Noise

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

Last September, IMAGiNE, one of the Internet’s leading BitTorrent release groups, stopped distributing new films. This immediately sparked speculation that the authorities were onto them, and last month the confirmation came that this was indeed the case.

Three weeks ago four members of the group were arrested and charged with several counts of criminal copyright infringement. Aside from reproducing and releasing copyrighted films on their private tracker UnleashTheNet, they also “capped” films at local movie theaters.

One of the accused members, 27-year old Sean Lovelady from California, admitted several of these acts and pleads guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement. Lovelady also waived his rights to appeal and in exchange the authorities have promised not to prosecute him for the other charges listed in the indictment.

With his guilty plea Lovelady faces a maximum penalty of 5 years in prison, a $250,000 fine, plus damages that might be claimed by copyright holders.

In the plea agreement Lovelady further agrees to “cooperate fully and truthfully with the United States, and provide all information known to the defendant regarding any criminal activity as requested by the government.” This might affect the cases against the other IMAGiNE members who have not pleaded guilty according to the arraignment sheets.

In addition to the guilty plea, an overview of “facts” which Lovelady signed as true and accurate gives an overview of some of the copyright infringements that took place, that UnleashTheNet was operated by IMAGiNE, and that the group also sold releases.

In furtherance of the conspiracy and to provide a platform for IMAGiNE Group members to share and to ready copies of motion pictures and other copyrighted works for dissemination over the Internet, in July and August 2010 a conspirator in the Eastern District of Virginia took a series of steps to facilitate the use of a new website for the IMAGiNE Group, titled “unleashthe.net.” In the Eastern District of Virginia and elsewhere, this conspirator: (a) rented computer servers in France and elsewhere for use by the IMAGiNE Group and to host its website; (b) registered domain names for use b the IMAGiNE Group; and (c) opened email and PayPal accounts to receive donations and payments from persons downloading or buying IMAGiNE Group releases of infringing or “pirated” copies of motion pictures and other copyrighted works and to fund payments for computer servers.

The same document also reveals that the MPAA was the main motivator behind the investigation.

“Following contact from a representative of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) in March 2010, investigators with the Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement(Homeland Security Investigations or HSI Norfolk) began investigating an Internet release group, identified as the IMAGiNE Group,” the document reads.

This is identical to the case against Megaupload, where the MPAA was also the driving force. And there are more similarities. Both cases are being handled by US Attorney Neil MacBride, who was also on the NinjaVideo case. Considering MacBride’s past work as Vice President of Anti-Piracy for the lobby group BSA, he is probably well-connected with the MPAA.

Thus far MacBride and his team have booked some successes in the NinjaVideo case. Five people connected to the site were arrested last year and four received jail sentences.

Lovelady and the others have been released from custody and await their sentencing, which is scheduled for this fall.

Source: IMAGiNE Member Pleads Guilty to Criminal Copyright Infringement

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

In recent years more than a quarter million people have been accused of sharing copyrighted works in the United States.

Copyright holders generally sue dozens, hundreds or sometimes even thousands of people at once, hoping to extract cash settlements from the alleged downloaders. The evidence they present to the court is usually an IP-address and a timestamp marking when the alleged infringement took place.

Early 2010, when these mass-lawsuits began, copyright holders targeted IP-addresses from all across the US in single lawsuits. This led some judges to dismiss cases because their courts have no jurisdiction over people who live elsewhere.

As a result, copyright holders switched to a new tactic. Before filing a suit they ran their database of infringing IP-addresses through so-called “geolocation” services so they could argue that the defendants most likely reside in the district where they were being sued.

This worked well for a while, but a new ruling by California District Court Judge Dean Pregerson puts an end to this new approach, killing 15 lawsuits in the process.

According to Pregerson, alleged BitTorrent pirates are protected by the First Amendment as they are “engaging in the exercise of speech, albeit to a limited extent.” Therefore, the copyright holder’s request to identify anonymous internet users has to meet certain criteria.

One of the requirements is that it’s absolutely clear that the accused are residents of the region where the court has jurisdiction, but according to Judge Pregerson it is not sufficient to use the results from a “geolocation” tool to prove it.

In a previous order the copyright holder – movie company Celestial Inc. – was asked to convince the court of the accuracy of these tools. In a reply Celestial referred to a website which contained some general claims as well as a quote from the company that collected the evidence, but it wasn’t enough.

“Based on Plaintiff’s own reliability claims, there may still be a 20 to 50 percent chance that this court lacks jurisdiction,” Judge Pregerson writes in his order.

The Judge adds that even if there is a slight chance that these tools are wrong, he simply can’t sign off on the subpoena request.

“Even if the most advanced geolocation tools were simply too unreliable to adequately establish jurisdiction, the court could not set aside constitutional concerns in favor of Plaintiff’s desire to subpoena the Doe Defendants’ identifying information.”

“Again, it is the First Amendment that requires courts to ensure complaints like this one would at least survive a motion to dismiss, before the court authorizes early discovery to identify anonymous internet users.”

The IP-address lookups and additional information provided by Celestial Inc. can’t guarantee that the defendants do indeed reside in California, and Judge Pregerson therefore dismissed the 15 mass-BitTorrent lawsuits the company filed at his court.

It also means the end of mass-BitTorrent lawsuits in the Californian court, as no geolocation tool is 100% accurate.

While the ruling doesn’t mean the end of all mass-BitTorrent lawsuits in the US just yet, it appears that there’s a growing opposition from judges against these practices.

For example, two weeks ago we reported on a related ruling in which a Florida judge dismissed several cases because an IP-address doesn’t identify a person. In other words, even when a court has jurisdiction, the copyright holder can not prove that the account holder connected to the IP-address is the person who shared the copyrighted file.

If other judges adopt either of the rulings above, it means the end of mass-BitTorrent lawsuits as we know them.

Source: IP-Address Can’t Even Identify a State, BitTorrent Judge Rules

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

Last month Counting Crows released their latest studio album titled Underwater Sunshine (Or What We Did On Our Summer Vacation).

Fans have been waiting since 2008 for the release and it’s selling well, but that won’t prevent the band from giving some tracks away for free.

Counting Crows decided to team up with BitTorrent Inc. and today they release a promotional bundle with the songs Untitled (Love Song), Like Teenage Gravity, Hospital, and Meet on the Ledge.

The download, which also includes high-resolution album artwork and liner notes from lead singer Adam Duritz, is available to BitTorrent’s 150 million users and will be bundled with all new downloads of the uTorrent client.

While this isn’t the first time artists have used BitTorrent’s promotion program to share their works for free, Counting Crows are perhaps the biggest name thus far. To find out why the band decided to embrace BitTorrent, TorrentFreak caught up with Adam Duritz.

“I’ve been a big proponent of giving songs away for a long time,” says Duritz, explaining why the band decided to share their music on BitTorrent.

While the singer doesn’t endorse people simply taking stuff, he realizes that BitTorrent can do a lot of good for musicians.

“I can dwell on the negatives, but I don’t want to miss out on the fact that there’s 150 million people who I can give songs to. You either treat it as just a money drain, like the record companies do. Or you can treat it as it actually is, which is a conduit, meaning it runs both ways.”

“You can either cry about it or make use of it. File-sharing is no different from the rest of the Internet, it is a tool that connects the entire world. It is the cure for Babel,” Duritz adds.

According to the singer the Internet is a “huge benefit” to music. Counting Crows realized this early on and started posting about their music on a message forum in 1995.

In the years that followed the music industry changed dramatically. But while the record labels have been complaining bitterly, according to the band’s frontman musicians are actually better off.

