which will generate millions in ad revenue.
What makes you think Gabon would have seen any of that revenue? They might only see the domain registration fees, even hosting does not have to be physically based in Gabon... The ads certainly won't be.
Wow, it's nice to see Gabon is in a great economic position, has eliminated all poverty, improved education, public healthcare, great mass transit systems, and can afford the luxury to turn down an offer to host what's sure to become one of the most popular websites on Earth, which will generate millions in ad revenue.
That would be all well and good if Gabon was likely to earn millions in revenue from it. It's more likely to earn only a small fee (less than $25?) for the domain name registration.
Not withstanding that, it seems fairly obvious that this is due to US pressure.
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Karma: Chameleon
It's some Third World hellhole whose economy runs on bribery and other crimes. What did he expect?
Wow, it's nice to see Gabon is in a great economic position, has eliminated all poverty, improved education, public healthcare, great mass transit systems, and can afford the luxury to turn down an offer to host what's sure to become one of the most popular websites on Earth, which will generate millions in ad revenue.
Holding the TLD of the domain name and hosting the site have nothing to do with each other. First of all, the site was to be cloud-based, so as not to have a single hosting location that can easily be taken down. Second of all, absolutely no cloud services vendors have hosting facilities in Gabon. Gabon would gain nothing from hosting me.ga except diplomatic and economic pressure from North American and European countries, and I'm quite sure that such pressure is what led them to take this action. If they had anything to gain at all, that'd be one thing, but they had a lot to lose, and nothing to gain whatsoever.
This goes to Kim Dotcom's problem...that no matter how he scatters and fuzzes his infrastructure, he will still have to contend with single points of failure that can be attacked through procedural means. I don't know how to deal with it, frankly...all completely decentralized systems for content distribution and sharing that I know of (like Freenet) are somewhat awkward and a real pain in the ass. If you need to use a domain name, you've got a point of vulnerability where the powers that be have an undue procedural advantage. This doesn't even take into account the other challenges of payment processing, financial basis (gotta pay your bills from an account somewhere), hiring of personnel (what if the operation is deemed a criminal activity, and they go after the employees under RICO or an equivalent law?), and other things I probably haven't even thought of.
For your security, this post has been encrypted with ROT-13, twice.
False dichotomy much?
Upward mobility is a slippery slope - the higher you climb the more you show your ass.
HAHAHAHA man, if you had chosen any words but "going to tell you how to live" this would have been nowhere NEAR as hilarious as it was, and could have been modded up +1, sad but true. But seriously? Republicans are the masters of telling people how they're going to live. Republicans are entirely about being free to live the way they want you to live. That's what they DO, that's what "social conservative" MEANS.
Cute parody, but by voting for the status quo we have shown we support it. Probably Romney wouldn't be against it. (And maybe in my state Bob Casey's opposition would have co-sponsored PIPA as well.) But in four years our new douche bag and turd sandwich are going to look at what they need to be to win and see this and these past years and march on with it. Because even if it doesn't win elections, it doesn't lose them and that's usually reason enough (with lobbying) to do anything.
Well there is the P2P DNS system and alternative DNS that are out there.
The problem is they are awkward to setup at best for a casual user and they simply aren't known enough to those outside of geek circles.
These 2 systems have the potential to solve EVERYTHING, but they are stagnating in the corner.
> I fear we could not afford to "try" Romney on this principle
And that's why nothing will ever change.
> Or perhaps it was lost when Obama was chosen on the "change and hope" platform that never materialized.
You mean "hope and change" didn't materialize? Wow, America really should have held him accountable for that, because it really seems right now like they got the change they wanted.
Mr Fox objected to the ban, saying "I don't intend to eat any hens this time! I just want to visit the hen house. My business there is totally legitimate. Judging foxes for what they did in the past is just fascism, man."
hahahahha. Why is this not moderated +5 funny?
Nobody in the US government anywhere on the political spectrum has shown they have any intentions to end the copyright/IP witchhunt except for SCOTUS and maybe 5 senators. The entirety of congress is at fault for this travesty and the damage this copyright/IP farce is causing to our economy.
I know, it's too bad that Romney didn't make it so we can have the government legislating fucking, the right to be with someone you care about, robbing everyone to give to the rich so they can get the highest score and privatizing profits while nationalizing their debt. Instead we have a president that wants to tax the robber barons, legislate people owning property they created, and making sure people are treated when they get sick instead of dying in the street due to a toothache.
Fuck Romney, he was a failure of a man, and would have ruined this nation. Anyone who doesn't see that is a horrible person that needs to learn what it's like to be human before hurt themselves
No no no. You need to listen to more conservative talk radio.
The proper term is Obamanation.
See, its like abomination.
That way we can get more riled up about it because it uses the dogma switch to turn off the tiny little rational parts of our brain we have not yet mananged to destroy yet.
No, it is a sign that the game he's been playing for many years now is finally over. You know, that of moving your operations to a different country each time the one you are currently in finally catches up with your crimes.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
I really like how the Republicans always want to let "the market" take care of things, then it fails and we have to bail banks out with public money. A system based purely on greed and search for profit is as unsustainable as a pure communist doctrine.
You keep chasing that carrot though.