MegaUpload Has Been Taken Offline

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#571847 22-Jan-2012 12:02

marmel:
You are talking about a DVD that you purchased.

Two completely different things.

In relation to obtaining a Netflix or US itunes account from NZ it isn't illegal as far as I am aware. The content is still being paid for. Sure you are circumventing their restrictions but they are still being paid for supplying the service.

Yes, you can buy DVDs from the States, however without a legitimate NZ Classification on it, you cannot legally sell it here.

For Netflix, there is still a massive argument, whether using VPN is classified using software to circumvent region locking(ie being available in the US not here)

But anyway, that's slightly off topic(well sort of on, sort of off) so I'll be quiet now

I have moved across the ditch. Now residing in Melbourne as a VOIP/Video Technical Trainer/Engineer.

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#571947 22-Jan-2012 15:51

freitasm:
MikeyPI:
freitasm:

IANAL, but to me this is the same as saying a bar owner, warned multiple times that drug dealers were selling their "merchandise" in the bar property decide to profit of it by offering "special rooms" to bar "sponsors" (subscribers). When the prosecution comes down they might not get the bar owner for drug dealing, but sure will get him for something like gang affiliation, or facilitating crime, or whatever.

You mean like SkyCity?

Who are getting punished with looser gambling laws & probably over a 100% increase in pokie machines, in exchange for a building a new casino/convention centre..

Completely unrelated. Read my example again. I don't see SkyCity helping drug dealers.

Huh? They did exactly that.. They were warned by CIB, SFO, & the Organised Crime group, yet still allowed them do deal meth, loan shark & launder money in there for years. They allowed them access to VIP / High roller rooms, even allowing them to hold private meetings in there.

In the end the police ran a separate operation & only informed Skycity in the later stages when they were about to effect the warrants.

Its exactly the same as the example you provided..

http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/money/4824128/Asian-mobsters-at-SkyCity-casino-agency

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/p-epidemic/news/article.cfm?c_id=605&objectid=10654426

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10655803

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10645449

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#571983 22-Jan-2012 17:03

lucky015:
freitasm:
nakedmolerat: this shows how dangerous it is to rely on 'cloud' storage

This is a statement with no support at all - unless you forgot to add a "joke" icon. One thing is having data stored with Microsoft, Amazon, Google. Another thing is having data stored in a web site known to host pirated content.

He made a very real point, Pirates may well move onto the sites with the bigger legal backbones to use to store files, I already know of people who have stored illegal content on similar services provided by Microsoft, Google and Similar, I have stored the odd thing there myself, There is a certain irony to storing a backup of crack for the Windows OS on Microsoft's own servers after all.

Is there some reason why large company's should not legally be held accountable in the same way as the shady looking smaller company's are held for providing almost exactly the same service? Are you saying they should be legally required to spend more on preventing illegal material from being uploaded than they make in profit from the service as is done with YouTube? or are you saying they should cancel the service altogether as soon as they are known for it being used by pirates?

What I am saying is that those companies have stronger incentives to crackdown on this kind of usage of their services. They owe it to their shareholders and to the US government.

I worked for a US-based company for more than 16 years. As an employee, every year I was required to pass certification in ECC (Export Control) and Ethics. It's something these companies take seriously. They will pull the plug on anyone using their services for something illegal, unlike the MegaUpload service.

lucky015: Certain company's are allowing the upload of MP3, etc files for cloud streaming services, They can NOT discern if it was legally ripped from an owned CD or not therefore a lot of the content uploaded will be illegal, This falls under similar laws.

The content is still being upload for private use, not for distribution. Very different things.

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#572233 23-Jan-2012 09:32

sbiddle: There has been nothing so far that I've heard that suggested he fled because he knew it was the Police coming. I'm sure anybody who has the level of security he clearly had would take exactly the same actions if they believed they were under threat.

Biddle ..for once what you see on the movies is true - Police have to announce very loudly and repeatedly that they are "Police" prior to entry and again inside - this is for the obvious reason - to avoid any suggestion by the person being arrested that they thought they were being raided by a rival gang or enemy. The Herald, if I believe them for once, reported that he saw them from the top of his stairs inside, and despite again announcing they were Police still ran for his safe room....the action of a person with nothing to hide?

Wonder what he got up to in his safe room? What could he have been doing in there?

Finally to all the arm chair critics that say it was a over reaction for a nerd - the response has nothing to do with him being a nerd. The fact he owns guns, is I understand only a part of the reason for the tactics used.

