Pivotal Canadian BitTorrent Showdown Looming
Written by enigmax on April 27, 2008In three months time, the Canadian music, movie and TV industries will unleash their combined legal might on a little known BitTorrent tracker. A true David and Goliath battle, the QuebecTorrent case is one that Michael Geist says is “worth watching”, and will have wide implications for all of ‘online’ Canada.
In October 2007, a small BitTorrent tracker called QuebecTorrent was pushed into the headlines, having been targeted by the Canadian music industry. It took threats from the CRIA to force Demonoid overseas, so QuebecTorrent might be forgiven for feeling just a little in the spotlight right now. Not only are they facing the CRIA, but also ADISQ and APFTQ (the TV and movie companies) – and CIRPA.
The legal background to the case is available in TorrentFreak’s previous interview with QuebecTorrent back in November 2007. Essentially, it’s felt that the decision in this case will impact the future of all Canadian BitTorrent trackers and have more serious implications, explained here by Micheal Geist:
This case is one worth watching – while the knee jerk reaction of some will be to call for the site’s immediate takedown, the legal principles that come from the case, including the liability for linking to unauthorized content and the responsibility of site owners for content posted by 3rd parties, could have significant implications for search engines, bloggers, and anyone else operating online.
TorrentFreak recently caught up with the admin, Doditz, and he told us: “First of all I had to change my lawyer because he got sick and can’t represent me anymore. The new lawyer is Sébastien Leblond and his team at Fetch Légal LTÉE.”
Doditz told us that the next big dates are the 9th, 10th and 11th July, where there will be a summary analysis of the case taking place in the Court of Justice in Montréal.
In an announcement to QuebecTorrent’s 85,000 members he said:
The eventual hearing will require adequate preparation, which will require active involvement of our lawyers in the next three months. Notably, this will require our defense, which will rest particularly on account of the jurisprudence involved with the subject, and the actual evaluation of the law.
Doditz says he will personally have to participate in this process and added that it’s possible that some of the site’s users could be asked to testify too.
Of course, with all this talk of legal action, talk of lots of expenses can’t be far away either. Indeed, the fear of increasing legal costs is often enough to make someone cave in to the demands of the media industry, and they know this all too well.
Nevertheless, QuebecTorrent is standing up and fighting. Doditz hopes that given the wider implications of a negative outcome in the case – such as those indicated by Michael Geist – this will enable him to raise the funds needed for an adequate defense and sensible outcome. He estimates they will need “approximately $15,000, plus applicable taxes, so about $5000 per month”.
A final message from Doditz: “Thank you in advance to all those who will allow QuebecTorrent to defend your rights and the exchange of international culture.”
Anyone wishing to help the cause, can do so by clicking here.
Previously: Filesharing Report Shows Explosive Growth for uTorrent
Next: uTorrent Marked as Trojan by Avast Antivirus
33 Responses
Blame Canada…
(Eh?)
=]
Go Canada!
Sheila: Times have changed
Our kids are getting worse
They won’t obey their parents
They just want to fart and curse!
Sharon: Should we blame the government?
Liane: Or blame society?
Dads: Or should we blame the images on TV?
Sheila: No, blame Canada
Everyone: Blame Canada
Sheila: With all their beady little eyes
And flapping heads so full of lies
Everyone: Blame Canada
Blame Canada
Sheila: We need to form a full assault
Everyone: It’s Canada’s fault!
Sharon: Don’t blame me
For my son Stan
He saw the damn cartoon
And now he’s off to join the Klan!
Liane: And my boy Eric once
Had my picture on his shelf
But now when I see him he tells me to fuck myself!
Sheila: Well, blame Canada
Everyone: Blame Canada
Sheila: It seems that everything’s gone wrong
Since Canada came along
Everyone: Blame Canada
Blame Canada
Copy Guy: They’re not even a real country anyway
Ms. McCormick: My son could’ve been a doctor or a lawyer rich and true,
Instead he burned up like a piggy on the barbecue
Everyone: Should we blame the matches?
Should we blame the fire?
Or the doctors who allowed him to expire?
Sheila: heck no!
Everyone: Blame Canada
Blame Canada
Sheila: With all their hockey hullabaloo
Liane: And that bitch Anne Murray too
Everyone: Blame Canada
Shame on Canada
For…
The smut we must stop
The trash we must bash
The Laughter and fun
Must all be undone
We must blame them and cause a fuss
Before somebody thinks of blaming uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuus!!!!
Best of luck to them
I only wish the link to the site was in english aswell. It would be greatly beneficial for the fundraising.
Best of luck!
For a minute I thought about making my first donation to anything ever.
But then I thought about all the people who are suffering in the world, and how selfish it would be to give what little extra money I might have to such a self-serving purpose.
@3: lololololololololololololol lolz. lol.
I thought Canada was pro-filesharing for personal use. Didn’t they legalise it? At least that’s what a Canadian person told me on some obscure forum :)
Good idea a English section will be added soon in to the donation page
thanks for the idea :)
good luck quebec, how can they have enough evidence to get quebec to court if they havent actually had any of the files on the server?
Yeah good luck beating them at their own system.
You don’t need money, you just some balls.
+need (sigh)
[quote]I thought Canada was pro-filesharing for personal use. Didn’t they legalise it? At least that’s what a Canadian person told me on some obscure forum :)[/quote]
Whoever told you that doesn’t understand very much. Infringing on copyright laws is still illegal in Canada, it’s just that the RCMP (Canadian pigs) will not persecute people for it (though it is a civil case and not a criminal case, the pigs would not go after you for it anyway, that’s the job of high paid lawyers).
