MPAA Decides Not Enough People Know About Isohunt

from the free-advertising dept

Wed, Jun 7th 2006 4:02pm — Mike Masnick

It appears the MPAA really has no clue how to look beyond a single step out from any of their actions. A week ago, they were crowing about how shutting down Pirate Bay was such a huge victory for the entertainment industry. Instead, the site was back up two days later, and only suffered additional outages because so many more people started using the site, thanks to the MPAA's inadvertent advertising for the site that, previously, was only known in select circles. Yesterday, we noted the entertainment industry was poised to do the same thing for AllofMP3.com, putting out official warnings telling people that it was illegal (something AllofMP3 denies), that effectively alerted an awful lot of people where they could get cheap, DRM-free music. Today comes the news that they're now going after yet another torrent tracker site to help it jump ranks from "known in certain circles" to "widely known." Step on up to the bigtime, Isohunt, the MPAA is coming after you. Once again, Isohunt has a reasonable defense in that they are simply a search engine, and host no infringing content. However, it's simply stunning that the industry continues to help promote these sites one after the other.

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80 Comments

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c0ke, 7 Jun 2006 @ 4:49pm

My Seed Son
Yay! More seeds... git it, git it gurrrrrrrrllll
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Panic, 7 Jun 2006 @ 4:50pm

thanks! I'd forgotten all about isohunt!
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Barbara S., 7 Jun 2006 @ 4:57pm

dont look at me!
If the MPAA says its bad, it has to be good!
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- Robc, 8 Jun 2006 @ 6:26am
  
  Re: dont look at me!
  "If the MPAA says its bad, it has to be good!"
  
  Someone make t-shirts, I'll buy one!
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
wtmfq, 7 Jun 2006 @ 5:02pm

select circles?
None of these sites are only known in select circles. If you had problems finding sites like this you need to learn how to use a search engine.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- |333173|3|_||3, 7 Jun 2006 @ 6:45pm
  
  Re: select circles?
  In that case the site is useless to the person anyway, but I had been using a torrent search a friend made a few months ago (it is password protected to keep the traffic down, he hosted it at home)
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Jimbo Bob Dingleberry, 7 Jun 2006 @ 5:04pm

Hah!
Barbara S. -> You're damn right!! If it weren't for the MPAA to advertise for these guys so much, I'd never know!
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personfromhell, 7 Jun 2006 @ 5:33pm

sometime you wonder
if the **AAs and jack thompson aren't actually trying to help their opponents
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Anonymous Coward, 7 Jun 2006 @ 5:40pm

Well it maight sound strange, but without fires, firefighters wouldnt have a job...
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- Anonymous Coward, 8 Jun 2006 @ 7:41am
  
  Re:
  not quite right, if people were still afraid there would be a fire firemen would exist.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Adam, 7 Jun 2006 @ 5:41pm

They're just thinking long term.
Look at where this goes:
**AA threatens a site that helps people find illegal material.
This creates tons of advertising for said site.
People flock to the site, and download illegal material.
**AA acquire yet more money from settlements with people they've threatened with lawsuits.

The **AA isn't stupid, they've just realized where the real money lies. Kind of like companies sitting on patents to sue someone for infringement, rather than to innovate. Media just doesn't pay anymore, at least compared to the users.
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Hmm, 7 Jun 2006 @ 5:51pm

I honestly did not know about isohunt. This is a big eye opener.

Thanks!
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Anonymous Coward, 7 Jun 2006 @ 6:09pm

Whoa those guys at MPAA are so sneaky. They figure they can draw so much attention to these sites that they are crippled and effectively useless. Its a reverse psychology DDOS attack Way to go!
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Anonymous Coward, 7 Jun 2006 @ 7:03pm

You're a little slow this has been happening for months...
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Tim Arview, 7 Jun 2006 @ 7:22pm

Yeah, and...
No one would know about money laundering if the FBI wasn't always arresting people.

We've been down this road before. See, I don't read those other websites. I read TechDirt. So, that means I had no idea IsoHunt or Pirate Bay existed until I read this particular story.