“Record business was never all that great for bands. It was always a 99 percent failure rate of bands. Even if you did do well record labels took 80 percent of your revenue and locked up your rights. And they are completely incompetent,” Duritz told TorrentFreak.

BitTorrent, the Internet and technological advances have democratized music and made it more accessible than ever before. Promotion is not centralized through the labels, but now works through bloggers, social networks and music services.

“On the Internet dependent bands can survive. Perhaps they don’t become megastars, but at least they can survive and thrive. And there’s a lot of great music out there right now.”

People make their own radio stations now according to Duritz, and BitTorrent plays a vital role there.

“If you got 150 million people on BitTorrent, then that’s the new radio station. That’s a better radio station in fact, because people have the choice to play it as much as they want and stop when they get sick of it.”

“I can’t believe everybody’s not doing it,” Duritz says, adding that it’s much better than bribing radio stations or record stores.

“It’s a no brainer to me and now that we’re an independent band we don’t have to listen to a bunch of idiots who tell us what we should or shouldn’t do. We can have smart people or we can trust ourselves.”

The Counting Crows frontman is no stranger to BitTorrent either. He knows sites like crows-town.com that are devoted to sharing his concerts, and he supports them.

“I gave birth to these websites basically because we’ve been encouraging people to tape concerts from the very beginning. We’re a good live band, so they’re going to want to listen to it. It would be great if we could sell concert recordings, but we don’t have to monetize everything,” Duritz told us.

“I have a whole wall of bootlegs in my house, not of us, but of other bands. So it would be a little hypocritical if I started getting angry at everybody else now. I think it’s a great thing and don’t know why bands have ever fought people recording shows because it’s a great advertisement for your product.”

So in part these torrent sites act as a promotional tool. And that’s exactly the reason why Counting Crows is partnering with BitTorrent.

“Giving songs away will draw people to the record, it will also draw people to the tour that’s coming up. Those are pretty big things. The fact that you can give something to that many people is not a small thing,” Duritz says.

“As an artist it’s what you’ve been wanting to do all along, which is to get your music to people.”

That said, Duritz thinks people will continue to buy music. However, they want sincere artists who charge a reasonable price, and not a band that’s backed by a record label people don’t trust.

“I believe in the future of the music business, just not the record labels,” he concludes.

For those who are interested, the Counting Crows bundle can be downloaded here.

Source: BitTorrent is the New Radio, Says Counting Crows Frontman

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

This week there are four newcomers in our chart.

21 Jump Street is the most downloaded movie this week.

The data for our weekly download chart is collected by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only. All the movies in the list are BD/DVDrips unless stated otherwise.

RSS feed for the weekly movie download chart.

Week ending May 13, 2012

Ranking	(last week)	Movie	IMDb Rating / Trailer
torrentfreak.com
1	(2)	21 Jump Street (R5)	7.6 / trailer
2	(…)	Get The Gringo	7.8 / trailer
3	(3)	The Avengers (CAM)	8.9 / trailer
4	(1)	This Means War	6.5 / trailer
5	(4)	Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows	7.4 / trailer
6	(…)	Vicky Donor (DVDscr)	8.0 / trailer
7	(…)	Hate Story (DVDscr)	?.? / trailer
8	(5)	Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol	4.8 / trailer
9	(9)	Chronicle	7.3 / trailer
10	(…)	Man On a Ledge	6.6 / trailer

Source: Top 10 Most Pirated Movies on BitTorrent

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

Hollywood, software giants and the major music labels see BitTorrent as one of the largest threats to their business.

Billions in revenue are lost each year, they claim. But not for long if the Russian based startup “Pirate Pay” has its way. The company has developed a technology which allows them to attack existing BitTorrent swarms, making it impossible for people to share files.

The idea started three years ago when the developers were building a traffic management solution for Internet providers. The technology worked well. It was able to stop BitTorrent traffic if needed, which made the developers realize that they might have built the holy anti-piracy grail.

“After creating the prototype, we realized we could more generally prevent files from being downloaded, which meant that the program had great promise in combating the spread of pirated content,” Pirate Pay CEO Andrei Klimenko says.

With this new business model in mind the company continued to develop their product, and it didn’t take long before an investor was willing to support it. Last year Pirate Pay received a $100,000 investment from the Microsoft Seed Financing Fund.

Microsoft Russia’s president praised the innovative idea, which his company would also be able to use in the future.

With the cash injection the company continued working on their anti-piracy solution and December last Direktcya Kino was the first to hire Pirate Pay’s services. For a month Pirate Pay’s technology protected the film “Vysotsky. Thanks to God, I’m alive,” (distributed by The Walt Disney Studios Sony Pictures Releasing company) with moderate success.

The company doesn’t reveal how it works, but they appear to be flooding clients with fake information, masquerading as legitimate peers.

“We used a number of servers to make a connection to each and every P2P client that distributed this film. Then Pirate Pay sent specific traffic to confuse these clients about the real IP-addresses of other clients and to make them disconnect from each other,” Andrei Klimenko says.

The end result was that 44,845 transfers were successfully stopped. How many downloads slipped through, and whether the downloaders didn’t simply try again later is unknown. Pirate Pay don’t disclose their exact rates but say they charge between $12,000 and $50,000 depending on the scope of the project.

While Pirate Pay claim their technology is truly unique, it is not the first company to tackle BitTorrent piracy. The now defunct MediaDefender charged hundreds of thousands of dollars to attack BitTorrent trackers and upload fake torrent files.

MediaDefender was rebranded to Peer Media, and under this brand they continue to offer these and other anti-piracy services.

Whether Pirate Pay is truly different and more effective than any of the other solutions remains to be seen. Even if it’s hugely effective, the scattered nature of BitTorrent makes it practically impossible to stop all infringing downloads of a movie, while the costs may outweigh the “losses” that are prevented.

Companies that really want to make Pirates Pay are probably better off investing in improvements to their legal offers.

Article updated to emphasize that Direktcya Kino was the first client.

Source: Microsoft Funded Startup Aims to Kill BitTorrent Traffic

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

Two weeks ago we published an opinion piece where we pointed out some unfortunately-phrased comments from MPAA boss Chris Dodd.

The former congressman pointed out that the film industry was able to thrive because of intellectual property protections.

“The ability to give birth to an idea and convert it into economic success, whether it is the content of a film or the technology of the internet, depends on copyright and patent protection,” he said, referring to the history of US film.

We thought that was ironic. Why? Because Hollywood was founded by a group of independent filmmakers who “fled” from Edison’s patents, among other things. The full story (see Copyhype) is richer, but it’s a well-known fact that those who now rule Hollywood refused to obey the patents.

To emphasize the irony we described Hollywood’s founders as “thieves” and “pirates,” using quotation marks. Aside from these terms, the events described in our article are mostly undisputed. In no way did we say that this history justifies modern-day piracy, we simply pointed out that Dodd’s comments were unfortunate.

The MPAA, however, doesn’t like to be called pirates. In a recent blog post they refer to the Copyhype post, claiming that what we and others such as Lawrence Lessig wrote is all lies. We are thieves.

“If you ask the operators of The Pirate Bay and their apologists, they’ll say Hollywood was built by a band of pirates, fleeing stringent East Coast patent protections to a free and open land to create at will. This theory conveniently parallels their own existence, as they seek to justify profiting from digital theft.”

And these thieves are wrong, the MPAA claims.

Hollywood’s founders were no pirates, but freedom fighters who rebelled against a “copyright” monopoly.

“The patents at issue were held by the Motion Picture Patents Company, which, through restrictive tie-in agreements and licensing practices, severely impeded independent filmmakers from entering the market.”

Hmmm, that sounds familiar.

These independent filmmakers lost the first patent lawsuit, but eventually the court sided with them.

