Torrent Uploader Fined $652,000 For Uploading 1 Movie

[Susan Boyle]

In spite of the heat on torrent sites, as well as uploaders and downloaders, it seems that people are not really deterred from carrying on. Even The Pirate Bay, the world’s most resilient torrent site, continues to operate. Of course, we don’t know how much longer they can resist with pressure coming from all sides. Still, people who torrent do not seem all that concerned.
But, did you know that people actually get caught and are punished for torrenting?




Take this guy from Sweden. According to Torrent Freak:

A moderator and uploader of one of Sweden’s oldest but now defunct private torrent sites has been hit with a huge damages award. For uploading a single pre-release movie the 28-year-old is now required to pay $652,000, the equivalent amount the studio would have charged for a license to distribute the movie for free. For sharing more than 500 others he received a suspended jail sentence plus 160 hours community service.

It’s rather notable that the fine – more than half a million dollars – is only for ONE movie. For the other movies he had shared, his punishment is “merely” community service.
Now, if you’re thinking that you have not done anything of this sort for years, you probably should not sit back and relax just yet. The unlucky guy is facing the consequences of his actions many years back. He used to be a moderator and uploader from April 2008 and November 2011. Many years later, he has been dubbed “Sweden’s “worst ever” individual movie pirate”. And the law has caught up with him.
It does seem that this case is being highlighted as an example. There are obviously many other individuals who have done the same thing, whether on a smaller or larger scale, it doesn’t matter.
So what do you think of this? Does it make you wary about torrenting activities?

[Reck]

Suing the average joe seems like a waste of time. These movie studios suing for outrageous amount of money that they KNOW the person being sued doesn't have is so stupid.

Hold on a sec, let me just grab half a million dollars that I dont have to pay you gots.

On another note, I stopped torrenting years ago when I got hit with a warning from my cable provider (Which is also my internet provider) telling me to stop downloading or they would have to give up my personal info and all that crap to the studio seeking retribution.

That scared the out of me. I stopped cold turkey.

I still download illegal but I do it through links such as Rapidgator, Uploaded.net and so on.

[DJR210]

I'm surprised they haven't caught up with Yify yet, that fool has literally uploaded almost any movie I can think of.

Suing the average joe seems like a waste of time. These movie studios suing for outrageous amount of money that they KNOW the person being sued doesn't have is so stupid.

Hold on a sec, let me just grab half a million dollars that I dont have to pay you gots.

On another note, I stopped torrenting years ago when I got hit with a warning from my cable provider (Which is also my internet provider) telling me to stop downloading or they would have to give up my personal info and all that crap to the studio seeking retribution.

That scared the out of me. I stopped cold turkey.

I still download illegal but I do it through links such as Rapidgator, Uploaded.net and so on.

Use a proxy server and you're good to go.

[Rogue]

Suing the average joe seems like a waste of time. These movie studios suing for outrageous amount of money that they KNOW the person being sued doesn't have is so stupid.

Hold on a sec, let me just grab half a million dollars that I dont have to pay you gots.

On another note, I stopped torrenting years ago when I got hit with a warning from my cable provider (Which is also my internet provider) telling me to stop downloading or they would have to give up my personal info and all that crap to the studio seeking retribution.

That scared the out of me. I stopped cold turkey.

I still download illegal but I do it through links such as Rapidgator, Uploaded.net and so on.

you can use some free proxy to hide your ass though. I was still downloading s from thepiratebay as recently as last month something before its recent shutdown (that spanish-voiced Don Jon was the last film I downloaded from thepiratebay tbh), and I downloaded all that without using any proxy, yet I didn't get no warning or from our internet provider (guess is common in china tbh, where even the government uses pirated operating systems).

And what I wanna know is if I upload a movie (like Manny & Lo, which's so old there's basically no source to download it from) to 4shared.com and post the download link on spurstalk, allowing other posters to download it, would it violate any laws and cause me any serious troubles?

[Holden_Caulfield]

i got that warning too a few years ago and pussied out , now i just stream everything

[Reck]

you can use some free proxy to hide your ass though. I was still downloading s from thepiratebay as recently as last month something before its recent shutdown (that spanish-voiced Don Jon was the last film I downloaded from thepiratebay tbh), and I downloaded all that without using any proxy, yet I didn't get no warning or from our internet provider (guess is common in china tbh, where even the government uses pirated operating systems).

And what I wanna know is if I upload a movie (like Manny & Lo, which's so old there's basically no source to download it from) to 4shared.com and post the download link on spurstalk, allowing other posters to download it, would it violate any laws and cause me any serious troubles?

