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This is ludicrous. How anyone can call MegaUpload a legit site is beyond me. Everyone knows MegaUpload has been primarily used for storing and sharing pirated w

This is ludicrous. How anyone can call MegaUpload a legit site is beyond me. Everyone knows MegaUpload has been primarily used for storing and sharing pirated works and while the site can be used for legitimate purposes, by and large it wasn't. I do feel for the people who honestly did have legit stuff stored there but I think TorrentFreak's attempt to spin this story like a legit site got shut down for no reason is laughable. So every major city has one of those "massage parlors" that are really just fronts for getting a happy ending. I'd liken this story to a hypothetical "Massage Parlor/rub and tug shop" getting shut down and then having a major local newspaper like the Chicago Tribune run a piece on how we should be outraged that a legit massage place got shut down because of a few bad employees and customers. Give me a break, everyone knew what MegaUpload was doing and while I don't doubt the possibility that some people didn't know and really were using it legitimately, overall stories like this only give the pro-SOPA people more ammunition to try to make our side look like a bunch of entitled, unethical, lawbreakers. Or, as they like to say, "pirates" except when they say it it implies something totally different than what some of us see it as. Only the most pedantic of the pedantic could not pick this story enough to try to make a case for defending MegaUpload. It's not like MU were hiding what they were doing very well. They only had plausible deniability with their cute disclaimer in the FAQ and the fact that it could be used legitimately but largely wasn't. There's no shortage of affordable, popular "file locker"/sharing sites that are legit out there. When you try to defend MegaUpload and say "this is what happens when laws like SOPA take effect" what people outside this community actually hear is: "look how SOPA can stop those law breaking pirates" and it actually makes us look bad. Instead, the message shouldn't be supporting MegaUpload but actually beating the opposition at their own game by framing it as "look, the Feds can shut down pirate sites just fine as it is so why do we need SOPA-like laws?" then go into the dirty details of how SOPA is bad. Definitions and opinions on piracy, copyright, sharing, etc. are irrelevant in this case. The fact is, it's illegal right now and so it got shut down.

radu_floricica 15y ago
Strange enough, I think both paid sex and non-commercial file sharing should be perfectly legal.
- billpatrianakos 15y ago
  Non-commercial file sharing and piracy are two different things. I hate to get pedantic, and I know what you mean but I have to preface what I'm about to say with this disclaimer lest some other pedant starts mincing words with me. Anyway, our opinions on what should be legal are totally irrelevant. Fact is, piracy is illegal and there are laws already in place and enforced on it. You can't just break the law en masse and call it a protest. The opposition just ends up marginalizing you as "a group of bad apples" no matter how many people do it. I favor copyright and don't much like piracy only because I wouldn't want my work to be pirated, however I do see the danger in SOPA and the extension of copyright so I would definitely protest with you guys here. The problem is we can't make change and be comfortable at the same time. If you want to see a change in policy you have to imcomvenience yourself a little in this case. Sitting on your computer and downloading torrents all day them writing a blog post about it doesn't do anyone but preach to the choir. You have to get active and get out into the streets. Protest in front of the offices of Universal, make t-shirts, formally organize, and start talking to the non-techie public in a way they understand. Unfortunately, us nerds seem to be terrible at doing that. We're all so pedantic, we argue amongst ourselves over the little things, and when we do try to educate the public we all spew out different, non-unified messages that the public doesn't see a reason to care about. We're all so enamoured with our ability to disrupt systems and do things our own way that we think we can always play by our own set of rules. I think thats hubris on our part and it's hurting us. In this case I think we need to play by their rules in such a way that we turn their own rules against us. Let's start a PR war. The kind of PR war that uses bumper sticker slogans and tactics the other side uses. We may think its beneath us but would you rather be right or would you rather win?
  - radu_floricica 15y ago
    By non-commercial file sharing I mean file sharing without making a monetary profit from it. This definition covers people using megaupload, but does not cover megaupload itself - who quite obviously made profit from distributing copyrighted works. There is a different discussion on whether closing it this way was the right thing, but I'm not interested in it right now. What I want to point is that the guy downloading and sharing the movie for home-viewing is definitely non commercial. And this is very much included in the common definition of piracy (along with commercial distribution like bootleg cds). Now, about how it's not ok to break the laws: I disagree. I view laws as a convenience for having a civilized society, not as sacred rules. I have enormous respect for them and I am perfectly aware that respecting just the laws you feel like when you feel like is a recipe for chaos. But I am also aware that not all laws are just. More to the point, I am aware that historically a huge number of laws were completely absurd, and from a modern point of view they were (also literally) medieval. I have absolutely no reason to believe we are now above having such absurd laws and I think drug and copyright laws are such modern examples, having no basis in fact and rationality. Therefore not only I have no respect for them, but also no compunction about breaking them (other then getting caught). Prostitution is a different matter btw - in principle I am for legalizing it, but in practice there are ways it could backfire. Human trafficking is real, and while I suspect having prostitution illegal only helps it I don't have the same degree of conviction. With copyright on the other hand there is no doubt in my mind that it's an absurd law - therefore I am morally free (and somehow obligated) to ignore it. Your main objection is that breaking the law doesn't help change it - this I do not think is true. Having millions, really having a majority of the population pirating movies and smoking pot - with no catastrophic consequences on either - only helps drive the point that the laws are absurd. If everybody respected the law just because it's the law we'd just have a world of sheep. It's enough we often get the circular reasoning that "all drugs are bad because they're illegal". I have no desire to see it applied to copyright.