“The status quo was challenged, and shortly afterwards, the Supreme Court determined that MPPC’s licensing practices give it ‘a potential power for evil over’ movie producers which ‘would be gravely injurious to th[e] public interest.’ This 1917 ruling severely undermined MPPC’s unfair business practices.”

Fair enough, but the MPAA’s version of the truth doesn’t change anything about the fact that the founders of Hollywood were challenging existing patents. That they won in the end doesn’t mean that patents weren’t violated in the years before.

So Dodd’s comment that “the ability to give birth to an idea and convert it into economic success, whether it is the content of a film or the technology of the internet, depends on copyright and patent protection,” is still rather unfortunate.

Especially because Dodd specifically referenced a time where patents were infringed en masse.

Also, the MPAA’s response in their recent blog post is in itself unfortunate. The lobby group says that Hollywood’s freedom fighters beat Edison because the court agreed that the MPPC had “a potential power for evil over” movie producers which “would be gravely injurious to th[e] public interest.”

Interesting, because today the MPAA is also quite powerful. They are the moral judge who decides what films the public is allowed to see. Not just for the major studios they represent, but also films of independent studios who are NOT an MPAA member company.

Through its ratings system they can make or break films, a “potential power for evil” for sure. Just ask South Park creator Matt Stone or watch “This Film is Not Yet Rated” to get an idea of what’s going on behind the scenes.

Fin.

Source: MPAA: We’re No Pirates! You Are Thieves! Or?

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

Last fall, John Wiley and Sons became the first book publisher to go after BitTorrent users in the US.

By filing a mass-BitTorrent lawsuit the company became one of the many copyright holders who together have sued a quarter million people in the country since early 2010. In recent months, Wiley has continued to file yet more suits against alleged BitTorrent pirates.

Up until recently Wiley has enjoyed an easy ride in court. In several cases the New York federal court was quick to allow the book publisher to subpoena Internet providers for the personal details of account holders. With these details, Wiley can then approach the defendants and negotiate an out-of-court settlement.

But not if it’s up to Verizon.

While most Internet providers generally don’t object to a court-ordered subpoena, Verizon has refused to hand over the personal details of accused subscribers. One of the reasons given by Verizon is that Wiley is demanding the information for improper purposes, namely “to harass, cause unnecessary delay, or needlessly increase the cost of litigation.”

In addition, the Internet provider doubts whether the subpoena will lead to the discovery of “relevant information.” In other words, Verizon seems to doubt that the person who pays for the account is also the infringer.

This issue was also raised by New York Judge Gary Brown in another case last week, in which he concluded that an IP-address is not a person. In his order Brown argued that in mass-BitTorrent lawsuits it is simply unknown whether the person linked to the IP-address has anything to do with the alleged copyright infringements.

Besides the two points above Verizon makes five more objections, including concerns over privacy. The company asserts that Wiley is seeking “information that is protected from disclosure by third parties’ rights of privacy and protections guaranteed by the First Amendment.”

For its part, Wiley is not convinced by Verizon’s protest and has asked the court to compel Verizon to respond to the subpoenas. To discuss the issue, Judge Katherine Forrest has scheduled a telephone conference for early next week.

Verizon’s objection is noteworthy because the action is not borne merely out of self-interest. Previously Time Warner also objected to mass-BitTorrent subpoenas where they had to produce the details of thousands of subscribers, arguing that this process was too time consuming.

However, in this case the burden on the ISP is relatively low, as Wiley says it only asked for the details of 10 account holders for which Verizon would receive compensation of $45 each.

Should Judge Katherine Forrest agree with Verizon’s objections it would be a serious blow to Wiley’s ongoing litigation campaign against BitTorrent users in the Southern District of New York.

Source: Verizon Refuses to Identify Alleged BitTorrent Pirates

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

After two Dutch ISPs were ordered to censor The Pirate Bay earlier this year there was an influx of visitors to Pirate Bay proxy sites.

In an attempt to take these proxies offline the Hollywood funded anti-piracy group BREIN obtained an injunction against one of the sites and used this to convince others to shut down as well.

The list of secondary targets included the local Pirate Party, who initially refused to give in to the demands but were later ordered to take their reverse proxy offline by the court. The Pirate Party claimed that the case against them amounted to a restriction of their freedom of speech, and sued BREIN over the order.

Today the Court of The Hague delivered its verdict, which confirms most of the earlier injunction. The Pirate Party is now forbidden from encouraging the public to circumvent the Pirate Bay blockade and from listing or hosting tools that can enable others to do so.

The Court specifically ruled that the Party’s reverse proxy has to remain offline. It was further ordered that Pirate Bay domains and IP-addresses have to be filtered from the Pirate Party’s generic proxy. In addition the Pirate Party can’t link to other websites that allow the public to bypass the blockade. These orders are only valid when paired with an encouragement to circumvent.

Should the Pirate Party fail to comply with the Court’s ruling it faces fines of €5,000 per day to a maximum penalty of €250,000.

“For many who where hoping for the law to come to the rescue of basic civil liberties, today must be a rough awakening,” Pirate Party chairman Dirk Poot told TorrentFreak in a comment. “This ridiculously broad verdict allows BREIN to take down any site that is posting information that displeases their censors.”

“A first in Dutch law is that a judge has now also ordered a generic proxy to filter internet traffic as well. BREIN has created jurisprudence that will now allow them to come after any open proxy they have set their sights on.”

Pirate Bay proxies are a hot topic, and not just in the Netherlands. Last week the UK High Court also ordered local ISPs to prevent subscribers from accessing The Pirate Bay website. As a result the proxy site of the UK Pirate Party became overloaded with visitors.

Whether BREIN’s equivalent in the UK will act against this and other proxies is unknown.

The ruling against the Dutch Pirate Party is the second today regarding The Pirate Bay. This morning the Court of The Hague ordered five more Dutch Internet providers to censor the torrent site. This means that pretty much all Dutch Internet users are now affected by the blockade.

The Pirate Bay, meanwhile, continues to share alternative means for blocked users to access the site. At the same time, the press attention is resulting in millions of extra visitors for the notorious BitTorrent site.

Source: Court Forbids Linking to Pirate Bay Proxies

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

In 2004 Google was sued by Perfect 10. The adult publisher demanded a permanent injunction against Google to prevent it from copying and distributing thumbnails of its images, and to stop the search engine from linking to websites where Perfect 10 content was hosted illegally. Initially Perfect 10 scored a substantial victory as the court agreed with the adult company’s position on Google’s use of thumbnails. However, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals later reversed this ruling stating that this utilization of thumbnails amounted to fair use. What followed was a lengthy legal battle in which the adult company targeted Google with a wide range of secondary liability claims. These claims were often supported by the MPAA and RIAA, and opposed by digital rights groups such as the EFF. After nearly 8 years of litigation and two failed requests for a Supreme Court review, the case continued at the District Court where both sides accused each other of breaking the rules. Notable is Perfect 10′s quite unconventional last-minute attempt to find more dirt on Google. Earlier this year the company called on the publicto provide evidence that Google was aiding or abetting copyright infringements. The publisher went as far as offering a $25,000 bounty, which is still listed on its website.

“Perfect 10 is offering $25,000 (twenty-five thousand dollars) to the person who provides us with the most compelling non-public evidence of Google illegal conduct between now and February 28, 2012.”

“The type of evidence we are looking for would be emails between a webmaster and Google, showing that Google aided or condoned copyright infringement, or that Google was involved in other illegal activities not known to the general public.”

