Kim Dotcom Gives TV Interview Where He Insists The Charges Against Him Are A Joke

from the making-his-case dept

Fri, Mar 2nd 2012 7:47am — Mike Masnick

While Kim Dotcom is out on bail in New Zealand, he gave an interview to a New Zealand TV station. You can watch it below or read the transcript at the previous link: Generally speaking, if you're facing criminal charges, it's probably not a wise idea to give public interviews to the press, and I don't see how doing this helps him in any way. He more or less lays out his expected argument concerning the copyright infringement claims, which are pretty much what you'd expect: that they followed the DMCA, took stuff down on request, and even gave copyright holders special access by which they could take links down themselves. Dotcom is clearly very well versed in the legal issues here, and he's choosing his words extremely carefully, but it still seems a bit silly to reveal such arguments outside of court, and it could come back to haunt him later (you can bet US prosecutors are pouring over every word to figure out what they can hang him on.

Also, while the interview focuses on the copyright issues, it avoids the key part of the charges, which is the criminal conspiracy issue. Obviously, those are built off of the copyright claims, but just fighting the copyright claims and ignoring the conspiracy charges is unlikely to be a winning strategy.

One key point he raises in the interview is the fact that, despite being in business for seven years, no MPAA studio ever took any legal action against them other than sending DMCA takedown notices which he claims they obeyed (the indictment suggests that Megaupload didn't necessarily have the greatest record on following takedowns):

JC: CNET, in an article that looked pretty well researched to me and well sourced said, and I quote, “among the copyright owners who’ve accused Megaupload of piracy, including software and video game companies none of them presented the FBI with more, quote, significant evidence, end quote, about Megaupload than the MPAA. Did any members of the MPAA come to you and say “we have concerns, Kim, about what’s going on in Megaupload”.

KD: Never. And I gotta tell you this – if you are a company that is hurt so much by what we are doing, billions of dollars of damage, you don’t wait and sit and do nothing. You call your lawyers and you try and sue us and try to stop us from what we are doing.

JC: So a cease and desist of some form or other. Did you ever receive any letters from members of the MPAA saying “the latest James Bond film is being exchanged, ad infinitum, through Megaupload, you must stop it”? Did you ever receive…

KD: Absolutely not. No legal document has ever reached us from any of these studios. The only thing that we get is Takedown Notices and them using the direct delete access on our website. So, isn’t it surprising to you that when I’m the pirate king and I’m causing all this damage that none of them has ever even attempted to sue us, to sue us for damages, you know? If you would run a business that loses billions of dollars because of me, you wouldn’t just sit there and do nothing. I mean, this investigation was ongoing for over two years, you know, the company was live for over seven years, the MPAA has always thrown names at us and called us all kinds of things but they’ve never actually done anything to you know, take us to court and for the very simple reason that there is a law in the US that protects us which is the Digital Millennium Copyright Act that protects online service providers from actions of their users and this is the same law that allowed Google to still exist, that allowed YouTube to still exist. You know that Viacom sued YouTube and YouTube claimed that they were protected by the DMCA and they won. And if you look at the YouTube case files, the emails that were exchanged internally we are a lamb compared to what was going on at YouTube at the time but these guys got away. They won their lawsuit and I’m sitting in jail, my house is being raided, all my assets are frozen without a trial, without a hearing. This is completely insane, is what it is.

Elsewhere he notes that he's an easy target because of his "flamboyant" past, but that, alone isn't illegal. But he also responds to the basic questions pretty clearly, noting that they can't proactively monitor the service, because (1) that's not required by law (2) it's technically impossible and (3) it could raise privacy questions under US law (that part might be a stretch, since the uploads weren't private, but public).

I still think there are serious problems with the lawsuit, but the case against him is a bit bigger than what he portrays in the interview, and he's going to need a much stronger defense if he's going to actually win the case.

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Filed Under: bail, copyright, dmca, kim dotcom, kim schmitz, new zealand, privacy
Companies: megaupload

211 Comments

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GMacGuffin (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 7:56am

Dude, literally everything you say can and will be used against you. As in, it's admissible against you, but not for you. If you absolutely need to spew, next time have your lawyer say it ...
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- FuzzyDuck, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:57am
  
  Re:
  Things might not work exactly the same way in NZ. He's clearly fighting for public opinion. That's a fight the US can only loose. The US prosecutors look more like vindictive little f*!%s every day - even threatening his pregnant wife. A positive view of him held by public opinion can only benefit him, at the very least it will ensure that everything is done by the book (New Zealand's book, not the US's book).
  
  People in NZ are scratching their heads wondering why this man was being arrested the way he was, with such an "American" show of force? They are seeing the NZ legal system being abused for US style persecution of someone. This is not how things work in New Zealand and allowing the US to corrupt the NZ legal system isn't going to go down well with public opinion.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - GMacGuffin (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:08am
    
    Re: Re:
    Point taken. And I sincerely hope you're right; and it works.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Ilfar, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:44am
    
    Re: Re:
    What? You mean the fact that it's a non-violent crime, but the arrest required how many police officers, choppers, and weapons? (Bear in mind, police don't go armed by default in NZ)
    
    It's all over at least two radio stations here with the morning jockeys - why did such a crime need that much force to arrest him? What I'm hearing is that everyone thinks the US is forcing the issue.
    
    Of course, we're a country with a total population smaller than most large cities overseas. Our opinion isn't exactly going to count for much on a global scale.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Lawrence D'Oliveiro, 2 Mar 2012 @ 3:53pm
      
      Re: Our opinion isn't exactly going to count for much on a global scale.
      And yet we have succeeded in mightily pissing off the US twice before: in 1985 with the passage of the anti-nuclear legislation under Lange, and in 2003 with our refusal to join in the Iraq boondoggle under Clarke.
      
      And in both cases, we were opting for peace rather than war.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - G Thompson (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:57pm
        
        Re: Re: Our opinion isn't exactly going to count for much on a global scale.
        This is why I'm amazed that every US Commentator (and this includes Techdirt) thinks it is all about the Criminal Case in the USA and that the extradition hearing is a done deal.
        
        Nothing could be further than the truth. The US Prosecutors who are basing their whole case on a US Grand Jury indictment (and that in itself is telling.. ham sandwich anyone?) and is basically telling everyone that Kim a Kiwi who has made good has done these things and needs to be punished by the 'protectors of the world'
        
        This interview is about pushing the message of how everyday Kiwi's think the USA is worse than even it was in 85 or 2003, that Democracy in the USA is basically non existent and how New Zealand needs to fight to keep its sovereignty and not kowtow like the UK, Europe and in some ways Australia (with Assange) is to US interests.
        
        When the USA has an extradition treaty and justice system that is equitable with the rest of the world, maybe this wouldn't be so bad. Until then every Kiwi should tell the USA to suck chips.
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:01am

Pardon me for saying it this way, but:

he comes off as a lying sack of shit.

Most of his justifications (and they are just justifications) are the same claptrap "not making it available fast enough" stuff that gets tosses around here. It's really way funnier to watch someone say it, rather than just reading a post.

This guy needs to shut up before he makes the case against him airtight.
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- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:15am
  
  Re:
  "This guy needs to shut up before he makes the case against him airtight."
  
  Actually, the defense can enter the entire interview as evidence for him, which might be a good idea as the persecution...I mean prosecution...will enter excerpts edited to fit their ideas.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - GMacGuffin (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:24am
    
    Re: Re:
    "Actually, the defense can enter the entire interview as evidence for him ..."
    
    Actually, they can't generally. It's hearsay. If the prosecution enters only snippets against him on a hearsay exception (admission of party/opponent), defense then may be able to bring in other sections to clarify & show context.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:44am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      How is a video of what someone actually said hearsay? I could see it being hearsay if some third-party said "In an off-camera interview, Kim Dotcom made the following statements". Video of a defendant speaking isn't hearsay.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - GMacGuffin (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:32am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Hearsay is any statement made by anybody who is not testifying at a hearing, if the statement is offered to prove the truth of the matter stated.
        
        The video is Dotcom making out-of-court statements of fact about his case. Hearsay if he tries to use it to prove the truth of his statements.
        
        So to get it in, it has to fall under an exception, one of which is the prosecution can use it against him - especially if he says it differently on the stand. And of course, he gave them 20+ minutes of stuff that they can use to try to shred him on cross-examination if he veers even slightly off the exact words in that interview. That's the not-wise part.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Lawrence D'Oliveiro, 2 Mar 2012 @ 3:56pm
        
        Re: Hearsay
        >Hearsay is any statement made by anybody who is not testifying at a hearing...
        
        No it isn�t. I was a juror at a trial where such evidence was presented, and it was not classed as hearsay, because the statement was being made to someone who should have known the facts, and who didn�t seem to disagree with them.
        