From what I could see, IsoHunt was the one who brought attention to the case to start with. The MPAA merely brought a case against them. The MPAA didn't publicize it. IsoHunt did.

Why does no one ever applaud these kinds of actions? Shutting down pirate download sites does NOT infinge on your rights to content. So this should be a non-issue.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Mike (profile), 8 Jun 2006 @ 2:57am
  
  Re: Yeah, and...
  Tim,
  
  Two problems with your comments:
  
  From what I could see, IsoHunt was the one who brought attention to the case to start with. The MPAA merely brought a case against them. The MPAA didn't publicize it. IsoHunt did.
  
  The MPAA seems to be putting out press releases whenever they file lawsuits or get these sites take down... so, no, the MPAA is publicizing it, claiming "victory" where there is none.
  
  Why does no one ever applaud these kinds of actions? Shutting down pirate download sites does NOT infinge on your rights to content. So this should be a non-issue.
  
  And here's the biggest problem. You call it a pirate download site, but it's not. It's a search engine. It can be used to find pirated material, as can a search engine like Google. It can also be used to find legitimate material, as can Google.
  
  Are you advocating shutting down Google as well?
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Tim Arview, 8 Jun 2006 @ 11:15am
    
    Point taken...mine as well
    Well, Mike, as I said, I don't know anything about them. So, then, I have to follow up with another question.
    
    If IsoHunt is not an illegal site, as you claim, then what is the harm in the MPAA drawing attention to them?
    
    Becuase they link to illegal download sites? You claim Google does as well. So why aren't you chastising people who promote Google? (Is that an "Ads by Google" link I see to the right?)
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Mike (profile), 8 Jun 2006 @ 11:31am
      
      Re: Point taken...mine as well
      uh... what?!?
      
      If IsoHunt is not an illegal site, as you claim, then what is the harm in the MPAA drawing attention to them?
      
      That is some of the most twisted logic I've seen in a long time.
      
      The point is that the MPAA wants to shut them down, but the reverse is happening. The MPAA has made it clear they don't like the site, but their actions have caused the site to do better.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Lowe Schmidt, 8 Jun 2006 @ 7:49am
  
  Re: Yeah, and...
  You're missing a big point, the serving of torrents is not illegal in sweden. To take down a complete ISP with something around ~200 customers for one (1) website serving somethings that's probably not illegal at all. Thats close to fascism for me.
  The police themselves even said at the raid that they weren't sure if what they did (taking the other servers) was legal. The police arrested the legal counsel of tpb for copyright infringement. the LEGAL counsel...
  
  And when we add the theory thats been growing that the swedish "justitsieminister" ordered the raid ... now we're talking.
  
  So go back to your hole, and STFU
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Tim Arview's Mom, 8 Jun 2006 @ 8:51am
  
  Re: Yeah, and...
  My son the moron said "Why does no one ever applaud these kinds of actions? Shutting down pirate download sites does NOT infinge on your rights to content. So this should be a non-issue."
  
  Son, should we blow up the interstate freeways because drug traffikers and bank robbers use them to commit crimes?
  
  I need these torrent sites because I like to watch re-runs of Matlock and Laurence Welk.
  
  You're a very bad boy for advocating cutting me off from my senior entertainment!!!!
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- elle, 8 Jun 2006 @ 9:56am
  
  Re: Yeah, and...
  Good point Tim
  
  Not sure why Techdirt has the hots to publicize every pirate site that the industry has to bring a case against.
  
  With all of these sites, it seems that all their business models come down to trying to find a new way to rip off the mainstream music industry, instead of doing something creative like figuring out a way to build a legitimate business around digital music distribution.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Mike (profile), 8 Jun 2006 @ 11:33am
    
    Re: Re: Yeah, and...
    Not sure why Techdirt has the hots to publicize every pirate site that the industry has to bring a case against.
    