The thing with links is that it goes through so many anon that finding the source is nearly impossible once it spreads.

That's why its safer. All they can do is ask the site master to delete the file and hope the uploader doesn't upload it again.

Also sites like Uploaded and so on are in sweden or some other country where there is no law on that and its actually legal to host such links.

As for posting it here on ST, they'd probably ban you for it.

These guys dont even let you post links to streaming sites let along downloading sites.

[mouse]

I'm surprised they haven't caught up with Yify yet,

You know what yify stands for?

Your Ip Fucked You

Everyone is going to receive mass billings for all their downloads.

[mouse]

i got that warning too a few years ago and pussied out , now i just stream everything

was it for the movie Inception (2010)

[lefty]

lol I download at least 2 movies a month (not a lot I know) from Torrents; sometimes bootlegs


Kickasstorrents imo

[Rogue]

sweden is a much safer/freer/better place to live in than the US imho just like I said. Sweden is one of the most livable countries in the world and if I were ever to move elsewhere from the pisshole country, Sweden would be my No.1 choice of destination definitely. I love Sweden not just the livelihood but also that I'd be able to meet and make friends with many people whose family names are "Johansson" I'd probably even change my family name to "Johansson" someday if I moved to Sweden tbh

and sweden is the 4th most compe ive country in the world http://www.businessinsider.com/the-t...2-9#4-sweden-7

[Holden_Caulfield]

was it for the movie Inception (2010)

lol i think it was, you too?

[koriwhat]

sweden is a much safer/freer/better place to live in than the US imho just like I said. Sweden is one of the most livable countries in the world and if I were ever to move elsewhere from the pisshole country, Sweden would be my No.1 choice of destination definitely. I love Sweden not just the livelihood but also that I'd be able to meet and make friends with many people whose family names are "Johansson" I'd probably even change my family name to "Johansson" someday if I moved to Sweden tbh

and sweden is the 4th most compe ive country in the world http://www.businessinsider.com/the-t...2-9#4-sweden-7

how long are you going to keep trolling ST with your stupid scarlett johansson bs? i think your isp should fine you for being such a dip .

[Rogue]

no trolling bro, our love for Goddess is 100% genuine tbh

[Reck]

no trolling bro, our love for Goddess is 100% genuine tbh

In fact, Kori should tattoo Scarlett's pretty face to cover that hideous Spur tattoo on both of his calves.

[Expert]

le is misleading. The dude downloaded and distributed a prerelease. That's like getting a demo tape of a superstar rapper and releasing your own CDs of it. Of course you're going to get ed. Can't afford the fine, don't steal .

This ing generation, thinking everything should be free for them, yet they should get paid by someone for what they do.

[AchillesHeel]

sweden is a much safer/freer/better place to live in than the US imho just like I said. Sweden is one of the most livable countries in the world and if I were ever to move elsewhere from the pisshole country, Sweden would be my No.1 choice of destination definitely. I love Sweden not just the livelihood but also that I'd be able to meet and make friends with many people whose family names are "Johansson" I'd probably even change my family name to "Johansson" someday if I moved to Sweden tbh

and sweden is the 4th most compe ive country in the world http://www.businessinsider.com/the-t...2-9#4-sweden-7

Been to sweden once, it's a good place to be at during the summer, Stockholm isn't that great though. And it was weird seeing horses poop in the middle of the street everywhere. The es were fine tho. There was even this really tall selling apple juice at a park , he looked like he was high as , too.

[koriwhat]

no trolling bro, our love for Goddess is 100% genuine tbh

In fact, Kori should tattoo Scarlett's pretty face to cover that hideous Spur tattoo on both of his calves.

two s obsessing over some celeb they never have a chance with. now that's comedy! yall probably jack off more than don jon.

[koriwhat]

And it was weird seeing horses poop in the middle of the street everywhere.

stay after the bars let out in austin, tx and you'll see the same on 6th.

[mouse]

lol i think it was, you too?

Yes!

After 13 years of downloading all kinds of tv shows,movies,software and music I finally got my first warning from At&T it was a TOS that blocks your browser I had to call them to unlock my wifi router so I could get back online the lady said I had a illegal copy of Inception that needed to be removed from my PC. I acted like it may have been my son and I was upset "he will be grounded" I told the lady.

then I did some research, first I went to pirate bay where I downloaded the film and read the comments.

http://pirateproxy.net/torrent/5921876

Then I realized many shared the same experiences with they're ISP as I did.

So I investigated further and found out Warner bros produced the film and were going after people they found out were downloading the movie.