In 2005, the controversial ruling of Justice Konrad von Finckenstein, making file uploading on peer-to-peer systems legal, was set aside by the Federal Court of Appeal. The Court of Appeal held that although the original case should be dismissed due to lack of evidence linking the unnamed defendants to the alleged copyright infringements, the question of the legality of peer-to-peer file sharing must be decided in a future case.
I’m on that site and I love it. It’s so cultural I can get stuff that I would never be able to get otherwise. But to make the site in both languages would be very good, just a tab at the top that would re-direct you to the language of your choice. Personally I prefer the forums in English, it takes less time to type and I hate using Anglicisms when I speak or write in French ;). What would happened if they would agree to fold and the lawsuit get drooped and then re-open it under a different name? That’s what I would do.
go get them, win or loose, put up a fight, dont let these greedy corporate fucks think they are law, and power. They are nothing, just money hungry pigs who sell other peoples work since they are unable to create anything good on their own.
They parade around like its their material, and need to be stopped. Win or loose, let them know this, and that ya wont bend over and fork over money to fill their dirty pockets.
@ #1 & #3 – Guess it’s easy to be a tard when you’re a kid living in Mommy’s house.
Perhaps they could also use donations for political campaigning?
[quote comment="361374"]@3: lololololololololololololol lolz. lol.
I thought Canada was pro-filesharing for personal use. Didn’t they legalise it? At least that’s what a Canadian person told me on some obscure forum :)[/quote]
That is for music only.
@16 – It’s just a joke, I love my canuck friends :)
am i going to be the first one to say bye bye to what.cd? they in canada
All those anti-piracy idiots deserve DEATH!
Just a thougth;
they say that linking to unauthorized content is copyright infrigment, because when you link it, you are a part of making it available for unauthorized distribution.
BUT!, making copyright material digital is also a way of making it available for unauthorized distribution. So in the bottom end, they, the record companies, can blame itselves for making it available for unauthorized distribution by creating digital version of it.
[quote comment="361371"]For a minute I thought about making my first donation to anything ever.
But then I thought about all the people who are suffering in the world, and how selfish it would be to give what little extra money I might have to such a self-serving purpose.[/quote]
So u kept it?
torrents are metadata they cannot be copyrighted
if you interpret the current law to outlaw torrents then you also outlaw google and systems which permit 3rd party links
the digital revolution is underway and we are not even close to the outcome
traditional copyright principles do not apply to digital media because of important economic principles:
1. can it be easily replicated? YES
2. can it be easily substituted? YES
3. is it sustainable? NO
here is a rule which is incontrovertible
A. (outside of the USA) the law will never make an ass of itself
http://www.h33t.com
The copyright laws in Canada are actually very odd as they are written. A lawyer on a TV show explained how they applied to music sharing.
It is perfectly legal to download a copy of a song. It is also legal to burn that copy on a CD, put it on an iPod, or just listen to it on your PC. It is illegal to share the digital copy with someone else (such as with a P2P application), but it’s perfectly legal to burn it to CD and give the CD to a friend (!).
None of that applies to movies, games, TV shows, and the like.
All the same, Canada needs to lock in a clause for P2P into the Copyright act. Something along the lines of distribution for the purpose of voluntary promotion among fans. This, “it’s fine to download and burn it but not share it over the internet”, garbage needs to be fixed up.
Either way, I haven’t downloaded much music from artists in Canada anyway. Seeing as nearly all radio stations play U.S. music anyway, it’s difficult to get that kind of promotion unless you sign on with an evil label.
It’s unfortunate that there is all this legal drag on file sharing. In my opinion file sharing cannot be decided upon in court. It’s not a legal issue. It’s a social issue. In court you can present legal arguments. But if the laws are fucked up already they don’t provide the oportunity to argue in a broader, more sensible way.
You know what? I don’t give a shit whether linking to some file that presumably contains copyrighted material might be infringing on some company’s intellectual property. This is completely irrelevant legal brag. It bores me to death.
If it turns out to be illegal to link to a file then we’ll link to a ton of distributed files that contain little “fair use” pieces of the copyrighted material. We put them together on our computers to watch movies, listen to music and play games. And then? And then “fair use” will become illegal. And then we’ll invent something else.
Stop sueing people and make content!
Kthxbye
The big movie guys just want to win somewhere / anywhere. When they finally do, it’s to set the basis on future cases. They don’t even care where as long as sooner or later they get lucky. They pick on the weak to get the win. Then it will scare off some of the stronger from fighting.
Woe be the day when they score some kind of victory.
I too would now rightfully like to see the provisions that made DPI (deep packet inspection) by ISPs to be made illegal not just by the CRTC but also by the federal government now too, including many of the bad acts of Bell, the Big Brother’s false invasion of our home, personal privacy. Since we can readily know that the reasons given for the internet downloading inspections, capping are unjustifiable, what are the actual reasons now for these online now inspections too?
http://thenonconformer.wordpress.com/?s=bad+bell
then i say we should be allowed to get stuff via bittorrent until htem media noobs learn to at minimum keep the deals they make.
Having bell breech contracts left and right is one thing but rogers is no better and neither is any other way you can get your tv so i download it via the net.
we need a change a gov’t and if them wanky liberls don’t do it we need ot get rid of pc party and liberal party for good
vote ANYTHING BUT Liberal and Conservative
…didn’t Canada legalise personal piracy a while back? Shouldn’t these dipwads have no legal legs to stand on?
going like its going they will win the way they like
not letting the other part defend them self by killing them with money pressure
if you look at this month quebectorrent donation this i exactly what is going to happend
ill go donate a 50$ to this site… not for the site cause i dont use it but for p2p around canada and world
i think you should do the same so this poor admin can defend the p2p
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