    Hmm. It was the MPAA that put out the press releases about these sites. To say that it's us promoting it is simply bizarre.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Paying for crappy movies?, 7 Jun 2006 @ 7:40pm

I honestly did not think about downloading movies until I saw an ad against it on a DVD I rented.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
hautedawg, 7 Jun 2006 @ 7:40pm

THE BS EFFECT
Yes, it is the BS effect. No, not for Babs, but for the pure, unadulterated BS the **AA is feeding us. They pick a site, try to shut it down, allowing another to pop up. It is battling fire with gasoline. If they truly wanted to stop, they'd pay attention and give the people what we WANT TO BUY! I'll be happy to PAY for music that does not protect itself from me...I PAY for it, I OWN it.

Go figure.
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Kris, 7 Jun 2006 @ 7:42pm

Links
It will be funny when they start coming after sites that link to sites that link to illegal files... but not when they come after people who comment on sites that link to sites that link to illegal files - that would just be excessive - and hard to say five times fast.
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Adam, 7 Jun 2006 @ 8:24pm

MPAA / RIAA = Hypocrites
I wrote an E-Book on the art of paper folding that I own all rights to. I have contacted my lawyers and we are preparing to file a lawsuit against the MPAA/RIAA for linking to 'The Pirate Bay' in their statements and press releases. Linking to 'The Pirate Bay' eventualy leads to links where people can obtain illegal copys of my E-Book. Therefor I formaly ask the MPAA and RIAA to please remove all references of 'The Pirate Bay' from your website, statements and press releases.

The hypocrites have just been owned by geek intellect.
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c0ke, 7 Jun 2006 @ 8:31pm

MPAA / RIAA = Old Businessmen
It's obvious that these organizations are head up by businessmen from the "olden days". I bet they don't even use computers and do not know the affect of their decisions. They prolly have web sites printed out on paper just to make changes in red ink.

It's sad because the decisions they make will not stop them from making the same mistake all over again. They won't stop..
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- Anonymous Coward, 7 Jun 2006 @ 8:54pm
  
  Re: MPAA / RIAA = Old Businessmen
  100% correct. you get the A+ for today. they are old men.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - c0ke, 7 Jun 2006 @ 9:24pm
    
    Re: Re: MPAA / RIAA = Old Businessmen
    Wow.. you have great attention to detail. A+ smiley face boobies..
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Spoon!!!, 7 Jun 2006 @ 10:21pm

Profit???
Since when did Pirate Bay make money on anything other than their cool t-shirts? Word-twisters. The richer we get, te less human some of us get. ::spits on the shiney half-bald head of the MPAA director and waxes it with ass-cloth::
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- GeekGuy, 8 Jun 2006 @ 11:39am
  
  Re: Profit???
  They make an estimated $60,000 in ad revenue per month.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Critical Bill, 8 Jun 2006 @ 2:30am

Rent & Rip
Why download movies anyway when you can rip thim sumbichez? You get better quality than some idiot's awful encoding or bootleg, plus they're supacustomizable. Go find the software on your own (it's free).
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
SmartITGuy, 8 Jun 2006 @ 7:35am

I think the ARTISTS should band together and SUE the RIAA and MPAA. It is because of their bumbling idiot lawyers that piracy is even MORE rampant because of the huge publicity they give all these sites.

Besides, I'm sure this would be a better way of getting their share of money for their work, since the RIAA/MPAA and all the studios rob the artists blind anyways.
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Jun 2006 @ 7:36am

There's no guarentee that MPAA isn't waiting for trafic to pick up, collecting those IPs, Torrents and user info, then brining the suit after they collect adequate data.
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Jun 2006 @ 7:46am

********************************************
The MPAA announced today that there is a new name for danger - it's I2P :
Not only does it supply anonymous email, blogging, IRC and websites - it's anonymous Bittorrent trackers and Gnutella client are actually distributing music and films.

So beware !

www.i2p.net
http://board.planetpeer.de/

Do't join them !
********************************************
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sdf, 8 Jun 2006 @ 7:55am

MPAA is scared, losing their business model!
These are the fundamental issues... DISTRIBUTION, PRICING and CONSUMER SATISFACTION.

The internet allows the artist themselves to do their own advertising and marketing to a greater audience (eg. things like YouTube and iTunes etc). So the MPAA must be fearing the extinction of their method of business, artists now don't need them anymore. In their painful demise of their business model the only way it seems to make money is to sue.

