Even though the sale never went through, OpenBitTorrent has proved its worth recently, since the Pirate Bay tracker had been struggling to stay online. That particular battle formally ended yesterday, with the announcement it had shut down for good.

Unlike most BitTorrent trackers, OpenBitTorrent is not linked to a torrent site where users can download or search for torrents. Indeed, its involvement in the process is very much limited. The tracker is merely assisting in connecting peers with each other based on a hash value, without having any control over, or knowledge of what is being tracked. It also operates a clear DMCA-style takedown policy.

Despite this setup, the Hollywood movie studios have made the decision to try and shut it down by taking the tracker’s hosting company, Portlane, to court.

“OpenBitTorrent is used for file sharing, and we suspect that it is the Pirate Bay tracker with a new name. It is added by default on all of the torrent tracker files on Pirate Bay,” Hollywood lawyer Monique Wadsted said in a comment. She further noted that the domain of the tracker was originally registered by Fredrik Neij, one of the Pirate Bay founders.

For Portlane, this is not its first experience of a copyright holder demanding the takedown of a BitTorrent site it hosts. Earlier this year, the IFPI asked Portlane to close several BitTorrent sites, which they refused to do. This time around Portlane is not going to comply without a fight either, citing freedom of expression and freedom of information as their defense.

It is indeed questionable if OpenBitTorrent can be held responsible for any copyright infringements that may take place on BitTorrent. Aside from the alleged connection to The Pirate Bay, the site’s assistance in the downloading process is not greater than that of BitTorrent outfits Vuze and uTorrent. Indeed, it could be considered to be less.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

Yesterday the court heard from iiNet barrister Richard Cobden, who described how
several of the plaintiffs and members of the MPAA had previously entered into contracts with BitTorrent Inc, the source of the official BitTorrent software.

He said that the logos of these studios appeared on BitTorrent.com (placed directly under the ‘free download’ link for the official BitTorrent client) and also on Mininova.

This lead Cobden to declare that the studios “….have engaged, at least from the logos on BitTorrent Inc, in the promotion of BitTorrent, the vehicle for all infringement in this case.”

Today AFACT barrister Tony Bannon criticized iiNet for these claims, describing them as “an excellent example of iiNet’s intent to focus not on legally relevant and factually indisputable matters but to focus on the legally irrelevant.”

Bannon said that the claims show that iiNet wishes to give the court the impression that his clients encouraged the exact same copyright infringement they now complain about in this case, going on to call the claims “legally irrelevant” and noting that the contacts with BitTorrent.com were terminated last year.

While Bannon insisted the details of those contracts are confidential, he was prepared to reveal that they included terms which required BitTorrent Inc to filter out torrents from their search engine which linked to illicit copies of the studios’ movies. He also said that iiNet knew that the contracts had been terminated but had not relayed that fact to the court, or when it spoke to members of the media.

However, an iiNet spokesperson seemed unrepentant. “The fact is the logos are still on the BitTorrent sites and serves the argument we are making, which is a couple of clicks away from where the logos are, you can download things. Part of the argument we are making in relation to all that is when it comes to what are ‘reasonable steps’ for iiNet to take about illegal downloading when they are not even asking BitTorrent to do the same thing?”

Earlier this week, iiNet had presented information to the court which showed that its competitors – other ISPs operating in a similar manner – also did not give in to AFACT demands that they should disconnect their copyright-infringing customers, backing up claims that iiNet had been singled out by the movie industry.

Tony Bannon criticized iiNet for producing this evidence, describing it as meaningless and “….an attempt to take the case outside of the real issues.”

AFACT boss Neil Gane briefly appeared on the witness stand and was questioned by iiNet barrister Richard Cobden. The exchange ended in a dispute over what confidential material can or cannot be used in the case.

Judge Cowdroy will decide on the issue by next Monday when Neil Gane retakes the stand.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

In September 2006, Scott pleaded guilty to two charges – ‘conspiracy to commit copyright infringement’ and ‘criminal copyright infringement’. For his ‘crime’, Scott was sentenced to 5 months in jail and 5 months home confinement but his release didn’t mean his life was back to normal.

After his release in 2007, Scott was fitted with a monitoring ankle bracelet which restricted his freedom, but the government hadn’t finished limiting his life. Scott had to have special software installed on his computer to monitor his online activities, but since it was Windows only, he had to give up his beloved Ubuntu.

In the months that followed, Scott publicly shared details via his blog of his struggle to come to terms with his severe treatment for uploading a single movie, which at times made pretty upsetting reading. Thankfully his nightmare is now coming to an end.

It has been around 3 weeks since Scott was taken off the US government’s monitor list, which means that he is no longer on probation. Scott says things have been pretty good since and he can now do things we all take for granted – like being able to use Ubuntu instead of Windows.

TorrentFreak caught up with Scott who said he was happy to send a message to his friends and readers here to mark his official freedom.

“I have officially been off probation since July 12th. What a great feeling to finally be free from the clutches of evil (or the federal government). It was actually a really easy time on probation. It was 2 years, dealing once a month with my probation officer… who was really a great person,” he told us.

For those of us who remember the exact time and date of the EliteTorrents raid, it seems like only yesterday, but so much has happened since and as Scott puts it, his freedom has been a long time coming.

“I haven’t had a clear head since May 25th, 2005. Over 4 years of what I would call the worst period of my life is over,” he recalls.

But in the end the release from the nightmare comes from Scott himself and he is certainly trying to make the best of things now.

“I have been focusing a lot of time on my family. We bought a house in November, while I was still on home confinement. I am working at a local college, dealing with ERP implementations, specifically Oracle, and I am still actively participating in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, and MMA,” he told TorrentFreak.

As if these things won’t keep Scott busy enough, he’s looking forward to a brighter future and a very special occasion.

“I will be hopefully starting back to school for my MBA in the spring. And I am getting married in May 2010. Aside from the economy, I couldn’t ask for anything more.”

Scott told us that he felt his story is probably no longer worthy of news, so he will take this opportunity to move back into the shadows to get on with his new lease of life.

“This will be the last time most of you hear from me – although there is sk0t.com. The good majority of you have been really supportive… so thank you all for caring, and for
those of you who didn’t care… thanks also.”

I’m sure that the readers will join us in wishing Scott all the best for the future and every happiness in his forthcoming marriage. Good luck Scott.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

However, thus far GGF’s plans for the site and tracker are rather vague and uncertain. First of all there is a huge divide between what the Pirate Bay co-founders think will happen to the site and what GGF is telling the public.

TorrentFreak has spoken with Pirate Bay co-founders Peter Sunde and Fredrik Neij who both think that the Pirate Bay will stay pretty much like it is now for the time being. The only difference in the short term, according to their knowledge, is that the site will link to torrents hosted on a third party domain tracked by a third party tracker.

Both the torrent hosting service and the tracker they are referring to are still in development, the co-founders said. They are not aware of any concrete plans to turn the site into a legal venture. In an attempt to find out we asked GGF to elaborate on their future plans and the response we got was remarkable.

