Indictment Charges Megaupload Site With Piracy

reply to post by celticdog

Great perspective and almost exactly what I was saying.

It's perfectly okay for the corporations to have ripped me off for years by forcing me, in the example of the music and related industries, to endlessly pay for their music and the products on which I play their music (vinyl to 8-tracks to cassettes to CDs to iPods) or film and related industries (theaters to TV to beta to VHS to CD to DVD to BluRay and DVR or whatever). It was fine for them to obsolete my investments over and over and to see me as a cash cow, but now that their business model is obsolete and because they did not plan for and cannot get a handle on the new ways, it's my fault again? I'm a consumer. I'm going to get the best value for me for a change. I like the new ways and I'm sorry they're dinosaurs and that their ride has come to an end and new corporations and entrepreneurs are rising to have their chance. They colluded with each other and with the devil for decades, and now new people are funneling off some of their profits and having a turn and they can't handle it. Too bad because that's the way of business and the world and no one said you were going to remain powerful forever. No guarantees, just like there was no guarantee that those hundreds of VHS movies that I paid $30 each for would work forever.

These are growing pains and their viscerally and pointlessly reacting to change that they can't control, for a change. They didn't have the foresight to see that their chosen path of endlessly sucking money from me, often over and over and over for the very same content, would end one day and now they can't keep up or find a way to catch up. Tough noogies. Change is here and happening more rapidly than they can keep up with it, and they're money (and the taxpayers' on their behalf!!!) would be far better spent changing with the world.

Music costs the consumer less money now because the steps provided by these middle men (aka corporations) and is available/storeable/portable across a platform that virtually everyone in the world already has in a technology that people are smart enough to keep up with. Many of the services provided by these corporations, (packaging design and development, distribution), their real cash cow, went away, along with many jobs by the way, and instead of looking to the future and the new opportunities it holds, they're attempting to hang on to their glory days. Many, many companies and businesses have been forced to change or fold, so why do they insist on resisting? The music, film, and book industries remind me of the oil companies in a way and how they think they're entitled to control anything related to their industries or that might replace it to keep sucking our pockets dry.

I shamelessly and I maintain legally download any and all music that I have already purchased on any media because I already own it and I'm to lazy to record and rip it myself when someone else has already done it and I can get it with a click. I still actually pay artists for music I deem worthy and will actually listen to over and over again. And I sit here and write this as I stare at shelves and shelves full of tapes, cassettes, cartridges CDs, books, and media in many formats and then look down at my iPod, which basically holes in one square inch. I kept up with all their changes and fed them my money for a very long time. That their product and its pathways and all the riches it has provided them for a century has vaporized with technology is just a fact of business and life.

Why they should have the government doing their dirty work for them initiated by lawyers who are clinging to the old ways as well is beyond me. Lawyers who also were complicit in all the thievery that these "industries" used to milk our money from us by changing the technology they could control on us every few years. Everyone's had to adapt and change and deal with the new realities and their old ways of doing business. Time they did too. Or die. Not everything lasts forever...just ask the people who used to deliver ice to homes.

And as one of the people in this film said, no one begrudges the artists...I'd gladly put money directly into their hats rather than into the pockets of the parasites who bottom fed off them for decades. To me this is all society and humanity righting itself. And shame on the government for being a whore for corporations and not doing what is right for all the people and their rights as other or newer corporations use and sell me and my intellectual capital and data regardless of what that does to my quality of life, security, and privacy.

They can't send everyone to jail but the martyrs. And they know this is where the real power finally lies and how much we can accomplish if we band together. And seeing that people are finally seeing that scares the hell out of the dinosaurs who can't adapt and don't realize that...well things change.

Originally posted by the2ofusr1
reply to post by OutKast Searcher

 

I didn,t know they stoped any theft only that its not going to happen on that site any longer ...The law against murdering someone dosent stop murder from happening ..education and morals will reduce it and like Ron Paul said its the only way to move forward to get thing at least heading in the right direction ....peace

It stopped the distrubution of some pirated material.

Fact still remains...if people would just pay for the things they want...we wouldn't NEED any of these laws. But since people feel like that they can steal on the internet...then laws are needed.

Education and morals on the internet...LOL.

Originally posted by Recouper
I don't watch movies or listen to professionally recorded music because I don't believe the current wealth disparity in today's world is ok.

SOPA worries me and I don't care either way about piracy. Our freedom on the Internet isn't just important because its something we can enjoy. Our freedom is part of our responsibility.