Distribution on the internet means there is no longer a delay in stock distribution, uniform worldwide availability, and no huge overheads being added to the cost of the content, profits go directly to the artists. Therefore the MPAA is an upset failing organisation that is losing to better distribution models that are reducing costs to the consumer.

Also I believe in a try/view/listen before you buy. How many of us have been ripped off at the cinema enticed by good trailers and the movie was a let down or a poor remake of an original movie - cinema's don't refund if you didn't like the movie. Movie studios take advantage of this by pumping out lots of crap movies and glossing them up to get movie goers to part with their hard earned money.

A simple effective method the MPAA can impact on privacy is to lower the costs to the consumer - they'd get more sales as people wouldn't think twice about paying a smaller amount if it meant owning a DVD or CD. For example, it is very expensive taking a family to the cinema these days for the average 2 adults + 2 kids family + candy bar expenses (candy bars are so overly priced and they claim it is to offset the costs of ticket sales) so no wonder home entertainment systems have skyrocketed in sales. Box office ticket sales is declining due to this fact not piracy and the cost of two adult tickets is the price of owning a movie on DVD. The only piracy I see is us public being robbed of our money by the MPAA and associates (cinemas etc).

No wonder sites like PirateBay and ISO Hunt have emerged, the public is sick of how we are treated.
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Craig, 8 Jun 2006 @ 8:12am

Encryption
In response to someone up top, saying that they are advertising for the sites so they can sue the downloaders. Have fun trying to identify who's downloading what with the advent of private trackers and encrypted torrent clients. This person obviously has no clue what they're talking about. If your downloading through an encrypted client a file that was encrypted in the first place, there isn't any chance of getting caught.
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- darthwader, 12 Jun 2006 @ 7:33am
  
  Re: Encryption
  Thats not true. As long as you use any form of
  centralized tracking that gives out the IPs
  of the peers in the swarm , its just to join the swarm
  take a sreen-shot and your busted.
  Its called "intent".
  I2p solves this by not letting
  people in the swarm know other peers IP
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
wilsonics, 8 Jun 2006 @ 8:13am

Tracker compilation
The best part about isohunt.net is when it finds the same torrent on multiple trackers, it recreates the torrent info with all the trackers it found from all the sources on the net.

So, if it found freefile.jpg.torrent on tracker 1, 2, 3, and 4...it wouldn't list 4 separate listings...it adds the 4 tracker's info to the torrent to get all the seeds possible on the net. This makes isohunt, in my opinion, the best tracker on the net...i really hope they can dodge this MPAA bull.

Go ISOHUNT!
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WATYF, 8 Jun 2006 @ 8:16am

Re: Yeah, and...
And here's the biggest problem. You call it a pirate download site, but it's not. It's a search engine. It can be used to find pirated material, as can a search engine like Google. It can also be used to find legitimate material, as can Google.

Are you advocating shutting down Google as well?

I've always thought that to be an odd argument. Would you object to the police shutting down a crack house, just because every once in a while someone uses it just to get some shut-eye?

If a ridiculously overwhelming majority of interactions on these sites involve downloading pirated material, then should we really be using an intellectually dishonest argument like, "Well... it could be used to find legal material."...?

Now... if there's a lot of legal searches and what not, then the Google argument could be made... but it doesn't appear that that's the case. I don't have stats on their usage, though... so maybe the ratio is different than I would think... but my initial impression (based on general observation) is that these sites exist to serve up links to pirated material, and that is what they are primarily used for on a daily basis.

WATYF
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- Chris, 8 Jun 2006 @ 8:36am
  
  Re: Re: Yeah, and...
  I download legal linux isos from isohunt on a regular basis. I downloaded the public office beta from there (faster than microsoft.com). I've even distributed my own content there before.
  
  It has its positive uses.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Tim Arview, 8 Jun 2006 @ 11:22am
    
    Re: Re: Re: Yeah, and...
    "I download legal linux isos from isohunt on a regular basis. I downloaded the public office beta from there (faster than microsoft.com). I've even distributed my own content there before."
    