GFF told us that most of their recent comments to the press were nothing more than “corporate bla bla.”

So let’s take a look at some of the bla bla that surfaced in the past day, to see if it makes any sense at all. Here are some of the key proposals.

1. The new Pirate Bay will put a halt to illegal downloading.
2. The Pirate Bay will compensate rights holders who publish their content on the site
3. The Pirate Bay will pay users for sharing files.

This sounds very impressive but, to put it mildly, it raises a few concerns.

It’s basically the same as saying that iTunes would pay its users to share music. When GGF has to pay both file-sharers and content providers they will undoubtedly have to raise huge sums money from a third party. So what is going to bring in this cash?

Ads of course! GGF is predicting to sell ads like no other website in the world has ever done. They told BusinessWeek that they hope to make as much as $672 million a year from advertisements.

GGF is also planning to raise money from ISPs. Theoretically ISPs might be willing to contribute because they could save on bandwidth costs if most of the files are served locally or directly from caching services, but it wont be enough. Also, they assume that The Pirate Bay will generate a significant portion of Internet traffic once they go ‘legal’, which is doubtful.

An even more significant problem is keeping the current users on board and cutting deals with content providers, all at the same time. This is an almost impossible task since copyright holders will only join if there is no illegal content on the site, and users will only stay if there is enough free and unrestricted DRM-free content available.

This means that GGF has to cut deals with pretty much every large music and movie studio from the start to have even a chance of survival. Even if they manage that, they also have to collect millions of dollars to compensate both the users and copyright holders.

Nevertheless, only hours after they announced they would acquire The Pirate Bay, GGF claimed that the entertainment companies they’ve spoken to are already interested in teaming up with the site they fought long and hard in court. Perhaps the Big Four are more open-minded than we expected – maybe GGF will draw on the business relationship it built with Vivendi in 2007?

No further explanation is needed to see that the bright future GGF is selling will never happen. Their plans seem to be completely delusional, at least in this world, and it’s even a mystery where they will get the $7.8 million funding to actually buy the site. If they ever will….

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

The judge acknowledged that the man indeed downloaded the files “without consent of the copyright holders” in 2003 and 2004, but ruled that he only did so for for “private use or sharing with other Internet users.” There was no financial gain, so no crime has been committed and the defendant walked free.

This is not the first time a Spanish court has ruled in favor of a file-sharer. In 2006, a man was similarly acquitted, and more recently it was ruled that websites linking to p2p downloads (torrents for example) operate within the law. Spanish law dictates that there has to be “an intent to profit” for someone to be held liable for copyright infringement.

Not everyone agrees with Spain’s liberal view on copyright infringement. According to the US, the Spanish government has done little “to change the widespread misperception in Spain that peer-to-peer file-sharing is legal.” However, as the courts show time and time again, this is no misperception – it is how the law spells it out.

Since sharing files on BitTorrent and other file-sharing networks is legal, it is no surprise that Spain tops the list of countries with the most recorded copyright infringements. Close to 25 million were counted by the piracy tracking company BayTSP in 2008, mostly on BitTorrent.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

Blue Gold : World Water Wars from director Sam Bozzo is a movie about one of planet earth’s most precious resources – water. It examines the ‘future’ for water and how various corporations are plotting to control its supply, how governments use water for political gain and how the control of this essential liquid could be the source of future military conflicts.

Of course, when anyone uploads a movie to the Internet in breach of copyright, there is always the chance of a different type of conflict – one with the entertainment companies and their anti-piracy allies. However, this particular movie is independent and less likely to attract that type of attention. Perhaps because of this and a warmth towards independent creators, the movie’s BitTorrent uploader godcanjudgeme added a note to his release on The Pirate Bay, encouraging people to financially support the movie by giving donations to the creators via their website.

Then something surprising happened. “A message was sent to a third party ‘acquaintance’ of mine, from the film’s producer Sam Bozzo,” godcanjudgeme told TorrentFreak.

Dear Torrent users,

I thank all of you for your interest in my film. When I read the book Blue Gold, I knew immediately I must utilize my film talents to relay the urgency of prioritizing our fresh water management for the survival of our race. I had no idea of the financial and physical risks that making this film would entail at the time, and if I did I honestly would not have made the film. Luckily for the world, the film exists, and so it is my goal to follow the advise of the first press review which proclaimed “Every person on the planet must see this film”. In this respect I thank godcanjudgeme for uploading this torrent and bringing a new audience to the film.

I have seen film festival audiences around the world transformed by the stories of the heroes of the water wars. I am thrilled that in the US and Canada the DVD is available via shoppbs.org and amazon.ca respectively. I respect the internet community that chooses to view films through torrents like this for whatever reason. In fact my first documentary, Hackers Wanted, focuses on the philosophy of true hackers and their journeys exploring cyberspace.

It is important to understand that independent films costs a great deal of personal finances to create, in this case over $100,000. In order that I may make other films in the future, I must at least make my money back. I respectfully ask that if you download the film you consider donating $5-$10 to the further publicity of the film via PayPal on my site www.bluegold-worldwaterwars.com. Also consider reviewing the film favorably on IMDB and recommending that others buy the DVD.

To be honest, at first I was upset to see this torrent, this film ‘leak’, but some good hacker friends have suggested I embrace the opportunity to reach a new audience, and I feel honored to be doing so!

So what inspired godcanjudgeme to upload the torrent in the first instance?

“I had received a number of requests for “Blue Gold : World Water Wars” after uploading another documentary entitled “Flow : The Love Of Water” which runs along similar lines,” he told TorrentFreak. “It is a topic which should be close to everyone’s hearts. The main reason for uploading “Blue Gold” was that it simply wasn’t available outside America, and so many people were wanting to see it,” he added.

Godcanjudgeme explained that he firmly believes that the downloaders of this particular documentary are not the average ‘hit and run’ movie grabber.

“I felt that in this case these are people that would have gone to a screening or purchased a copy if it was an option,” he told TorrentFeak. “Therefore I truly hope people will realize that independent filmmakers do need our support. If this were a multi million dollar production I could expect no consideration for the producers of the film, but in this case however it was decided to ask that people give something in return to the persons responsible for providing not only entertainment but insight.”

“We all have movies that we have downloaded for free,” he added, “probably large numbers of them, in this case I think it’s time to show our support.”

Since Sam Bozzo is embracing BitTorrent, it seems appropriate to add links where people can download the movie. And in the spirit in which godcanjudgeme uploaded the movie, please consider donating.

The DVDRip can be downloaded from OneBigTorrent or The Pirate Bay .

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

But what if a throwaway comment about torrents via Twitter was enough to put a movie studio in direct contact with you in a matter of minutes? This is what happened to photographer, writer and Twitter user Amanda Music, as she wondered;

Ugh WHY IS ADVENTURELAND NOT ON TORRENTS YET?

Amanda told TorrentFreak, “My friends and I usually wait to download cams of movies. We have yet to find one for Adventureland. So I was Tweeting about it. My friends were too though, but I guess they didn’t put torrent & Adventureland in the same sentence.”

