Anti-Piracy Outfit Pirates TorrentFreak
Written by Ernesto on November 19, 2007The infamous Dutch anti-piracy organization BREIN has infringed TorrentFreak’s copyright and blatantly copied a quote from one of our articles without attributing the source. TorrentFreak is thus considering legal action against these copy/paste pirates, where they may face a fine of up to $975,000 and several years in prison.
Today, BREIN published a press release (translated) full of half-truths in which they pride themselves over the recent move of SumoTorrent to Canada. In the press release they refer to TorrentFeak as a “pirate weblog”, and use a quote from an interview we did with the SumoTorrent administrator a little over a week ago. However, they do not link back to the original article, they don’t even mention TorrentFreak at all, thereby infringing on our copyright license.
Shocking indeed, who could have ever thought that these noble copyright protectors would be capable of such barbaric practices? Maybe they’ll start stealing children next?
The reason why BREIN didn’t link back to us is obvious, they don’t want the public to read a “pirate weblog” so they would find out what they’re really like. BREIN is known to threaten, intimidate and scare P2P webmasters, and they are pretty successful at it.
Like most other anti-piracy organizations, BREIN is above all a propaganda machine that effectively twists the truth to educate Internet users. They are a puppet of the MPAA and large media corporations and were recently awarded by Hollywood with an anti-piracy Oscar (translated) for its effectiveness. They even have a trophy cabinet in their offices to show off to their visitors.
Unfortunately, BREIN is not the only anti-piracy organization that infringes copyright. In February we reported that the MPAA used “Forest Blog” software without authorization. The software had been completely stripped of his name, and links back to his site, thereby violating the linkware license. The MPAA later said that they were only testing the software. Not that it makes any difference, but why should one (willingly) remove all credits to the developer if it’s only a test?
But the MPAA doesn’t only steal software, they also pirate films. For those who haven’t seen the great documentary “This Film Is Not Yet Rated“, the MPAA openly admitted that they made unauthorized copies themselves. Kirby Dick, the producer of the documentary found out that the film that he submitted for screening purposes was copied without his permission. Say what?
So who’s calling who a pirate here?
Previously: Top Pirate Reveals Warez Scene Secrets, Attracts MPAA Lawyer’s Attention
Next: Finnish FBI Raids Warez Topsites Following MPA, IFPI and BSA Investigation
173 Responses
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Ok, I’ve read all of the comments now. For those of you saying that TorrentFreak is the hypocrite, you obviously are not very familiar about this site. It is a site that delivers NEWS about the torrenting and filesharing aspects of this world we live in. It does NOT endorse torrenting or illegal file sharing, nor can you find any evidence of TorrentFreak as a site breaking any laws. I believe that it is perfectly fair for TorrentFreak to open a lawsuit against BREIN for this copyright infringement (which it is).
“Who’s calling -whom- a pirate?”
(no need to attribute this comment)
“The MPAA later said that they were only testing the software.”
The same way we “test” their shit-ass movies to sort the rare few worth paying for?
Fun joke, but unfortunately, Creative Commons licenses don’t hold up well in court and it is very hard to receive money from damages on infringement of non-registered material.
According to the CC license BRIEN was also supposed to “Share-alike”, but we can’t expect an anti-piracy outfit like them to give something away for free can we?
Obviously, a lawsuit against BREIN is highly improbably, and that’s not because torrentfreak would not win it, but because it will cost tens of thousand of dollars and a few years. And I doubt that site’s owners want that.
The important thing is that they exposed BREIN and now everybody knows about it; its even on digg. That’s more than any lawsuit will ever do.
[quote comment="218552"]Obviously, a lawsuit against BREIN is highly improbable, and that’s not because torrentfreak would not win it, but because it will cost tens of thousand of dollars and a few years. And I doubt that site’s owners want that.
The important thing is that they exposed BREIN and now everybody knows about it; its even on digg. That’s more than any lawsuit will ever do.[/quote]
[quote comment="218530"][Torrentfreak] does NOT endorse torrenting or illegal file sharing [/quote]
LOL! Here’s a few quotes from Torrentfreak blog posts:
“One million uploaded torrents is a great accomplishment … Mininova founder Niek assured us that they are working on [traffic problems] and that it should get better soon.”
“In the meantime, here’s an article that explains how to bypass Comcast’s BitTorrent interference.”