    You *download* from isohunt? I thought Mike said it was a search engine...
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- WATYF's Mom, 8 Jun 2006 @ 8:56am
  
  Re: Re: Yeah, and...
  WATYF, this is your mother speaking. I know you download a lot of porn and spend a lot of time alone in your bedroom because of it.
  
  Using your logic I should shut off the electricity to your room because you are using your computer as a wanking mate. Well I have hope that sometimes you use your computer for other purposes than wanking to porn so I am letting you keep your electricity on.
  
  Love, your Mom.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - WATYF, 8 Jun 2006 @ 10:21am
    
    Re: Re: Re: Yeah, and...
    WATYF, this is your mother speaking. I know you download a lot of porn and spend a lot of time alone in your bedroom because of it.
    
    Using your logic I should shut off the electricity to your room because you are using your computer as a wanking mate. Well I have hope that sometimes you use your computer for other purposes than wanking to porn so I am letting you keep your electricity on.
    
    Love, your Mom.
    
    Actually... that's nowhere close to my logic... but thanks anyway, Mom. See you at Thanksgiving!
    
    WATYF
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Mike (profile), 8 Jun 2006 @ 11:14am
  
  Re: Re: Yeah, and...
  WATYF:
  
  Sorry, you've got it wrong.
  
  I've always thought that to be an odd argument. Would you object to the police shutting down a crack house, just because every once in a while someone uses it just to get some shut-eye?
  
  No, it would be like burning down the entire neighborhood.
  
  The point is you're impacting plenty of others. If the industry is upset with these folks, go after the ones actually responsible. Not the search engine which has legitimate uses.
  
  If a ridiculously overwhelming majority of interactions on these sites involve downloading pirated material, then should we really be using an intellectually dishonest argument like, "Well... it could be used to find legal material."...?
  
  So, by your reasoning, the photocopier and the VCR should both be illegal. Sorry, I think having non-infringing uses is a pretty good reason to keep something legal.
  
  And as for "overwhelming majority" that's open to question, but the use of these technologies also changes over time. When the VCR first lauched, the "overwhelming majority" of use was for infringing material. Now? Not so much. How do you pick the time when to decide?
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Tim Arview, 8 Jun 2006 @ 11:29am
    
    Re: Re: Re: Yeah, and...
    "The point is you're impacting plenty of others."
    
    I thought no one knew about IsoHunt before this whole deal. Who else is this impacting?
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 8 Jun 2006 @ 6:00pm
  
  Re: Re: Yeah, and...
  "Are you advocating shutting down Google as well?..."
  
  The word 'music' has replaced the word 'sex' as the most searched for word on the internet.. so yes under the dodgy MPAA/RIAA argument Google should be sued too...
  
  or perhaps they would like it better if there was no internet at all - after all its all just piracy, terrorism and pornography..... NOT !!!
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
jeff, 8 Jun 2006 @ 8:32am

i can't believe...
that we let people like dan fucking glickman live. you're not allowed to kill the old, the sick or the young just for the hell of it...but can we kill the fucker just for being terribly unpopular? please? i mean, he's old, his skin's probably really thin. one good bash to the side of his face with the infamous retractable baton and he'd drop like a rock. or at least bleed to death. THAT'S a movie i'd go see in a theater.
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GrayMan, 8 Jun 2006 @ 8:43am

Moviecost
Someone calculated some time ago that if the moviecompanies sold off their content at $0.99 a download, then they would in effect earn about twice the amount that they are getting today. At that price, I would think everybody would buy movie-downloads instead of pirating them. But then, that is just my opinion!
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Vic, 8 Jun 2006 @ 9:29am

Re
Man I had forgotten about isohunt too...thanks MPAA! haha
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Jazza, 8 Jun 2006 @ 9:30am

I totally agree. They did the same with Napster, hell even mp3's ;)
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Anonymous, 8 Jun 2006 @ 10:07am

RIAA/MPAA
I say take all the lawyers, **AA execs, and anyone else connected with them and put them on a island of their own where they are unable to pull this BS. We then demand that they stop their BS and if they do stop and agree not to start again we let them off the island. It's too bad a few employees on the inside don't have the guts to do some damage (control) of their own.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
WATYF, 8 Jun 2006 @ 10:37am

And now....
...and now for the serious reply. :op

That may well be one of the most ridiculous strawman arguments I have ever seen posted on the net. Shutting off the electricity?????? Way to exaggerate someone else's opinion, to the point that it doesn't even resemble their original remarks, just so you can support your weak argument.