It seems these keywords were being monitored by Hollywood studio Miramax, presumably to find out quickly when their movie hits the web. But instead, Miramax actually responded to Amanda and asked her not to use BitTorrent to get the movie;

Cmon Amanda, don’t do it. #adventureland #fbi

“Miramax found my Tweet through a search and told me not to do it. In a nice way,” Amanda told TorrentFreak. “I had already looked for the torrent and didn’t find one so I decided to reply and say that I wouldn’t download it. I was joking in a way.”

Amanda replied to Miramax, “Okay I won’t, JUST FOR YOU,” but to her surprise they responded again.

And Miramax were true to their word – almost. They provided Amanda with a code for a single free ticket and since Amanda is currently in New York City, she will go see Adventureland today.

“I was pretty surprised about it,” explained Amanda. “I couldn’t find a working Adventureland torrent anyway.”

thanks to iheartmovies

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

It all started with rumors about two US ISPs, Comcast and AT&T, who were said to be doing a three-strikes deal with the RIAA. It soon became known that this rumor was completely fabricated, but not before hundreds of other news oulets reproduced the story. At the end of the week it turned out that there was no news at all.

Yes, the RIAA, MPAA and other outfits do plan to send copyright infringement warnings to ISPs, but they’ve been doing so for at least half a decade. Every other month these Hollywood lobbyists pitch their anti-piracy efforts to the public, and that’s exactly what they are paid for. This doesn’t mean, however, that something is about to change.

The anti-piracy outfits are happy with all the free publicity of course, that is exactly what they are after. Their purpose is to scare people. In this post we hope to clear up some of the misunderstandings, as we show that the scary stories published this week have no substance at all.

Copyright infringement warnings?

For years, content owners such as record labels or movie studios have been sending copyright infringement notices to ISPs, who are legally obliged to forward these to their customers. Some ISPs simply ignore them, while others faithfully forward the emails to the customer account associated with the infringing IP-address. Many ISPs don’t keep records of these events.

So, is my ISP spying on me?

No. This is a common misunderstanding. ISPs don’t look into your specific downloading behavior, they never have and there is no indication that this will change anytime in the near future. All the ‘evidence’ comes from organizations that work for the copyright holders.

What do they know about me?

If you receive a warning, all copyright holders know about you at this stage is your IP-address and what files were (partially) shared via your account, or more accurately – the bill payer’s account. The MPAA, RIAA and others don’t know your name and they never will unless they get a court order forcing your ISP to hand over the information. In the bigger picture, this is very rare.

How did they track me down?

The copyright holders hire companies such as BayTSP and DtecNet to track down people who share certain titles on BitTorrent and other file-sharing networks. They join the swarm and request files from others. When someone shares a piece of the file with them they log the IP-address, look up the ISP and send out a copyright infringement notice automatically. Unlike the file-sharers, these companies are authorized to download these files, so they are not infringing copyright themselves.

Will I get sued if I receive a warning through my ISP?

No. These copyright infringement warnings are not related to any legal action. Copyright holders do go after people who share their work on file-sharing networks, but this has nothing to do with the warnings they send out via ISPs.

Will they take my Internet away?

No. Although there is a lot of talk about “three strikes” policies, no ISP has agreed (or was forced) to disconnect users after they receive their third warning. In New Zealand they came close to implementing a law that would require ISPs to do this, but this proposal was pulled.

In France they are also considering three strikes legislation, but this has not passed into action yet. In Ireland the largest ISP Eircom said it would disconnect repeated infringers only if they receive a court order.

It is worth mentioning though that ISPs may cut off people whenever they think it’s necessary. Cox does this in the US for example, without an agreement with the MPAA or RIAA. ISPs have terms and conditions and most forbid copyright infringement, but really this is just to cover their own backs under the law.

Do I have to be worried?

Receiving a regular infringement notice is nothing to be worried about. However, if you download copyrighted files without authorization from the copyright holder you are breaking the law in some countries. If you receive a warning without having shared anything yourself (which happens quite often) then there’s nothing to worry about.

Can I protect (hide) myself?

If you don’t want to be spied on when using BitTorrent the best option is to hide your IP-address. You can do so by subscribing to a VPN service or by using software such as TorrentPrivacy. Blocklist software such as PeerGuardian is often recommended, but it is also highly ineffective as the lists are never fully up-to date or accurate.

What’s the point in all this?

The MPAA and RIAA don’t want their products on file-sharing networks and they use these warning emails to deter people from sharing these files with others. Since it’s much cheaper (and effective) than suing people, this is now their strategy of choice. Using news outlets to spread their doom and gloom scenarios is just part of their operation.

In the future the amount of warnings they send out to alleged infringers will increase and the studios and ISPs will work together to keep the associated operating costs down, if that’s not what they’ve already been doing in their recent meetings. It’s just the old model, scaled up with a rumor or two on top.

Let’s move on already.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

Wesley has a talking ‘tracker watch’ that is able to tap into the power of TorrentSphere when needed, and transform him into TorrentBoy. Together with a laser blaster-carrying, speech-impeded teddy bear named Crash, he defends the world against all evil, including giant leeches.

Although the book isn’t literally about BitTorrent, it is inspired by it says MCM. “The underlying concept of the TorrentSphere is that all people in the world are connected through a massive invisible network, and that the network makes us all smarter and better people.

“It’s BitTorrent philosophy, but very abstracted. Then again, TorrentBoy battles giant leeches. Take from that what you will,” the author adds.

The book is a pleasure to read, and certainly not just for kids. It has a Creative Commons license, which means that people are free to add, edit, remix and share the book for non-commercial use. In fact, the author encourages readers to do so with the TorrentBoy project that was launched in addition to the book.

With the project MCM hopes to get a swarm of people involved in the TorrentBoy series. The best ideas will get licensed, and those who help out will of course get their share of the revenue generated. All is explained in the video at the bottom of this article.

‘TorrentBoy: Zombie World!’ can be downloaded for free, but a paperback and e-book (.epub) version are also sold on Amazon, Barnes and Noble and other book stores. TorrentBoy has to be on BitTorrent of course, so we’ve uploaded a torrent to Mininova as well.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

BarTor uses the web interface of the BitTorrent client running on your computer, and it even supports multiple clients for people who have more than one BitTorrent client they need to send torrents to.

The torrents start downloading right away and when you arrive at home, the music, movie or software will be done downloading and ready to use. It can’t get much easier. BarTor’s functionality is very similar to the Torrent Droid app we reported on before, but BarTor is the first to become available to the public.

The only downside is that the app is not available for free. It’s currently being sold in the Android Market for $2.99. Just like with most iPhone apps, however, it probably wont take long before it appears on BitTorrent sites itself.

Justin, the developer of the application told TorrentFreak that he is well aware of this threat to his business model and understands that his target audience is likely to pirate the application itself.

“I am sure it will happen and although i’d like it not to, there isn’t a whole lot I can do about it. I feel that there are a lot of people out there who will be willing to pay the nominal fee for this app,” he told us.