        Of course, IANAL.
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        G Thompson (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:07pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Actually if the prosecution are stupid enough to try to use it in the extradition case within New Zealand then the defence can not only fully use it, but fully use all other footage of prosecutors anywhere (and this includes politicians and industry) talking on camera/radio about the case.
        
        It then would become a character type situation under the extradition case. if though he gets to the USA then yep they can do what you stated since hearsay exceptions are different there as I understand it.
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    - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 1:15pm
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      "Actually, the defense can enter the entire interview as evidence for him ..."
      
      "Actually, they can't generally. It's hearsay. If the prosecution enters only snippets against him on a hearsay exception (admission of party/opponent), defense then may be able to bring in other sections to clarify & show context."
      
      Actually, "hearsay" is quoting third parties without corroboration.
      Kim Dotcom is the first party, the actual speaker, stating what he knows, not quoting anyone else.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 1:27pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        He is right according to wiki and if referring to US law
        
        "Hearsay is a statement, other than one made by the declarant while testifying at the trial or hearing, offered in evidence to prove the truth of the matter asserted."[1] Per Federal Rule of Evidence 801(d)(2)(a), a statement made by a defendant is admissible as evidence only if it is inculpatory; exculpatory statements made to an investigator are hearsay and therefore may not be admitted as evidence in court, unless the defendant testifies.[3] When an out-of-court statement offered as evidence contains another out-of-court statement it is called double hearsay, and both layers of hearsay must be found separately admissible.[4]
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 2:48pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        "[1] Per Federal Rule of Evidence 801(d)(2)(a), a statement made by a defendant is admissible as evidence only if it is inculpatory; exculpatory statements made to an investigator are hearsay and therefore may not be admitted as evidence in court, unless the defendant testifies."
        
        Kim made NO incriminating (inculpatory) statements in the intervie.
        Therefore, according to you, since his interview contains ONLY exculpatory statments, there's no harm to him in the interview, and it can only serve to turn public opinion on his side, which will prove useful later on.
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- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:31am
  
  Re:
  You hear what you already believe. Next time try listening.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Coyote, 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:08am
  
  Re:
  But that -is- a legitimate complaint; if you don't make something available fast enough, people find other ways of getting it. It's not always how it works, but for the most part, he's correct.
  
  As for his 'justifications.' I don't see any justifications, just pretty basic truth here. Maybe when you stop listening for your own justifications as to why he's guilty and start just simply listening, which is what no one in the MPAA, RIAA or Hollywood want to do, you'll actually learn something.
  
  Just saiyan.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 3:09pm
    
    Re: Re:
    A guy wants to get laid. He wants to get laid right now.
    But no girl is willing to bone him right now.
    
    Are you saying that because he wants something right now but can't get it legally, he's justified in obtaining it illegally? Via abusing the rights of someone else?
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Lawrence D'Oliveiro, 2 Mar 2012 @ 3:59pm
      
      Re: Are you saying that because he wants something right now but can't get it legally, he's justified in obtaining it illegally? Via abusing the rights of someone else?
      Only if sex toys are illegal in your country.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - Anonymous Coward, 4 Mar 2012 @ 2:26pm
        
        Re: Re: Are you saying that because he wants something right now but can't get it legally, he's justified in obtaining it illegally? Via abusing the rights of someone else?
        And if they are, you probably live in a country called Texas.
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    - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 4:08pm
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      This just in: Megaupload has more uses than piracy. Very legitimate uses, even!
      
      SHOCKING, I KNOW.
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    - Karl (profile), 3 Mar 2012 @ 8:58am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      A guy wants to get laid. He wants to get laid right now.
      But no girl is willing to bone him right now.
      
      That's a bad analogy. It would be more accurate to say that lots of women are willing to bone him right now, but only if he pays their pimp.
      
      And, if the guy has sex with a girl that looks like that prostitute, the pimp still demands money.
      
      Now, I'm not saying that the copyright industries are the moral equivalent of pimping... Wait, yes, that's exactly what I'm saying.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - (A), 3 Mar 2012 @ 2:51pm
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      Only because of government do we have this legal/illegal paradigm. Anarchy solves that problem.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- jupiterkansas (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:39am
  
  Re:
  Not like that fine, upstanding ex-Senator Chris Dodd.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:03am

"JC: So a cease and desist of some form or other. Did you ever receive any letters from members of the MPAA saying �the latest James Bond film is being exchanged, ad infinitum, through Megaupload, you must stop it�? Did you ever receive�"

KD: Absolutely not. No legal document has ever reached us from any of these studios.

Methinks fat boy parses words pretty well. legal documents?

For someone that pays lawyers millions, you'd think he'd listen to their advice. I can't imagine a lawyer in his right mind who would authorize an interview like this. It's not being tried in the court of public opinion. And what he did was put himself on the record and perhaps limit what his lawyers may want to say, or not say at trial. Really stupid.
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- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:12am
  
  Re:
  I grant that it was probably stupid - but he is not only trying to save his ass, he's trying to save his business AND his business model.
  
  Selective prosecution is pretty much what this is because he is right - google\youtube are, if you follow the same logic they are using against Megauploads, were and are vastly more egregious infringers than Megauploads ever was.
  
  The reason i say that is that megauploads provided, in a nutshell, a locker for you to stow your stuff and the ability to give anyone you wanted the key [by giving them the URL] Youtube actually has the tools on their site to enable you to covert and publish videos that you got from pretty much anywhere. Indeed, youtube will make recommendations based on your previously viewed videos. If providing such tools and recommendations is not contributory, then how is a general locker service?
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:17am
    
    Re: Re:
    I think you had the ability to mark things as "public" vs private on MegaUpload. People were uploading copyrighted movies and making them public which basically turned it into a hosting site for illegal content.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - :Lobo Santo (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:39am
      
      Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
      Yes, precisely!
      
      It's like when somebody stashes bootleg records in a bus-station locker and gives the key to somebody else--the correct governmental response is to seize the bus company's assets nation-wide and shut down the bus company's entire business for YEARS while the case is investigated.
      
      Makes perfect sense.
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      - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:44am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        If there is only one bus a day, and it's empty, and nobody every takes the bus, and the station keeps adding more and more lockers, and people stand in front of the lockers charging $120 a year for "faster locker access", you can pretty much figure out the rest.
        
        Thanks for playing "FAIL!", Kim Dotcom style.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:53am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        " one bus a day, and it's empty, and nobody every takes the bus"
        
        Yeah because there was no one using MU legitimately. No one ever wanted to email a file larger then 2mb.
        
        Which is a fact you know because the MPAA told you so.
        
        Thanks for playing, "completely making up facts to support your argument," **AA style.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:22am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        The number of legit users was negligible. 90% of the users were download only to start with, so most people were not sending anything. It goes on from there...
        
        It's pretty hard to deny reality,but you sure are doing a good job trying.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Tim K (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:30am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        And despite people continually telling you that that 90% figure you come up with every time doesn't mean shit, you still use it. One popular artist giving away songs = how many legit downloads?
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:59pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        Tim, once again, if it was a single data point that meant nothing, you might have something. But other studies have shown, as an example, that a similar amount of Torrent traffic is also pirated material. What is surprising is that, even with multiple data points, nobody here seems willing to accept the truth.
        
        "One popular artist giving away songs = how many legit downloads?"
        
        On a site with 50 million or so hits a day, the 100,000 downloads of a popular song would be, what 2%? Well within the window.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 1:13pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        Yes that would be 2% so it would only take 50 popular songs to cover all the traffic according to your math. You know more than one song and one artist is popular at a time right? It is a single data point that means nothing, just saying there is more data does not make it so.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 3 Mar 2012 @ 12:20pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        Yup, but since there isn't 50 songs on Mega, let alone 50 being downloaded 100,000 times per day, the point is moot.
        
        See, here's the other problem that will forever blow your "it's mostly legal" argument out the window: The prosecutors have the logs, and they know who was downloading what. They know that almost all of the traffic was related to infringing material. The fact that most file lockers cannot operate without it should tell you something.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 5 Mar 2012 @ 8:42am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        "The prosecutors have the logs, and they know who was downloading what. They know that almost all of the traffic was related to infringing material. The fact that most file lockers cannot operate without it should tell you something."
        
        Then why are the prosecutors trying to have all the logs and files deleted?
        
        Without corroborating evidence, there's nothing to prove their doctored evidence is inaccurate!
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:32am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        Again that does not imply its illegal downloading going on. You are making a huge jump there to prove your point. If a Redhat distro goes up and 10k people download it, that legal. If an artist puts a song up and 100K people download it, thats legal.
        
