should tracker staff get paid?

[Brandon]

let's hope none of you (tracker staff) will ever have to debate this question with a highly paid prosecutor. i think he might beg to differ.

i didn't refer to bcg by the way. i don't even know wether you have a pay2leech system or not.

OiNK was accused of something like, "making money in the name of 'donations'". They even said OiNK membership could only be obtained by payment. And when torrentfreak wrote otherwise, the authorities responded something like "180,000 OiNK members must have been more generous then I expected ." wacko

The point is if authorities were to break into a tracker, they would not give a flying f about whether a tracker has P2l or not....they can make up their own stuff and people (plus media) will easily buy it. Yes, P2L might be additional cause for severe the punishment but how worse can it make?

editZ: oink bail extended to 10th lozl.

Accusations and facts are totally different things. The authorities can say anything they want, and they will in order to get people worked up.. But in a court, accusations hold no value without proof. When they bring up the evidence on the server, clearly stating that you give $x, you get x credits then that clearly brings up debate about selling warez because you're directly selling the ability to download just that.. You could shoot back at me saying ISP's are selling warez b/c they give you the ability to download it, but there are many more uses for the internet than warez and ISP's don't advertise anything of the illegal sort. On a torrent site, when you buy those GB's, you can use them for only one thing: Downloading warez.

That doesn't even include what happens when they get the paypal transaction records (which they can) and see you've been sending a couple grand a month to escort services and other personal things like your bank account and such.

[dafunks]

.....paypal transaction records (which they can) and see you've been sending a couple grand a month to escort services....

WALLHAX, how did you know?

[wheeloftime]

Sage advise:

You'll never get paid for a job that someone else is willing to do for free.

Generally true, but sometimes it depends on how well you do the job.

[Swax]

On a torrent site, when you buy those GB's, you can use them for only one thing: Downloading warez.

If a lawyer was prosecuting me basing their case on that I'd feel all warm and tingly inside knowing they're blissfully naive.

Bittorrent trackers do have the occassional legitimate download. Be it freeware software, royalty-free albums or even user-created content (tutorials, eBooks, How-To Videos...). As long as a tracker has at least some of these files then the tracker itself is not illegal, only some (albeit most) of the content is illegal.

[Peanut]

Well i seeded over 1TB and download berly in the hundreds ...... On a site that i love ......
do i deserve to get pay for it ( it did cost me electricity,time) and a risk of getting a big fine ........ and am just a member there .....
The answer is nooooo why? cause every thing is free of what we download
and if you need money ( get a job like any other person) "Cashcrate"
- We all waste our time on stupid things ......... It doesn't mean we should get pay for them ....

[Silverleaf]

@Peanut... you are right... you have electricity bills but think about it over again. You download software/movies/games worth over 1 million dollars every year (or maybe more....much more) so i guess that will compensate your electricity bill.

[wheeloftime]

Well i seeded over 1TB and download berly in the hundreds ...... On a site that i love ......
do i deserve to get pay for it ( it did cost me electricity,time) and a risk of getting a big fine ........ and am just a member there .....
The answer is nooooo why? cause every thing is free of what we download
and if you need money ( get a job like any other person) "Cashcrate"
- We all waste our time on stupid things ......... It doesn't mean we should get pay for them ....

The staff at MacDonalds get paid for cooking my burgers and yet I don't get paid for eating them. It costs me petrol, time etc. and I take the risk of food poisoning.

[ftnftw]

On a torrent site, when you buy those GB's, you can use them for only one thing: Downloading warez.

If a lawyer was prosecuting me basing their case on that I'd feel all warm and tingly inside knowing they're blissfully naive.

Bittorrent trackers do have the occassional legitimate download. Be it freeware software, royalty-free albums or even user-created content (tutorials, eBooks, How-To Videos...). As long as a tracker has at least some of these files then the tracker itself is not illegal, only some (albeit most) of the content is illegal.

That lawyer may seem naive to a bt pro like yourself, but the inference is not a great logical leap. I could see that argument actually working.

Also, the fact that a handful of non-infringing content is available on a tracker does very little to support the legality of a tracker that facilitates the infringement of PBs of infringing material.

Your points may stand true in a vacuum, but they are extremely weak and it is highly improbable that a judge will find such arguments persuasive.

[Polarbear]

On a torrent site, when you buy those GB's, you can use them for only one thing: Downloading warez.

If a lawyer was prosecuting me basing their case on that I'd feel all warm and tingly inside knowing they're blissfully naive.

Bittorrent trackers do have the occassional legitimate download. Be it freeware software, royalty-free albums or even user-created content (tutorials, eBooks, How-To Videos...). As long as a tracker has at least some of these files then the tracker itself is not illegal, only some (albeit most) of the content is illegal.

every country has different laws. in most western countries any expert in copyright law would smile at you when he'd hear that.

a chinese company that fakes industrial design doesn't get legal if they create something by their own sometimes.

[Swax]

That lawyer may seem naive to a bt pro like yourself, but the inference is not a great logical leap. I could see that argument actually working.

Also, the fact that a handful of non-infringing content is available on a tracker does very little to support the legality of a tracker that facilitates the infringement of PBs of infringing material.

Your points may stand true in a vacuum, but they are extremely weak and it is highly improbable that a judge will find such arguments persuasive.

For the lawyer to make such an inference* would involve ignoring the facts. The prosecutor would almost be making an assumption based on biased and incorrect information from the authorities.
Jumping to conclusions, as a lawyer, does not appease most judges, assuming the case is fair.

I am by no means trying to claim that donating to a torrent tracker is a wise act, as the authorities would see it as a contribution to misbegotten wealth for the tracker's owners through malfeasance.

I am merely mentioning a point that is constantly iterated and ever clearer; that judges are no longer as susceptible to assumptions made by the media (or prosecutors) as they once were.

(*=that only Warez can be downloaded)