They are still in the news today..

http://torrentfreak.com/warner-bros-...e-isps-130607/

Short story:
I started downloading all kinds of crap since 1998 when MannyisGod was talking about this site called WinMX to another poster at the PMSA forum. I was looking for bands like The Hunt,Saxxon,The Godz,Leggs Diamond, etc..and couldn't find them at the music stores and was complaining at the forum when Manny said have you tried a Torrent? Being that I had an online ego that wouldn't allow me to say WTF is a torrent? I said yes but I hadn't Finally I told him my browser couldn't get to the Torrent so he posted a link. You have to remember Google was not released for public use back then, you had to rely on AOL searches or links from your online friends.

After I figured out how to use Torrents I soon found out the two most basic problems were downloading a Virus/Trojan and the huge amount of needed space on your Hard Drive which back then was like only 5GBs. If you had a new system most PCs had only 2300 MBs of HD space just enough to download three 700Mb movies and have 200 MBs left over which 50 Mbs of that was needed to instal windows 95.

The sad part of all this the movie was filmed with a Camcorder off the screen and had a bad picture and crappy sound I could only watch 10 minutes of it.

[mouse]

Court: 30,000 Movie Piracy Threats Could Have No Legal Basis

During the past few weeks an estimated 30,000 Internet users received threatening letters from a lawfirm claiming that they needed to pay hard cash in compensation after ‘illegally’ watching adult movies on the hugely popular streaming site RedTube.



But in a turnaround described as “spectacular” by a lawfirm involved in the dispute, a court has admitted that those individuals’ personal details should never have been handed over.

Threatening letters from copyright trolls usually take pretty much the same format – “You’ve downloaded or shared our content using BitTorrent networks and for that we will take you to court. However, it doesn’t have to be that way. For the payment of a few hundred to a few thousand dollars or euros, we can make this all go away.”

Earlier this month, however, there was a new twist to this awful business. Many thousands of individuals began receiving letters from German lawfirm U & C acting on behalf of a Swiss company called The Archive AG. Their claim was that letter recipients had watched several adult les on the hugely popular adult streaming site RedTube.

Just to put things into perspective, that’s like watching a clip on YouTube and someone coming along with a demand that you pay them cash – a very worrying development indeed.

Wilde Beuger Solmecke, a law firm that specializes in defending Internet users from the threats of copyright trolls, has been working hard on the case and estimates that around 30,000 people have received these demands.

All along the lawfirm has insisted that there is no legal basis for the threats and now, quite amazingly, the court that has been dealing with the case has admitted there may have been a major screw up.

After receiving at least 50 full complaints, the Cologne Regional Court has been reexamining the entire process and now, according to lawyer Christian Solmecke, the Court has made a “spectacular” turnaround.

“Apparently, some of the judges who issued the information decisions now – after knowing the complete situation – have changed their mind (or for the first time formed a complete opinion) and decided that streaming is no longer illegal,” Solmecke explains.

If that is indeed the case, the Court should never have granted The Archive AG’s request to obtain the real-life iden ies of the RedTube visitors, not least since they had broken no laws. Solmecke says if the Court stands by its ‘new’ interpretation of relevant copyright law (private copying and temporary acts of copying) then visitors to streaming sites should be able to relax once more.

“There are many indications that the judges believe streaming – whether from a legitimate or an unlawful platform – should always regarded as lawful,” Solmecke says.

“For those concerned, the application of this standard would have the advantage that they will not have to worry about the legality of a platform in the future. We have held this legal opinion for a long time.”

The Cologne Regional Court’s decision will be welcomed by all letter recipients but for the Court’s next move we shall have to wait until at least January. The hope is that all 30,000 individuals won’t have to pay a penny and that copyright troll heads will roll. Definitely one to watch.

[Rogue]

two s obsessing over some celeb they never have a chance with. now that's comedy! yall probably jack off more than don jon.

We never masturbate to out goddess tbh because that would feel like a crime, a profanity to our holy goddess. When I'm masturbating I usually think of some random es in our classes who're not too good but still above average, and who I could bring to my bed any ing day if I ever wanted to. they all seemed to like me (at least most of them do, tbh, even those who already have bf's), knowing how handsome a guy Rogue is, but I'm sorry, I really wanna say sorry to them but I ain't no Don Jon, or Leigh (the saucy in my novel Stranger in hometown). Love is always a serious deal to me and I ain't ever gonna play with it. I know I can't afford to marry anyone anytime soon, or to start a serious relationship with anyone, so I just don't wanna waste their time, or my time and parents' money.