For people who prefer to buy the product instead, BarTor also works with Google Base’s product search. For every search it will return a list of retailers that sell the product, including the location and the price. Not free, but you might still save a few bucks.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

A recent post by isoHunt founder Gary Fung inspired us to run a poll. We know that TorrentFreak readers might not be representative of the average file sharer, but we would love to find out why you use BitTorrent. The following poll has four answer options, based on the four types file-sharer, as described by Lawrence Lessig in his book Free Culture.

The options are as follows.

1. Because it’s free

Some use BitTorrent to download music, movies and software so they don’t have to pay for them. Instead of purchasing a CD or buying a DVD, they prefer to download it for free on BitTorrent.

2. To ‘try before I buy

The second type uses BitTorrent mainly to sample content and try before they buy. They download music to discover new artists and might end up buying the album if they like it. Similarly, they try software or download movies but buy them when they live up to their expectations.

3. Because I can’t get it elsewhere

The third group mainly downloads content they can’t get elsewhere. The TV-show that it not on TV in your country yet, or that song you can’t buy easily online without having to deal with all kinds of digital restrictions.

4. To download ‘legal’ torrents

The last type of file-sharer mainly downloads content that the creator wants to share for free, often indicated by the misleading term ‘legal torrents’. Music from Jamendo for example, or films that are ok to share.

So where do you fit in? Let us know.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

The Pirate Bay trial started on February 16 with lots of press coverage, protesting pirates and people handing out free candy. As the days went by, plenty of information was presented by both the prosecution and defense.

So which elements are most relevant, and which side is ahead in the polls?

On day two of the trial the prosecutor announced that half of the charges against the four defendants had been dropped. The prosecutor couldn’t prove that the .torrent files that were submitted as evidence actually used The Pirate Bay’s tracker, and he had to let go of all charges that accused the Pirate Bay folks of ‘assisting copyright infringement’.

What remained is the claim that they were ‘assisting in making copyright content available’. Armed with several screenshots of web pages and torrents downloading films and music albums, the prosecution argued that this was indeed the case. The torrent files hosted on The Pirate Bay allow people to download and share copyrighted material – period – they argued.

The crucial part here of course is whether the defendants actually ‘assisted’ in making any files available, this will eventually be up to the judge to decide. The prosecution has shown that there are indeed torrent files hosted on The Pirate Bay, and that some of these indirectly link to copyrighted material. However, whether the defendants are assisting in making copyright content available remains doubtful.

The defense has argued that they are not ‘assisting’, and dragged a giant primate into court to prove it. On the third day of the trial Carl Lundström’s lawyer, Per E Samuelsson pointed out that the prosecution failed to prove that Lundström had been involved in any transfers of any copyrighted material. This became known as the now famous King Kong defense.

“The admins of The Pirate Bay don’t initiate transfers. It’s the users that do and they are physically identifiable people. They call themselves names like King Kong,” Samuelsson told the court.

“According to legal procedure, the accusations must be against an individual and there must be a close tie between the perpetrators of a crime and those who are assisting. This tie has not been shown. The prosecutor must show that Carl Lundström has personally interacted with the user King Kong, who may very well be found in the jungles of Cambodia,” the lawyer added.

During the days that followed both sides tried to strengthen their case, but not much that was actually related to the ‘assisting in making available’ charges that are central to the case. The prosecution brought in more screenshots and some actual torrent files as evidence, and tried to get a better grip on the Pirate Bay’s anarchic ‘management’ structure.

The defense on the other hand, argued that there are many ways to share torrent files online. By playing a video in court they showed that The Pirate Bay is just one of many torrent trackers, and a tiny part of the download chain. One of the witnesses, Kristoffer Schollin from Gothenburg University, told the court that the Pirate Bay is an “open database” of .torrent files which he described as simply an advanced type of hyperlink.

In addition to detailing the charges, there was further debate on the damages claims from last week. While music and movie industry insiders claimed that piracy was responsible for a large part of the decline in sales of their respective industries, media professor Wallis told the court that the file-sharing is actually beneficial to the entertainment industry.

It is now up to the judge to review all the information presented by both parties and decide whether the defendants are guilty of ‘assisting in making copyright content available’.

If the decision was based purely on a big win via the media during the trial, there can be no question that The Pirate Bay won a decisive victory and proved to be even more popular than ever expected. However, as it stands, it’s difficult to find anyone – no matter where their preferences lie – who is willing to step out and say who they believe is going to prevail in the case overall.

What is pretty much certain is that this won’t end with the verdict that is due on April 17. No matter what the outcome it seems unthinkable that either side will accept a defeat. An appeal seems almost inevitable.

Stay tuned.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

Answering questions from the defense, Schollin explained that .torrent files are a more sophisticated type of Internet link (such as an http hyperlink) and that The Pirate Bay is an “open database” of .torrent files. Several large companies are using BitTorrent technology said Schollin, including Blizzard who use it for World of Warcraft.

When asked about TPB specifically, Schollin noted that the site is essentially a BBS (Bulletin Board) for .torrent files, attached to a forum for debate. He was also asked, in his opinion, if TPB is illegal. “That’s for the court to decide,” he said, while noting that the technology behind the site is not illegal in any way.

Schollin told the court that The Pirate Bay may not be the world’s largest tracker, but it is the most famous one, largely thanks to the media and thanks to the trial. Right now there are maybe a dozen other big ones and maybe even a thousand others, he said.

Going on, he noted it is usually sites that are known to users, while trackers can operate behind the scenes, not seen by the regular users. The day of the very big torrent site may be over, he added, and said he believes the future could lie in meta-searches, while explaining how client-based searches like Vuze’s operate.

When asked about the type of content indexed on TPB, Schollin said, “My God, everything,” noting that both copyright and copyright-free material can be found.

When speaking with Carl Lundstom’s lawyer Per E Samuelsson, Schollin admitted that while searching for .torrents via Google (using Harry Potter as an example) more results could be found than with TPB’s search alone. Indeed, said Schollin, EU law documents are easier for him to find via Google than they are on the EU’s own website.

The so-called King Kong defense also resurfaced, with Samuelsson asking Schollin if it was possible to conclude that the torrent file uploaded by user ‘KingKong’ was first published on TPB. Schollin said it was not possible.

Touching again on the issue of whose actual tracker is used when a torrent file is activated, Schollin said that just because a .torrent is available on TPB, it doesn’t automatically follow that the file uses TPB’s tracker.

Schollin went on to explain how to make a .torrent file which links to content. He said that in the creation stage, it doesn’t even require an Internet connection and everything is done on the user’s PC with a torrent client, not on TPB. Once created the .torrent file could be uploaded on to the Internet. It would then be indexed by Google, which then allows anyone to access the .torrent via a Google search.

Then it was Prosecutor Håkan Roswall’s turn to question Schollin. He put it to Schollin that kudos could be achieved in file-sharing circles if an individual put pre-release material up on the Internet, a point with which Schollin agreed.

Roswall asked Schollin why he felt the TPB had grown so big and so popular. Schollin said that many users may feel that participation might be considered ‘cool’. The discussion again moved back to DHT (Distributed Hash Table) and then the court took a break.