Freedom doesn't include open theft and pirating.

If you truly believe that...I want you to walk into a local store and steal something. When you are arrested...claim you are just exercising your freedom.

Originally posted by OutKast Searcher

Originally posted by Recouper
I don't watch movies or listen to professionally recorded music because I don't believe the current wealth disparity in today's world is ok.

SOPA worries me and I don't care either way about piracy. Our freedom on the Internet isn't just important because its something we can enjoy. Our freedom is part of our responsibility.

Freedom doesn't include open theft and pirating.

If you truly believe that...I want you to walk into a local store and steal something. When you are arrested...claim you are just exercising your freedom.

Freedom also means other things as well. To pursue business ventures freely without competing in a monopolized market.

The tax credit, write offs, and grants issued in the entertainment industry leave a select few companies at the top. In the music industry, the performers are used like cattle while corporations have the best negotiators and lawyers to make sure they are milking as much as they can from their herd.

It does not condone the action of intellectual property theft, but at the same time, this is by design. These actions are a symptom of something else going on in the industry.

reply to post by OutKast Searcher


But that's where we differ. I don't actually believe piracy has anything to do with SOPA beyond being an enabler.

Just to clarify, I don't want what's on this store's shelves, free or otherwise. That's a different subject, the point is, SOPA still worries me.

Originally posted by OutKast Searcher
Don't blame the government when all of you who pirate music, movies, and software...blame yourselves.

i'm going to copy/paste a comment i made on a similar thread here

what we have are competing views on the sanctity of created goods. in effect the time, labor, and intellectual input that allows the creation of goods or services, is not viewed as valuable in other countries, beyond what is necessary for getting the goods created and delivered, which often boils down to cheap or free (slave) labor. and as the usa becomes more and more socialistic, it too has become less and less interested in the value of the labor or creative processes of its citizens.

it wants to demand by law, that you work free of charge (read slave labor). this is all part of the plan. when they tell you that you should demand the right to free stuff that wasn't initially created as free stuff, they are in essence saying that your fellow humans should be treated as slaves or paid so little, their lives are subject to countless deprivations (the life of a slave).

it's really sad that the only two options here are:
no freedom of expression
vs.
your time, talent, work, and life, are meaningless in the face of the greater good, and the greater good can be a veritable tyrant once suitably manipulated (mob mentality). either way, they win, because the end goal is to take every single right you have as a human being, and turn it into free slave labor with no outlet for expression.

centralization and socialism is a big problem for everyone, even though it initially looks people friendly, it's not. it gives the illusion of granting everyone a powerful choice in decisions, but it doesn't. it manipulates the 51% to detriment of the 49%. the issue with the 51% being so powerful is, this is the same mindset that lead to the witch burnings, the inquisition, the stoning of women, the enslavement of large groups of people in siberia, the enslavement of large groups of people in germany, the enslavement of large groups of people in colonial america, and etc. why are we just merrily traipsing along towards our own demise as a free people?

it makes sense that the socialists went after teens, initially, because they haven't as yet experienced what it means to work for your livelihood. so some guy's creative labor means about as much to them as their mom and dad's creative labor, which is free for them to use as they see fit (with provisos, of course, but even provisos are missing when it's someone else's stuff).

i was always under the impression that the idea was to give out of your abundance or out of the charity in your heart, not at gunpoint or LOIC point. and although i understand why people are upset about SOPA and PIPA (cause it sucks), i also can see what inspired SOPA and PIPA in the first place, is the outright insistence that everyone else's labor belongs to you whether they want to give it to you or not. that's theft-- plain and simple.

that some person's creative labor is not always freely given, can say more about him than just black or white, greed or charity. assuming it's greed is ridiculous. he may be poor or struggling. he may be working on an important project and even the slightest change could effect the success. he may have been working his whole life to bring about some innovation, funded by some cheaper project that's being taken for free just because these people think you should give them whatever they want.

many of these places overseas are lead by people who are not even remotely generous with their creative labor. in fact, all their slaves pay for their success and their luxurious lifestyles. which is where socialism has lead our nation.

