Megaupload Shuts Down, Arrests Have Been Made
#1
Posted 20 January 2012 - 11:28 AM
Seven members of the site and two corporations – Megaupload Limited and Vestor Limited – were indicted by a grand jury in Virgina, and charged “with engaging in a racketeering conspiracy, conspiring to commit copyright infringement, conspiring to commit money laundering and two substantive counts of criminal copyright infringement”.
Arrests have been made in New Zealand, were Megaupload founder Kim Schmitz and three others were arrested at the request of US officials. According to The Verge, a total of 20 search warrants have been issued in the US and eight other countries including The Netherlands, Germany, Canada and Australia. In addition, assets worth more than $50 million US Dollars have been seized as well as 18 domain names associated with the business.
Users who try to open the Megaupload website, any of the site’s inner pages, hosted files or one of the related domain names will notice that all connections time out. Megaupload, which has been listed as one of the top 100 sites at Alexa, and its cousin site Megavideo, in the sub 200 rankings, have been two of the most popular file sharing sites on the Internet.
The core question that many Internet users will have right now is if this will affect other file sharing services like Rapidshare as well.
http://www.ghacks.ne...have-been-made/
Makes you wonder who is next...
#2
Posted 20 January 2012 - 11:59 AM
Despite the fact, that the US don't even hand people over, that are indicted by the international court in Den Haag.
#3
Posted 20 January 2012 - 02:31 PM
always intrigues me how they come up with these numbers. most assume that everyone that downloaded it illegally would have paid full retail for it had it not been available.“half a billion dollars in harm to copyright owners”.
what really disturbs me is these quotes
I must have missed that part of the megaupload (or any others like it) where it expressly promotes the illegal sharing of copyrighted works.A business model expressly designed to promote uploading of the most popular copyrighted works for many millions of users to download
yeah. cuz thats illegal. seriously? how the hell does this encourage sharing illegal files?? megaupload is NOT and has never claimed to be long term storage. neither has rapidshare, etc. automatically deleting files after a period of time fits perfectly into its goal of a short term file exchange site. not everybody has web/ftp servers they can setup to exchange files and most email services are limited to 10MB attachments.A structure to discourage the vast majority of its users from using Megaupload for long-term or personal storage by automatically deleting content that was not regularly downloaded
so now for content to be popular it MUST be illegally distributed?A rewards program that would provide users with financial incentives to upload popular content and drive web traffic to the site, often through user-generated websites known as linking sites.
- Brito likes this
#4
Posted 20 January 2012 - 03:25 PM
I better close down the download portal here at reboot, it is starting to become popular..so now for content to be popular it MUST be illegally distributed?
#5
Posted 20 January 2012 - 03:39 PM
yes. and the AD sharing is going to have to go as well. you are offering financial incentives for members to start topics (most likely also providing illegal files in said topics) and encourage discussion in them.I better close down the download portal here at reboot, it is starting to become popular..
#6
Posted 20 January 2012 - 06:05 PM
I'm a bit surprised about this quote. Megaupload was one of te very few sites, which did not offer such a program.A rewards program that would provide users with financial incentives to upload popular content and drive web traffic to the site, often through user-generated websites known as linking sites.
Wasn't the automatic deleting, when files weren't downloaded a certain time, limited to the free uploads?A structure to discourage the vast majority of its users from using Megaupload for long-term or personal storage by automatically deleting content that was not regularly downloaded
I think to remember, that premium accounts didn't had that limitation.
But as usual, one can make up any reason, no matter how stupid, simply because judges are eighter bought or have no clue about IT.
I mean, of how many movie pirates have you heared, which attacked the poor movie transporter, killed and mamed half the crew, to then disappear with the film roles?
Still the governments, which are usually so big on fighting defamations of minorities, do nothing against the MAFFIA.
#7
Posted 20 January 2012 - 06:14 PM
I remember a case back in the 90ies, were it was claimed, that a schoolboy of 13 years, had cost the industry 150000 DM, because of the illegal software that was found on him.always intrigues me how they come up with these numbers. most assume that everyone that downloaded it illegally would have paid full retail for it had it not been available.
I always wondered, how much the guys, who calculate these sums, must make to give their children such an allowance.
#8
Posted 20 January 2012 - 06:38 PM
Could you clarify "downloaded illegally" clause for forum readers? Did you mean "used without license" after being downloaded? Or the fact of download is deemed also illegal without evidence of use - in what scenarios?most assume that everyone that downloaded it illegally would have paid full retail for it had it not been available.
#9
Posted 20 January 2012 - 06:49 PM
#10
Posted 20 January 2012 - 09:07 PM
even if they did give their children that much for allowance chances are they would still not buy a single song.I remember a case back in the 90ies, were it was claimed, that a schoolboy of 13 years, had cost the industry 150000 DM, because of the illegal software that was found on him.