        Its ridiculous to say and equal number of people must be uploading for it to have been legal uses. When my boss puts up a file my whole department downloads it, we don't all upload something first.
        
        Its easy to make shit up, which is probably why you are so good at it.
        
        "I was reading in the transcripts of IPI v RedHat that back in the day, 12 million unique IP addresses connected to RedHat and Fedora repositories to update/install systems. When I checked today, Fedora Project showed 1.913 million in a recent week." http://mrpogson.com/2011/03/27/how-many-people-use-gnulinux-lots/
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 1:00pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        Again, see above. When that data point matches up pretty much to other studies about pirate traffic, it seems pretty obvious.
        
        1.913 million in a week is nice. Mega did 350 million a week. See how that works out?
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 1:11pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        Yeah that was 1 example of a legitimate product. and again what studies.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:00am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        Come on, you said " It goes on from there..." lets here the rest, i need a good laugh. Also I am impressed by your imagination i really want to see how it's so obvious to you that "people used the site legitimately" is all just a smokescreen.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        The Groove Tiger (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:28am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        Actually, 1234567890% of the use was legitimate. I know because those numbers are on the top of my keyboard, which is a better source of data as whatever you used to arrive to your "90%" conclusion.
        
        In fact, by checking my CHARMAP.EXE application, I can tell you that only -∞.π% of the users were infringers. I got it from the same source as you (Imaginary land).
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:35am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        Was your hands if you are pulling facts out of his ass too.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:41am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        wash*
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        The Groove Tiger (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 7:47pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        I'm wearing rubber gloves, of course. With lots of lube. And liniment.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 4 Mar 2012 @ 10:10pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        yes, and the word "TYPEWRITER" is the longest word you can type of the top row of a standard QWERTY keyboard !!!
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        fairusefriendly (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 2:39pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        And who says that is automatically illegal
        
        System management servers in corporations do that all the time. Your not installing a backup you backed up, your installing from a central common installation point.
        
        The system restore is the common software/os/applications that are common to all the machines on the network.
        
        Same principle should apply to tv shows(which you paid for..) etc.
        
        Want to change the laws to say that you can't download stuff you didn't personally backup even though you own a valid licence to the content, and your talking about bankrupting the entire US economy.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:16am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        Except there were a lot of people using those buses.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:03am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Baby & Bathwater
        It's not like that. That's not comparable.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:15am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      Youtube also has the ability to mark thing public or private.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - I-Blz, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:46am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        In fact, I'd say that Youtube's privitization feature is used as or less often than MegaUploads's was!
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- G Thompson (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:16pm
  
  Re:
  Legal documents mean business records, official emails, minutes of meetings between parties, etc.
  
  They don't just mean DMCA notices, which do not actually carry or have any legal weight nor obligation outside of the USofA.
  
  Oh and I'd authorise it, though even if the Interview wasn't authorised Kim is savvy enough to understand the Kiwi angst against USA thuggery.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:10am

How hard is it for them to see the files that are most often accessed on their server and use common sense to determine that it is infringing. Here is the scenario, "Oh, look, this file has been viewed 1,000,000 times, and it's called LordOfTheRingsTwoTowers and it was uploaded by a 17 year old from Spain." MegaUpload not only ignored blatant and obvious piracy, it encouraged this piracy by offering credits for people who uploaded illegal content.
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- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:16am
  
  Re:
  Well, aside from the fact that your idea isn't required by law, would actually open up anyone following it to *more* liability when they inevitably miss things, and isn't feasible in any reality-based universe where files can be renamed and/or repackaged and/or archived and/or password protected and/or split, your idea is great.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:21am
    
    Re: Re:
    If I were running a business where i pay for bandwidth, and they were, I would want to know what that bandwidth was being used for. I garantee that they had reports that showed which files were being most often downloaded. MegaUpload was knowingly hosting and distributing illegal content.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Tim K (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:24am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      Again, it is not their job, nor is it required by law to police the user uploaded content.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:12am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Oh, you mean willful blindness. That sounds an awful lot like the lame excuses bankers used to make when accepting duffel bags full of cash in the pre anti-money laundering law days. If you make money from doing business in an ecosystem; be it the financial or internet ecosystem- it comes with an obligation to take reasonable measures against lawlessness.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Tim K (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:19am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        And for sites like megaupload that would be following the DMCA. They even went beyond 'reasonable measures' by allowing the *AAs access to delete files themselves. With that much content you cannot police it yourself or as the AC below stated, Also again, it makes them more liable for the things they inevitably miss
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:38pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Don't see the problem there, the entertainment industry is worldwide famous for creative accounting and everybody seems to be ok to turn a blind eye to it.
        
        Drug addicts dying from overdose are a constant on that industry and I don't see nobody doing anything about it.
        
        Why should a file locker care what is being used for?
        It is not their problem unless they get specifics from someone else and they apparently took all the "reasonable" measures possible, preempting anything is not a reasonable measure and it never was, so unless you have something else you are just full of shit.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:46pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        That is a good point. Why can't the labels stop this rampant drug use? They have to know its going on, can't they just check in on the artists? Why are they not doing their part to prevent these heinous crimes?
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:48pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        That is a good point. Why can't the labels stop this rampant drug use? They have to know its going on, can't they just check in on the artists? Why are they not doing their part to prevent these heinous crimes?
        
        They should be able to keep track of all the money they give the artists and make sure it isn't going to illegal drugs.
        
        If they just knew who they were doing business with they could prevent their money from going to drug kingpins and fueling death and violence.
        
        Thank you AC! This will provide hours of counter analogy fun!
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:39am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      Also again, it makes them more liable for the things they inevitably miss. Not to mention with 800 transfers completing a second how many full time jobs is that to monitor, even if you just look at say the top 10%.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:24am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        How is it that YouTube isn't flooded with porn? How is that possible?
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Tim K (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:28am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Because with youtube and porn it is not a question about whether or not it is copyrighted material. youtube does not allow any porn at all, legitimate or otherwise
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:50am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        ^ and if you want to find some boobies on there you can(for a short minute before it gets flagged by the community then removed), but why try and hunt it down when you can just go somewhere like pornhub.com ?
        
        Why try to flood youtube with porn when there are like 80 youtube-for-porn sites already? Maybe if there were sites for half of this copyrighted material youtube wouldn't be constantly battling people putting it up.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:38pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Not all Youtube porn gets removed. I believe there is some review and certainly anything that is flagged will get reviewed. Here is an example though of Youtube porn that has been there for nearly 3 years.
        Warning, NSFW and annoyingly guttural Dutch spoken as well as ecstatic moaning which sounds more like the morning hack of a smoker stricken with TB.
        http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wklVrKQEx40&feature=related
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:43pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Wow that was the weirdest softcore "porn" i have ever seen. 4700~ views when I got there. I'd almost bet that the spike in viewership from this link will get it removed finally but it might stay.
        
        But yeah no system is perfect.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 3 Mar 2012 @ 7:05pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        And because you pointed it out it has now been removed. Do you see how that works?
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:48am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Because people who see it flag it, it gets reviewed and then gets removed. In no way does YouTube pro-actively police uploaded content - it's all reactive.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:45pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Watch Youtube videos as they get posted (filter on most recent). Occasionally you will see one that violate the Youtube Code. This will be deleted within a couple of minutes. So, either someone or an algorithm is reviewing these. Citizen enforcers can't be there all the time to flag this stuff within minutes.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:40pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Because the community flag the content they don't like, that is why, nobody is going to flag uploaded movies in Russian though.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:40am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      f I were running a business where i pay for bandwidth, and they were, I would want to know what that bandwidth was being used for.
      
      Cool, go into business with your magical ability to detect infringing content across all the jurisdictions of the world if it's that easy. There's clearly a market for it.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:22am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      Right, do you run a check on everybody you do business with or just the ones you get some sort of a tip about it?
      
      How much would it cost to you personally to have to check every single transaction you do and clear it?
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:37am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        No check everyone. That is why no criminal can ever put illegally gained money in a bank. /sarc
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Another AC, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:10am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      What you seem to think is simple is in fact very hard to do.
      
      When literally millions of simultaneous uploads and downloads are being made every day, how can you possibly filter them all? It would take an army of people and resources, which is not practical.
      