i don't want sopa or pipa either, as is evident from the comments on here. the issue is, should people in foreign countries, such as china or timbucktwo, be allowed to take your stuff for free and use it however they want, if you didn't offer it for free in the first place? if the whole planet decides americans are their little slaves, what's gonna stop them? we are, afterall, becoming a global DEMOCRACY where mob rules and 51% gets to say what the other 49% have to endure. i liked the original american idea better, where there were safeguards in place, based on the constitution and bill of rights, and these people decided based on the constitution and bill of rights, whether someone else could be enslaved. and they learned that no, other people should not be enslaved.

then, in some mind numbingly bizarre decision, one of our president's gave it all away and sold us out to the socialists (was it woodrow wilson?). soon the 51% will be able to vote away your right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness from across the planet. don't think because you haven't been implicated as part of the problem, that you won't, at some time in the future. hollywood is getting a taste of that right now.

reply to post by boncho

It does not condone the action of intellectual property theft

Besides stealing food for your starving family...nothing condones theft.

You are combining two seperate issues...roadblocks to entering an industry as an entrepenuer...and theft by consumers.

The two have nothing to do with each other.


Stealing is stealing. And people are being shown to be hypocrites. People weren't against SOPA/PIPA because they feared google or facebook would be shut down...that was just an extremist argument...they were scared that they would actually have to pay for music and movies.

After speaking to a few people about this subject i`v been told

"Megaupload's premises were raided and its executives were taken into custody because
the company was initially funded with stolen credit card numbers.
SOPA would only allow law enforcement agents to erase DNS records, not allow them to perform warrantless seizures"

the source of this information i trust
draw your own conlusions from this
would certainly make sense

Entertainment companies have themselves to blame for pirating. They have been ripping the public off for decades and it has only been since the Internet revolution and file sharing that people have been able to level the playing field.
Ticket prices to see movies are no reflection of how much the cost of making the movie actually is..
Why should I pay the same price to see a movie that only cost !0 mil to make as a movie like Avatar that cost a few hundred mil to make?
It would be like the car industry charging the same exhorbitant price for a Holden Barina as a Porsche or Rolls Royce. It would be nothing but price gouging and they wouldn't get away with it. Yet they've been gouging us for years.

Yet movies and also music seem to be treated like some special entity that doesn't come under the same umbrella as other consumer products except of course when it comes to the theft of the copyright then they want to compare it to the left of handbags, tvs etc. that is , when it suits their argument.

I can get a refund on most consumer goods that I buy if I'm not satisfied EXCEPT DVDs and CDs.
Funny that. That special entity thing again.

Anyway the Megaupload story is sad in a lot of ways.
But it's good to see Anonymous fighting the good fight.

Originally posted by boncho


This is pretty huge in the battle for the internet. News is just breaking, Megaupload has been shutdown and the owner arrested.

I will add more in a second after I can read a couple more articles.

One of the world's largest file-sharing sites was shut down Thursday, and its founder and several company executives were charged with violating piracy laws, federal prosecutors said.

Read more: www.3news.co.nz...

www.nytimes.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

SOPA isn't even in force yet....

... not that I don't think Megaupload wasn't used for nothing but stuff that's slightly illicit.

>> But the MAIN reason now that I don't think people should pay for copyrighted works is SOPA and laws like it that use the FBI to guarantee a profit to outdated business models; paying money for entertainment now is giving money to a group that wants to destroy your right to privacy and civil liberties.

If you weren't someone who pirated works -- at least don't be someone who pays for content that sends money to these advocacy groups. Buy something used or rent it on Red Box if you have to. It's like buying oil from terrorists or their bankers in Dubai.

Originally posted by Flighty
Entertainment companies have themselves to blame for pirating. They have been ripping the public off for decades and it has only been since the Internet revolution and file sharing that people have been able to level the playing field.
Ticket prices to see movies are no reflection of how much the cost of making the movie actually is..
Why should I pay the same price to see a movie that only cost !0 mil to make as a movie like Avatar that cost a few hundred mil to make?
It would be like the car industry charging the same exhorbitant price for a Holden Barina as a Porsche or Rolls Royce. It would be nothing but price gouging and they wouldn't get away with it. Yet they've been gouging us for years.

Yet movies and also music seem to be treated like some special entity that doesn't come under the same umbrella as other consumer products except of course when it comes to the theft of the copyright then they want to compare it to the left of handbags, tvs etc. that is , when it suits their argument.

I can get a refund on most consumer goods that I buy if I'm not satisfied EXCEPT DVDs and CDs.
Funny that. That special entity thing again.

