This week, Irish ISP Eircom and the music industry avoided an expensive legal battle, and settled out of court with a deal to disconnect alleged pirates. Eircom didn’t want to start using filtering technology to thwart pirates, so it made a deal with the labels instead – and it sucks.
Comcast doesn’t really have a good reputation in the BitTorrent community and it’s getting worse by the day. They now have plans to cooperate with the RIAA and disconnect alleged copyright infringers. A worrisome development, especially since they have a tendency to accuse innocent customers.
Players of the PC game Gears of War have a problem that means they are currently unable to even load their game. The reason – a hard-coded shutoff date in the DRM that prevents the game from playing. Yet again, DRM prevents an honestly purchased game from working. Will Crysis and GTA IV break next?
In Europe, Pirate Parties have quite a following, especially in Sweden where a political scientist recently described them as a “classic civil right movement”. The U.S. Pirate Party hopes to replicate some of this success, and officially launched in California today, the home of the movie industry.
Traffic management company Ipoque has just released a whitepaper, detailing pros and cons of different methods of dealing with piracy on P2P networks. Surprisingly, the conclusions in the paper are not straight adverts for their own products and services. We will highlight some of the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly conclusions.
Despite calls from the public, pressure groups and ISPs, the New Zealand government has refused to withdraw the planned Section 92 of the Copyright Amendment Act. The controversial act provides ‘Guilt Upon Accusation’, meaning that those simply accused of file-sharing are disconnected from the Internet.
Hundreds of ISPs all over the world limit and restrict BitTorrent traffic on their networks. Unfortunately, most companies are not very open about their network management solutions. With a newly launched website, Google is now helping out by supporting applications that distinguish the good ISPs from the bad.
Up until today, the ‘Big Four’ record labels were taking legal action against Ireland’s biggest ISP, Eircom, in order to force it to employ filtering technology to stop online pirates. The case has been aborted as Eircom, at the behest of the music industry, has agreed to start disconnecting those accused of illicit file-sharing.
Cox, the third largest ISP in the U.S, is none too fond of BitTorrent users. Previously we reported that they disconnect alleged copyright infringers without warning. Today, Cox announced a new ‘network management’ trial where P2P, Usenet and FTP users will be slowed down when the network is congested.
Sites offering downloads of BitTorrent clients and other well-known software, which then require an SMS to be sent to ‘activate’ the installer of free software, have been appearing at an increasing rate. Not only does uTorrent end up costing up to $20, but these sites are in breach of new telecoms regulations and are set to be shut down.
The fifth season of the hit series ‘Lost’ premiered on U.S. television with two brand new episodes last week. With close to two million downloads for both episodes in only a few days, it leads this week’s list of most pirated TV-Shows on BitTorrent.
On February 16th 2009, the trial of The Pirate Bay will start in Sweden. Details of the case have been scarce thus far, but one of the witnesses for the prosecution will be a police officer who got a job at Warner Bros. last year. Pirate Bay’s co-founder Peter Sunde promised to bring more competent witnesses to court.
The top 10 most downloaded movies on BitTorrent, “Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa” tops the chart this week, followed by the screener of “Australia”.
Ever since the UK’s major ISPs and the music industry were forced together by the government to sort out online piracy, it has been feared that a ’3 Strikes’ regime was on the horizon. Now, according to a government minister, that possibility has been ruled out.
We recently reported the story of the pirated iPhone game ‘Whack em All’, where the developer actually engaged the game’s cracker instead of taking an aggressive stance. The dialogue had a surprising effect. Sales increased 100%, pirates donated and the game is now available free of charge.
This week, millions of people watched Obama’s inauguration on the Internet through one of the many sites that offered a live feed. CNN’s broadcast was without doubt one of the most used viewed streams, with a peak of more than a million simultaneous viewers and also one that was using P2P technology.
