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How was MU different from any other cloud storage provider, or for that matter, Google? They let people store data on their servers and access it over the web

by drcube 14y ago

How was MU different from any other cloud storage provider, or for that matter, Google? They let people store data on their servers and access it over the web from their browser. That's it. You might as well say "Fuck Tim Berners-Lee, if current laws aren't good enough to stamp out things like the Web, then the laws will be changed until they can." Which, frankly, seems to be happening, unfortunately.

tzs 14y ago
> How was MU different from any other cloud storage provider, or for that matter, Google? Google, Dropbox, and so on were not founded by people who had been convicted of fraud, insider trading, and embezzlement, and in their entire adult lives only seemed to not be involved in criminal activity when they were still on parole from their previous conviction and so HAD to keep clean to avoid having parole revoked. That tends to make people, including law enforcement, give Google and the others the benefit of the doubt when they say that any misuse of their service is not intended on their part and they will try to stop it.
- drcube 14y ago
  This is simply ad hominem. I asked how the web service differed in specific ways related to copyright, not how the founders differed in general.
  - jlgreco 14y ago
    His non-answer makes the real answer clear; they are not.
  - tptacek 14y ago
    Then the question should have been resolved to your satisfaction upthread: Mega was a service, run by a criminal, that conspired overtly to profit from infringement of music, TV, software, and motion picture copyright.
    - b1daly 14y ago
      @tptacek, don't you think this point about Apple and the iPod (as well as early Youtube behavior) have some bearing on this case? Obviously Apple knew for a long time that the vast majority of music on mp3 players was copied, probably illegally. They provided tools to "rip" the CDs! In Apple's case, they stayed well on the legal side of the letter of the law, but the underlying reality was the iPod siphoned off a lot of profit from the record labels because the ability to carry a lot of music with you was so compelling, legal or not. In the MU case, setting aside the unsavory aspects of Kim Dotcom, they were well on the other, illegal, side of the letter of the law. But in both cases, the defense of the behavior comes down to legal technicalities, as opposed to broader concepts of "fairness" or "ethicalness." Really, it seems the same with Google, as long as they comply with the DMCA they are safe, but I doubt they care to much about the wellbeing of content owners whose content is being infringed and accessed through Google. That's money in the bank to them. I'm not trolling, just curious as to your thoughts on this. FWIW, I do support the concept of intellectual property. But I think it should be enforced against for profit entities, and take a live and let live when it comes to individuals copying for their own use. It's messy obviously, such a distinction might not be able to be enforced. But I don't think it's as much a case of ethical behavior as other laws address (laws against violent crime for example).
tptacek 14y ago
MegaUpload operated with foreknowledge of extensive infringing activity on their site, and further willfuly acted to further that activity, for instance by creating an affiliate program that rewarded site members for pushing more copyrighted material to the site. These assertions were corroborated by MegaUpload's own email. Again: there are two sides to complying with copyright law to obtain protection under "safe harbor" rules. The side everyone is familiar with is "complying with takedown notices". But the other side, just as important, spelled out in the law, is not operating your service with foreknowledge of infringement. It isn't enough just to wait for copyright holders to send takedowns. By actively courting piracy, MegaUpload forfeited safe harbor protections. This question comes up in almost every thread about MegaUpload. The answer is very simple. Even if (in the back of their minds) the operators of Youtube must have known they were a haven for video piracy, so long as they themselves didn't engage with that piracy (and complied with takedowns) they were safe. MegaUpload's staff engaged.
- drcube 14y ago
  So Google doesn't know there is infringing material on the web? YouTube doesn't have the foresight to realize users will upload TV shows, movies and music? If I recall correctly, MegaUpload gave copyright owners free reign to delete anything they wanted off the site with no takedown notice at all. Does Google allow just anyone to delete pages from their search results? Tell me about these affiliate programs. Did they really say "Please help us infringe other people's copyright. The more you infringe, the more money you make!"? My understanding was that they encouraged user interaction, no differently than Facebook or any other commercial web site out there.
  - tptacek 14y ago
    Thanks for asking this question. To help understand what's being alleged by the DOJ, you'd probably want to know what they found in Mega's email; for instance: On or about April 23, 2009, DOTCOM sent an e-mail message to VANDER KOLK, ORTMANN, and BENCKO in which he complained about the deletion of URL links in response to infringement notices from the copyright holders. In the message, DOTCOMstated that “I told you many times not to delete links that are reported in batches of thousands from insignificant sources. I would say that those infringement reports from MEXICO of “14,000” links would fall into that category. And the fact that we lost significant revenue because of it justifies my reaction.” * "We have a funny business... modern days pirates", said one Mega- employee to another. "We're not pirates", he responded. "We're just providing shipping services to pirates." * When an outsider complained that MegaVideo's hosting of the Showtime pay-tv series "Dexter" had desynchronized audio/video, instead of taking down "Dexter", Kim Schmitz fired off mail saying that fixing the AV problem was a priority. * Mega employees themselves uploaded copies of major motion pictures to the service, such as Luc Besson's _Taken_. * There are Mega emails, on which Kim is apparently CC'd, in which employees enumerate the specific files uploaded to certain high-performing affiliate members, noting (approvingly) that they include copyrighted movies and TV shows. For instance, one line item in an accounting mail: 100 USD [USERNAME DELETED] 10+ Full popular DVD rips (split files), a few small porn movies, some software with keygenerators (warez) Remember: there are two sides to claiming "safe harbor": complying with takedowns, and not operating your service with actual knowledge of infringing activity on the service. Mega obviously operated with extensive actual knowledge of infringement. The operators of Youtube obviously knew that piracy was rampant on the Internet, and even on their service, but no prosecutor or litigator was ever able to show that Youtube's operators knew of specific, actual infringing activity on the site. I found it easier to cite my comments from the last big Mega thread here than to go back to the indictment, which you can find easily on Google. The indictment is hilarious. The craziness at Mega just goes on and on. If you can think of something a lawyer would tell you not to do if you were going to run a file sharing service, Mega probably found a creatively terrible way to do it.