      Even if you only look at the top most downloaded files, I suspect the vast majority will be legal files at the top, and somewhere in the middle might be some copyright material. This doesn't even consider that megaupload has no way of knowing if it's infringing or not. Common sense certainly doesn't help - The file called "LordOfTheRingsTwoTowers" may in fact just be popular fan art, not even a movie file. Megaupload has no way of knowing the age of the uploader (maybe the location) but both of those are completely irrelevant anyway.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:29am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Where is all the pron on YouTube? You know people are uploading it, I don't see it in my search results. How did it go away????
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Another AC, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:32am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        haha Look harder, it's there.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Tim K (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:36am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Because with youtube and porn it is not a question about whether or not it is copyrighted material. youtube does not allow any porn at all, legitimate or otherwise
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:58am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        They also don't allow infringing content. Read their terms of service agreement that you must agree to before you are allowed to upload content. People KNOW when something is illegal in many cases, ignoring it is enabling it.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Tim K (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:02am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        With non-porn they have to (or should have to) verify that it is in fact infringing content and not just fair use or parody, or a non-copyright holder attempting to take something down. With porn, they just have to say, yes, this is porn, no further checks necessary
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 2:57pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Really? Who is going to check?? You mean that have someone that views every complaint? I thought that was impossible to do - at least according to some other people who have commented on this very post.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:52am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Also the community flags it for removal not proactive youtube searches. Maybe if the copyright holders stopped alienating the community they would flag some of their content for them...
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:01am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        I don't feel alienated by the copyright holders. I feel pissed off at the pirates. Their actions are leading to the legislation which makes all of our lives harder. Don't blame the copyright holders for protecting their rights and requesting that existing laws be enforced.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:20am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        They are not protecting their rights and requesting existing laws to be enforced. They are saying "its too hard for us to protect our rights! Make new laws that either destroy services people find valuable or make other people police for our content. We just want to sit here conducting business the same way we did 20 years ago, make more money than we did 20 years ago and never have to think or innovate or try anything."
        
        Or to be more succinct. "these people are committing civil crimes but its too hard for us to do anything about it, here are 10s of millions of dollars, do everything you can to make hundreds of millions of people actions criminal."
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:27am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Also apparently how you feel isn't how the youtube community in general feels or it would be a lot harder to find infringing content.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        The eejit (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:00pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        There's "protecting their rights" and then there's "stealing taxpayer's money to police our private business".
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 2:59pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Is your "private business" pirating content?
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:51pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Fair and square I blame copyright holders the holders of a government granted monopoly that should be illegal in the first place for laws that threatens democracy, are you going to try and defend the aggressive nature of exclusionary douches that don't know how to survive in a free market?
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 3:02pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        If they create it (or own it in the case of copyright LAW) they control how it is distributed, it's EXISTING LAW not something new, EXISTING LAW. The laws that existed before the internet still apply to the internet. You are not entitled to steal the works of other people just because the internet exists. Existing law prior to the internet covers illegal copying and is applicable to the internet. The new laws have been enforcement issues. Trying to force someone to actually enforce EXISTING copyright law.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - Anonymous Coward, 4 Mar 2012 @ 9:46pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        if you cannot conduct your business or any aspect of your business within the terms of the law, and with due diligence, and probaty, then your entire business model is illegal.
        
        or
        
        if you are too stupid to be able to work within the law, you deserve to be imprisoned, or punished.
        
        or
        
        "its too hard to do" is no excuse for breaking the law.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - The Law Man, 21 Mar 2012 @ 11:16pm
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      That's not the problem... Just say, you're some hot stuff like Metallica or Snoop Dog or something, k? Now Compare these: I break and enter your house, stab you multiple times and rob your safe... Vs. Stealing your wallet one fine day on the train while you're not looking... Vs. selling burned copies of the latest CD that you recently released in the school yard... In these 3 examples, YOU CAN'T SERIOUSLY TELL ME THAT ALL THE CRIMES MENTIONED ABOVE DESERVE THE SAME PUNISHMENT :-P .... Dotcom has been treated like a terrorist that was smuggling guns and using human aim-boards to test the guns with customers.. FBI raided and broke in his house from hellicopters, held him at gunpoint, terrorrized him, his friends and family... That's the first issue..
      
      Second issue is they seized and froze all his assets effectively significantly delaying him from building up a legal team... So his fundamental right to retain counsel just vanished because he broke copyright laws?? The seized assets include his house!! Where him, his wife and 3 kids live! ALL THIS BEFORE BEING GIVEN A TRIAL!! Coooommoooonnnn!!!! What's going on here???? :-P How would you like the police to raid and damage your house, take everything from you, then years later (after a lengthy court case), potentially you win and they tell you: "You're innocent and free to go, oh here's your house back, your family can move back in now... Here's your money too!" NICE ONE! Guilty before being proven!!
      
      But the root issue here... What really smells rotten is Copyright Law... It's the model of copyright law that smells like rotten illogical fish... In the internet age, media files, copyrighted or not, are just a commodity.. Dotcom or not, Megaupload or not, there are extremely fast ways to download any kind of content on the net, copyrighted or not... So go ahead and arrest the thousands of people behind thousands of sites that facilitate/host copyrighted media... And arrest the millions of users who use the sites and download the media too! Don't forget the kid in the schoolyard trying to make extra pocket money by selling copyrighted cds/movies! Afterall a crime is a crime! (all things equal, you kill someone and make money vs. You just kill someone, you'll go to jail period).
      
      The Government is way over its head with Copyright Law. Abuse of power! As it has been mentioned elsewhere.. "The Dotcom case is just a civil case in disguise"
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:18am
  
  Re:
  The job of "protecting copyrights" is the copyright holder's not MegaUpload's, or anyone else's.
  
  Once they received the DMCAs they took them down.
  It may not have been as fast as the copyright holders would've liked, but still within the range specified by law.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:23am
    
    Re: Re:
    according to dotcom, the studios also had direct access to delete links and files of infringing content.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Jay (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:32am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      Correct. They did have that power. And they abused it by deleting links that weren't theirs also. That's one reason for the tiff with Universal and Megaupload.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:31am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Really if you are making an acusation you better have facts that are relavent to the case otherwise your libelous claims can put your butt in court.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:28am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        I hear you rape pandas. See you in court.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Chargone (profile), 3 Mar 2012 @ 12:13am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        maybe he can tell us when he stopped doing that?
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:04pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Yes sir, can you tell us how long it's been since you last raped a panda?
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Jay (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:41pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Actually, I got it wrong...
        
        Megaupload had the bad takedown of the music video.
        
        Warner bros took down files on Rapidshare illegally.
        
        No huge difference on the issue here. The fact remains they still had a way to address the actual infringements.
        
        Your panda problem I can't help though.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:53pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        I hear you have dealing with pedobear.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        G Thompson (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:25pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        ha ha ha ha.. Oh gawd.
        
        If it is an opinion it's not defamatory per se (libelous).
        
        Though the statement in this case is actually factual based on the case between MegaUpload and Universal. This is one of the intriguing things in this whole case. Universal got pulled over the coals by the court, all of a sudden there is indictments by the Ham Sandwich bunch against a organisation who had the audacity to tell the emperor he had no clothes on.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Anonymous Coward, 3 Mar 2012 @ 12:22pm
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      No, they had the ability to rmeove links - but the original files remained, linked from hundreds of other places. So it became whack a mole, with Mega knowing exactly everywhere that the files were linked from, but refusing to remove the original files, and removing only the links that were specifically reported.
      
      Bad faith actions that will get megachubby a few years in the clink.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:18am
  
  Re:
  They lack the manpower and\or technology to do that. If you are talking about millions of files to review out of 10s or hundreds of millions of files available - who is to say what is legit and what is not - and how many man hours or cpu cycles would they have to spend doing it. Its not reasonable for them to have that burden. Especially when they put in place the ability for the MAFIAA to delete at will.
  
  From a technology perspective, you are talking about writing custom algorithms that will flag files, then parse the file names and contents, and then determine if they are infringing - to do that they need to have some sort of signature for the original to compare against. That takes servers, storage, bandwidth, manpower to program, electricity, etc. Its a colossal undertaking to even contemplate and would probably take more staff to develop and implement than the company employed at their height.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:25am
    
    Re: Re:
    There is no computer that can use the arcade fuzzy letter of the law to determine infringiment.
    
    What if you have a document that allows you to redistribute something, will a computer system ask for that before deleting anything?
    
    How about fair use?
    
    AI's are advancing but they are not there just yet, and when they are, why would we need judges?
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:36am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      You can't defend the willingly allowing the infringment to occur. They KNEW it was happening so much so that they offered people incentives to upload popular infringing content (according to the indictment. Just because you can't catch all illegal activity is no excuse to ignore all of it. That would be like telling all of law enforcement to stop enforcing every law. You're saying because you can't catch all of it you shouldnt bother looking for any of it, you should tell your local police force to stop arresting people for drunk driving because they can't catch them all.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:05am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        "Just because you can't catch all illegal activity is no excuse to ignore all of it."
        
        Actually that is exactly why they have to ignore it. The law does not require them to police all of their users content but once they start they become liable for the shit they miss.
        