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#572235 23-Jan-2012 09:41

bigal_nz:
Biddle ..for once what you see on the movies is true - Police have to announce very loudly and repeatedly that they are "Police" prior to entry and again inside - this is for the obvious reason - to avoid any suggestion by the person being arrested that they thought they were being raided by a rival gang or enemy. The Herald, if I believe them for once, reported that he saw them from the top of his stairs inside, and despite again announcing they were Police still ran for his safe room....the action of a person with nothing to hide?

Wonder what he got up to in his safe room? What could he have been doing in there?

Finally to all the arm chair critics that say it was a over reaction for a nerd - the response has nothing to do with him being a nerd. The fact he owns guns, is I understand only a part of the reason for the tactics used.

Yeah, because bad guys would never shout out that they are police when they are entering someones house for evil purposes.

Richard rich.ms

bigal_nz

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#572238 23-Jan-2012 09:44

richms:
bigal_nz:
Biddle ..for once what you see on the movies is true - Police have to announce very loudly and repeatedly that they are "Police" prior to entry and again inside - this is for the obvious reason - to avoid any suggestion by the person being arrested that they thought they were being raided by a rival gang or enemy. The Herald, if I believe them for once, reported that he saw them from the top of his stairs inside, and despite again announcing they were Police still ran for his safe room....the action of a person with nothing to hide?

Wonder what he got up to in his safe room? What could he have been doing in there?

Finally to all the arm chair critics that say it was a over reaction for a nerd - the response has nothing to do with him being a nerd. The fact he owns guns, is I understand only a part of the reason for the tactics used.

Yeah, because bad guys would never shout out that they are police when they are entering someones house for evil purposes.

Next time you get pulled over, dont stop just keep driving. When you finally get arrested tell the judge that you didnt stop because you thought it might be bad guys pretending to be cops.

Let me know how that works out for you.

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#572246 23-Jan-2012 09:56

bigal_nz: Wonder what he got up to in his safe room? What could he have been doing in there?

The Police do themselves no favours with comments such as this in their official press release"

"Once they gained entry into this room they found Mr Dotcom near a firearm which had the appearance of a shortened shotgun.

Turns out the guns were both located in gun safes. What actual purpose did the mention of the gun serve, other that the Police trying to hype the story up?

If we were to put this in the context of another story - If a press release was issued for a sudden death where Police forced entry into a home, and a body was found with no obvious wounds, would the presence of a weapon being located in a gun safe be mentioned? If not, why not?

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#572247 23-Jan-2012 09:56

bigal_nz:
richms: Yeah, because bad guys would never shout out that they are police when they are entering someones house for evil purposes.

Next time you get pulled over, dont stop just keep driving. When you finally get arrested tell the judge that you didnt stop because you thought it might be bad guys pretending to be cops.

Let me know how that works out for you.

Anyone can shout "Stop. Police". It's a bit harder to get real-looking blue/red lights for cars though.

I was once driving near a dry border between two countries and an unmarked car started following me with a red light on the dashboard. I didn't stop, knowing that area was known for bands of armed people carjacking. I dashed to the next police station (granted I knew my way around town).

The guys in the car rushed parallel to me to show guns and a police badge - as if I could easily identify a police badge when you are in a highway and there's no one in uniform inside the car.

In that case, they were actual police officers - but not in uniform. After a few minutes at the police station everyone was happy and I went my way.

The reason they wanted to stop me was because I was driving a brand new car close to the border. They thought it could be stolen. Back in the early 90s it was a bit harder to identify stolen cars from another state. They wanted to check the documents. No search was done (as there was no reason to believe I had anything really).

So, everyone will respond to threats in a different way. This is in no way related to reports of this specific arrest, just a story for comparison (and also to say how hardcore I am, been around the world driving close to country borders during though times. My name is Bond).

bigal_nz

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#572252 23-Jan-2012 10:10

freitasm:
bigal_nz:
richms: Yeah, because bad guys would never shout out that they are police when they are entering someones house for evil purposes.

Next time you get pulled over, dont stop just keep driving. When you finally get arrested tell the judge that you didnt stop because you thought it might be bad guys pretending to be cops.

Let me know how that works out for you.

Anyone can shout "Stop. Police". It's a bit harder to get real-looking blue/red lights for cars though.