by drcube 14y ago

tzs 14y ago

> How was MU different from any other cloud storage provider, or for that matter, Google? Google, Dropbox, and so on were not founded by people who had been convicted of fraud, insider trading, and embezzlement, and in their entire adult lives only seemed to not be involved in criminal activity when they were still on parole from their previous conviction and so HAD to keep clean to avoid having parole revoked. That tends to make people, including law enforcement, give Google and the others the benefit of the doubt when they say that any misuse of their service is not intended on their part and they will try to stop it.

drcube 14y ago
This is simply ad hominem. I asked how the web service differed in specific ways related to copyright, not how the founders differed in general.
- jlgreco 14y ago
  His non-answer makes the real answer clear; they are not.
- tptacek 14y ago
  Then the question should have been resolved to your satisfaction upthread: Mega was a service, run by a criminal, that conspired overtly to profit from infringement of music, TV, software, and motion picture copyright.
  - b1daly 14y ago
    @tptacek, don't you think this point about Apple and the iPod (as well as early Youtube behavior) have some bearing on this case? Obviously Apple knew for a long time that the vast majority of music on mp3 players was copied, probably illegally. They provided tools to "rip" the CDs! In Apple's case, they stayed well on the legal side of the letter of the law, but the underlying reality was the iPod siphoned off a lot of profit from the record labels because the ability to carry a lot of music with you was so compelling, legal or not. In the MU case, setting aside the unsavory aspects of Kim Dotcom, they were well on the other, illegal, side of the letter of the law. But in both cases, the defense of the behavior comes down to legal technicalities, as opposed to broader concepts of "fairness" or "ethicalness." Really, it seems the same with Google, as long as they comply with the DMCA they are safe, but I doubt they care to much about the wellbeing of content owners whose content is being infringed and accessed through Google. That's money in the bank to them. I'm not trolling, just curious as to your thoughts on this. FWIW, I do support the concept of intellectual property. But I think it should be enforced against for profit entities, and take a live and let live when it comes to individuals copying for their own use. It's messy obviously, such a distinction might not be able to be enforced. But I don't think it's as much a case of ethical behavior as other laws address (laws against violent crime for example).