Anyway the Megaupload story is sad in a lot of ways.
But it's good to see Anonymous fighting the good fight.

they haven't been ripping people off. it's like buying food or clothing. if you want it, you pay for it or get someone to give it to you. if you don't want to spend the money you entertain yourself or go to charitable organization for assistance. maybe we need a charitable site for entertainment, where the artists and film makers do the work for free, for the poor and then anyone who wants to pay, can, and anyone who can't pay, don't have to, and the proceeds could pay for the production of the stuff, and additional funds could go to help the poor.

why does it always have to be one extreme or the other. innovate.

I dont get it. If it is about piracy, why Megaupload and why only Megaupload? Lots of sites that similar or even worse than mu if about piracy.

And how about people who upload their important documents and cant get it? How about theirs right?
It maybe too far to speculate but is there a possibility that someone upload important documents in mu and gov just want to take it forcefully?

A couple of famous rock bands have stated if it wasn't for 'bootleg' copies nobody would have heard of them!

reply to post by OutKast Searcher


Monopolized markets give less opportunities and selections for the consumer. Personally, if I do watch or listen to music, it is often from other markets from other countries.

I am not interested in the Western media as much anymore. There is a lack of creativity that has bred over the last 30 years. Every now and then I get a recommendation to see a movie and I may go.

If the market is dominated by a large group, and the distribution channels are locked down so that only a few can reach the intended audience, what you see is a product being turned out without an active gauge for market reception.

People buying is not necessarily people wanting. I think this was evident during the Napster days when lesser known artists started developing huge fan bases.

The point is to encourage competition, encourage the consumer to pay for the product (as they should) but make sure that in the end they don't feel ripped off for doing so.

Originally posted by wulff
A couple of famous rock bands have stated if it wasn't for 'bootleg' copies nobody would have heard of them!

which raises an important point. we just need some innovation here, not encouraging everyone to take other people's stuff for free, but rather allowing the creative labor of others to find a place in the market, by offering it for free with a donate button, like most of the internet currently is. if big names got involved and did charitable works for donations but available freely to the public, alot of this issue would become a non-issue.

but notice, it isn't being allowed to go in that direction because they don't want us to have a choice of whether our labor, creative or otherwise, will be free. they want to force it to be free. that, my friend, is slavery.

reply to post by undo


Yeah I guess it would be hard to answer the anomolies that I highlighted in my post.
It seems the only ones who want welfare and subsidisation are the makers of movies that cost next to nothing to
make but still want to charge full price for tickets to go see.

Megaupload hasn't done anything to anyone. This is outrageous!

Damn! I wonder how many unencrypted .rar files were on their servers?

Originally posted by Flighty
reply to post by undo

 

Yeah I guess it would be hard to answer the anomolies that I highlighted in my post.
It seems the only ones who want welfare and subsidisation are the makers of movies that cost next to nothing to
make but still want to charge full price for tickets to go see.

actually, i read years ago, that they are extremely expensive to make and many times the stars don't make anything until the film passes the break even point.

an example: during the filming of star wars: the empire strikes back, george lucas gave the director (irvin kerschner, i think it was) financial freedom to create the best film he could. by then star wars was a big name. everywhere they went, businesses were price gouging the staff, from the lowiest props guys, camera men, to the director, bit part players, the actors and actresses. before the film was even released, it was many millions of dollars over budget, which was already a substantial budget due to the first film's success and the success of the marketing of related items, like dolls and collectibles. when lucas realized what was going on, it was already way out of control. fortunately, it made enough money to pay back the expense of making it and recoup the people who were involved in its creation.

who is irvin kerschner?




can you imagine being charged so much for everything everyone did in your company, that people were going in debt, just to be in your employ? this is what happens when somebody thinks you have something of value they can take from you. and the price gets passed along. happens all the time.

Hi all you good people, Why are the lawmakers not considering prosecutions on top file sharing companies like CNET \ C.B.S, Limewire, Microsoft, Disney to name but a few ? who have distributed software to be able to download your favourite stuff !! Then use all this cash to pressure congress to prosecute the very same people who use this software to download their content ??? Very strange greedy for power world eh !! I post this MUST SEE link www.youtube.com...
onecandleinthedark.blogspot.com...
Why a company such as Megaupload is chosen from one of the smaller populated countries on the planet ? be made an example of ..... and not the biggest software and filesharing companies operating within the USA.?
kind regards Dave Bates

reply to post by jaynkeel


Yep. And now that money's in everything, sharing's become a dirty word.