radu_floricica 15y ago

Strange enough, I think both paid sex and non-commercial file sharing should be perfectly legal.

billpatrianakos 15y ago
Non-commercial file sharing and piracy are two different things. I hate to get pedantic, and I know what you mean but I have to preface what I'm about to say with this disclaimer lest some other pedant starts mincing words with me. Anyway, our opinions on what should be legal are totally irrelevant. Fact is, piracy is illegal and there are laws already in place and enforced on it. You can't just break the law en masse and call it a protest. The opposition just ends up marginalizing you as "a group of bad apples" no matter how many people do it. I favor copyright and don't much like piracy only because I wouldn't want my work to be pirated, however I do see the danger in SOPA and the extension of copyright so I would definitely protest with you guys here. The problem is we can't make change and be comfortable at the same time. If you want to see a change in policy you have to imcomvenience yourself a little in this case. Sitting on your computer and downloading torrents all day them writing a blog post about it doesn't do anyone but preach to the choir. You have to get active and get out into the streets. Protest in front of the offices of Universal, make t-shirts, formally organize, and start talking to the non-techie public in a way they understand. Unfortunately, us nerds seem to be terrible at doing that. We're all so pedantic, we argue amongst ourselves over the little things, and when we do try to educate the public we all spew out different, non-unified messages that the public doesn't see a reason to care about. We're all so enamoured with our ability to disrupt systems and do things our own way that we think we can always play by our own set of rules. I think thats hubris on our part and it's hurting us. In this case I think we need to play by their rules in such a way that we turn their own rules against us. Let's start a PR war. The kind of PR war that uses bumper sticker slogans and tactics the other side uses. We may think its beneath us but would you rather be right or would you rather win?
- radu_floricica 15y ago
  By non-commercial file sharing I mean file sharing without making a monetary profit from it. This definition covers people using megaupload, but does not cover megaupload itself - who quite obviously made profit from distributing copyrighted works. There is a different discussion on whether closing it this way was the right thing, but I'm not interested in it right now. What I want to point is that the guy downloading and sharing the movie for home-viewing is definitely non commercial. And this is very much included in the common definition of piracy (along with commercial distribution like bootleg cds). Now, about how it's not ok to break the laws: I disagree. I view laws as a convenience for having a civilized society, not as sacred rules. I have enormous respect for them and I am perfectly aware that respecting just the laws you feel like when you feel like is a recipe for chaos. But I am also aware that not all laws are just. More to the point, I am aware that historically a huge number of laws were completely absurd, and from a modern point of view they were (also literally) medieval. I have absolutely no reason to believe we are now above having such absurd laws and I think drug and copyright laws are such modern examples, having no basis in fact and rationality. Therefore not only I have no respect for them, but also no compunction about breaking them (other then getting caught). Prostitution is a different matter btw - in principle I am for legalizing it, but in practice there are ways it could backfire. Human trafficking is real, and while I suspect having prostitution illegal only helps it I don't have the same degree of conviction. With copyright on the other hand there is no doubt in my mind that it's an absurd law - therefore I am morally free (and somehow obligated) to ignore it. Your main objection is that breaking the law doesn't help change it - this I do not think is true. Having millions, really having a majority of the population pirating movies and smoking pot - with no catastrophic consequences on either - only helps drive the point that the laws are absurd. If everybody respected the law just because it's the law we'd just have a world of sheep. It's enough we often get the circular reasoning that "all drugs are bad because they're illegal". I have no desire to see it applied to copyright.