I always wondered, how much the guys, who calculate these sums, must make to give their children such an allowance.
people who buy will buy
the people that download 100-1000's of songs/movies/software/whatever will never buy it even if a store where to offer it for free to anyone who came and grabbed it off the shelf.
furthermore the industry's have made a habit of punishing those who do "legally" purchase songs/movies/ect. want to watch your paid for DVD on your phone or ipod? too bad. go buy a copy for it or use the DRM infested "digital copy"...oh wait you have an android/zune/whatever? too bad. it only works on iPod.
pirates have no such restrictions and can happily use the media however they choose....I wonder who is getting the better deal?
#11
Posted 20 January 2012 - 10:17 PM
But the point, that all those defenses, people come up with, to protect something, cause always more discomfort to those people, for who it never would have been needed, than to the target group, has often been made.
Yet noone listens!
#12
Posted 20 January 2012 - 11:53 PM
Marlon was wrong though... Movie giants are running behind their Wall Street buddies making money seemingly out of thin air.
#13
Posted 21 January 2012 - 01:22 AM
This statement is pure propaganda, from MAFIA.Simply movie industry can't keep up with tech advances dragging profit down,
In the early 90ies, we could go see a movie on a saturday for 5 german marks per ticket. Cinemas were everywhere and they were all packed on weekends.
When we want to go today, see a movie, i pay on a saturday 15 Euro per ticket. That's about 30 german marks!
In comparison wages are today in euro not even what they were back then in german marks.
Most Cinemas have closed, even the really great ones we had.
Greed is, what kills their profits. Nothing else!!!
#14
Posted 21 January 2012 - 02:12 AM
#15
Posted 23 January 2012 - 04:24 AM
A Report from the Front Line
MegaUpload
Closed.
FileServe
Deleting multiple files. Closed affiliate program.
FileJungle
(Owned by FileServe) Deleting multiple files. Testing out blocking some USA IP addresses.
UploadStation
(Owned by FileServe) Deleting multiple files. Testing out blocking some USA IP addresses.
FileSonic
Sharing disabled. Closed affiliate program. Deleting files and accounts.
VideoBB
Closed affiliate program.
Uploaded.to
Banned USA IP addresses.
FilePost
Started suspending accounts with infringing material (doing what Hotfile did)
VideoZer
Closed affiliate program.
4shared
Deleting multiple files.
Wupload
Many accounts disabled.
East European & former Soviet Union countries based file sharing services are working as usual :-)
Source:
http://www.avaxhome..../The_storm.html
------------------------------------
http://www.filesonic.rs/
"All sharing functionality on FileSonic is now disabled. Our service can only be used to upload and retrieve files that you have uploaded personally."
#16
Posted 23 January 2012 - 07:15 AM
Also, if you've ever downloaded anything from Megaupload that is copywrited material, you could be sued for $150,000 per item. So, if you downloaded 2 albums, let's say that's 20 songs. You could owe $1.5million. That is, if the government decides to actually take action with all of their newly aquired logs full of downloads, uploads, and IPs.
#17
Posted 23 January 2012 - 01:46 PM
Was funny to follow the whole deal. Like watching a trainwreck happening in slow motion.
- First MU the biggest filehoster worldwide, responsible for 4% of all internet traffic, acording to some sources, went belly up.
- Then the weekend-download-wave hit the rest of the providers, most busy deleting new ciontent as fast as it appeared.
- Which further increased the load on the few provider still hosting.
Resulting first in download speeds of 2kB/s for guest access and as little as 34KB for premium users, before one after the other provider collpsed completely.
Even if they can't touch MU, they already succeeded. For now filehosting seems dead.
Interestingly hits against torrentsites never caused this kind of fallout.
#18
Posted 23 January 2012 - 02:11 PM
The Internet world is becoming too close to a real world with borders.
#19
Posted 23 January 2012 - 02:27 PM
It's time for a more complicated, geeky way, so that the noobs and lamers rather buy than learn, how to download.
And then we're all, geeks, nerds and MAFIA, happy again.
#20
Posted 23 January 2012 - 06:44 PM
GEMA.de
GEMA also bans YouTube videos in Germany that violate its copyright.
http://articles.busi...gema-operations
#21
Posted 23 January 2012 - 07:05 PM
We are setting up servers.
Each user gets a FTPs access, which can be used to safely transfer files.We hope to launch the online version of the site in less than 3 days.
( On Wednesday, January 25 ).
For your safety, our infrastructure will be out of the U.S jurisdiction ( Russia ).
http://anonyupload.com/
#22
Posted 23 January 2012 - 08:57 PM
#23
Posted 24 January 2012 - 12:04 AM
Torrent sites don't store cracked copyright material. The difference of this action with SOPA and PIPA is such top level actions are usually political statements therefore scary but short lived, while SOPA and PIPA were aimed to provide smaller players with tools to go to a local court and get a site shutdown or remove copyright order instead of playing costly "pushing" game at the very top usually possible only for big guys. It looks, they'll find middle ground over time.Interestingly hits against torrent sites never caused this kind of fallout.
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