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Pirate Music Site's Owner Sentenced to Five Years in Prison (torrentfreak.com)
An anonymous reader shares an update on Artur Sargsyan, who owned the music-pirating site Sharebeast as well as Newjams and Albumjams. TorrentFreak reports:
Thursday a U.S. District Judge sentenced the 30-year-old to five years in prison, three years of supervised release, and more than $642,000 in restitution and forfeiture...
The RIAA claimed that ShareBeast was the largest illegal file-sharing site operating in the United States... "Millions of users accessed songs from ShareBeast each month without one penny of compensation going to countless artists, songwriters, labels and others who created the music," RIAA Chairman & CEO Cary Sherman commented at the time...
If Sargsyan had responded to takedown notices more positively, it's possible that things may have progressed in a different direction. The RIAA sent the site more than 100 copyright-infringement emails over a three-year period but to no effect. This led the music industry group to get out its calculator and inform the Deparmtment of Justice that the total monetary loss to its member companies was "a conservative" $6.3 billion "gut-punch" to music creators who were paid nothing by the service... "His reproduction of copyrighted musical works were made available only to generate undeserved profits for himself," said U.S. Attorney Byung J. "BJay" Pak. "The incredible work done by our law enforcement partners and prosecutors in light of the complexity of Sargsyan's operation demonstrates that we will employ all of our resources to stop this kind of theft."
David J. LaValley, Special Agent in Charge of FBI Atlanta, said "His sentence sends a message that no matter how complex the operation, the FBI, its federal partners and law enforcement partners around the globe will go to every length to protect the property of hard working artists and the companies that produce their art."
Today if you visit ShareBeast.com or AlbumJams.com, they display an "FBI anti-piracy warning" image notifying visitors the domain has been seized, adding "Willful copyright infringement is a federal crime that carries penalties for first time offenders of up to five years in federal prison, a $250,000 fine, forfeiture and restitution." The image is surrounded by a red border with the word "seized" written over and over again.
If Sargsyan had responded to takedown notices more positively, it's possible that things may have progressed in a different direction. The RIAA sent the site more than 100 copyright-infringement emails over a three-year period but to no effect. This led the music industry group to get out its calculator and inform the Deparmtment of Justice that the total monetary loss to its member companies was "a conservative" $6.3 billion "gut-punch" to music creators who were paid nothing by the service... "His reproduction of copyrighted musical works were made available only to generate undeserved profits for himself," said U.S. Attorney Byung J. "BJay" Pak. "The incredible work done by our law enforcement partners and prosecutors in light of the complexity of Sargsyan's operation demonstrates that we will employ all of our resources to stop this kind of theft."
David J. LaValley, Special Agent in Charge of FBI Atlanta, said "His sentence sends a message that no matter how complex the operation, the FBI, its federal partners and law enforcement partners around the globe will go to every length to protect the property of hard working artists and the companies that produce their art."
Today if you visit ShareBeast.com or AlbumJams.com, they display an "FBI anti-piracy warning" image notifying visitors the domain has been seized, adding "Willful copyright infringement is a federal crime that carries penalties for first time offenders of up to five years in federal prison, a $250,000 fine, forfeiture and restitution." The image is surrounded by a red border with the word "seized" written over and over again.
Once again showing who REALLY runs the country. A collections of very large corporations, rotating on a daily basis depending on who has some $ to throw around. This is just the government paying its bills.
Also, 5 years in prison for running a music piracy site? While Youtube, which is littered with piracy left/right operates freely, and nobody ever would even THINK of prosecuting, much less jail time?
The FBI getting involved in something as benign as copyright violation is absurd. Meanwhile real criminals who rob people of actual money roam about freely on the internet, stealing identity, money, etc. Real, actual harm rather than "potential lost revenue, and free advertising" that piracy provides.
Can't be bothered to find a Psychopath In Florida that posted his intentions to Social Media USING HIS REAL NAME!
But RIAA Copyright infringement? YES SIR! WE WILL ARREST HIM NOW SIR!
According to the RIAA, in 2016 the $7.65 billion in revenue in total. I am a bit skeptical that this non-millionare impacted the music industry... at all. But the music industry (though not usually the artists who get basically nothing from their deals 90% of the time) is corrupt and stupid and we already knew that.
I'm not saying the guy doesn't deserve some punishment, and I'm guessing based on the numbers in the article he was appropriately fined by the courts despite the RIAA's utter insanity, though a 5 year prison sentence seems a bit much.
I'm picturing... concertinas.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
The owner of these sites obviously wasn't the smartest person around. Making yourself such an easy to pick apple raises your chances of getting picked!
Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
No, a “conservative” 6.3 billion. Meaning they would have liked to put the figure much higher, but didn’t quite dare to.
Also: a prison term, a fine and restitution? If you steal actual physical CDs, they’ll stick you in prison, take back whichever CDs they can find and perhaps impound any profits you made selling them, but that’ll be the end of it.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
To a handful of bankers that *really* managed to cause billions of dollars of damage by crashing the entire American economy back in 2007/2008- days they spent in jail: 0.
I would say that his sentence would be appealable on that fact alone under the fourteenth amendment. However, since his assists are probably entirely gone, It's probably doubtful that he could mount a meaningful appeal.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
So, we're back to classic late 90's-style Napster math are we? With the logical fallacy that if the person downloaded it, they would have bought it had they not been able to obtain it illegally.