But our goddess is more like a spiritual symbol to me, like, my erection will immediately soften down as soon as I think of our goddess or see a picture of hers, because it makes me feel guilty if I masturbate with our goddess in my mind. So, it's not like we couldn't get any es in our lives, of course we can, but we're both honest men. We don't wanna fool them es around, pretending to like them and luring them into our beds when Goddess is the only woman we genuinely love in the entire universe.

[Suspect]

Most people getting in trouble are the ones downloading things that have trackers on them. Supposedly shows on HBO and stuff are ones like that.

[DMC]

Been to sweden once, it's a good place to be at during the summer, Stockholm isn't that great though. And it was weird seeing horses poop in the middle of the street everywhere. The es were fine tho. There was even this really tall selling apple juice at a park , he looked like he was high as , too.

They say when a Russian man thinks of sex with a Finnish woman, he's actually thinking of a Swedish man.

[mouse]

U.S. Releases More Evidence of Megaupload’s ‘Mass Infringing Use’

The U.S. Department of Justice has released a new 191-page filing in which Megaupload is portrayed as a massive piracy hub. The Government is using data obtained from Megaupload’s seized databases to back up and expand several of the allegations against Kim Dotcom and his co-defendants. Among other things, the evidence suggests that “repeat infringers” drove a lot of traffic to Mega’s sites. The do ent further shows that roughly 43% of all files streamed on Megavideo received a takedown notice.

megauploadThe Department of Justice recently requested a secret order to help copyright holders by releasing sealed evidence from Megaupload’s servers. Despite protests from Megaupload, the U.S. has now made this information public.



The evidence offers new details obtained from Megaupload’s databases to back up claims that were made in the original indictment. According to the United States the new evidence makes it even more clear that Megaupload was mostly a piracy hub, and that Kim Dotcom and his colleagues were well aware of that.

In large part the new evidence deals with how Megaupload and Megavideo responded to DMCA notices. The Government accuses Megaupload of misleading copyright holders, as they only disabled URLs to infringing files, and not the files themselves. In addition, the new evidence shows that “repeat infringers” were allowed to continue uploading copyrighted material.

For example, the Megavideo database revealed that there were 33 active user accounts that had more than 10,000 URL links disabled through DMCA notices. The decision not to terminate these users was due to the millions of views these repeat infringers were driving, the Government says.

“In total, links created and distributed by these repeat infringer accounts attracted more than 475 million views on Megavideo.com. Had the Mega Conspiracy terminated the accounts of these repeat infringers, for which they had actual knowledge, the Mega Sites would have lost these millions of views,” the Government writes.

According to the new information the infringing users were responsible for uploading the files that generated the majority of all views on Megaupload.

In total there were 93,878 users that had at least one of their links disabled through a takedown notice. The links of these infringing users were accessed more than 27.2 billion times, which is roughly 77% of Megavideo’s total views.

In addition, the Government claims that 43% of all video files that were viewed on Megavideo had received at least one takedown notice.

The Government further states that Megaupload was not primarily a cyberlocker, as most users couldn’t store files permanently. Only premium subscribers could store files permanently, and free and unregistered users would lose access to files that weren’t downloaded regularly.

“One of the databases shows that on or about January 19, 2012, the Mega Sites had approximately 66.6 million total registered users. Of these, approximately 800,000, or roughly 1.2%, were premium subscribers. Therefore, approximately 98.8% of users did not have significant capabilities to store private content long-term,” the Government writes.

Most users were indeed not interested in storing files, as information from Megaupload’s databases shows that the vast majority of Megaupload’s users never uploaded a single file.

“In addition, of the 66.6 million total registered users, at most, only 5.86 million registered users, or less than 9%, had ever uploaded a file to either Megaupload.com or Megavideo.com. Therefore, the vast majority of users accessed the Mega Sites to view and download content.”

The Government then goes on to detail several of the “repeat infringer” accounts, and how the Megaupload team interacted with these users. The evidence also includes various email and Skype conversations between Dotcom and his team where there are seemingly aware of the infringing use of Megaupload.

The Government had requested to release this information so copyright holders could use it to their advantage in possible lawsuits. Whether the evidence released thus far will be good enough to make a case against the Megaupload team remains to be seen.