        They are not law enforcement officers. They are a private company that has no legal requirement to stop people from committing civil offenses.
        
        If you were right then Viacom wouldn't have lost their case against youtube. But they did. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viacom_International_Inc._v._YouTube,_Inc.#District_Court_ruling
        I'm sure you know better than Judge Stanton though.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:55pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Really?
        
        Why police officers are not hold accountable for the crimes others commit?
        
        They should be doing much more to stop crime and not just turning a blind eye according to you.
        
        That is how stupid you sound.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 1:08pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Not just crimes in general but what about crimes committed by other police? Surely they should be liable if they can not even stop their co-workers from committing crimes. /sarc
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Tim K (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:22am
  
  Re:
  And in reference to songs? How do they know what's infringing and what artists are giving away?
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:40am
    
    Re: Re:
    They aren't going to catch all infringing content, but when they willingly allow obvious infringment and even encourage it by offering credits for people who upload popoular illegal content, their business model is exposed for what it truely was, using the DMCA to shelter the business while asking users to submit infringing content.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Tim K (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:57am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      offering credits for people who upload popoular illegal content
      Because legitimate content creators wouldn't be using that as an incentive to use the site at all...
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:03am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        They didn't care if you were legitimate or not.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:06am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        "They didn't know if you were legitimate or not if the copyright holder didn't report you."
        
        FTFY
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Gwiz (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:36am
  
  Re:
  ...and it was uploaded by a 17 year old from Spain.
  
  From Spain. Where file sharing for personal use is totally and completely legal.
  
  Where exactly is the legal problem with that?
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:41am
    
    Re: Re:
    File sharing for "personal" use, with those outside of SPAIN is not legal.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:06am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      That's funny, apparently you know more about spanish law then several spanish courts
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - G Thompson (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:31pm
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      Really? A fair few sovereign jurisdictions dispute you on that criteria. New Zealand being one of them.
      
      Though if your about unlawful, meaning civil, then you are correct (or for commercial use under criminal) though if unlawful the onus is on the plaintiff to prove and IS NOT THE ROLE OF GOVERNMENT
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- :Lobo Santo (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:42am
  
  Re: Cue the Ironic
  Yep, because I'd never name the picture I've taken of my puppies which I've ironically named "Lord of the Rings" and "The Two Towers" because shiznit like that never happens in real life...
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - GMacGuffin (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:19am
    
    Re: Re: Cue the Ironic
    Yeah, I learned that the hard way when I posted videos of my dogs "The Hurt Locker" and "Downfall"
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:43am
    
    Re: Re: Cue the Ironic
    Yeah and 5 second view of that content would be all it would take. Don't try to use that naming bullshit as a reason why it would be impossible to find any infringing content. I garnatee I would find infringing content in less than 30 seconds on half a dozen web sites right now.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:08am
      
      Re: Re: Re: Cue the Ironic
      so if 800 things are transferred every second they would only need to hire about 4000 employees to spend 5 seconds checking each transfer, 24 hours a day.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - Violated (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 6:29pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Cue the Ironic
        With 8 hour shifts that would require 12,000 employees. Pay them $10 an hour and that would be $340.4 million wages bill a year excluding managers, taxes and accountants.
        
        Then there would be plenty of human error with pressing the wrong button for any number of reasons. In only 5 second you cannot get a good feel of the media. Then in light of media under copyright they do not know if uploaded lawfully such as with a personal back-up or the rights owner distributing their own work.
        
        We can then add in computer software, digital books, music and stuff you don't even know what it is.
        
        Now if we add in the company now being liable to mistakes we just hit an extremely stupid plan.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        G Thompson (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:36pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Cue the Ironic
        Eureka!
        
        Now we know where all these bullshit figures of 'loss to the economy' is coming from..
        
        They are counting all these jobs that they think the ISP's etc should be paying for out of their own budgets.
        
        It all makes sense now...
        
        Cant we all just Think of the copyright infringemnt searchers..
        
        /sarc
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:09am
      
      Re: Re: Re: Cue the Ironic
      " I garnatee I would find infringing content in less than 30 seconds on half a dozen web sites right now."
      
      Congrats, maybe you should work for the copyright holders and help them find their content. Oh wait they don't want to pay you they want to force the websites to hire people to do this.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Anonymous Coward, 3 Mar 2012 @ 10:18am
      
      Re: Re: Re: Cue the Ironic
      If you examine copyrighted content, how do you avoid getting charged for copyright violation? Watching copyrighted content even to check that it is copyrighted is illegal.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - Anonymous Coward, 4 Mar 2012 @ 9:27pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Cue the Ironic
        watching or examining copyrighted material is not an offense, you do it all the time, even when you read Techdirt.
        
        do you understand what a law is ? watching copyright is not a violation of COPYRight, making available COPIES of that copyrighted material is a VIOLATION, and being against the law, is a crime.
        
        You have violated the law, receiving an illegal copy of something that has been copied in breach of copyright law, is 'receiving stolen goods' and 'knowingly participting in a criminal act'. .. both are crimes under common law.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 5 Mar 2012 @ 7:09am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Cue the Ironic
        I'm pretty sure receiving a copy (emphasis on "COPY") of something IS NOT "receiving stolen goods", but what do I know, I'm basing my statement off an ACTUAL U.S. Supreme Court ruling (you know, the ruling that stated a copy cannot be equated with theft/stolen goods, since it's you know, a copy), as opposed to biased and incorrect/misinformed personal opinion like you use.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Chris-Mouse (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:55am
  
  Re:
  How hard is it for them to see the files that are most often accessed on their server and use common sense to determine that it is infringing.
  As it turns out, the answer is 'very hard'.
  To start with look at the easy part, 'fair use.' You can probably make a pretty good guess at whether or not a use is fair, but that's all you can do. Fair use is something that ultimately needs to be decided by a court.
  The harder item to determine would be licensing. In order to determine whether or not a file is licensed, you would need to A) know the copyright status of the work (and this can vary with country!) B) know who the copyright holder is, and C) have access to the terms and conditions of every single license ever granted for the use of that work.
  Good luck building that database. Even the creators of the work are finding they have to use a lawsuit in order to pry that information out of the big studios.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:47am
    
    Re: Re:
    So you're saying that if the ENTIRE Lord of the Rings film were uploaded by a user account opened by a 17 year old in Spain, that there would be reasonable doubt that it was infringing? No one can be that naive. Dotcom knew there was infringment and did nothing about it.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Tim K (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:49am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      If by nothing you mean follow DMCA takedowns and give access for the studios to take files down themselves, then yes, he did 'nothing'
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:55am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        actually he amassed a fortune pilfering access to stolen IP.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Tim K (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:59am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        amassed a fortune stealing access to stolen IP??
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:05am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        I had typed pilfering IP and wanted to change it to selling access to stolen IP. Get a life Grammar Nazi.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Tim K (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:10am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        pilfer, grammar, i do think they mean what you think they mean
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:38pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        get a life grammar nazi from the guy who is swallowing Chris Dodd's semen on a daily basis... that's brilliant.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:59pm
        
        from the hard-to-have-good-grammar-if-your-mouth-is-full-of-cock dept
        lol
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 2:44pm
        
        Re: from the hard-to-have-good-grammar-if-your-mouth-is-full-of-cock dept
        did you just laugh at your own insult?
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Chargone (profile), 3 Mar 2012 @ 12:18am
        
        Re: Re: from the hard-to-have-good-grammar-if-your-mouth-is-full-of-cock dept
        i believe they are different shades of blue.
        not quite sure though.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        G Thompson (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:38pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        That image...
        
        ewwwwwwwwwwwwww
        
        Bastard! ;)
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:11am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        You sure it wasn't because he provided a useful service to people?
        
        Is that why microsoft is/was planning to open a filelocker? They wanted to get in on that sweet sweet pirate money? Or do you think that a lot of people actually wanted to use the legitimate service?
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:20am
  
  Re:
  a) Only a court of law can determine infringement there are no clear rules and there are exceptions that must be taken into account, after all this is a government granted monopoly that can be used to censor others and like any other monopolies it has very bad side effects and that is why only courts are allowed currently to say what is or not is infringement.
  
  So no they don't have the ability to "see" anything and should not have the ability to "see" what they want, there is a reason why the law is the way it is, it was made to protect democracy against monopolies and you apparently want to erode those safeguards in self interest.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:51am
    
    Re: Re:
    Hey AC what do you do for a living? I will find a legal loophole to screw you out of your compensation, let's see how you like it, buddy.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:12am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      oh so you do work for the **AA?
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Colin, 2 Mar 2012 @ 2:10pm
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      Cool, then you shouldn't have any problem proving how much money the studios were "screwed out of"? I'm sure there's a nice concrete, provable number right?
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:26am

"Generally speaking, if you're facing criminal charges, it's probably not a wise idea to give public interviews to the press, and I don't see how doing this helps him in any way."

