Kim Dotcom - the gift that keeps on giving

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#2002614 26-Apr-2018 08:15

quickymart:

Geektastic:
quickymart: My stepbrother reckons he's never worked an honest day in his life.

That's possible. What is your stepbrother's name so we can check?

Normally I call him "bro"

Yeah I got a cousin up the road who knows him too!

kryptonjohn

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#2002642 26-Apr-2018 09:23

DaveB:

driller2000:

I had/have some sympathy for DotCom - for a couple of reasons:

1. The police have been dodge in their prosecution - illegal spying by them, invalid search warrants + illegal seizure of assets (subsequently overturned), withholding of evidence for his defence team etc.

2. If his version of events is correct ie. that he did take-down content that was claimed by others - and more than that, he gave these same organisations direct access to their servers so they could delete offending content as well - then that is a defence argument worth running. Possible challenges to seizure of assets in other territories ie. Hong Kong - suggest other courts see flaws in the prosecution case.

3. The raid was completely over the top - Armed Raid + 76 Cops + 2 Helicopters ?? - he's a large wealthy German - not Dr No.

4. The way our govt of the day kow-towed to the US was embarrassing - esp re extradition to the US. It should have been done in accordance with fair and due process. Clearly they haven't - or we wouldn't be tied up in knots 6 years later.

Comments:

Yes I know MegaUpload was used for sharing copyrighted material. But his claim that you give the speeding ticket to the driver of the offending car - NOT the owner of the road.

So yeah ....he is great example of greed and excess - but whatever - he has right to justice like we all do - and to date I don't think that has been the case.

Best post I have seen on Geekzone about Kim Dotcom. Well done.

The owner of the road analogy was not that good. A better analogy would be ticketing the owner of a road that offered drivers a financial inducement to speed.

rugrat

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#2002770 26-Apr-2018 12:59

kryptonjohn:
The owner of the road analogy was not that good. A better analogy would be ticketing the owner of a road that offered drivers a financial inducement to speed.

I still don’t get what he was doing was illegal. There are other file sharing sites on internet.
You Tube as already pointed out has copyright stuff on it, yet no one is going after these.

He was also complying with DMCA take down notices as the others do.
People only paid if they wanted faster downloads, I.e use a private road.

freitasm

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#2002806 26-Apr-2018 13:58

rugrat: I still don’t get what he was doing was illegal. There are other file sharing sites on internet. You Tube as already pointed out has copyright stuff on it, yet no one is going after these.

The problem was the alleged kickbacks paid to people who uploaded the content for sharing. This would break the safe harbour he had.

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#2002826 26-Apr-2018 14:39

Is that not similar to YouTube's sharing advertising revenue with uploaders?

freitasm

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#2002831 26-Apr-2018 14:58

@gzt: Is that not similar to YouTube's sharing advertising revenue with uploaders?

YouTube automatically identify copyrighted content and disable ad revenue in videos that breach copyright. Accounts that receive repeated notifications are automatically removed.

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#2002838 26-Apr-2018 15:09

freitasm:

What I've seen here so far is opinion. When people start abusing you will know - they're banned, most of the times without warning. Name calling, defamation, etc are examples.

Except for when abuse is directed at Trump. Open season on him.

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Jaxar

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#2002841 26-Apr-2018 15:12

freitasm:

@gzt: Is that not similar to YouTube's sharing advertising revenue with uploaders?

YouTube automatically identify copyrighted content and disable ad revenue in videos that breach copyright. Accounts that receive repeated notifications are automatically removed.

I was at some point given the impression that these steps taken by YouTube were voluntary and not actually required by law.

I also have herd it said probably from the same source that voluntarily going further than required by law was probably a tactic used by YouTube to avoid further law changes potentially forcing their hand in a more costly way.

I'm very much interested in correction if I'm wrong on this.

My most lasting memory of the megaupload takedown was on that very day starting to suggest it to a customer as a solution to his problem he was having sending an email with a very large attachment.

The thing that makes me sad about the whole situation was all the legitimate data belonging to regular innocent users which was lost because of this. I don't know how to fit that into a car analogy however.

Please note: I have a professional bias towards Vodafone.