On return, IFPI lawyer Peter Danowsky stepped up to question Kristoffer Schollin. He asked where Schollin’s interest in TPB began and he replied it started when there was lots of discussion about them on the Internet. Conversation moved to Schollin’s knowledge of TPB’s infamous ‘legal’ page and the ideology of some of its users.

Next up to question Schollin was Monique Wadsted, representing the movie companies. She asked Schollin if he had heard the rumor that 40% of the Internet’s traffic is down to TPB. Schollin said this was incorrect and it was more likely that they were responsible for 40% of all BitTorrent traffic. Wadsted then put it to Schollin that 50% of all the world’s .torrent files sit on TPB, and he denied this amount too, but recognized that there would be a significant number.

Schollin was then asked by the defense if he believed that TPB has a role in transmitting communications on the Internet. Schollin agreed it did. When asked if TPB might be considered a ’service provider’ under the law, he said that was for the court to decide.

Up next as a witness was Roger Wallis. Wallis is a media professor, composer and Chairman of the Swedish Composers of Popular Music and is involved in other outfits dedicated to the rights of musicians. However, Wallis previously said that he did not see the difference between TPB and other search engines such as Google and has criticized the music industry for being too slow adopting technology.

Speaking with Peter Altin, (Peter Sunde’s lawyer), Wallis said he specializes in developing the music industry on the Internet and because of this some have incorrectly drawn the assumption that he works for the industry – he doesn’t.

Wallis referred to a report he wrote which detailed the music industry’s approach to digital technology. He said there were elements who would do anything to smother it, referring to the backlash against cassette tapes in the 1970’s.

Altin asked Wallis if there is any connection between illicit downloads and lost sales in the music industry. Contradicting the opinion of John Kennedy of the IFPI in his testimony yesterday, Wallis said that downloading caused an increase in sales of live event tickets and although there has been a reduction in CD sales, this won’t continue.

Wallis went on to explain that while some people download, these people also tend to buy more CDs than others that don’t. It’s not just downloading causing competition for the industry, other things have an effect such as the growth of computer games, he said.

Wallis believes the music industry is shooting itself in the foot by going after file-sharers, for the reasons mentioned in the previous paragraph. He said that on the whole, file-sharing is beneficial to the music and movie industries, pointing out that the movie industry just had its most successful year ever. But the music industry doesn’t help itself he argues. Anyone who has bought a Beatles single in the past, simply cannot buy the same single in the digital domain due to licensing issues. “This is madness,” he said.

Next up to question Wallis was Peter Danowsky, who immediately started to annoy him by questioning his credentials. Danowsky mused if Wallis was even a proper professor, while disputing the year when Wallis qualified as such, calling him into doubt and criticizing him. “Have you no better questions to ask?” Wallis replied, reportedly visibly annoyed.

With tempers starting to fray, the court took a break.

After the break media professor Roger Wallis was questioned by Henrik Pontén from Sweden’s Anti-Piracy Office. Pontén went on where Danowsky left off and asked the professor if he could elaborate a bit more on how he acquired his title. “Can you use Google? Wallis replied “Then you could easily find my CV,” he added, and the court agreed with his assessment that they have already been over this.

Pontén then showed some graphs from a study that showed that 18% of those who download copyrighted music buy less, while only 8% indicate to buy more. These figures cause some confusion in court, and Wallis responded by saying that these figures do not correspond with his findings. “I believe that it has no relevance,” Wallis added. The prosecution asks some more questions about the contradicting results of the other study, but Wallis doesn’t want to go into it.

When Wallis left the stand he was asked whether he wanted compensation for his appearance. “You are welcome to send some flowers to my wife,” he responded.

Defendant Peter Sunde then asked the court if it’s ok to show an 8 minute clip that explains how BitTorrent works. The defense explains that the film will show that none of the alleged criminal offenses actually took place since torrent files can be shared in many ways. Fredrik Neij, one of the other defendants, further said that the SLK investigation was flawed because not all the torrents that were presented as evidence are exclusively tracked by TPB.

After a short break the film was played (available for download here) and it showed how a torrent is created. First a BitTorrent is downloaded. To make the torrent a tracker has to be added, hundreds of trackers can be found through Google the film explained. It further explained how these torrent files can be shared through MSN, Skype, through blogs like Wordpress or a website such as The Pirate Bay. The other party can then grab the torrent and start downloading.

The rest of the day the court will go over the personal charges against Fredrik Neij and Gottfrid Svartholm. These are seperate cases, not related to TPB, and we will therefore not cover these on TorrentFreak. Our daily coverage on the proceedings in the TPB trial will continue on Monday.

Developing story, please check back for updates.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

“Right now, society is developing at a fantastic pace. That is immensely wonderful and everyone involved is having fun. Let us try and make it a good development,” said Johan Allgoth of the Pirate Bureau.

The cheerful spirit was not only due to the events in the first week of the trial (where the prosecution repeatedly failed to present any evidence) but also down to a supply of free champagne for all pirates in attendance.

“The Pirate Bureau operated for many years without economic resources and that was a very good way for us to work. Lately, we’ve had some money coming into the organization and we needed to put it to good use. Buying champagne for great people is definitely a good way to channel our resources, paying the poor artist another way,” Johan Allgoth told us.

The Pirate Bureau has had a busy week in Stockholm, doing their part in the performance of the Spectrial theater. Their headquarters have been located in the S23K bus, parked outside the court. From the bus they created audio visual art, published op-eds and streamed impromptu parties with everyone welcome to participate.

Anyone with an instrument could come by the bus and add their piece to a composition called “Düsseldorf versus Bochum“, a recording which was premiered at yesterday’s party. Support for the pirate movement has never been so massive as it has this week, even coming from the Stockholm police.

“Late Wednesday night, we had some problems with the police because there had been complaints about the electrical generator outside the bus being noisy. The situation was resolved in 2 seconds and the police actually said they support us. Even the very people who are to uphold law and order love The Pirate Bay, doesn’t that tell something about the absurdity of the trial?” Allgoth said.

There was also political support for the defendants. During yesterday’s party The Pirate Bay was given the Freedom Prize by Swedish Moderate Party’s youth organization. Most importantly, however, the party offered some time to relax after hours in court, or listening to and translating the trial’s audio streams for days.

Last night, artists Ollibolli, Tobias Bernstrup and Goto80 played live. On the walls were projections of the IRC channel so party-goers could see The Pirate Bay torrents being posted real-time. There was also video art made of the movies whose supposed sharing is cause for the prosecution in the trial.

As evening turned into night, brokep entered the DJ booth to keep the pirates dancing. Whether or not an anti-pirate party from the opposing side would have been successful is doubtful.

“I do not think the anti-pirates are partying tonight, I believe they are sweating. But we’d welcome them with open arms here. I think especially Henrik Pontén and Monique Wadstedt would make great additions to the party. Some of the more aggressive copyright-coterists wouldn’t fit here.”