Shutting off the electricity would be more analogous to me suggesting that we should shut down the entire internet just to get rid of isohunt... which, of course, is nowhere near what I said.

If you wanna translate what I'm saying, a more reasonable analogy about a porn obsessed kid would be: His mother places a filter on his computer that only allows him to visit sites on an approved list, or his mother moves the computer to a public room of the house so he can still use it for normal activities or his mother grounds him from using the computer if he is caught looking at it.

See... when you don't act like an idiot and blow things completely out of proportion, my suggestion sounds much more reasonable... and downright logical.... go figger.

WATYF
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
WATYF, 8 Jun 2006 @ 11:43am

No, it would be like burning down the entire neighborhood.

How? We're talking about one site (one crack house), which is almost exclusively used to distribute illegal material (smoke crack in). Just because every once in a while someone uses it to post a torrent of a home video they made (they stop by just to sleep on the couch), doesn't mean it's not a breeding ground for illegal activity that should be defended with some "well, we don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater" logic.

The point is you're impacting plenty of others. If the industry is upset with these folks, go after the ones actually responsible. Not the search engine which has legitimate uses.

Which others? What law-abiding citizens lose by it getting shut down? There are craploads of distribution networks that police their own content and don't allow illegal materials to be linked/posted on their sites. Any law-abiding citizen still has a plethora of places to go to distribute their material or find other legal material.

And "going after the ones actually responsible" isn't as simple as you make it sound. We're not talking about walking a beat in downtown Podunk. We're talking about untraceable groups in countries that sometimes don't even have laws against this stuff. And they distribute, en masse, to the US, using these "search engines".

So, by your reasoning, the photocopier and the VCR should both be illegal. Sorry, I think having non-infringing uses is a pretty good reason to keep something legal.

No... that's not my reasoning at all. Why can't anyone make an accurate analogy around here? The copier and VCR are OBJECTS used to perform an action. I'm not talking about outlawing media conversion software or the DivX codec. Those are some of the OBJECTS used by the people involved in this issue, but they aren't the issue at all. The issue is blatant, mass distribution of illegal material.

And as for "overwhelming majority" that's open to question, but the use of these technologies also changes over time. When the VCR first lauched, the "overwhelming majority" of use was for infringing material. Now? Not so much. How do you pick the time when to decide?

Again... not the same thing. If you outlawed the VCR in the beginning, it would have never had the chance to have a legal use. Which is why we shouldn't outlaw the DivX codec or any of the other tools used by pirates. But the distribution networks of illegal video tapes, back in the day, were prosecuted... because they were using a legitimate tool to perform an illegal act.

And I know you want to compare some site like isohunt to a legitimate tool like the VCR, but it's not. It's ONE implementation of a tool (the search engine) which is being used almost entirely for illegal distribution. If they shut it down, I fail to see how it would be a hindrance (or even an inconvenience) to legal activity, seeing how there are plenty of legally operating search tools and distribution tools out there.

My whole point is that focusing on some narrow, minority of people who use these search engines, while ignoring the widespread illegal activity these sites promote is an intellectually dishonest argument. Anyone who's honest with themselves knows these sites exist, and are designed, to distribute copyrighted material. Hiding behind some "possible non-infringing uses" argument just doesn't pass the smell test.

WATYF
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Mike (profile), 8 Jun 2006 @ 12:14pm

Hiding behind some "possible non-infringing uses" argument just doesn't pass the smell test.

And yet it passes the Supreme Court test...

I tend to take their test over your "smell test."

But maybe that's just me.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 8 Jun 2006 @ 6:28pm
  
  Re:
  No man its not just you - we're with you on that!!!
  
  further to my comment above on how music is now the most searched for word on the internet (replacing sex) and how this would, in the eyes of RIAA/MPAA be a reason to sue Google; I say - you can not make water unwet, and you cannot stop it from flowing, and no matter how many people you sue for drinking it, people will still drink it.
  