Agreed - it is a bit harder to get real-looking red/blue lights. Even harder again to get real looking Police helicopters and teams of 20 people in AOS uniforms all uniformly dressed with M4 rifles and squads of patrol cars, and loud hailers, and lots of flashing lights and......do I need to go on?

sbiddle: There has been nothing so far that I've heard that suggested he fled because he knew it was the Police coming. I'm sure anybody who has the level of security he clearly had would take exactly the same actions if they believed they were under threat.

The point: they said they were Police loudly, they had all the gear and helicopters to go with it. Any suggestion he hid because he didnt know they were Police is unfounded.

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#572253 23-Jan-2012 10:12

bigal_nz:
freitasm:
bigal_nz:
richms: Yeah, because bad guys would never shout out that they are police when they are entering someones house for evil purposes.

Next time you get pulled over, dont stop just keep driving. When you finally get arrested tell the judge that you didnt stop because you thought it might be bad guys pretending to be cops.

Let me know how that works out for you.

Anyone can shout "Stop. Police". It's a bit harder to get real-looking blue/red lights for cars though.

Agreed - it is a bit harder to get real-looking red/blue lights. Even harder again to get real looking Police helicopters and teams of 20 people in AOS uniforms all uniformly dressed with M4 rifles and squads of patrol cars, and loud hailers, and lots of flashing lights and......do I need to go on?

I wasn't suggesting anything related to the arrest. My point was to the "pull over stop" situation you used to illustrate your thought, and how just saying "police" doesn't mean much until you can positively identify the officer - by badges, lights, uniform.

As for this specific arrest, sure, it was in total force, so there would be no confusion.

bigal_nz

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#572256 23-Jan-2012 10:19

sbiddle:
bigal_nz: Wonder what he got up to in his safe room? What could he have been doing in there?

The Police do themselves no favours with comments such as this in their official press release"

"Once they gained entry into this room they found Mr Dotcom near a firearm which had the appearance of a shortened shotgun.

Turns out the guns were both located in gun safes. What actual purpose did the mention of the gun serve, other that the Police trying to hype the story up?

If we were to put this in the context of another story - If a press release was issued for a sudden death where Police forced entry into a home, and a body was found with no obvious wounds, would the presence of a weapon being located in a gun safe be mentioned? If not, why not?

Yeah, I do agree on the face of it, whats being reported in the media does make it sound like the Police have been somewhat selective in they way the whole guns bit has been portrayed.

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#572265 23-Jan-2012 10:37

vinnieg:
marmel:
You are talking about a DVD that you purchased.

Two completely different things.

In relation to obtaining a Netflix or US itunes account from NZ it isn't illegal as far as I am aware. The content is still being paid for. Sure you are circumventing their restrictions?but they are still being paid for supplying the service.

Yes, you can buy DVDs from the States, however without a legitimate NZ Classification on it, you cannot legally sell it here.

For Netflix, there is still a massive argument, whether using VPN is classified using software to circumvent region locking(ie being available in the US not here)

But anyway, that's slightly off topic(well sort of on, sort of off) so I'll be quiet now

?

Using tools to circumvent regional restrictions is (for now) legal in NZ though. Our laws explicitly do not recognise region locking as a legitimate use of TPMs (much to Hollywood's disgust).

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#572266 23-Jan-2012 10:40

I personally don't see using a VPN as being any different to parallel importing of goods, something that is legal in NZ (but not legal everywhere else in the world).

CruciasNZ

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#572273 23-Jan-2012 11:01

Megaupload being taken offline was a serious inconvenience for me. I am part of a team which writes rules for Video Game tournaments and then runs them. Our rulebooks were hosted on Megaupload and were our own work.

We had to re-upload our collection to other places. Not fun when we're within a week of starting and have to contact everyone to tell them of the change of location. Good test of the email tree though.

------------

As for the raid thing, Armed Police, helicopters and then telling people he had a gun when he wasn't going for it or in direct and useful possession of it? Doesn't this strike you as oddly familiar? Perhaps the Maori Terrorists?

The is probably a case of the right thing for many many wrong reasons

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#572275 23-Jan-2012 11:02

CruciasNZ: Megaupload being taken offline was a serious inconvenience for me. I am part of a team which writes rules for Video Game tournaments and then runs them. Our rulebooks were hosted on Megaupload and were our own work.

We had to re-upload our collection to other places. Not fun when we're within a week of starting and have to contact everyone to tell them of the change of location. Good test of the email tree though.

This might sound harsh but... If I had to participate in anything and was directed to download documents, I'd rather have these hosted on more professional services such as Google Docs or Windows Live Skydrive than hosted on a site like that.

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