However, judging from the recent court updates this offer didn’t bring in the much-desired evidence. Both parties agreed to dismiss the case with prejudice, meaning it can no longer be appealed. “Perfect 10 agrees not to commence any future lawsuit against Google in any court arising from any such Google act or omission on or before the date of dismissal of this action, or any such DMCA notices sent by Perfect 10 on or before the date of dismissal of this action,” the court filing reads. Whether the dismissal follows on an out-of-court settlement is unknown. A Google spokesperson didn’t answer this specific question, instead offering the following comment. “We always asserted that there was no merit to this case. Plaintiff seemed to agree: last week he asked for a dismissal of the case with prejudice.” Another plausible reason for the dismissal could be that Perfect 10 was feeling the heat, as the court ordered the company to open its books and provide full insight into all internal communications regarding the court case. While the dismissal marks the end of a landmark case, Perfect 10 shows no sign of slowing down their legal actions. The company has a long history of copyright cases targeting companies such as Megaupload, Amazon, and Hotfile. Last month Russia’s Google equivalent Yandex joined these ranks, and earlier this week Perfect 10 sued the microblogging platform Tumblr. And so it continues.

Source: Iconic Piracy Suit Against Google Dismissed, Despite $25,000 Bounty

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

The Pirate Bay renamed itself to The Research Bay today for a collaboration with the Cybernorms research group at Lund University.

The notorious BitTorrent site is encouraging visitors to take part in the survey into people’s file-sharing habits and their views on copyright enforcement. The study is a follow up to a similar survey last year, in which 75,000 people from all over the world participated.

One of the main goals of the project is to counter entertainment industry propaganda. The researchers want to document how the Internet creates new social norms in society, and to what extent these norms are, or should be, reflected in relevant legislation.

“This research is first of all aiming at creating a better base of knowledge for policy makers. Without adequate information it is impossible to adapt the legal systems in a legitimate way,” Måns Svensson, PhD in Sociology of Law at Lund and study manager told TorrentFreak.

“Further, this research is important as a counterweight to the propaganda produced by various actors. Through the follow-up survey we are able to register changes and trends; and also we have the opportunity to ask some new questions, for example related to the recent demands on UK ISPs to block The Pirate Bay.”

Svensson told TorrentFreak that the Pirate Bay is the perfect partner to carry out this type of research.

Among other things, the first study revealed that Pirate Bay users show a great interest in VPN services and other anonymizers. With this second survey the Cybernorms group wants to see how the findings of the first study developed over time.

“We are very curious of how the use of anonymity services has developed during the last year. A survey conducted earlier this year in Sweden indicated a growing use among file sharers of VPN services for anonymization. We think that we have reason to believe that intensified enforcement strategies will accelerate this development,” Svensson said.

In addition, the survey also give the researchers the opportunity to delve deeper in people’s responses to recent Pirate Bay blockades, such as the one that was ordered in the UK last week.

“We are also curious to learn more about the specific techniques used for online anonymity and the techniques for avoiding blocking. This time we are breaking down the data on a national level which means that we will be able to compare legal strategies with the actual behavioral changes.”

Svensson stresses that he and his colleagues have a responsibility as social scientists to monitor the responses to more repressive anti-piracy laws. Thus far this has resulted in a few interesting insights. For example, they found that changing the law doesn’t mean that people’s norms will change.

Instead, the gap between law and file-sharer’s morals widens.

“Our research has shown that tougher legislation actually does have an effect on the amount that people file share copyright protected media. However, this legislation has no effect on the social norms of society,” Svensson said.

“People still don’t think it is wrong to share files. What we have is a deterrent effect due to enforcement actions, but an effect that lacks societal support. This is a dangerous development that in the long run risks undermining the trust in the democratic society.”

Readers who want to help out with the research are invited to take part in the survey. Next week all results of the first survey will be published to the public.

Source: The Pirate Bay Partners With Academic Researchers to Counter Propaganda

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

A week before its premiere in US movie theaters, a camcorded version of The Avengers appeared online.

Immediately thousands of fans jumped on the release and according to figures collated by TorrentFreak, in the days that followed it was downloaded half a million times. While this may very well be a record for a “CAM” movie, it failed to exceed the download numbers of several other movies that were available in higher quality.

Record or not, the movie’s distributer Disney must have been terrified by this early release. However, this weekend the suits at the studio were able to breathe a sign of relief, or rather, start popping open the Champagne.

With more than $200 million in box office revenue, The Avengers had the most successful first weekend in movie history. It broke the record set by Harry Potter last year by more than $30 million, despite the “massive” piracy.

But is this really such a big surprise? Not when you look at the numbers.

Of all the people who downloaded a pirate copy of the film about 20% came from the US. This means that roughly 100,000 Americans have downloaded a copy online through BitTorrent. Now, IF all these people bought a movie ticket instead then box office revenue would be just 0.5% higher.

Not much of an impact, and even less when you consider that these “pirates” do not all count as a lost sale.

We don’t think that there are many movie fans who see a low quality camcorded version of a movie as a true alternative to watching a film in a movie theater. The two are totally different experiences, and not direct competition at all.

If anything, downloading a camcorded movie could be compared to downloading a low quality bootleg of a concert. People who download these are collectors, passionate fans, or just curious. But in no way do these bootlegs seriously hurt concert attendances.

The same might be said for advance leaks of games. These pre-release copies are often downloaded by tens of thousands of people, but not necessarily those who refuse to pay. The people who download these buggy and sometimes hardly playable games are often curious game fanatics who tend to buy the official game when it comes out.

The claim that camcorded films are killing the movie industry is nonsense and spending millions of dollars on anti-camcording technologies is simply not worth it.

But does this mean that piracy is not an issue for the movie industry at all? Well not so fast.

A recent study showed that the US box office is not suffering from movie piracy, but that there is a detrimental effect on international box office figures. The researchers attribute this impact to the wide release gaps, which sometimes result in a high quality DVD copy being available on pirate sites while a movie is still showing in theaters.

These high quality copies are more likely to “compete” with movie theater attendance and if a movie is not showing in local theaters at all, it definitely has the potential to impact future attendance.

This is even more true for the DVD-aftermarket and VOD sales. High quality pirated copies are direct competition and can impact revenues.

The challenge for the movie industry is to make legal offerings more appealing than pirated counterparts. Of course it may not always be able to compete with “free,” but there is still a lot of ground to make up when it comes to availability and quality of legal offerings.

But in no way are camcorded copies killing the US movie industry.

Source: The Avengers: Why Pirates Failed To Prevent A Box Office Record

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

All around the world file-sharers are being chased by anti-piracy outfits and the authorities. But while copyright holders are often quick to label file-sharers as pirates, there is a large group of people who actually consider copying to be a sacred act.

To emphasize the holiness of copying, philosophy student Isaac Gerson started the Church of Kopimism in Sweden. After a rough start with two failed applications, the new religion was finally recognized by the authorities in January.

For a church that holds CTRL+C and CTRL+V as sacred symbols it is no surprise that the word of this new religion spread quickly. In recent months it expanded globally, from the United States to Estonia. All followers believe that copying and sharing is the most beautiful thing in the world.

This belief in sharing is not restricted to files, code and information, but also applies to love. It was only a matter of time before the first Kopimist couple would become married, and last weekend this joyful union took place at the Share conference in Belgrade.

On stage, a Romanian woman and an Italian man were joined in a holy Kopimist act. Both promised to share the rest of their lives together and to uphold the highest sharing standards.

The Church was delighted to bring the news and commented: “We are very happy today. Love is all about sharing. A married couple share everything with each other.”

Like any other matrimony, a Kopimism marriage is bound by rules. The Church of Kopimism allows the couple to share their love with others, as long as those others don’t steal it. Most importantly, however, they have to copy and remix themselves.

“Hopefully, they will copy and remix some DNA-cells and create a new human being. That is the spirit of Kopimism. Feel the love and share that information. Copy all of its holiness.”