It worked for the pirate bay. Yes, they were found guilty, yes it was because of a kangaroo court, but they won the public opinion by a long shot. And a lot of that was because of how open they were about everything, the interviews they did (and documentary of the entire court case/tour bus deal), and just how accessible they were.

I'm not saying you're wrong, just wanted to point out one big case in which interviews meant winning the war but losing the battle.
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- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:23am
  
  Re:
  I don't think it's a very good comparison. Dotcom faces decades in prison, millions in fines and forfeiture of more than $50 million. The consequences of him losing this case are enormous. Not so with the Pirate Bay. It was an incredibly stupid thing to do.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:12pm
    
    Re: Re:
    When the pirate bay started they faced greater than $10 million in damages (not sure if that was each or not) and an unspecified amount of jailtime. They managed to appeal and get increased fines but no jailtime. Without knowing how this will go it's not a horrible comparison.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:42am

I wish they would sue the MPAA/RIAA for allowing all the copyrighted material to stay up. "Look we gave you the tools and asked you to look for your copyrighted material and you just left it up there! It's easy right? Just look through these files and find your stuff and take it out, we don't know what you own or put up yourselves so please clean your shit off our site."
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
fairusefriendly (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:44am

it could raise privacy questions under US law (that part might be a stretch, since the uploads weren't private, but public).

just because a link can be made public doesn't mean that it WAS made public

I could for example use mega upload to put up a file i bought from my home, go to another machine at my work and download it so i could consume it there.

That would still be a private transaction because i never shared that link with anyone at all.

It also very difficult to tell the difference between that private act and me simply emailing the same file to someone who didn't pay for it.
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- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:43am
  
  Re: Exactly
  'That would still be a private transaction because i never shared that link with anyone at all.
  
  It also very difficult to tell the difference between that private act and me simply emailing the same file to someone who didn't pay for it.'
  
  I think quite a few people were uploading to file hosts as an additional back-up for their back-up type thing. Free, unlimited ... and LEGAL even if it was copyrighted. All file host services keep track of the number of downloads and a file shared between private personal computers would have maybe 5 downloads. A file shared publicaly would have 100-1000. That's a big difference.
  
  I thought the interview was good. The indictment was a press release. It's not a black and white case but can be very helpful to get press and public involved in covering copyright and patent issues.
  
  The issue that in some countries file sharing is still legal was never brought up. I think a bigger issue is whether the US wants to become the world's copyright cops. MPAA and RIAA didn't pay for this raid, the taxpayers did.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:32pm
    
    Re: Re: Exactly
    " All file host services keep track of the number of downloads and a file shared between private personal computers would have maybe 5 downloads. A file shared publicaly would have 100-1000. That's a big difference."
    
    I agree it is a big difference, but its still not their job to start looking at all the files that have been shared more than 100 times or whatever X value they want to make up.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - fairusefriendly (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 2:54pm
    
    Re: Re: Exactly
    1. i have downloaded a file across multiple machines 20-30 times.
    
    My favorite episode of doctor who blink was on a filelocker, and i kept redownloading it every time i wanted to watch it.
    
    Once i was done i deleted it.
    
    second the law doesn't make them keep track and evaluate
    
    in fact if they were stupid enough to do so, they would INCREASE their liability for any that they missed.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:55am

You're wrong Mike. This was a great interview, and it will greatly help his image in public, which I believe matters.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:01am
  
  Re:
  agree 100%
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Violated (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 6:45pm
  
  Re:
  He did not say anything we did not know already except for adding data to Mega's DMCA compliance figures.
  
  Most importantly those in the entertainment industry have been saying some very bad things recently, including this indictment, and he did need to speak up to set the record straight. You simply cannot let others slander you in propaganda without fighting back in an honest voice.
  
  I would be surprised if he did not go through these questions with a lawyer beforehand but this was pretty idiot proof stuff all about the DMCA and privacy.
  
  As to the bigger claims then they should be left for the trial but copyright infringement is certainly the core of this case.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Chargone (profile), 3 Mar 2012 @ 12:26am
    
    Re: Re:
    the thing here is, a lot of the NZ public did NOT know this stuff.
    
    Campbell Live (the program this interview was given on) is on immediately after the news. it probably gets, oh, rough estimate, half (maybe more these days) of prime time viewers in this country watching it.
    
    most of them are NOT the sort to keep track of these things.
    
    they will, however, generally take exception to injustice and/or foreign abuse of our legal systems etc.
    
    (on another note, it amuses me that nationalism has become left wing ideology here. heh. only in as much as the rightist parties Currently capable of attaining seats in government are globalist/corporatist types, but still.)
    
    should be noted however, that the program and channel this are on are owned by american interests, so it's sort of surprising it was them, and not TV1's equivilant who got it. (mind you, TV1 is government owned. Currently that's the government that allowed/facilitated this mess in the first place. perhaps it would have gone that way under a Labour etc. government. mind you, it'd probably have been a lot less dramatic under a Labour government...)
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - JMT (profile), 3 Mar 2012 @ 3:51pm
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      "should be noted however, that the program and channel this are on are owned by american interests..."
      
      They were previously owned by Canadian company, but now their owners are Australian. No US interests.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Violated (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 6:47pm
  
  Re:
  He did not say anything we did not know already except for adding data to Mega's DMCA compliance figures.
  
  Most importantly those in the entertainment industry have been saying some very bad things recently, including this indictment, and he did need to speak up to set the record straight. You simply cannot let others slander you in propaganda without fighting back in an honest voice.
  
  I would be surprised if he did not go through these questions with a lawyer beforehand but this was pretty idiot proof stuff all about the DMCA and privacy.
  
  As to the bigger claims then they should be left for the trial but copyright infringement is certainly the core of this case.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:58am

He, makes an excellent point: Is the post office liable for infringing material circulated in sealed envelopes in the mail?

If not why not.
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- The eejit (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:46am
  
  Re:
  Government fiat.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:37am
  
  Re:
  Same with UPS/Fedex and all the drugs they traffic. They have to know there are drugs in some of those 20 billion packages, why don't they just search them all.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:00am

(you can bet US prosecutors are pouring over every word to figure out what they can hang him on.

)
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:08am
  
  Re:
  You missed the other half of the correction. It's supposed to be "poring over" not "pouring over".
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
bob, 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:32am

What a skillful bit of horsemanure.
1) Did he really receive no complaints from Hollywood? Many of the customers who paid him routinely complained that their emails went unanswered:

"I mailed Megaupload customer service politely multiple times and never got an answer"

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080616052428AAC29IR

2) I would count the DMCA notices as complaints. If you're paying all of those people to handle the raft of DMCA notices, a proactive business manager might wonder if there's a better way. If you're really dealing with so many complaints coming in from the world, that may be a clue that you're running a bad business.

3) As Mike noted-- thank you-- Dotcom dodges the most damning evidence that he shared profits with the pirates making him their partner.

Again, this shows the total disregard for the other people in society-- often a clue that someone is a criminal.

And he takes a very lacksidasical attitude toward "policing" the uploading streams. Imagine you're running a bar. Every Friday night you serve too much alcohol and people start fighting outside, smashing some cars or raping some women. You could take the Kim Dotcom attitude and say, "Hey, I can't police the folks once they get liquored up here. I'm not responsible. It's not my fault she got raped."

Maybe that shirking of responsibility is legally correct. But the responsible business owners fix those problems before they metastasize. The bar owners serve less concentrated drinks. They fix the problem or get driven out of business by the people hurt by the collateral damage.

Any fool could have seen that paying the uploaders for content was incentivizing piracy. That's why responsible cloud services stopped immediately. There's no reason to pay uploaders who are supposedly the kind of file transfer customer that Dotcom claims he was pursuing. In a normal business, you charge more to your heaviest consumers of resources. You don't give them a rebate.

Dotcom doesn't discuss this. Gosh, he's a creep and a loon. I guess he doesn't have any choice by to lunge for any potential defense, but what a pox on society.

All the more reason we shouldn't call setting up an FTP server to be "innovation".
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- Tim K (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:39am
  
  Re: What a skillful bit of horsemanure.
  Any fool could have seen that paying the uploaders for content was incentivizing piracy. That's why responsible cloud services stopped immediately.
  And it was incentivizing legitimate content creators, but we'll ignore that little fact.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - fairusefriendly (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:08am
    
    Re: Re: What a skillful bit of horsemanure.
    so should the those people have a right to sue the US government and the RIAA for statutory damages of 25k per person who was denied from getting their files.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Tim K (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:22am
      
      Re: Re: Re: What a skillful bit of horsemanure.
      25k? That sounds a little low
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- fairusefriendly (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:43am
  
  Re: What a skillful bit of horsemanure.
  2. Given the wording of the safe harbor provision, taking the time to figure out that better way would make you potentially liable. If you didn't do a perfect job the first time, that knowledge would make you liable for all the imperfections.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:46am
  
  Re: What a skillful bit of horsemanure.
  Many = 1 guy on yahoo answers
  
  "RAPE! this guy like and allows RAPE!"
  