Rikkitic

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#2002846 26-Apr-2018 15:26

Jaxar:

The thing that makes me sad about the whole situation was all the legitimate data belonging to regular innocent users which was lost because of this. I don't know how to fit that into a car analogy however.

Overeager police, while chasing truck carrying stolen goods, run it over cliff, destroying everything in it, including goods not stolen.

Plesse igmore amd axxept applogies in adbance fir anu typos

Yabanize

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#2002900 26-Apr-2018 16:13

Jaxar:

freitasm:

@gzt: Is that not similar to YouTube's sharing advertising revenue with uploaders?

YouTube automatically identify copyrighted content and disable ad revenue in videos that breach copyright. Accounts that receive repeated notifications are automatically removed.

I was at some point given the impression that these steps taken by YouTube were voluntary and not actually required by law.

I also have herd it said probably from the same source that voluntarily going further than required by law was probably a tactic used by YouTube to avoid further law changes potentially forcing their hand in a more costly way.

I'm very much interested in correction if I'm wrong on this.

My most lasting memory of the megaupload takedown was on that very day starting to suggest it to a customer as a solution to his problem he was having sending an email with a very large attachment.

The thing that makes me sad about the whole situation was all the legitimate data belonging to regular innocent users which was lost because of this. I don't know how to fit that into a car analogy however.

Apparently MegaUpload only rewarded users for files under 100mb, meaning a movie wouldn't be eligible.. But then people would break the movies up in to lots of little files to get around this.. Cant win really.

Copyright isn't a crime in New Zealand, its just a civil issue so he can't be extradited for it, thats why money laundering etc have to be tacked on. That combined with all the wrongdoing by the authorities in his case is why I think the extradition will fail

gzt

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#2003089 26-Apr-2018 19:44

freitasm:
@gzt: Is that not similar to YouTube's sharing advertising revenue with uploaders?

YouTube automatically identify copyrighted content and disable ad revenue in videos that breach copyright. Accounts that receive repeated notifications are automatically removed.

YouTube now does that to some extent.

I'm not sure that was the case in Jan 2012 when megaupload was seized.

Even now there are many many movies on YouTube with advertising and obvious copyright content.

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Yabanize

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#2003166 26-Apr-2018 22:58

gzt:
freitasm:

@gzt: Is that not similar to YouTube's sharing advertising revenue with uploaders?

YouTube automatically identify copyrighted content and disable ad revenue in videos that breach copyright. Accounts that receive repeated notifications are automatically removed.

YouTube now does that to some extent.

I'm not sure that was the case in Jan 2012 when megaupload was seized.

Even now there are many many movies on YouTube with advertising and obvious copyright content.

I believe Hollywood did go after YouTube the same way they went after MegaUpload but it was too difficult so they went after smaller (although still large) services like MegaUpload instead

Geektastic

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#2003168 26-Apr-2018 23:02

quickymart:
Geektastic:
quickymart: My stepbrother reckons he's never worked an honest day in his life.

That's possible. What is your stepbrother's name so we can check?

Normally I call him "bro"

Man! You sure have a lot of stepbrothers around here...! I've met loads of them.

UHD

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#2003178 27-Apr-2018 05:44

freitasm:

@gzt: Is that not similar to YouTube's sharing advertising revenue with uploaders?

YouTube automatically identify copyrighted content and disable ad revenue in videos that breach copyright. Accounts that receive repeated notifications are automatically removed.

This was not the case for much of the time MegaUpload was online and MegaUpload being taken down was one of the reasons Google proactively pushed for greater automation and deletion of copyrighted content.

frankv

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#2003346 27-Apr-2018 10:12

freitasm:

rugrat: I still don’t get what he was doing was illegal. There are other file sharing sites on internet. You Tube as already pointed out has copyright stuff on it, yet no one is going after these.

The problem was the alleged kickbacks paid to people who uploaded the content for sharing. This would break the safe harbour he had.

I think also that, when multiple people uploaded the same file, MegaUpload would only store it once, with multiple links to it. When RIAA identified an illegal upload, the link to the file would be deleted, not the file itself. RIAA would have to identify all the illegal uploads to get the file removed.

I suspect also that this was a bit of a test case; if they could nail MegaUpload, a cease-and-desist letter to another file sharer would be much more likely to have the desired result.

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