Several studies have shown that an extension of copyright on sound recordings is a bad idea. It will lead to less competition and higher prices while only the record labels benefit from it. Next Tuesday, the Open Rights Group will be hosting a round-table event to discuss performance copyright extension in the EU.
After months of delay, four users of the popular BitTorrent tracker OiNK have been sentenced to community service and payment of court costs. One uploader and Alan Ellis, the administrator of the site, are still awaiting their day in court
Yesterday saw the announcement of the 2009 Oscar nominees. This year there were 26 movies put forward, and by nomination day, 23 of them were already being shared online in DVD quality, many of them copies of voter’s DVD Screeners.
With the trial starting in only a few weeks, some have pictured dark clouds above the world’s most popular BitTorrent tracker. The Pirate Bay team doesn’t seem to be bothered by it though, as they prefer to look ahead. For the first time in years there are plans to redo the design of the site, and it’s looking bright.
TV shows are by far the most wanted files on BitTorrent, and according to some, it’s becoming the modern day TiVo. But what are all those people downloading?
Everyone can upload torrents to Mininova, but not everyone knows that the site also has a content distribution platform for premium publishers. The service is aimed at indie publishers who want to promote their works to the millions of BitTorrent users, free of charge. Today, Mininova welcomes the 1000th publisher.
IsoHunt is one of the world’s largest BitTorrent sites. For quite a while the site has been displaying Google ads through Ask.com. Today there is controversy, as several large companies found out that their ads have been appearing on IsoHunt. Among them, Sony BMG, artist sponsor StatoilHydro and Norwegian online media store Platekompaniet.
After high-level discussions on the piracy situation in 2008, the Italian government has announced the signing of an agreement which will see it collaborate with the French on the issue. Of concern to those sharing files online, Minister of Culture Sandro Bondi says Italy will follow the “French model”.
Net neutrality really is the hot topic at the moment. After the FCC slapped Comcast for slowing down BitTorrent users, Canada is now looking into the network management practices of its ISPs. And rightly so, as a CRTC investigation reveals that most of the ISPs in Canada actively slow down customers using P2P applications.
Swedish file-sharers have previously been protected from police action, since any offenses they commit do not generally carry a prison sentence. Now, the government is considering new legislation which will give the police powers to go after regular file-sharers, even if their actions were previously only punishable by a fine.
The top 10 most downloaded movies on BitTorrent, “RocknRolla” tops the chart for the second week in a row, followed by “Pride and Glory”.
TDC, Denmark’s largest ISP and owner of most of the cables, has decided to block access to The Pirate Bay. TDC took the step following an earlier decision made by a Danish judge who ordered another ISP, Tele2, to do the same. The case is currently under appeal, but TDC decided to block the BitTorrent tracker as a precaution.
Commissioned by the Dutch government, a recently published report concludes that file-sharing has a positive effect on the economy, both on the long and short term. A massive 30% of the Dutch population uses file-sharing software to download music, games, movies and other forms of entertainment, which is now considered to be a ‘good thing’.
RLSLOG, one of the world’s most popular release news sites, has been taken down following action by Web Sheriff. The site, which did not host any copyright material whatsoever, has been down for two days after the UK-based outfit issued complaints to the site’s host and their bandwidth provider. The site will return.
Myka, a new BitTorrent enabled set-top box was about to enter the market last year, and received widespread coverage online. The project soon went silent, but this weekend they have made the news again with another promise to ship soon. Don’t fall for it though, it has scam written all over it.
The Internet has been a blessing for the music industry. Although the RIAA and IFPI frequently complain about piracy, their own research shows that only 10% of all illegal downloads are considered to be a loss in sales. Meanwhile, piracy has shown them how to monetize music online, and turn it into profit.
Ung Pirat, the youth organization of the Swedish Pirate Party received over 1.3 million Krona from the Swedish government yesterday. The money – government funding to political youth organizations – was heavily criticized by anti-piracy lobbyists.