Or to put it in the words of another famous religion.

“Be fruitful and multiply, teem on the earth and multiply in it.”

Amen.

Source: File-Sharing Church Weds First Couple

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

This week there are three newcomers in our chart.

This Means War is the most downloaded movie this week.

The data for our weekly download chart is collected by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only. All the movies in the list are BD/DVDrips unless stated otherwise.

RSS feed for the weekly movie download chart.

Week ending May 6, 2012

Ranking	(last week)	Movie	IMDb Rating / Trailer
torrentfreak.com
1	(…)	This Means War	6.5 / trailer
2	(…)	21 Jump Street (R5)	7.6 / trailer
3	(4)	The Avengers (CAM)	8.9 / trailer
4	(1)	Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows	7.4 / trailer
5	(3)	Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol	4.8 / trailer
6	(5)	Haywire	6.2 / trailer
7	(…)	Red Tails	5.8 / trailer
8	(6)	The Grey	7.2 / trailer
9	(2)	Chronicle	7.3 / trailer
10	(8)	We Bought a Zoo	7.3 / trailer

Source: Top 10 Most Pirated Movies on BitTorrent

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

A few days ago the latest uTorrent alpha release saw the light.

Among other things, the new version aims to make downloads even faster for users with high bandwidth connections.

But there was something else quite unique about the release. Those who took a peek at the ‘about’ section saw the name of a new mysterious company. BitTorrent Inc. wasn’t listed there, but Gyre Inc.

So had uTorrent been quietly sold?

TorrentFreak contacted BitTorrent Inc. to find out more, and we were told that Gyre Inc. was listed there because of a “coding error.” The company didn’t want to confirm or deny the existence of a rebranding exercise, but did say that they “regularly test new brand and product names internally.”

This vagueness encouraged us to research the “Gyre” brand and to speculate about BitTorrent’s future.

Let’s start with some details on Gyre Inc. first. The company was registered in January of this year and lists BitTorrent Inc. CEO Eric Klinker as the service agent. The company address is identical to that of BitTorrent’s San Francisco offices.

One of the signs that points in the direction of a rebranding effort is the fact that BitTorrent Inc. copied all their BitTorrent trademarks for the term Gyre. These three Gyre trademarks cover devices, software and licensing and are identical to the existing BitTorrent trademarks.

And that’s not all.

There is also some evidence to suggest that Gyre is more than just a front for a new product. The company name already appears in the “Terms of Use” for the “Share” app released by BitTorrent Inc. a few months ago. In these same terms there’s also a reference to “SoShare”, another term trademarked by BitTorrent recently.

BitTorrent developers are also referencing Gyre in their code. In the new plugin.btapp.js for example we see several mentions. This is part of a yet-to-be-released product where web browsers can talk to uTorrent/BitTorrent via a plugin.

And what about the unusual fact that “Gyrecorp” is selling uTorrent stickers and shirts?

Gyrecorp?

But perhaps the strongest support for a possible rebranding is that BitTorrent didn’t deny this when we specifically asked about it. We were informed that uTorrent and BitTorrent will continue to be released under BitTorrent Inc. But it wasn’t specified for how long.

BitTorrent Inc. wouldn’t be the first of its kind to change names. Several years ago Azureus changed its name to Vuze. This rebranding also covered the name of the BitTorrent client, but there is no indication that the uTorrent brand will disappear.

The ultimate question is of course why BitTorrent Inc. needs a new brand name to begin with. Could it be the pirate stigma? Are investors pushing for something new? Is there a sale on the horizon?

All speculation for now, but something is up for sure.

Source: BitTorrent Set To Rebrand Itself As Gyre?

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

According to growing reports from India, subscribers of several large Internet service providers can no longer access The Pirate Bay, KickAssTorrents, BitSnoop and several other BitTorrent sites. In what appears to be a Government-ordered blackout, the websites in question are all being blocked at the ISP level.

Interestingly, torrent sites are not the only target. A similar block is also restricting access to the popular video sharing platform Vimeo, a site mostly used by indie filmmakers to share their work.

While there has been no official announcement, the blockade is currently affecting users of several large internet providers including Reliance Communications and Zylog Wi5.

Instead of gaining access to the sites above, subscribers are redirected to a message claiming that the site is “blocked as per instructions from Department of Telecom.

Blocked

While the exact reason for the blockade is unclear, the warning banner is the same as one users got when Megaupload, RapidShare and other popular cyberlocker services were censored last year.

This blockade turned out to be an overbroad implementation of a so called “John Doe order” which prohibited Internet providers from allowing subscriber access to unauthorized copies an upcoming Bollywood movie.

Whatever the reason for the current blackout, it’s clear that the Indian entertainment industries have access to tools Hollywood can only dream of. Either directly, of with help from the Government, allegedly infringing websites can be pulled down without a trial. Just last month more than 100 music sites were censored upon request from several music labels.

For the millions of filmmakers on Vimeo this new reality will be a rude awakening, but for the folks at The Pirate Bay it is hardly a surprise.

The notorious torrent site is already blocked in numerous countries, most recently the UK. And with the current pro-blocking climate, we doubt that India will be the last country to hop on the banwagon.

Source: India Orders Blackout of Vimeo, The Pirate Bay and More

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

Mass-BitTorrent lawsuits have been dragging on for more than two years in the US, involving more than a quarter million alleged downloaders.

The copyright holders who start these cases generally provide nothing more than an IP-address as evidence. They then ask the courts to grant a subpoena, allowing them to ask Internet providers for the personal details of the alleged offenders.

The problem, however, is that the person listed as the account holder is often not the person who downloaded the infringing material. Or put differently; an IP-address is not a person.

Previous judges who handled BitTorrent cases have made observations along these lines, but none have been as detailed as New York Magistrate Judge Gary Brown was in a recent order.

In his recommendation order the Judge labels mass-BitTorrent lawsuits a “waste of judicial resources.” For a variety of reasons he recommends other judges to reject similar cases in the future.

One of the arguments discussed in detail is the copyright holders’ claim that IP-addresses can identify the alleged infringers. According to Judge Brown this claim is very weak.

“The assumption that the person who pays for Internet access at a given location is the same individual who allegedly downloaded a single sexually explicit film is tenuous, and one that has grown more so over time,” he writes.

“An IP address provides only the location at which one of any number of computer devices may be deployed, much like a telephone number can be used for any number of telephones.”

“Thus, it is no more likely that the subscriber to an IP address carried out a particular computer function – here the purported illegal downloading of a single pornographic film – than to say an individual who pays the telephone bill made a specific telephone call.”

The Judge continues by arguing that having an IP-address as evidence is even weaker than a telephone number, as the majority of US homes have a wireless network nowadays. This means that many people, including complete strangers if one has an open network, can use the same IP-address simultaneously.

“While a decade ago, home wireless networks were nearly non-existent, 61% of US homes now have wireless access. As a result, a single IP address usually supports multiple computer devices – which unlike traditional telephones can be operated simultaneously by different individuals,” Judge Brown writes.

“Different family members, or even visitors, could have performed the alleged downloads. Unless the wireless router has been appropriately secured (and in some cases, even if it has been secured), neighbors or passersby could access the Internet using the IP address assigned to a particular subscriber and download the plaintiff’s film.”

Judge Brown explains that the widespread use of wireless networks makes a significant difference in cases against file-sharers. He refers to an old RIAA case of nearly a decade ago where the alleged infringer was located at a University, on a wired connection offering hundreds to tracks in a shared folder. The Judge points out that nowadays it is much harder to pinpoint specific infringers.

