megaupload has been taken down by the FBI

[burgerkingdiamond]

google it if you haven't heard. This sucks.

[Mischief Maker]

Freaking figures! I waited until today to download the Blindmankind Future Pinball tables and now they'll probably never be publicly made available again.

[Friendly]

Didn't our croporate overlords say they needed SOPA to stop online piracy? How dare the FBI act without SOPA? Bad FBI, bad. Who's going to vote for SOPA now?

[hail good sir]

we

[Friendly]

Curious if this a direct product of the new legislation.

It hasn't been passed yet.

[Mischief Maker]

Hackers allegedly shut down the Departement of Justice, Universal Music (suing megaupload), and the MPAA sites in response.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-27080_3-57362 ... y-arrests/

The internet is going to War!

[mesh control]

Fuck....

I hope mediafire or rapidshare stay alive.

[Friendly]

Hackers allegedly shut down the Departement of Justice, Universal Music (suing megaupload), and the MPAA sites in response.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-27080_3-57362 ... y-arrests/

The internet is going to War!

Oh no, the Department of Justice! Does that mean we will no longer be able to call the police?

/sarcasm

Really, unless they manage to shut down corporate-owned online stores for extended periods, who cares.

[antron]

these guys were fucking stupid.

hosting copyrighted content, ignoring complaints to take it down (or faking a removal) , paying people they knew would post more copyrighted content.

it would be different if the site was hosted in a country where it is legal to do that, but I bet that's not the case. it would have to be outside of the WTO.

[rancor]

Shit.. I was actually hosting a lot of public domain and mixtape videos on Megaupload..

[Despatche]

ignoring complaints to take it down (or faking a removal)

huh? if someone complains to megaupload, it goes down. there are people that bomb megaupload and other sites all the time about this.

paying people they knew would post more copyrighted content.

where is this coming from?

it would be different if the site was hosted in a country where it is legal to do that, but I bet that's not the case. it would have to be outside of the WTO.

hong kong-based, not sure about actual servers. also not sure how you know what megaupload supposedly does yet do not know where they're located.

anyway i'm gonna guess this entire takedown is related to universal, completely disregarding what megaupload did or didn't do. i'm implying that universal saw them as serious competition and actual illegal activity was used as a simple scapegoat, because that's how stupid things are now

[Ex-Cyber]

Curious if this a direct product of the new legislation

Actually, it's sort of the other way around: SOPA/PIPA is being pushed because brand/content owners don't want a shutdown to take this much effort (FBI/DOJ investigation, arrests, indictments, etc.).

[xbl0x180]

Curious if this a direct product of the new legislation

Actually, it's sort of the other way around: SOPA/PIPA is being pushed because brand/content owners don't want a shutdown to take this much effort (FBI/DOJ investigation, arrests, indictments, etc.).

Yeah! Forget due process. Kill everything and ask questions later. Anyone in favour of this kind of mass censorship should be tried for treason

[Moniker]

[tinotormed]

Shit.. I was actually hosting a lot of public domain and mixtape videos on Megaupload..

This even includes the superplays I have uploaded sadly. Good thing I didn't upload some of it.

[Ex-Cyber]

Yeah; I'm guessing the DOJ has no fucking clue how much legit content it just took offline. They probably just seriously pissed off 95% of the denizens of xda-developers, among others. It's no wonder there's already been an Anonymous op.

[NTSC-J]

[GaijinPunch]

You meme whore. Can't wait to see the next one.

[antron]

ignoring complaints to take it down (or faking a removal)

huh? if someone complains to megaupload, it goes down. there are people that bomb megaupload and other sites all the time about this.

paying people they knew would post more copyrighted content.

where is this coming from?

the charges as reported in the news. they allegedly would just remove reported links, but leave others for other users.

but we'll see eventually if they have the evidence. I'm sure the prosecution knows what a shitstorm they are stirring up. I'm betting they've got the goods on them.

And if it turns out to be true it will be a shame what megaupload has done to so many fair-use content producers.

[Ex-Cyber]

they allegedly would just remove reported links, but leave others for other users.

I'm not sure what this means. Are you talking about having multiple identifiers for files that are deduplicated in the backend or something like that?

edit: looks like that from the indictment, and I don't think the wording of 17 USC 512 is going to work in their favor.

[Mischief Maker]

From what I gather, they gave financial compensation to people who put up files that generated a lot of traffic (ad revenue) and they had IM chat logs between execs acknowledging that their biggest earners were pirates. They had a server in the US that gave the FBI jurisdiction.

Either very poorly timed from a political perspective, or perfectly timed to respond to SOPA/PIPA criticisms, depending on your spin.

[Ex-Cyber]

The pro-SOPA/PIPA spin is going to be obvious:

1) Most infringing sites are smaller outfits, and the government can't investigate and prosecute all of them
2) This only worked because Megaupload operated partially in the US, we need SOPA/PIPA to go after more foreign criminals.

(yes, "foreign criminals" is an actual catch phrase among supporters; xenophobia ftw)

[CMoon]

Wow, the irony here is that my record label (tens of thousands of dollars) was killed by piracy, but I stand by where the internet is going. Change is inevitable. If hollywood/music industry is so fucking scared, they need to change with the times like Kindle/Nook. They can argue about lost revenue, but there's always been a youth/artist/poverty community which could never afford their bullshit prices. Why not burn the public libraries down?--there's free media there too!

Seriously, fuck the copyright police.

[Ex-Cyber]

Seriously, fuck the copyright police.

This is about where I've been for years. I only really embraced it after encountering Ian Clarke's observation that on the net, effective copyright enforcement and effective viewpoint/artistic/political censorship require essentially the same technical apparatus. That is, you can't somehow design the system to enable one without enabling the other; the best you can hope for is that the policy on what constitutes illegal communication will be unambiguous, stable, and consistently administered by trustworthy officials (good luck with that).

[Friendly]

Food for thought: The content mafia claims that megaupload caused 500 Million USD in damages. They also claim that megaupload earned 175 Million USD with premium accounts. Which is 35% of what the content mafia would have earned with their antiquated pricing structure and distribution systems.

Doesn't that mean the content mafia could use a system like megaupload (free limited downloads or premium download flatrates) and live happily ever after? The horror!

[Teufel_in_Blau]

http://arstechnica.com/business/news/20 ... ropbox.ars

Moneyquote:

Although Megaupload's presence in the corporate world may not have matched its overall share of Internet usage, its consumption of bandwidth was outpacing Dropbox and numerous other business-focused file-sharing services, according to a new study.

This shit is going to be hilarious!

[drauch]

Subsequently an anime site has been turned off as well, as all of their files were hosted by megaupload. Well, there goes my source for downloading anime that won't ever get released in English...

[Gus]

Subsequently hsbsitez has been turned off as well, as all of their files were hosted by megaupload. Well, there goes my source for downloading anime that won't ever get released in English...

l2torrent

[xbl0x180]

Subsequently an anime site has been turned off as well, as all of their files were hosted by megaupload. Well, there goes my source for downloading anime that won't ever get released in English...

No more H scanlations from several sources... stuff that will never be translated into English by official sources. F*** the U.S. govt.

[Never_Scurred]

Thank God for private trackers.