[mouse]

Most Important Torrent Site in Years to Take the Internet By Storm


A brand new entrant to the torrent site market is set to take the Internet by storm. A P2P veteran, fresh from defeating the major recording labels in a 13 million euro lawsuit, has obtained 1.6 million euros from the Spanish Government to power his new dream – a 30 million torrent search engine. Throw in a brand new advert-free torrent client, a Free Software promise, plus a determination not to be bullied by corporations, and we have a very potent mix indeed.


torrentsfmIn 2008, Universal, Sony, EMI, Warner and “Spanish RIAA” outfit Promusicae joined forces to file a 13 million euro lawsuit against MP2P Technologies, a company created by Spaniard Pablo Soto.

Soto had been in the computer business since he was 16 and had created several file-sharing applications including Blubster, the so-called “Spanish Napster”. The labels claimed that Soto’s creations were designed to profit from infringements of their copyrights, something which amounted to unfair compe ion. In trying to prove their case the labels went as far as spying on Soto with a hidden camera.

In 2011, Madrid Commercial Court No. 4 rejected the compensation demands of the labels and ruled in favor of the developer, declaring that his technology was “totally neutral.”

Things quickly improved for Soto. In December 2011 he received a 1.6 million euros grant from the Spanish Government to develop a new search engine called Foofind, a project described by the Government as having “enormous potential for the future of our country.”

Now Soto is back – and ready to cause the biggest file-sharing stir in recent memory by not only launching his own BitTorrent client, but by launching a Foofind-powered (and by default Spanish Government-funded) torrent site.

Add in the fact that Soto is releasing all the code as Free Software to “ensure the open Internet” along with a promise not to infringe on users’ privacy and we have a very potent mix indeed.

“Lately we’ve seen more and more proof that what just a few ‘conspiranoids’ like myself were alerting years ago is now unfortunately becoming true: the war to control the Internet is being won by corrupt governments and corporations,” Soto tells TorrentFreak.

“We believe that the most powerful weapon we have in this important battlefield is Free Software. Constructing search engines, P2P servants, robots and what not, and releasing them all under a free license that lets everybody read the code, modify it, and replicate it, is a way to give control back to the people.”

The end result is two products. The first, called Torrents Downloader, is a no-nonsense torrent client with built-in search and freely available source code. It has no adware, no third-party software ‘additions’, and at v0.1 is just beginning its life.


“We are trying to make the most streamlined Bittorrent client, one that everybody would feel comfortable with. We realized that too often, we engineers tend to build software that we love to use but our moms would hate, and we want to change that!” Soto explains.



TorrentDownloader

The second product in the Spaniard’s offering is almost certainly going to cause chaos. Soto and friends have secured one of the most desirable domain names (torrents.com) to launch possibly the most important torrent site (torrents.fm) in recent memory. The team have not only created a great product, but unlike the vast majority of other torrent site operators they are not hiding away. They are proud of their product and ready to stand by it – no matter what.




Torrents.fm – 30 million torrents so far and looking good

TorrentsFM

“We’ve been fighting for what we believe is right for almost 15 years. I received my first multi-million lawsuit from the majors six years ago. We will keep defending ourselves, and so far we’ve won on every court decision,” Soto says.

“When dealing with those organizations, you can’t avoid being harassed, but you can avoid losing the legal fight. Moreover, we’re open to sustainable partnerships with content companies but not to being controlled by copyright conglomerates that are merely protecting dying, legacy business models.”

The indications are, however, that Soto will indeed find himself in a head-on collision with Hollywood and the major labels. His torrent site is not only beautifully presented (Soto says his team comprises the most talented designers and coders he’s ever met), but also indexes tens of millions of torrents linking to every kind of content imaginable.




Indexing every type of content available, courtesy of the Spanish Government

TorrentsFM

“Our robots are crawling everything, they discover new torrent sites on a daily basis. Some have a small number of magnets, others have vast amounts of torrent files. Either way, we work to make everything easily findable. We just surpassed the 30 million files mark and we are rapidly growing,” Soto explains.

So how will Soto and his team make themselves less of a target? Most importantly the site will remove links to unauthorized content within the parameters of applicable law but Soto says that being tough is equally important.

“In the past we have found that by doing the right thing, and fighting every legal attack, not surrendering to injustice, are the only ways to endure. Sooner or later, every industry that believes they can make a living from litigation ends up eaten by their own business model,” he explains.

For the entertainment industries, learning from the lessons of the past would be a good place to start, the Spaniard says.

“History repeats itself. In the past, some of today’s biggest money makers for Hollywood were enemies but they put down their weapons and subsequently made money together, like the infamous fight between broadcasters and cable companies, who now make billions of dollars together. We’re open to talks but we will continue to defend the open internet for society’s sake,” he concludes.

Torrents.fm can be found here and test pilots for Torrents Downloader should head over here.