Brown also cites various other judges who’ve made comments on the IP-address issue. In SBO Pictures, Inc. v. Does 1-3036 for example, the court noted:

“By defining Doe Defendants as ISP subscribers who were assigned certain IP addresses, instead of the actual Internet users who allegedly engaged in infringing activity, Plaintiff’s sought-after discovery has the potential to draw numerous innocent internet users into the litigation, placing a burden upon them that weighs against allowing the discovery as designed.”

Judge Brown concludes that in these and other mass-BitTorrent lawsuits it is simply unknown whether the person linked to the IP-address has anything to do with the alleged copyright infringements.

“Although the complaints state that IP addresses are assigned to ‘devices’ and thus by discovering the individual associated with that IP address will reveal ‘defendants’ true identity,’ this is unlikely to be the case,” he concludes.

In other words, the copyright holders in these cases have wrongfully accused dozens, hundreds, and sometimes thousands of people.

Aside from effectively shutting down all mass-BitTorrent lawsuits in the Eastern District of New York, the order is a great reference for other judges dealing with similar cases. Suing BitTorrent users is fine, especially one at a time, but with proper evidence and not by abusing and misleading the courts.

Source: Judge: An IP-Address Doesn’t Identify a Person (or BitTorrent Pirate)

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

In recent months many people have been baffled by the US Government’s decision to shutdown and prosecute Megaupload.

While the Department of Justice proudly presented the case as one of the biggest criminal cases ever brought in the US, critics claim the Government has gone too far.

Many law experts agree with this assessment and point out that Megaupload is a lot less guilty than portrayed by the authorities.

This weekend Eric Goldman, a Prof. at Santa Clara University School of Law, joined in with his comments. His attack on the US Government is scathing, describing the Megaupload prosecution as a “depressing display of abuse of government authority.”

Siding with Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom who lashed out against the Government earlier, the Prof. claims that the shutdown of the world’s most popular cyberlocker was a gift to the entertainment industry.

“The government’s prosecution of Megaupload demonstrates the implications of the government acting as a proxy for private commercial interests. The government is using its enforcement powers to accomplish what most copyright owners haven’t been willing to do in civil court,” Goldman writes.

“The revolving door between government and the content industry” and the “Obama administration’s desire to curry continued favor and campaign contributions from well-heeled sources,” are the main motivations Goldman cites.

According to the Professor, Megaupload should have never been taken offline. He claims that it’s a modern-day equivalent of the printing press.

“Megaupload’s website is analogous to a printing press that constantly published new content. Under our Constitution, the government can’t simply shut down a printing press, but that’s basically what our government did when it turned Megaupload off and seized all of the assets.”

“Not surprisingly, shutting down a printing press suppresses countless legitimate content publications by legitimate users of Megaupload,” Goldman adds.

In addition, by shutting the site down and arguing that all data can be destroyed, the authorities are destroying evidence and ignoring the constitutional rights of the millions of US citizens who stored data on Megaupload.

“The government’s further insistence that all user data, even legitimate data, should be destroyed is even more shocking. Destroying the evidence not only screws over the legitimate users, but it may make it impossible for Megaupload to mount a proper defense. It’s depressing our government isn’t above such cheap tricks in its zeal to win.”

Professor Goldman continues by pointing out that the Government has to prove “willful infringement” when they want to hold Megaupload accountable for the infringements of its users. This is going to hard, he argues, as Megaupload has several strong potential defenses.

“Whether it actually qualified for these is irrelevant; Megaupload’s subjective belief in these defenses should destroy the wilfulness requirement. Thus, the government is simply making up the law to try to hold Megaupload accountable for its users’ uploading/downloading,” Goldman writes.

In his closing arguments, Professor Goldman points out that actions like the Megaupload prosecution will only make the public more skeptical about the Government’s attempts to control the Internet on behalf of a few multi-billion dollar companies.

“In the end, the Megaupload prosecution demonstrates that SOPA advocates are inevitably going to win. The content owners’ ire toward ‘foreign rogue websites’ combined with the administration’s willingness to break the law, if necessary, to keep content owners happy, leads to lawless outcomes like the Megaupload prosecution and ICE’s domain name seizures,” he concludes.

Source: Megaupload Prosecution Is Lawless and Unconstitutional, Law Professor Says

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

Last week the Creative Coalition Campaign hosted a conference on anti-piracy measures.

One of the key speakers at the event was Gerard Lewis, Vice President of Internet provider Comcast, who informed participants about the upcoming copyright alerts system that will become active in three months.

The system will be managed by the Center for Copyright Information, and is the result of a voluntary agreement between copyright holders and all major ISPs that was signed last summer.

Under the agreement a third-party company will collect the IP-addresses of alleged infringers on BitTorrent and other public file-sharing networks. The ISPs will then notify these offenders and tell them that their behavior is unacceptable. After six warnings the ISP may then take a variety of repressive measures, which includes the option to cut off the offender’s connection temporarily.

In his talk Comcast’s Vice President explained that the “six-strikes” system is needed because the DMCA law doesn’t work well for P2P infringements. Instead, the copyright holders and ISPs needed a more flexible approach, which culminated in the copyright alerts system and a historic memorandum of understanding.

Lewis went on to emphasize that the deal safeguards the privacy of subscribers, as copyright holders don’t get the personal details of alleged pirates. The warnings are mostly educational, informative, and point people to sources where they can download content legally. Additionally, Lewis said it’s important that the repressive measures don’t disrupt vital services such as phone calls.

He further noted that while ISPs are now playing a valuable role, more anti-piracy work can be done with other parties. Payment processors and search engines could be around the table as well according to Comcast’s Vice President.

Overall, Lewis said that a flexible and voluntary agreement is a good model to follow, but that they are still learning as the system is being rolled out. The effectiveness of the copyright alerts system remains to be seen.

In France a three-strikes warning system is mandated by the Hadopi law, and at the conference Marie-Françoise Marais of the Hadopi office shared some new statistics. Since the law was implemented late 2010 a total of 970,000 warnings have been sent out. 88,600 alleged infringers received a second warning and 270 are on their third strike.

The last group risks a 1,500 euro fine and Internet disconnection of up to a month, should a judge agree.

Marais used the above statistics to argue that relatively few people continue downloading copyrighted material after being warned. But, she also noted that it doesn’t always work, as one person begged to download one more episode of the US TV-show “24.”

The impact of the US “six-strikes” version will become apparent in the months to come.

While Comcast and the other partners are confident that alerts are an effective and reasonable way to deter online piracy, others have their doubts. For one, the monitoring system is relatively easy to bypass through a proxy or VPN.

Secondly, the multi-million dollar plan only covers a few of the many sources of online piracy. The millions of U.S. Internet users who download via cyberlockers and streaming portals are not affected by this agreement at all, as these downloads are impossible for third parties to track legally.

How ‘reasonable’ the “six-strikes” system turns out to be largely depends on what punishments Internet providers intend to hand out. Needless to say, a temporary reduction in bandwidth is less severe than cutting people’s Internet access. More details on this are expected to come out in the near future.

Source: Comcast Praises Voluntary BitTorrent Crackdown Agreement

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

After the MPA won its blocking case against the Newzbin2 Usenet indexing site last year, it was only a matter of time before similar sites were targeted in the same mannner.

Indeed, after a few weeks a conglomerate of music labels filed a lawsuit against several Internet providers, demanding that they block subscriber access to The Pirate Bay.

Nine labels including EMI, Polydor, Sony, Virgin and Warner said that The Pirate Bay infringes their copyrights and that several ISPs including TalkTalk and Virgin Media should implement a blockade under Section 97A of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act.

In February the High Court agreed that The Pirate Bay and its users do indeed breach copyright on a major scale, and today this decision was followed by a court order.