  "Gosh, I'm a creep and a loon" ftfy
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- JMT (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:24pm
  
  Re: What a skillful bit of horsemanure.
  "Did he really receive no complaints from Hollywood? Many of the customers who paid him routinely complained that their emails went unanswered:"
  
  Are you joking? Do you really think if the MPAA, RIAA, et al wanted to make a serious legal complaint to the company they would just send the website an email?
  
  "If you're really dealing with so many complaints coming in from the world, that may be a clue that you're relying on a bad business model."
  
  If you're really having to send out so many "complaints" to a file locker website, that may be a clue that you're running a bad business.
  
  "Again, this shows the total disregard for the other people in society-- often a clue that someone is a criminal."
  
  I'd say he was showing considerable regard for the 180 million happy Megaupload users. How many people are in the US movie business again? A few hundred thousand from memory. Why are they more important?
  
  "Imagine you're running a bar. Every Friday night you serve too much alcohol and people start fighting outside, smashing some cars or raping some women."
  
  As soon as you start using analogies involving rape, or any other serious violent crime, you sound like complete asshole. It's copyright infringement, nobody gets hurt. Your movies and songs are not that important.
  
  "Gosh, he's a creep and a loon."
  
  I hope you realise that's exactly what people here think about you.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Terry Hancock (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:43am

Normally, I would agree with the advice to sit pat and let the lawyers do the talking. But this case is about public opinion and the nature of the law more than anything else.

It's political as much as it is legal.

It's unfortunate that Dotcom is neither attractive nor charismatic in person -- because that matters in politics.

I imagine that's not coincidence: with so many file locker services and file sharing services to choose from, the prosecutors could easily have gone shopping for just the right image they wanted on their "Wanted" poster -- they are engaged in politics and manipulation, not seeking justice.
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- The eejit (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:47am
  
  Re:
  Then they should be shot as traitors to culture everywhere.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Chargone (profile), 3 Mar 2012 @ 12:30am
    
    Re: Re:
    ... you know, i think treason during war time is the only thing NZ still has a death penalty for? (if i remember rightly. i'm not a lawyer, so i may not.) ... too bad they're not Kiwis... and we're not at war. oh well.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:27am
  
  Re:
  It's unfortunate that Dotcom is neither attractive nor charismatic in person -- because that matters in politics.
  
  It will matter in the courtroom as well.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Violated (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 7:00pm
    
    Re: Re:
    I would term him a formable character.
    
    He seems to be doing well enough being the reformed playboy type now living the life of an honest family man. The overkill nature of this raid also highlights he is person his adversaries want to remove.
    
    I can't say if he could win over a Jury but he is making a good start.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:10am

Kim will be the king.

I don't think he will ever receive a fair trial in the American system unless he is able to get a jury trial in that case it might be a good idea to give as many interviews as he can so people are aware of the power of jury nullification.

No matter what the law says if it is viewed as bad the jury have the power to grant innocence to anyone they like.
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- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:38am
  
  Re:
  "No matter what the law says if it is viewed as bad the jury have the power to grant innocence to anyone they like."
  
  A power they have but seldom use, seldom understand, and seldom are made aware of.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Chargone (profile), 3 Mar 2012 @ 12:34am
    
    Re: Re:
    used fairly recently in NZ... though given exactly how that panned out i wouldn't be surprised if there had been a few changes since.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Violated (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 7:07pm
  
  Re:
  He WILL be getting a jury trial being criminal charges.
  
  Unfortunately the courtroom is the stage, the jury the audience, and the lawyers the actors. The winner is the one who can put on the best performance.
  
  Our main hope would be this jury being Internet users but the prosecution may reject all Internet users and go with really old people who know little about technology.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Digitari, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:29am

Re:
.Com and Megauplaod are as guilty as the Movie studious are that Lindsey Lohan did Cocaine, or the Music studios are for GnR's Drug use ( or any other Artist )that is in Hollywood.
Why hasn't the DEA jailed Hollywood for all the "contributory" drug use?
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Digital Consumer (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:43am

It is funny how views change down the years for me.
I grew up in California. The public school system and my parents dosed me with a heavy sense of nationalism. It was not until I got caught up in the system that I started to question it.

Weed did not kill me, or anyone else I knew that smoked it. As a matter of fact, all of my friends that smoked it went to college and got degrees from computer science to law. I was told in fact in school and by adults that drugs would kill me.

Then I saw them drinking and acting worse than weed ever changed people. And that was legal. So in my middle teens I learned a valuable lesson. Law does not equal morality. Morality has it's place in society, but determining what is moral and what is not is a dodgy area, because special interest will pick up the moral flag and drop it when it suits their agenda.

So how to decide? I can only do what I think is right, and follow the laws accordingly based on the risk I am willing to take for what I believe in.

So the question gets harder when I try to determine not only what I believe, but what I would like to have my children believe.

I worry for my 4 year old son and morality and legal decisions he will have to make growing up in a land where right and wrong are only tools that the government(i.e. special interest) use to strip you of your rights.

I have some outdated beliefs that I do not want to pass on but it is difficult for me to let go of. In the end though, my fears for my children's well being are sharp and visceral.

If I teach them justice and fire in their beliefs, they very well may be persecuted. Unfortunately, the other option is to try and suffocate who they might be or become.

My 4 year old is potentially going to grow up in a world where resources are dwindling and population continues to grow, and morality will possibly be bypassed by survival.

That terrifies me, and is driving me to a point where I feel like I may have to make some risky revolutionary choices at some point to defend the future and freedoms I want him to have.

I don't believe that the corporations will let go of the profits and laws that hold them in power without blood and sacrifice. This idea, which in America 20 years ago seemed far fetched and crazy is reaching a critical mass at a faster pace every day.

We will innovate and protect our freedoms, or we will see blood, mark my words. You see it world wide, governments people bled for taking back freedoms at a rapid pace for the good of society. Follow the money friends. I will stop my rant, but these are a chunk of my fears, and these censorship laws never lead to a happy society.
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HrilL, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:57am

I have issue with your number 3.
The uploads are private. Only the uploader has access to the link that is randomly generated. It is up to that person if they want to share that link or not. You can only download the file if you have the direct link. Thus proactively looking at private files would violate privacy laws. The site is in no place to arbitrarily decided which files may be shared publically and which ones have not been.
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Pjerky (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:16am

International Law
What I don't understand is how the United States could possibly have any jurisdiction here for an international company that merely uses a US controlled TDL extension (.com). They have no residency whatsoever in the United States.

And even if they did, how the hell are they supposed to follow the laws of every country out there on the internet? Its not possible and not practical. As far as I am concerned no country has jurisdiction on the internet AND only has jurisdiction over companies and individuals that are based in that country.

We can't dictate the law for the entire world. We here in the United States need to stop trying to. Our government has no right to do this. And they have no place holding up ANY company's business model. This is ridiculous. We need to remove that power from our politicians.

They should never be able to initiate prosecution in defense of a company's revenue. That is not their job. Their job is to protect the people and promote advancement of our world as well as manage public services.

The United States has no right to freeze this man's accounts. They have no right to arrest or take from him. This is insanity. I really hope that he sues the United States government in international court and wins re-compensation for lost income and his suffering.
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- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:39am
  
  Re: International Law
  "We can't dictate the law for the entire world. We here in the United States need to stop trying to. Our government has no right to do this."
  
  We don't, its not "our government" anymore. Unless you are a corporate citizen and/or give them millions of dollars to exert your will over the world.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Chargone (profile), 3 Mar 2012 @ 12:40am
  
  Re: International Law
  that's the general public sentiment in NZ on such issues also.
  
  basically the US government/corporations need to paint the guy black enough to make him look Worse than them in the public eye to win in that arena here.
  
  they have a bit of an advantage in that the guy only got into the country due to our current government's incredably dubious 'cash for residency' set up (incidently, Kim . com is a resident, not a citizen, of NZ last i checked.) if he'd simply been arrested normally, and they'd dealt with it Properly and By the Book without this corrupt rubbish such as what happend with Megaupload and the files there on, they'd have that one sewn up.
  
  their inability to act in a legal, logical, reasonable, non-corrupt manner has probably destroyed that advantage though.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
el_porko (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:46am

A side issue...
Just a little side issue here, I'm trying to watch the imbedded video but it comes up with "The uploader has not made this video avalible in you country".