  How can this be the information age if all the information is property?
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Sucking a hard Joystick, 8 Jun 2006 @ 12:42pm

MPAA, RIAA and some other corrupt "organisations" will burn in hell
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mct, 8 Jun 2006 @ 5:58pm

theft is theft.

Excuses for theft are just that - excuses.

go mpaa/riaa go!
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- Anonymous Coward, 8 Jun 2006 @ 6:23pm
  
  Re:
  I agree theft is theft - theft of musicians rights: 90-95% of artists signed to major record labels NEVER recieve royalties for their sound recordings; the average musician signed to a major label needs to sell 1m copies of a CD to recieve royalties - meanwhile the label has grossed $11m in revenue from the sales... theft... you say... theft of our culture, theft of free speech, theft of technological innovation, all in the name of multi national bottom lines and the preservation of an outdated business model...
  
  excuses are just that - excuses
  
  go DOWN mpaa/riaa and stay there for good !!!
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- Mike the pirate, 19 Jun 2007 @ 5:46am
  
  Re:
  No!! This is sharing!! Just like going to a mates house and borrowing a dvd! All this fuss about nothing!! FFS
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Jun 2006 @ 8:14pm

I dislike the **AA for a lot of reasons. I download the occasional album. I buy what i like. I delete the rest. Technically it's illigal, but really i end up buying more crap now than i would have otherwise. Software is another story, tho. There's so much quality Open Source software out there to support, pretty much anything you could ever want to do can be done for free anyway. My beef with them is where they completely and utterly destroy people's lives for a few movies or songs. And the option to pay for music and movies via an internet distribution method should mean that i can take that music and movie and play it anytime i want and on whatever device i choose. Why they haven't taken advantage of the DVD downloading culture by offering a cheap way to download a DVD you can burn on your own is beyond me. Odds are that would do more harm to the pirate community than attacking them in this manner.

But the Real reason i'm so pissed is at them is the DVD i bought the other night. There was an ad telling me not to download movies. It's illegal. well no crap... that's why i just BOUGHT the disc you put that ad on. Why the hell are they threatening me with an ad like that? I obviously am not the person they need to be going after.

Some of the stuff they're tryin lately seems somewhat kooky. The multiple incidental copy licence fee stuff? what the hell is that all about?

If someone's gonna buy something they'll buy it. If they download it chances are they probably wouldn't have bought it in the first place. Not trying to excuse it, just sayin'...
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Jun 2006 @ 9:38pm

boycott DRM, if we don't buy it, they'll find another way to supply it.
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Data Hunter, 8 Jun 2006 @ 9:43pm

RIAA and MPAA
I must say that both of these organizations are heading off the downfall of the internet as we know it. It boggles the mind that they can get the court systems to back them in their rape of the entertainment market. Pretty soon they will be trying to collect from innocent bystanders that hear music from passing cars or over store speaker systems.
I have to say that in my case I have no intention of buying anymore CD or DVD movies as long as the RIAA and MPAA persist in taking anyone that wants entertainment to court for every deluded DRM infraction they can come up with.
There are soo many independant song and movie artists waiting to be discovered.
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Anonymous Coward, 9 Jun 2006 @ 10:28am

Different revenue stream
I don't think its that silly for the **AA to advertise these sites. They predict that given time and legislation, they'll be able to foreclose on them all. The more money those sites make in the meantime means more assets for the **AA to seize before they go bankrupt.
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cook, 9 Jun 2006 @ 7:51pm

""If the MPAA says its bad, it has to be good!"

"Someone make t-shirts, I'll buy one!"

I would buy a few of them.
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cook, 9 Jun 2006 @ 7:52pm

""If the MPAA says its bad, it has to be good!"

"Someone make t-shirts, I'll buy one!"