With the defense in the Tenenbaum case getting their request to broadcast the trial online, it seemed that some light of exposure was to be brought to the RIAA’s method of litigation. Yet the RIAA doesn’t want their court practices exposed for all to see, and have now appealed the judges decision.
UK communications minister Lord Carter has drafted new regulations that will require ISPs to warn customers suspected of sharing copyrighted material, that they are acting illegally. Furthermore, ISPs will have to hand over details of repeated infringers to the entertainment industry and other rights holders.
In line with its new strategy of trying to force ISPs to take responsibility for the actions of their customers, in 2008 the ‘Big Four’ record labels, headed up by the IFPI, announced they would take Ireland’s largest ISP to court. The case began yesterday and is already proving controversial.
The UK Government, through the BERR, commissioned a public consultation last year into illicit file-sharing, and how to deal with it. The responses should have been published in December, but due to a holdup concerning a freedom of information request, it was delayed until today. Despite this, some will still be kept confidential.
Many torrent sites come and go, but few are as large or enduring as Mininova. Today, the BitTorrent giant celebrates its 4th birthday, after the first public version of the site went live in January 2005. For those who work hard to fulfill their dreams, from little acorns, mighty oak trees grow.
Confessed pirates themselves, Franz Ferdinand have recently taken a pro-piracy stance, encouraging fans to download some of their work. It was therefore quite a surprise to hear that the band has recently hired the infamous Web-Sheriff to stop people from downloading their recently leaked album “Tonight”.
The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) currently being discussed by several of the world’s leading countries, will undoubtedly lead to stricter ant-piracy legislation. The problem though, is that nobody really knows what it will entail. The EU refuses to make the drafts public, which makes it impossible for the public to review the documents before they are signed.
DtecNet, the anti-piracy outfit replacing MediaSentry as the RIAA’s chief evidence collector, also operates in several other countries. The Danish company is working for the BPI in Britain in support of its drive to force a “3 strikes” regime, and helping in Australian investigations against alleged pirates. We take a closer look.
TV shows are by far the most wanted files on BitTorrent, and according to some, it’s becoming the modern day TiVo. But what are all those people downloading?
The website of the Arabian Anti-Piracy Alliance, which represents the MPAA and a wide range of copyright holders in the Middle East, has been defaced by hackers. The entire news section was wiped out a week ago, and it hasn’t recovered since. It seems like this anti-piracy outfit doesn’t even visit its own site.
Last year The Pirate Bay and the Bureau of Piracy bought themselves a bus, painted it up in suitable pirate-style livery and embarked on a European tour. Now, with the trial of The Pirate Bay just a few weeks away, the bus will be coming home to Sweden to serve as the official court case press center.
The top 10 most downloaded movies on BitTorrent, “RocknRolla” tops the chart this week, followed by “Max Payne”.
The first four episodes of the new 24 season have made their way onto BitTorrent, just hours before the official TV premiere. Jack Bauer fans have had to wait a while for this one. Season 7 was originally scheduled to be aired early 2008, but was postponed for a year because of the writers strike. The wait is finally over.
Coda.fm is a new music torrent indexer that looks surprisingly good for a torrent site, and one that combines great design and functionality like we’ve never seen before. Yet another great way to discover new music – if only the RIAA approved.
After two of its founders were arrested by Australian police, the 400,000 member MovieX tracker hasn’t seen the end of its troubles. Although it survived the arrests, the site’s vital uploaders have been jumping ship and now, with the site offline again, it appears its finances have been plundered too.
Microsoft ran into major bandwidth problems when they released the latest Beta of Windows 7 to the public. The company decided to delay the release while they added some more servers, citing “very heavy traffic”. If they had only used BitTorrent, this heavy traffic would have actually speeded up distribution, instead of slowing it down.
Over the past three years, TorrentFreak has reported on various messes generated by DRM, and how that has impacted people all over the world. Now someone has decided it needs looking into, and so the Federal Trade Commission in the US has commissioned a Town Hall meeting on the subject.