But I'm from New Zealand! I can't watch New zealand news? A bit ironic really; now I'll have to pirate it.

I wonder if it's avalible on Megaupload ...., wait..., no...., Arghhhh.....
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- Chargone (profile), 3 Mar 2012 @ 12:54am
  
  Re: A side issue...
  might have something to do with 3news having their own website where the video is available to NZ users (and possibly others).
  
  they want your eyeballs for advertising money, i guess.
  
  unless that video is from their site? i can't really tell, but i do know they're set up to be a right pain in the arse to get at the video any way other than via their page (even any attempts to download it with other software will tend to grab the ad at the begining and not the article, for example.)
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jocka, 2 Mar 2012 @ 12:29pm

Kim Dotcom is a realist
"It's not being tried in the court of public opinion". This is New Zealand, public opinion is important. The US has taken a huge risk because this is looking like it could really backfire for them. Wikileaks has already shown the secret bribery the US has offer to have US internet laws in NZ and I can tell you people here are not happy whatsoever.
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 2:06pm

King of the Internet!LoL

I keep picturing, Tony Montana of the Internet........

"You need people like me. You need people like me so you can point your fuckin' fingers and say, "That's the bad guy. Well, shay gonite to the badguy"

or Arnie

"Get to the chopper!�......�Do it!�......�Do it!Nooooow�

Im so confused!
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 2:35pm

Are we supposed to take a guy who runs around calling himself "Kim Dotcom" seriously?
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- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 2:41pm
  
  Re:
  Lol, not only does he call himself that, its his legal name.
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  - Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 5:12pm
    
    Re: Re:
    It just sounds way too gay.
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 3:28pm

Yo mikey, i'd keep an eye out on this here trial, specifically the judge and his "alignements"
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 3:48pm

Popcorn ready to be made, expiry date 9 months

Wonder if he'd be willing to "visit" america, if he was promised a speedy court date and unrestricted acces to his family and an agreed upon amount of his assets sent to his family if the sentence goes against him?

Popcorn can only last so long man!
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Lawrence D'Oliveiro, 2 Mar 2012 @ 5:15pm

He�s Such A Big Guy ...
... maybe we should call him Kim Com.
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- Violated (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 7:47pm
  
  Re: He�s Such A Big Guy ...
  More valid is Kim.Com
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  - Lawrence D'Oliveiro, 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:05pm
    
    Say It Out Loud
    n/t
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Steve Easton, 2 Mar 2012 @ 5:38pm

100% Nonsense
The DMCA was written to protect ISPs that are passive conduits or providers of connectivity. There are hundreds of self proclaimed Internet expert lawyers telling these fools they are protected. IT DOES NOT APPLY to a company that profits from deliberate theft. These guys recruit and pay thieves to upload files that they know are stolen property. All of the files are stolen.
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- Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 6:23pm
  
  Re: 100% Nonsense
  prove it asshole
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- teka, 2 Mar 2012 @ 7:09pm
  
  Re: 100% Nonsense
  flagged as funny.
  You are right, you managed to spew 100% nonsense.
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- Karl (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:44pm
  
  Re: 100% Nonsense
  The DMCA was written to protect ISPs that are passive conduits or providers of connectivity.
  
  Absolutely, positively false. 512(a) (and probably (b)) were written with ISP's and "passive conduits" in mind, but there are three more categories of entities covered under "safe harbors" laws: user-generated content sites such as YouTube (section (c)), search engines (section (d)), and schools (section (e)).
  
  These guys recruit and pay thieves to upload files that they know are stolen property.
  
  First, it's not "stolen property," according to the Supreme Court. Second, even the indictments do not claim that they "recruit and pay thieves." They offered rewards programs for popular content, but there is absolutely nothing unlawful about that whatsoever.
  
  I won't even touch the "all the files are stolen" line, which is obviously a flat-out lie, and many of the people who comment here have personally lost files that they did not share due to the seizures.
  
  Now, I don't think "DotCom" is innocent of copyright infringement. If the indictment is even half correct, I'm pretty sure that he's going to lose a lot of court battles.
  
  That doesn't mean you have to lie about it.
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Quinn Wilde, 2 Mar 2012 @ 7:43pm

I miss Megaupload
Let me just say that I miss megaupload primarily for the legal files it hosted, which are now gone. Countless forum links to this Android ROM or that little program someone wrote for a really specific task are now dead and worthless.

Within weeks of the site going down I had literally lost count of the number of times I found a forum post where someone had created just the solution to a problem I was having, but the link was to a zip file on megaupload.

When DotCom wins, I wonder how much he will be compensated for his billion dollar business?
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- Chargone (profile), 3 Mar 2012 @ 1:02am
  
  Re: I miss Megaupload
  knowing the usual way of things the US government will find a way to politely and publicly tell him to fuck off and the NZ government will give him a few hundred thousand plus expenses or something for the trouble of the process itself and absolutely nothing will be done for Anyone based on the insanity that was the treatment of megaupload itself.
  
  (save, perhaps, if public opinion is loud enough, NZ's government may amend it's law to prevent this nonsense process happening here again... or to make it easier to sneak such things under the public radar...)
  
  if he loses it could easily be the nail in the coffin for the current government (unfortunately, probably not enough to finally kill off the disaster that is the National party so the Conservative Party (actually conservative rather than corporatist, and nationalist rather than globalist) can pick up most of the anti-left votes. then we just need to kill off Labour in favour of the Greens, NZ first, and various other smaller entities and we'll be golden for a generation or two. added bonus: that would be the three parties with clue one how to run an economy, even if that is purely incidental to their other goals.)
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Anonymous Coward, 3 Mar 2012 @ 12:51am

I'm not sifting through every comment to see if this was brought up before. As far as I remember the uploads were not public, you were given a link and no one could access the content without the link. I.E. it's only public if you post the link someplace public.
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Content Creator Steve, 3 Mar 2012 @ 11:04am

The question must be asked. If this pirate king walks free, then by definition New Zealand is a pirate heaven. When are we going to liberate New Zealand?
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thedrik, 4 Mar 2012 @ 12:41pm

Kim Dotcom
I don't feel the interview will adversely affect his case. The "evidence" the US government has against Dotcom will have to be submitted to the courts of New Zealand. The New Zealand courts will have to agree that the evidence presented will subject Dotcom to trial under New Zealand Law. If this happens, Dotcom will be extradited. In these types of cases, the US Government will make the Person wanted for extradition appear like THE WORLDS most terrible criminal...and 99.9% of the time it is NOT the case. Often times, independent unbiased testimony...not fabricatible evidence is what the foreign court will look for in this type of proceeding. Everything from Google to Youtube to Ebay has a 3rd party element which is next to impossible to police. Megaupload is no different. He won't be extradited on legal merits, only politically motivated governments will cause him to be extradited.
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darryl, 4 Mar 2012 @ 9:18pm

(2) it's technically impossible and (3)
Bullshit!!! but I love it when "the masnick" says that something is "technically impossible", and he says it a ways that he expects others to actually believe him !

Masnick just because you are not able to tie your own shoe laces, does not mean the task is "technically impossible".

technically imcompetent, I can believe... especially consider the level of competence displayed in the "quality" or lack thereof of Techdirt..
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- Anonymous Coward, 5 Mar 2012 @ 6:18am
  
  Re: (2) it's technically impossible and (3)
  I'm suppose to believe a guy who finds it technically impossible to write a paragraph?
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  - Anonymous Coward, 5 Mar 2012 @ 8:20am
    
    Re: Re: (2) it's technically impossible and (3)
    What's interesting is the other day, he had the nerve to say that Mike must've failed debate class in school then went on a bit of a tirade to that effect (pointing out his flawed style and whatnot), to which several responded that he should be one to talk, since he apparently failed all his English classes in school (based on the rather obvious evidence, his own comments). At which point he brushed it off and said something like it doesn't matter, because I'm not Mike and I'm not the one running a site, oh and nice to see you guys go for the quick easy personal attack against me. Which was hilarious, if there's one group of people who really piss me off but amuse me to no end, it's hypocrite like Darryl.
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Phred Phnerd (profile), 5 Mar 2012 @ 4:00pm

A government for the content industry by the content industry
Wow, I'm ashamed at my governments misguidedness and overreach. Kim Dotcom needs to succede in his pursuit of justice to save the rest of us.
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Victor, 22 Jan 2013 @ 2:16am

Ouh yeah!
You fools were completely wrong. Now it is demonstrated that the US goverment made an institutional corruption helping an outdated business model industry. Now, what do you think about Mega? May you don't know nothing about criptography...
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