“There are rules on how to behave, in nightclubs as well as on the Internet, and the way some of them behave they would probably be thrown out by the bouncers from the nightclub. And from the Internet.”

All in all it has been an exciting week for all the spectrial followers, most of who also actively participated. The party (more pics) was well deserved and turned out to be a great success. On Tuesday the trial will continue, and we will make sure to keep you updated on the latest developments.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

Carl Lundström’s lawyer Per E Samuelsson continued with his client’s defense, reiterating the weakness of the links between him and the other defendants, and The Pirate Bay operation as a whole. Samuelsson also pointed to Lundström’s email correspondence in 2005 with Gottfrid and Fredrik, where they discussed the possibility of having to move the site to another country. This, he said, was an indication that the defendants kept an eye on the changes in the law and were mindful that they should operate legally within it.

In the meantime, it came to the court’s attention that Tobias Andersson, a future witness in the case, was sitting in the court. He was asked to leave the room, with permission to continue listening on the audio feed next door. He will testify later on.

After a break, the court’s attention switched to Fredrik Neij (TiAMO). The court heard that Fredrik was never a member of Piratbyran and he had no ideological motivation to join TPB. Instead, Fredrik was attracted to the site by the BitTorrent technology. He joined to “..play with The Pirate Bay, just as I wanted,” he said.

The defense said that Fredrik was always mindful of the law and had a desire to operate within it, consulting lawyers to ensure his activities were legal.

In a reference to companies like MediaDefender, Fredrik noted that “anti-p2p companies access our tracker and manipulate our statistics.” He said that although a torrent may have only been uploaded once, these anti-p2p activities inflate the stats on the tracker to indicate that more transfers took place than in reality.

Fredrik was then questioned about his relationship with advertiser Oded Daniel. When the prosecution asked if Oded was involved in the technical aspects of TPB, Fredrik replied.. “No, he’s not good at that. He uses Windows, so…” There was laughter heard on the live audio feed after that remark, not from the court room, but from the listening lounge next door where the bloggers are situated.

Fredrik was asked about the significance of the site’s name, but shrugged and repeated that his interest is merely in the technology.

Fredrik was further questioned by Håkan Roswall, with the Prosecutor pointing out that during his police interview, Fredrik admitted that there may be links to copyright works on TPB. Fredrik said he knew about these due to the legal complaints the site received, noting that the complaints referred only to inapplicable US laws. He went on to deny having received any of these personally, but while he admitted he seen them, he denied creating any of the infamous responses.

Roswall asked Fredrik if he had ever been a seeder on the site. Fredrik admitted to seeding torrents but noted that he only did this with copyright-free material.

When questioned about the situation of some torrents being removed from the site due to bad labeling, the court heard from the defense that TPB site is uncensored, with thousands of new torrents added every day and it is an impossible task to review them all. The tracker is completely open and anyone can and does add to it regularly, completely without any input or correspondence with TPB staff.

Just before lunch, Monique Wadsted for the movie companies took over questioning Fredrik. After a discussion over the way emails are handled at The Pirate Bay, out of the blue she began to introduce new evidence which had not previously been disclosed to the defense, in what is being viewed as an attempt to unsettle Fredrik.

She asked about Fredrik’s connections to other torrent sites, namely OscarTorrents and EurovisionTorrents and he denied being personally connected to them. Noting the breach of protocol, the judge asked if it was acceptable for the court to be considering evidence that was not already presented pre-trial. Monique Wadsted tried to shout down the judge, but that didn’t really help much. The court then took a break.

After the lunch break IFPI’s lawyer Peter Danowsky continued with Fredrik’s questioning. He tried to pin something on him, but Fredrik pointed out that the email he’s referring to is a reply, and that the quotes mean that he didn’t write that part of the email.

Fredrik’s lawyer is next up to ask questions, and the prosecution was educated on the subject of open BitTorrent trackers, BitTorrent swarms and the fact that torrent files can be distributed through means other than the TPB, like email or FTP.

Then the Prosecutor handed over a printed page from TPB and said: “This is a printout from a part of your web page. You call this a screenshot?” Fredrik answered: “This isn’t a screenshot, just a printed page.” Fredrik then explains what’s on the print (a Pink Panther torrent), and how the upload process on TPB works.

Next it’s Gottfrid’s turn to answer questions. The prosecution emphasizes the financial issues, and specifically the link with Oded. When asked if Gottfrid was in charge of ad sales he answered: “No, I tried to get away from that because of time issues. I had a business to run before you came and took it all away.”

The prosecution further questioned Gottfrid about moderation issues, replies to copyright holders and his involvement in developing the site. The prosecutor pushed hard on whether Peter Sunde had worked on the layout and graphics for the site. “To my knowledge, he is neither designer nor graphic artist,” Gottfried replied.

Wadsted later asked Gottfrid how they handle torrents that (allegedly) link to child porn. He said that in such a case they would inform the police. She then asked if they removed those torrents. He said “some”. “Not all?” was Wadsted’s reply. Gottfrid explained that it is not up to them to investigate crimes, but that they do inform the police. “We can’t do investigations of our own. And if the police say we should remove a torrent, we will,” he said.

Gottfrid further said that Peter Sunde has nothing to do with technical administration, design, layout, ad sales or any hands-on stuff with the site. He’s just been a spokesperson for The Pirate Bay. “Neither me or Neij work well in furnished rooms. Peter was better on the verbal issues and media,” he said.

Around 4 PM the Prosecutor announced that he wanted to bring in additional evidence, some actual torrent files on a diskette (he probably meant CD). The Prosecutor demanded a statement on it at 9 in the morning tomorrow. The defense wasn’t too happy about this, and Gottfrid demanded all torrents instead of four.

Update:Just a passing thought…..While Wadsted may have thought she was being clever mentioning possible child porn tracked by The Pirate Bay earlier, it’s not beyond reason that when Gottfrid said that they don’t remove all such torrents, this could be on the instruction of the police – presumably so they can track any offenders. In this situation, the police must understand that Pirate Bay neither committed any offense, nor encouraged it, nor know the people involved. Is there something important here? I guess the court will decide.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

Among the early adopters of the BitTorrent protocol were several Linux projects, saving thousands of dollars in bandwidth costs. In 2005, Linuxtracker started to aggregate these Linux distributions, and it has been growing steadily over the years, racking up more than 130,000 unique visitors each month.

The site’s server currently tracks more than 40,000 peers and in the past 12 months it coordinated the distribution of 180 terabytes worth of Linux software. TorrentFreak caught up with Mark Angeli, the founder of the site, and we asked him what motivated him to create Linuxtracker.

“I was getting into the BitTorrent ‘movement’ downloading the shows I missed at night while at work. At this time I was also trying out new Linux distributions on a fairly regular basis and while I had decent download speeds, I wanted to find a better way to download and share Linux,” Mark told us.

“Some of the bigger distributions were beginning to use BitTorrent as a means of distribution, but the smaller ones were having a hard time. I wanted to make it easy for them, so I put up a site and a tracker,” he added.