I would buy a few of them.
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Anonymous Coward, 17 Jun 2006 @ 8:31am

I use Google.com for my torrents. Just type name of the movie + "torrent". I always find what I search. Should they shut down Google, then?
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Penniless, 6 Aug 2006 @ 10:00am

I wouldn't care really except
If the **AA were to raid someone and find their stash of illegal music - so be it, technially it IS wrong. But, like someone else said, the only problem I have is the fine. Honestly, they go for like $150,000 per VIDEO it seems - bloody hell! I understand you're trying to get a point, but seriously, that's overdoing doing it! You're going to knock the entire family on the streets for downloading one or two videos - that's totally uncalled for. If you put it on view with other crimes, you're ruining their lives almost as much as someone who did something terrible like assault or muder or something, as they are now homeless, jobless, publically humiliated, and so forth - and have absolutely no money!
I understand giving someone a fine - but how about only making them pay what the song/movie/etc is ACTUALLY worth, then a *little* extra considering they stole.

In any case, I just laughed by ass off when I heard they shut down TPB - obviously, when they came back traffic was going to double at least with the sudden news!
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thatonedude, 19 Aug 2006 @ 5:01pm

isohunt
you know somethin only real reason why mpaa is mad in the first place is due to the fact that there not makin money. second of all most people still buy dvd's cd's etc, pirated movies and mp3s usualy are of poor quality and not always guarentied to work right and then you have to download the appropriate avi filters for them to work anyways, which is somethin alot of computers dont know how to do anyways, thirdly alot of people download the content preview it and then decide if they would want to spend 20 bucks on the dvd or cd to begin with so i propose an idea to keep us consumers happy and the mpaa happy charge a 20 dollar membership fee to the site, the people running the sight keep 10 dollars and the mpaa still makes money in the process sounds fair to me? stop pickin on the sharing sites already its gettin old....peace
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Dj_Suffer, 20 Aug 2006 @ 12:02pm

Mpaa Tshirt
I made a T-Shirt saying "If the MPAA says its bad, It HAS to be good" because that dude said he'd buy one...

~copy from here~
+
http://img511.imageshack.us/img511/5453/mpaashirtds4.png
+
~paste in url bar~

Email machina.cult@gmail.com if you want one...
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god, 13 Nov 2006 @ 7:55pm

i love you
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HEY, 13 Nov 2006 @ 7:56pm

piracy is oh so right and the mpaa is oh so wrong...
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- upyoass, 17 Jan 2007 @ 6:12am
  
  ISOHUNT FINALLY SHUT DOWN!
  Looks like the MPAA (goat fukkers) finally got isohunt shut down. What's the next best torrent search engine?
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hawkinau, 17 Jan 2007 @ 7:32am

has Isohunt bit the dust too
Last nite I did a search on Isohunt as one always does and found what I was looking for as usualy happens, tonite I wanted to look for something else clicked up their url and to my amazment I had "page can not be displayed" come up so I tried a few more times with out success so went to google and clicked on an Isohunt link and got the same result?????? Has Isohunt gone the way of napster and countless other p2p search engines because the MPAA have got nothing better to do than piss everyone off????
If anyone has any info on the site could u please let me know? If they have gone by the wayside I hope they come back trice as big, It was a bloody good site and if not what good Torrent sites r left out there in cyber space?
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shakk, 17 Jan 2007 @ 9:41pm

isohunt
nope, it's not.

final note today at the site today "We are moving house. If the tubes run smoothly, we expect to be back in full swing tomorrow."
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mafiadaddy, 20 Jan 2007 @ 2:12am

leave iso hunt alone and pick on someone else whats the point anyway
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jack, 26 Apr 2008 @ 3:06pm

it may not true.did this can create any legal problem.how can i share this one to others. ================ jack New way to get heard about online! Get connected with millions of social networks worldwide and let people know about your business. http://www.widecircles.com
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Jul 2008 @ 10:56am

bless them they do try
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midland eye, 4 Dec 2008 @ 5:15am

littigation
they advertise .you get more custom .they then request records of downloads whuch have substantialy increased.duh more revenue. why oh why do you guys have to hang on to records dump the blasted junk and theres nothin to get.easy.
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4MIN, 14 Mar 2009 @ 9:50am

AllofMP3.com
Don't care russian all have left with hands, they have paid the enormous fine, but nobody as well as has not fallen into prison.
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