An unreleased and unfinished track produced by Dr. Dre has hit BitTorrent. The track “It Could’ve Been You” featuring R.Kelly, 50 Cent and upcoming artist Bishop Lamont, is thought to be part of Dre’s long-awaited ‘Detox’ album. It is just over four minutes long in 320k. Dre is said to be “furious”.
Silence is Sexy, a Dutch band that previously released its album through Mininova’s content distribution platform, has been picked as one of the nominees for the Interactive Award 2009. The award is given to the best concept which utilizes the Internet to promote music and engage fans.
An increasing number of musicians are experimenting with giving away their music for free on BitTorrent. This trend has led to the formation of a new Netlabel, CXCR6, which specifically targets the BitTorrent community with new album releases. We got in touch with its founder about his motivation to promote free music.
Netgear has just announced its Internet TV Player, a set-top box that allows users to play content from video streaming sites like YouTube, directly on their TV. Perhaps of more interest is the device’s built-in BitTorrent client, which makes it an ideal TV-torrent player as well.
The developer of an iPhone game had a nice surprise when it suddenly saw a surge in users. The game had around ten downloads a day from iTunes, which inexplicably transformed into more than 400 users in a single day. The reason – the game got cracked. Read what happened when the developer confronted the cracker.
Entertainment industry lobbyists are desperately pushing to get tougher anti-piracy legislation implemented worldwide. The Pirate Prisons Project followed these developments closely and sees it as a business opportunity. It has now opened up their prison construction project to investors, while pirates are given the chance to book a cell in advance.
A few days we reported on a new service which claimed to offer lifetime anonymous BitTorrent for a $50.00 one-off payment. As the service ‘launched’ we had our doubts, but understandably some people decided to give it a try since it was so cheap. It turns out that the offer was indeed too good to be true.
TV shows are by far the most wanted files on BitTorrent, and according to some, it’s becoming the modern day TiVo. But what are all those people downloading?
The BitTorrent popularity surge is still underway, with more users discovering that it’s the fastest way to transfer large files online. One of the most frequently visited torrent sites, Mininova, has seen the number of torrent downloads double from 3.5 billion to 7 billion during 2008, and this download rate is still increasing.
Next month, New Zealand is scheduled to implement Section 92 of the Copyright Amendment Act. The controversial act provides ‘Guilt Upon Accusation’, which means that if a file-sharer is simply accused of copyright infringement, they are immediately guilty. The punishment – summary Internet disconnection.
The top 10 most downloaded movies on BitTorrent, “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” tops the chart this week, followed by “Appaloosa”.
A new trojan popped up at several torrent sites a few weeks ago, one that blocks access to The Pirate Bay and Mininova, while informing its victims that “downloading is wrong.” The trojan edits the hosts file on Windows machines, and redirects the BitTorrent sites to localhost, making them impossible to load.
Hustler Europe, part of the world’s largest adult entertainment company, has hired anti-piracy company Media Protector to start chasing down file-sharers. The partnership will have a familiar aim – to find alleged infringers on P2P networks and send them threats to pay up – or else.
The music industry has taken some extreme measures to counter piracy, but it hasn’t found the silver bullet yet. The key is to come up with a service that will fulfill the needs of music lovers, and one that would even be embraced by the most hardcore pirate. With Spotify, this might just become possible.
What will happen to BitTorrent users and their favorite sites in the new year? What will happen to the music industry’s new efforts to combat piracy with the help of ISPs, and what about efforts to legalize file sharing? We asked guest columnist Janko Roettgers for his predictions for 2009.
In these harsh economic times, everyone is looking out for a bargain. A new VPN service launched recently offering a lifetime of anonymous BitTorrent, completely unlimited, for a one-off $50.00 payment. Sounds good? We take a closer look to see if the numbers stack up.
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Peter Sunde Left Quote
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