The first Linux torrent Mark uploaded was for Slax 4.2.0. but it was only the beginning. Soon dozen of torrents followed, and with it their community of Linux enthusiasts started to expand. Mark told us that they have some exciting plans for the future, but these remain between him and the other admins of the site for now. One thing he did reveal is that they are looking to add a “lighter” version of the site for those on smaller devices like netbooks and smartphones.

One of the great advantages of the Linuxtracker community is that the seed/leech ratios are extremely good, even though the site doesn’t require users to register. The site is currently celebrating the month of February with some giveaways from their sponsors, so for all the Linux fans who haven’t discovered the site already, it’s well worth checking out.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

In existence since 2006, Fanedit.org is the world’s biggest fanedit site and the people there clearly have a passion for what they do. Visited by around 2000 people every day, members of the site have created dozens of new versions of existing movies such as sci-fi greats Alien, The Matrix, Terminator and Star Trek, and regular movies like Titanic, Harry Potter and Pulp Fiction. However, things started to turn sour for the site recently. TorrentFreak caught up with the admin of Fanedit.org, boon23, for the lowdown.

TF: Please introduce yourself to the readers

boon23: I am boon23, faneditor and administrator of the biggest fanedits website in the world. I’m a preschool teacher from Europe and as faneditor I post under the name CBB (created by boon) and have so far created 29 fanedits, which is quite a lot. It is my hobby, my art, the thing I really love to do and will continue to do.

TF: Tell us a little about fanediting.

boon23: It’s actually a bit like creating a mix music CD or deleting tracks from a music album, but even more like remixing music to your own liking. Creating fanedits is a desire as old as movies themselves. People love to make things more their own or enjoy a variation on the original.

TF: How long have people been sharing fanedits online?

boon23: The online sharing of fanedits started 2004 with the fanedit: The Phantom Edit, a fanedit by Mike Nichols based on The Phantom Menace (SW Episode 1). It was shared millions of times, because people had such a big desire for a grown up version of that movie. The latest incredibly successful fanedit is Adywan’s Star Wars Revisited, which corrected every little flaw from the 2004 release of A New Hope. New special effects, sharper image, better and corrected coloring, new and improved scenes, new music, additional and corrected sound effects. It was created by one guy in 2 years, in which he did nothing else but work on this project.

Fanediting is strictly non commercial (on fanedit.org). We expect everyone interested in a fanedit to buy and own the original movie, have links for that on every page and ban and report everyone that tries to sell a fanedit. With this we are trying to keep it as legal as possible.

TF: The MPAA don’t like what happens on the site. When did you first hear that they had the site in the cross-hairs?

boon23: Three days ago I heard for the first time from them through my webhost, who was contacted by them. They filed a DMCA complaint and wanted two pages containing loads of Rapidshare download links removed. They did not get into detail, or say which fanedits were concerned. Both pages contained links to five or more fanedited movies.

TF: What exactly is their complaint?

boon23: Their problem is that people are sharing movies for free and they do not earn money from that, even if those movies are not the original versions. They see a copyright infringement in this, despite our warnings and disclaimers for legality. The MPAA demands are not clear yet.

TF: Not all studios have a huge problem with the site – tell us about Lucasfilm.

boon23: Lucasfilm tolerated and accepted fan films. A year ago we were contacted by their anti-piracy department regarding one fanedit they wanted to be removed, but they clearly stated that they had looked through the entire website and did not find anything offensive – and fanedit.org has about 80!!! Star Wars fanedits!

TF: You had a BitTorrent tracker on Fanedit.org, could you tell us more about that?

boon23: We used TorrentTrader but linked from it to external torrents only. No torrent was ever transferred by our own tracker. On the tracker we had about 400 torrent links to fanedits.

TF: Is this the first threatened legal action against the site?

boon23: Fanedit.org started in 2006 and we have not had any kind of legal problem before (except for the small and rather positive incident with Lucasfilm). The page was never private and open for all search engines.

TF: What steps are you taking in the face of these MPAA threats?

boon23: Dreamhost has informed us of the consequences – being shut down, lawsuit filing etc, so that is why we are taking down all the download links from Fanedit.org and the according forum now, which is an incredible amount of work. We deactivated our tracker yesterday and cannot bring it up again on this webhost.

TF: Thanks for taking the time to speak with us, and good luck in the future.

Boon23 told us that he feels this MPAA action is a serious blow against an artform that is not harming the industry and was certainly never based on anything commercial, and he is saddened that this previously-tolerated ‘gray area’ (such as with Lucasfilm) has now come to an end.

Time will tell what the future is for Fanedit.org and fanedits in general. In the meantime, it seems clear that a US-based host is causing difficulties for the site, which may have to relocate in order to survive. Any offers of hosting will be gratefully received.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

The report caused quite a stir, with dedicated Repo! fans, known as the ‘Repo Army’, angry at BitTorrent users for “stealing” their soundtrack (more about why this is so important to them later) and BitTorrent users angry at the Repo! fans for trying to mess up their torrent sites with fakes.

Director Darren Bousman has since told his fans to leave BitTorrent alone, and there even some torrent users having friendly chats on the Repo! forums now. To see things from ‘the other side’, we caught up with Darren to find out exactly why this soundtrack is so important to the Repo! fans.

TF: Please introduce yourself to the TorrentFreak readers.

dlb: Most of you know me from the SAW films. But long before SAW I was directing this little stage play called Repo! The Genetic Opera. It was the first thing I ever read that spoke to me. I have been fighting to get it made [as a movie] ever since. It’s been a long long road – and only now, after the success of three SAW films am I able to get Repo! off the ground.

TF: What makes it so different to your previous work?

dlb: Repo! to me was about doing something completely different. I had directed three sequels. I am proud of the SAW films, but I wanted to do something unique. Repo! is that. A lot of people will hate Repo!, a lot will love it. I will admit it’s polarizing. But I wouldn’t have it any other way. Repo! is so different than SAW in every single aspect. I hope people give it a chance, and don’t prejudge it because of certain cast members they may dislike, or on the mere fact people ’sing’ in it.

TF: You’ve gone on record saying that you feel very protective of the movie, as if watching over a child’s first day at school, and that’s understandable. The actual movie comes out on November 7th, however, you asked the fans to concentrate on ‘protecting’ the soundtrack instead. Could you explain why this soundtrack is so crucial to you, your fans and the upcoming movie?

dlb: I am not some muti-millionaire – and sales of this album will affect me personally. I have been begging and pleading to get this movie made since 2001. I have fought, burned bridges, sacrificed relationships, and even ended relationships all based on Repo! Why? Because I believe in the project so much. I put all my resources into making this movie. However through the entire course of making it I was told IT WOULDN’T work, that there wasn’t an audience for this. I have been met with constant opposition. At one point there was talk of not even releasing a soundtrack. I fought, screamed and fought some more to get this small release we have – on Amazon, iTunes and other downloadable sites. This was a way to gauge the interest in the film. I did this to show all the nay-sayers LOOK at our numbers. Look at the reactions.