ISPs Sky, Everything Everywhere, TalkTalk, O2 and Virgin Media must censor The Pirate Bay website in the weeks to come. A sixth ISP, BT, has asked for more time to consider its position.

A Pirate Bay spokesperson told TorrentFreak that this measure is going to do very little to stop people from accessing their site, as there are many ways to circumvent it. “This will just give us more traffic, as always. Thanks for the free advertising.”

The UK Pirate Party is also prepared for the block and is offering a reverse proxy which allows blocked Internet users to access The Pirate Bay.

Virgin Media responded to the BBC by saying that a blockade won’t be very effective unless the entertainment industry works on legal alternatives as well.

“As a responsible ISP, Virgin Media complies with court orders addressed to the company but strongly believes that changing consumer behavior to tackle copyright infringement also needs compelling legal alternatives, such as our agreement with Spotify, to give consumers access to great content at the right price,” their spokesperson said.

Music industry group BPI, on the other hand, sees today’s verdict as a major victory.

“The High Court has confirmed that The Pirate Bay infringes copyright on a massive scale. Its operators line their pockets by commercially exploiting music and other creative works without paying a penny to the people who created them,” BPI boss Geoff Taylor said.

The Open Rights Group says the court-ordered block represents the thin end of the wedge.

“Blocking the Pirate Bay is pointless and dangerous. It will fuel calls for further, wider and even more drastic calls for Internet censorship of many kinds, from pornography to extremism,” ORG Executive Director Jim Killock said.

“Internet censorship is growing in scope and becoming easier. Yet it never has the effect desired. It simply turns criminals into heroes.”

The UK is not the first country in Europe where the Pirate Bay is blocked by court order. Similar verdicts were already handed down in Italy, The Netherlands, Denmark, Belgium and Finland previously.

Despite these blockades, The Pirate Bay continues to grow month after month.

Source: UK ISPs Must Censor The Pirate Bay, High Court Rules

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

This week there are three newcomers in our chart.

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows is the most downloaded movie this week.

The data for our weekly download chart is collected by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only. All the movies in the list are BD/DVDrips unless stated otherwise.

RSS feed for the weekly movie download chart.

Week ending April 29, 2012

Ranking	(last week)	Movie	IMDb Rating / Trailer
torrentfreak.com
1	(1)	Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows	7.4 / trailer
2	(…)	Chronicle	4.8 / trailer
3	(4)	Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol	4.8 / trailer
4	(…)	The Avengers (CAM)	8.9 / trailer
5	(2)	Haywire	6.2 / trailer
6	(7)	The Grey	7.2 / trailer
7	(3)	Contraband	6.6 / trailer
8	(6)	We Bought a Zoo	7.3 / trailer
9	(…)	Tezz	6.2 / trailer
10	(5)	Bad Ass (VODrip)	5.6 / trailer

Source: Top 10 Most Pirated Movies on BitTorrent

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

Spearheaded by the MPAA, Hollywood’s major movie studios continuously emphasize how copyright infringement costs them billions of dollars every year.

Pirates are ruining the industry and are the direct reason for the loss of thousands of jobs, they say. Better copyright protections are the solution, they conclude.

A recent example of this reasoning was displayed by MPAA boss Chris Dodd earlier this week at the CinemaCon meeting in Las Vegas. Dodd told the audience that copyright protection has always been vital to the US movie industry, and it’s copyright that has allowed Hollywood to thrive .

The MPAA used this to emphasize that the movie industry and the tech sector have a mutual interest in strong copyright legislation. Or put in his words:

The truth is that neither the content nor the technology industries could survive without strong protections for intellectual property.

Many of you are familiar with how the name Hollywood became synonymous with the birth of the American film industry. It was in Jacob Stern’s horse barn, at the corner of Hollywood and Vine, the story goes, that Cecil B. DeMille screened the first full length feature film 100 years ago.

Well, when it comes to the tech sector, replace “Jacob Stern’s horse barn” with “Mark Zuckerberg’s dorm room” at Harvard, and you have almost the same story with the birth of Facebook.

In these and countless other examples throughout our history, the ability to give birth to an idea and convert it into economic success, whether it is the content of a film or the technology of the internet, depends on copyright and patent protection

An interesting argument, but also an unfortunate one. Not only because Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg has been accused of stealing the Facebook idea himself, which Hollywood turned into a movie recently. But also because it’s easy to argue that the American movie industry was built by copyright “thieves.”

In fact, Hollywood wouldn’t be what it is today if a bunch of rogue filmmakers hadn’t fled New York early last century. This “pirate” version of the movie industry history starts with one of America’s greatest innovators, Thomas Edison.

Little over a century ago Edison stood at the cradle of the filmmaking industry. He was the first to invent a device through which people could project film and obtained many movie related patents. To make money from his hard work he asked a licensing fee from those who were making movies with his technology.

This licensing requirement motivated a group of rogue filmmaking pirates to flee New York, including a man named William. They left for the then still wild West, where they recorded many films without a license until Edison’s patents expired. These pirates continue to do business there today in a place they named Hollywood. William’s last name? Fox.

So Edison got no money from these Hollywood pirates. While today’s Hollywood would be up in arms about this gross circumvention of intellectual property rights, we should mention that Edison himself wasn’t squeaky clean either.

In fact, in 1902 Thomas Edison himself copied “A Trip to the Moon,” a movie from Georges Méliès, without permission to show it in US theaters. This overt act of piracy eventually resulted in the bankruptcy of the French filmmaker.

The above shows that it’s not a stretch to argue that the movie industry was built by pirates. Or to put it in other words, if early 1900 filmmakers would have paid for their licenses, Hollywood would probably have never been built.

But you won’t hear that from the MPAA of course…

Source: MPAA Boss ‘Forgets’ Hollywood’s Pirate History

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

The New Zealand High Court has decided to return several items of property belonging to Kim Dotcom.

The Megaupload founder is allowed to keep his $20,000 a month spending budget and regains use of his Mercedes-Benz G55AMG, a luxury car worth $250,000 that sports “Police” on its license plate. A bank account containing $301,000 was also returned.

Dotcom’s wife Mona will have her expenses covered and can have use of a Toyota Vellfire.

Despite the partial success, Stuff reports that the High Court chose to uphold the majority of the US District Court seizure order. This means that most of Dotcom’s cars and other goods will remain with the authorities until further notice.

Dotcom’s attorney Willie Akel had asked the court to return all properties because the New Zealand authorities didn’t investigate the US request, but Judge Potter said that the Attorney General is not required to evaluate the legitimacy of the US order.

A significant portion of the new funds will be used to pay for legal expenses, both in New Zealand and the United States.

Among other things, the legal team will try to prevent Dotcom’s extradition. A court will review whether the Megaupload founder has committed an extraditable offense that violates New Zealand law. Earlier this week Dotcom’s US lawyer Ira Rothken said they are confident that this is not the case.

“According to our New Zealand counsel we don’t think that would be the case so we’re optimistic that Kim Dotcom will have a good result in New Zealand,” Rothken said.

The extradition hearing is scheduled for September. In the meantime Megaupload’s defense team is preparing a response to the US indictment, which is expected to be filed in the coming weeks.

Dotcom believes that they have a strong case against an indictment he describes as “nonsense.” The Megaupload founder previously shared several issues that the defense team will bring up in their reply, and he characterized the whole case as a political move.

“This Mega takedown was possible because of corruption on the highest political level, serving the interests of the copyright extremists in Hollywood,” he said.

Whether Megaupload will have to defend itself is still uncertain though. Last week Judge O’Grady informed the FBI that a trial in the United States may never happen because it is impossible to serve a foreign company with criminal charges.

