Another EliteTorrents Uploader Facing 10 Years in Prison

[TheFoX]

He didn't force people to "donate" he lied about the levels of donations he received. Where he claimed that he had only received a few hundred pounds for "server costs" he was actually receiving thousands and making huge profits.

Is that a fact?

Does anyone have any actual proof that he was profiting on a large scale?


I'm not saying he didn't pull in some serious donation money, but then his servers were not cheap either, and if you add in the cost of a few seedboxes, which he probably had, then the cost of running something like OiNK starts to mount up.

[mbucari1]

I believe oink had 4 servers mirrored servers for the site+tracker. I remember reading about it a few months ago during the anniversary celebration.

[Chip Monk]

He didn't force people to "donate" he lied about the levels of donations he received. Where he claimed that he had only received a few hundred pounds for "server costs" he was actually receiving thousands and making huge profits.

Is that a fact?

Does anyone have any actual proof that he was profiting on a large scale?


I'm not saying he didn't pull in some serious donation money, but then his servers were not cheap either, and if you add in the cost of a few seedboxes, which he probably had, then the cost of running something like OiNK starts to mount up.

The UK is covered by the European Convention on Human Rights. One of those is a person's right to privacy. In order for that right to be breached the Police must demonstrate that they have reasonable grounds to believe that a crime of a serious nature has been commited, or is being commited. If they wish to use a search warrant they must be able to demonstrate that the use of that warrant is proportionate to the crime being commited (see Reulation of Investigatory Powers Act). They could not get a search warrant for a private house if they were dealing with a minor offence.

In short, at the very least the Police had enough evidence to prove to a Court that a serious offence was being commited. The Dutch authorities (also covered by ECHR) obviously agreed.

Let's get serious here, they had accessed his bank account, paypal account and anything else they wanted prior to his arrest and the searches/seizures. The only question left is how helpful he is willing to be in their other enquiries. This chap must have been well connected and I'm sure he would be of great use to them.

[yetmae]

Laws in their initial concept are a great idea. The concept being
that, if we write down the behavior that people find unacceptable
to the degree that it will rouse them to violence, then everyone
has a better chance of knowing what is unacceptable, and less
violence will result. When used in this way, the law is just a
reflection of an existing moral code that would be enforced even
if it were not written down. The problem begins the moment people
start viewing laws the other way around, and start enforcing rules
just because they are written down. As soon as this change occurs,
anyone who gains the power to write the rules, gains the power to
rouse a whole society to violence in an unjust cause. "Law enforcement
is a cheap substitute for justice." Since all law enforcement
involves the threat of, or actual use of violence, the test of a
law should be the question "Would a reasonable person act violently
to prevent another person from doing this?"

So I guess the question here is, "Notwithstanding what the law says, would a reasonable person act violently to prevent others from sharing files?" I think you'd be hard pressed to find anyone a significant percentage of the general population who would agree with the use of violence here.

Unfortunately, I think it will be an uphill battle convincing people that laws should not be enforced just because they have been written down -- usually by those who are in the pockets of the large corporations who will benefit from them.

[TheFoX]

So I guess the question here is, "Notwithstanding what the law says, would a reasonable person act violently to prevent others from sharing files?" I think you'd be hard pressed to find anyone a significant percentage of the general population who would agree with the use of violence here.

Unfortunately, I think it will be an uphill battle convincing people that laws should not be enforced just because they have been written down -- usually by those who are in the pockets of the large corporations who will benefit from them.

Very concise viewpoint. I think, though, we need to differentiate between reasonable and unreasonable. We know, for a fact, that the actions of the RIAA and their John Doe subpoenas is unreasonable (what reasonable person or organisation would attempt to sue someone who had been dead for years?).

We are talking of copyright infringement, or more to the point, concept infringement. Intellectual property is a grey area. What constitutes property, and what constitutes public domain?

Take the alphabet for example. If the creators of the alphabet had decided to copyright the concept, then we would need a license to write words. What about the concept of writing? You see that the whole concept of copyrighting concepts if malformed (even this concept could be copyrighted).

I'm not saying that relevant art should not be exempt from copyrighting, but imagine that a new genre of music was created by an artist (Ska, for example). Who would own the concept, or would it be public domain?

I know this is leading away from the subject in question, but there is more than simple theft issues here. The whole concept of music distribution is in question, along with the heavy handed tactics of the organisations who want to keep the status quo.

Lets remember that the music industry only duplicates the work of the artist. It doesn't create the work of the artist. Maybe we should ask the artists what their viewpoints are, in these matters.

[Polarbear]

George Lucas started as a small independent film maker a long time ago.

nowadays he made a fortune with his movies.

why doesn't he have the dignity to stand up for those guys?

they may end up in prison just because they shared one of his movies with others.

the movie made $380,262,555 dollars only in the us (other countries not included)

how the hell did those guys influence anyone's business.

it's a shame for george lucas, the producers and the whole complex called entertainment industry.

and it's even a bigger shame for the u.s. law sytem.

[DanielleD87]

this is why i proxy everything, even his web site.

also, behind my proxy chain goes to internet that isn't registered (hacked internet) so miraculously if someone got my real ip and not the spoof comcast one i'm using as a header then they would have an awful hard time finding me. to be precise they wouldn't be able to be more accurate then a 60 mile diameter.

[psxcite]

Yep. Same here. They can trace my node, but that would narrow it down to about 2000 homes in my area.

[Polarbear]

you are going a bit off topic here, but let me tell you one thing. if they want to find you, they will.
everything that has a wire on it and sends or receives data can be found.

in addition there's something called dragnet investigation. 2000 homes for a good one would be a piece of cake.

[LoKaLiRi]

10 years it is very long time

bad