TF: You told Alternative Film Guide that Repo! was so weird, out of the box, and avant garde that people didn’t know what to make of it. It sounds like getting people outside the mainstream familiar with the movie might be a challenge. How would you feel if thousands downloaded this soundtrack for free via BitTorrent but a proportion of those loved it and turned up at the theater as a paying customer?

dlb: I wish it worked like this but for this film it doesn’t. That’s why I had the reaction I did when I heard it was being downloaded for free. The release of Repo! is only in 6 theaters. SIX THEATERS. Even if I sold out EVERY single show – in every single city – for the entire run, it still wouldn’t make the money it needs to make. Sales of the soundtrack are the only way to prove if this film registered with fans. Our hope was – the sales would be so good on the soundtrack – we would get more theaters. More screens, more showing. Repo! will not be in the majority of cities, or countries. Its only in three cities. THREE CITIES. This album was our way of showing those in charge there is an audience for this.

TF: Could you tell us about your hugely dedicated fans, the ‘Repo! Army’ ?

dlb: These are the greatest fans I have ever come across – the most loyal people I think I will ever meet. These people weren’t hired by me. They found Repo! A good portion of the Repo! Army has seen the movie through various festivals. And the movie spoke to them. Since I don’t have the support of most movies – I turn to them to help spread the word. I never realized how passionate they were until recently when they turned out in droves to Austin Texas to see a screening of Repo! They are as passionate about Repo! as your users are about file sharing.

TF: Of course, BitTorrent fans can spread the word for you too. An interesting group have been vocal in emails to TorrentFreak – the Repo! fans who are also BitTorrent users. Are you surprised that some of your fans in the ‘Repo Army’ are buying your material with a passion, yet appear to be using BitTorrent too?

dlb: No, not at all. I am sure tons of people use these sites. The sad fact with Repo! is that every person who purchases the album for $9.99 is making a big statement. And these statements are going to be be the difference between Repo! playing in six theaters, or seven. To the mass population this will seem trivial – but for us, who have very little support or marketing. One paid download is huge.

TF: Thanks for speaking with us Darren, and we wish you well with the movie.

The brief storm that blew up between the opposing groups has largely died down now, after being dampened by Darren’s request to his fans to stop actions against torrents. After much correspondence with Darren it seems clear to us that he never really intended to hurt BitTorrent, but acted passionately in his role as the ‘protective father’ of the movie, not as some greedy corporate fat cat.

Darren told TorrentFreak that he was sorry that his actions offended some BitTorrent users, adding “Just understand, we are not the studio system. We are not the major corporation. We are a group of people who have been fighting to get something made only to see it released in just 6 theaters.”

It’s not hard to see why this movie and its soundtrack has raised such passions, when years of planning, investment and dreams rest on the success of such a small release window. However, in the absence of a huge marketing investment by Lions Gate, the movie will live or die by word of mouth and magnitude of Internet ‘buzz’.

Big named movies and albums gain less from the publicity offered by piracy than smaller productions desperate for exposure, so at least on the surface, Repo! seems an ideal candidate to benefit. It will be interesting to see how much success this movie gets, and if the piracy situation mirrors that. Hopefully, if the Repo! soundtrack does get downloaded a lot – and loved – those six theaters will be full and extended to more, which can’t fail to boost January’s DVD release.

Of course, when you rely on companies like Lions Gate to get even 6 theaters, admitting that piracy might help isn’t going to go down too well.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

Bousman details his brilliant plan in the forum post:

People will copy and burn the REPO CD and put it out on the web on something called TORRENT SITES. What this means to the movie is devastating. Basically – those who MIGHT have bought the soundtrack will instead download it for free… Thus hurting the soundtrack, and the movie. So what can you do?

Upload FAKE REPO albums to TORRENT sites under the REPO name. Meaning basically people will go online to a TORRENT site and try to search for REPO. They will find it – but alas it wont be REPO. It will be something else… If enough people do this – it becomes harder to STEAL the album.

Pain, something found in abundance in the Saw movies, was evident in the disorganized battle-plan that followed. Technical discussion began, noting the need for a good fake album to have the same number of tracks as the real version. Other suggestions to thwart the evil pirates include renaming and seeding random songs, and uploading audio recordings which preach the importance of buying the album.

After someone pointed out that people would complain about fake torrents in the comments section of torrent sites, solutions offered included the Army posting its own comments saying that the fake isn’t really a fake, and posting on real torrents to say that they were the fakes. Both techniques were doomed to fail before they began.

One of our favorite posts was the user who offered to spam the Ares Galaxy network on her own, and unwittingly came up with the basis of a usable slogan for the fakes campaign: “Wait a minute, did Darren just ask us to essentially Rick-Roll people in the name of Repo? Hell yes.”

Sadly, even with an army of completely well-intentioned and dedicated fans plus a great slogan, victory isn’t guaranteed. After posting some fake torrents on The Pirate Bay, it didn’t take long for the negative comments from regular Pirate Bay users to build up, and the torrents were removed. Despite many attempts by the Army at countering with some fake comments of their own. The ranks of the general public Repo Army went into battle against just a few pirates but were completely unprepared, and suffered a bloody end that would’ve made Jigsaw proud.

One user seemed to be a bit more aware, posting, “You can keep it secret or whatever method you want, it’s not going to work. You can’t fool a pirate that easy, if we just could get scene access and pre it, so it looks real.”

Right now, the fans have regrouped and are currently marking real Demonoid torrents as containing a virus, in order to get them removed. It doesn’t seem to be working.

The Repo Army doesn’t act purely against BitTorrent, since it had been previously ordered to “Attack YouTube” by messaging anyone on the site who uploads any part of the album, and ordering them to take the clip down. Some fans are even creating Repo anti-piracy videos:

In the meantime the fans have ensured that the soundtrack in question, Repo! The Genetic Opera, is currently at 22 in Amazon’s bestsellers chart, largely thanks to 25 five-star reviews, which currently represent 100% of the total reviews on this album. Apparently it’s easier to fool Amazon than the average BitTorrent site.

Thanks to Charax

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

We’ve been reporting on Mininova’s download figures for a while now. In June 2007 Mininova saw its 2 billionth download. This figure has since tripled to 6 billion – an impressive figure for a site that has been around for less than four years.

Over the past months, the downloads have been growing steadily, and today, another record was broken. Over 10 million torrents were downloaded in a single day – 117.6 per second – a rate never achieved before. With many TV-shows debuting today, this has been the busiest day ever on Mininova, and probably on other BitTorrent sites as well.

While the movie and music studios are complaining loudly, TV-shows are getting the most downloads on BitTorrent. On average, half of all the BitTorrent downloads at any given point in time are TV-episodes. The availability of free-streams seems to bring this figure down a little, but only in the US.

Meanwhile, the Mininova team is focusing more on premium publishers. Last year the site launched a content distribution platform where publishers can offer their content to the millions of Mininova visitors without any charge. Mininova users can download these premium files at high speeds, and they even have the option to stream music and video.

Perhaps it’s a good idea if some of the TV publishers go talk to the Mininova team, and get an account there. We’re sure that they are welcome at their new office.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.