tptacek 14y ago

MegaUpload operated with foreknowledge of extensive infringing activity on their site, and further willfuly acted to further that activity, for instance by creating an affiliate program that rewarded site members for pushing more copyrighted material to the site. These assertions were corroborated by MegaUpload's own email. Again: there are two sides to complying with copyright law to obtain protection under "safe harbor" rules. The side everyone is familiar with is "complying with takedown notices". But the other side, just as important, spelled out in the law, is not operating your service with foreknowledge of infringement. It isn't enough just to wait for copyright holders to send takedowns. By actively courting piracy, MegaUpload forfeited safe harbor protections. This question comes up in almost every thread about MegaUpload. The answer is very simple. Even if (in the back of their minds) the operators of Youtube must have known they were a haven for video piracy, so long as they themselves didn't engage with that piracy (and complied with takedowns) they were safe. MegaUpload's staff engaged.

drcube 14y ago
So Google doesn't know there is infringing material on the web? YouTube doesn't have the foresight to realize users will upload TV shows, movies and music? If I recall correctly, MegaUpload gave copyright owners free reign to delete anything they wanted off the site with no takedown notice at all. Does Google allow just anyone to delete pages from their search results? Tell me about these affiliate programs. Did they really say "Please help us infringe other people's copyright. The more you infringe, the more money you make!"? My understanding was that they encouraged user interaction, no differently than Facebook or any other commercial web site out there.
- tptacek 14y ago
  Thanks for asking this question. To help understand what's being alleged by the DOJ, you'd probably want to know what they found in Mega's email; for instance: On or about April 23, 2009, DOTCOM sent an e-mail message to VANDER KOLK, ORTMANN, and BENCKO in which he complained about the deletion of URL links in response to infringement notices from the copyright holders. In the message, DOTCOMstated that “I told you many times not to delete links that are reported in batches of thousands from insignificant sources. I would say that those infringement reports from MEXICO of “14,000” links would fall into that category. And the fact that we lost significant revenue because of it justifies my reaction.” * "We have a funny business... modern days pirates", said one Mega- employee to another. "We're not pirates", he responded. "We're just providing shipping services to pirates." * When an outsider complained that MegaVideo's hosting of the Showtime pay-tv series "Dexter" had desynchronized audio/video, instead of taking down "Dexter", Kim Schmitz fired off mail saying that fixing the AV problem was a priority. * Mega employees themselves uploaded copies of major motion pictures to the service, such as Luc Besson's _Taken_. * There are Mega emails, on which Kim is apparently CC'd, in which employees enumerate the specific files uploaded to certain high-performing affiliate members, noting (approvingly) that they include copyrighted movies and TV shows. For instance, one line item in an accounting mail: 100 USD [USERNAME DELETED] 10+ Full popular DVD rips (split files), a few small porn movies, some software with keygenerators (warez) Remember: there are two sides to claiming "safe harbor": complying with takedowns, and not operating your service with actual knowledge of infringing activity on the service. Mega obviously operated with extensive actual knowledge of infringement. The operators of Youtube obviously knew that piracy was rampant on the Internet, and even on their service, but no prosecutor or litigator was ever able to show that Youtube's operators knew of specific, actual infringing activity on the site. I found it easier to cite my comments from the last big Mega thread here than to go back to the indictment, which you can find easily on Google. The indictment is hilarious. The craziness at Mega just goes on and on. If you can think of something a lawyer would tell you not to do if you were going to run a file sharing service, Mega probably found a creatively terrible way to do it.