Source: Megaupload’s Kim Dotcom Gets $750,000 Back

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

“Today’s copyright legislation is out of balance, and out of tune with the times. It has turned an entire generation of young people into criminals in the eyes of the law, in a futile attempt at stopping technological development.”

These are the first words of a new book that two Pirate Party icons shared with all members of the European Parliament this week. In a time where copyright laws increasingly violate basic human rights, Pirate Party MEP Christian Engstrom and Rick Falkvinge want to break this trend.

Instead of merely pointing out what is wrong with current proposals such as ACTA, they’re going a step further by offering alternatives.

“We feel that there are many people who know that the Pirate Party is unhappy with copyright legislation as it stands today, but who are unaware that we have a constructive proposal as to how it should be reformed. We are not just complaining,” Christian Engstrom told TorrentFreak.

In the early years the Pirate Party was often jokingly characterized as a bunch of spotty nerds who simply want free stuff. While this perception has changed somewhat in recent years, especially when Christian Engstrom joined the European Parliament, there is still a need to clarify the Party’s position.

“We wanted to explain why this issue is about preserving fundamental rights on the internet, and not just about getting free films or pop music,” says Engstrom.

“The battle over ACTA has made many politicians aware of the fact that freedom on the internet is an issue that citizens (a.k.a. voters) care about, but most mainstream politicians are not very familiar with the issue.”

The book gives a broad overview of how the current copyright monopoly is starting to degrade free speech and people’s privacy. Internet censorship proposals have become commonplace and alleged pirates are punished without due process, all without any clear evidence that more stringent measures actually cause a decline in piracy.

Therefore, one of the key issues of the book is to offer alternatives. The Pirate Party doesn’t want to abolish copyright, they want to reform it. For example, the moral rights of authors would remain unchanged, but all non-commercial copying would be legalized. In addition, DRM woud be banned entirely.

“I am hoping that the book will be helpful in that respect, and that the timing is quite good right now. If we manage to stop ACTA, the natural question becomes ‘okay, so what should we do instead?’ Then we have a realistic and sensible answer,” Engstrom told us.

Those who are interested in reading the book can download it for free in several formats. A paper version is also available on the self-publishing platform Lulu.

Source: Pirate Party Presents ACTA Alternative to European Parliament

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

With help from the music industry’s biggest arch-rival The Pirate Bay, UK rapper Dan Bull is on course to get his first official ‘hit’ listed in various international single charts.

With a song titled “Sharing is Caring,” Bull is not exactly the type of artist music execs want to see in there. And that is exactly the point.

Dan Bull has no corporate promotion machine behind him. He has virtually no radio play and his music can’t be bought in bricks-and-mortar music stores. Instead, Bull is a self-confessed ‘pirate’ who relies on a crowd of like-minded people to earn a living.

“Sites such as The Pirate Bay do more to help unsigned artists than industry lobbyists ever have. Projects like The Promo Bay, which devotes The Pirate Bay’s home page, free of charge, to any musician who applies, creates overnight success stories,” Bull explained.

So instead of signing away his rights to a major music label, Bull is sharing his work with the public for free. That has worked well for the rapper thus far, but to show just how powerful the Internet can be he’s now aiming for a listing in the international singles charts. Not for the recognition, but to make a statement.

“The singles charts are worthless as an indicator of quality, and artists needn’t strive for the validation of reaching them. However, by taking a free song by an unsigned artist to the echelons normally reserved for the industry elite, I want to smash the glass ceiling and show that there is another way of doing things,” Bull said.

“We don’t need the protection of ACTA, CISPA or any other acronym. As long as our internet is free, creativity will thrive.”

And with a healthy boost from The Pirate Bay earlier this week this plan might just succeed.

Raiding the music charts

After Bull introduced the goal here on TorrentFreak last Sunday, singles sales took off. When The Pirate Bay joined in a few hours later with a front page promotion, they skyrocketed. By Monday morning several versions of the “Sharing is Caring” single were on Amazon’s top 10 bestseller list.

Bull decided to release 10 different versions of the track because every individual download counts towards the eventual chart position of the single. In other words, the more versions people buy the higher “Sharing is Caring” will end up in the single charts.

After the initial boom the sales are now going on steadily. In the UK the most popular version of the single is currently listed at #75, with 4 others listed in the top 100 as well. In the rap category 8 versions are listed in the top 17, and in the Reggae chart “Sharing is Caring” is topping the chart.

#1 Reggae

While the above stats are encouraging, there is still some work to be done before the official single charts are released this weekend. Since the Pirate Bay promo campaign has now ended, it is now up to the public to spread the message further.

Help is still needed.

“The campaign has been going really well, although it’s much harder than I imagined to compete with the big-budget campaigns behind people like Jay-Z and Calvin Harris. I need absolutely everyone who can to contribute in order to get a place in the ‘official’ charts,” Bull told TorrentFreak.

To encourage people to buy all 10 versions of the single, Bull is going to thank all mass-buyers in an upcoming music video.

Those who want to help out can go to the campaign page where all the paid versions of the tracks are listed. Please don’t feel obliged to do so, but if “Sharing is Caring” doesn’t appear in the single charts this weekend we’ll have to blame all the cheapskate pirates, and declare an official victory for the major music labels. Sort of.

Source: Pirate Bay Boosts “Sharing is Caring” Into The Music Charts

This post was syndicated from: TorrentFreak and was written by: Ernesto. Original post: at TorrentFreak

The legal battle over Internet censorship is reaching new heights in the Netherlands, as the local anti-piracy group BREIN is now asking the court to gag the Pirate Party.

The lawsuit is the next move in BREIN’s attempt to deny Dutch citizens’ access to The Pirate Bay.

In January, a Dutch court ruled that Ziggo, the largest ISP in the country, and competitor XS4ALL, must block access to The Pirate Bay. As a result hundreds of individuals setup proxy websites allowing subscribers to route around the blockade, effectively rendering the order useless.

In a countering move BREIN obtained an injunction from the court to shut these proxies down, including one operated by the Pirate Party. However, the Pirates are determined to put up a fight and have taken BREIN to court to get the order overthrown.

The case, in which the Pirate Party asked the court to lift all censorship restrictions, was heard by the court yesterday. BREIN, however, did exactly the opposite by submitting a rather broad set of new demands essentially asking the court to gag the political party.

In short BREIN’s demands are as follows.

1. The Pirate Party should be banned from operating a reverse proxy for Pirate Bay

2. The Pirate Party should be banned from operating a generic proxy service

3. The Pirate Party should be banned from linking to third-party proxies

4. The Pirate Party should be banned from listing new IP-addresses / domains Pirate Bay registers

5. The Pirate Party should be banned from encouraging people to circumvent the Pirate Bay blockade

If the Pirate Party violates the above terms BREIN asked for a penalty of €10,000 per day, up to a maximum of €250,000.

Needless to say, the demands of the anti-piracy group are unprecedented for a copyright related case. It is essentially a gag-order to enforce a previously obtained court verdict. If the court sides with BREIN this will have rather far-reaching consequences for people’s freedom of speech. It may also invite other parties to consider making similar demands.

The question is also how far BREIN wants to take this. Should other generic proxy sites be banned as well? And what about VPNs or the TOR network? All of these services allow the public to bypass the court-ordered blockade.

Meanwhile, the popular Dutch weblog Geenstijl is making some noise as well, as they launched a redirection site (FuckTimKuik.org) that forwards people to available proxies. BREIN has yet to respond to this initiative, but it shows that it will be quite difficult to root out all circumvention methods.

The court’s decision in the case between the Pirate Party and BREIN is expected to be published in two weeks. This verdict will coincide with BREIN’s case against two other Dutch Internet providers that are still allowing access to The Pirate Bay.

Source: Anti-Piracy Group Asks Court to Gag The Pirate Party