“Featured Articles: Featured Articles: * How to make BitTorrent Transfers Anonymous, * How to Optimize Your BitTorrent Download Speed, * How To Encrypt BitTorrent Traffic, * Start your own BitTorrent tracker”
[quote comment="218553"][quote comment="218552"]Obviously, a lawsuit against BREIN is highly improbable, and that’s not because torrentfreak would not win it, but because it will cost tens of thousand of dollars and a few years. And I doubt that site’s owners want that.
The important thing is that they exposed BREIN and now everybody knows about it; its even on digg. That’s more than any lawsuit will ever do.[/quote][/quote]
+
[quote comment="218556"][quote comment="218530"][Torrentfreak] does NOT endorse torrenting or illegal file sharing [/quote]
LOL! Here’s a few quotes from Torrentfreak blog posts:
“One million uploaded torrents is a great accomplishment … Mininova founder Niek assured us that they are working on [traffic problems] and that it should get better soon.”
“In the meantime, here’s an article that explains how to bypass Comcast’s BitTorrent interference.”
“Featured Articles: Featured Articles: * How to make BitTorrent Transfers Anonymous, * How to Optimize Your BitTorrent Download Speed, * How To Encrypt BitTorrent Traffic, * Start your own BitTorrent tracker”[/quote]
They never told you it was a good idea. There are “how-to”s on the web to learn how to kill people, or to make deadly poisons, but they dont endorse doing so.
Everything on the internet should get the U.S Governments approval before it can ba accessed.
All over some copypasta.
That would make for some pretty boring porn.
[quote comment="218564"]Everything on the internet should get the U.S Governments approval before it can ba accessed.[/quote]
Sounds good… Unfortunately, you’d only be able to access Disney.com if they did :P
What the hell… Sue their ass. :D
[quote comment="218590"][quote comment="218564"]Everything on the internet should get the U.S Governments approval before it can ba accessed.[/quote]
Sounds good… Unfortunately, you’d only be able to access Disney.com if they did :P
:D[/quote]
That’s what they want isn’t it?
Internets going to shit anyway.
OK, so it’s a small quote that they ripped without attributing the source, so what is what is being said by about 40% of the comments above. Hypocrisy and irony is sourced as justification to continue on in a cow–like doe-eyed do-nothing state whilst legal systems and criminal laws around the planet continue their inexorable march away from common law justice towards corporate institutionalism. Well that’s just pathetic at A Time when most of our protections against systemic corporate abuses ARE still in place, ARE under massive attack, and rarely utilized by the individual for the purposes that they were originally drawn up for.
But actually, The point is not only that they infringed on torrent freak’s ‘intellectual property’, It’s that they also did it MALICIOUSLY by SLANDERING the source as a ‘pirate weblog’ thus trying to create the impression that now simply reporting/commenting on developments in the great IP debate that influences our legal systems to the individuals detriment is now somehow illegal or morally underhanded. Every opportunity to defend the safe-guards of the citizenry AGAINST corporatism should be embraced before it’s not just South American and Indian people who have to fight for their rights to even drink water or plant natural seed stock. Corporations and their fascist ‘legal’ arms such as BREIN have, do, and will always threaten, intimidate, and sue the weaker forces that face them because that’s how they set the precedents that they and other corporate forces utilize in the future, getting a bit of control here, and a bit of control there until it all translates as overwhelming power. Seriously, did you ever hear of any corporation dictating and leading criminal raids carried out by a ‘democratic’ state’s police forces prior to this decade? Think about it.
So, take the power that’s yours while you still have it, they stole from you, they infringed the laws, and they would sue or intimidate you into shutting down your site and thus your voice if the roles were reversed. And the basis of the argument that it was a ‘factual’ quote is complete imbecilic crap. It was the guys stated opinion even if he went further and had been quoted as saying ‘it’s a fact’ because apart from the obvious, when did anyone ever have the income sheets of every torrent site on the net? He didn’t so it is just his stated opinion.
STAND UP.
Sue those assholes!
kIRBY dICK, EH?
No Doubt
*chats* SUE THEM SUE THEM SUE THEM
*chants**
[quote comment="218558"][quote comment="218556"][quote comment="218530"][Torrentfreak] does NOT endorse torrenting or illegal file sharing [/quote]
LOL! Here’s a few quotes from Torrentfreak blog posts:
“One million uploaded torrents is a great accomplishment … Mininova founder Niek assured us that they are working on [traffic problems] and that it should get better soon.”
“In the meantime, here’s an article that explains how to bypass Comcast’s BitTorrent interference.”
“Featured Articles: Featured Articles: * How to make BitTorrent Transfers Anonymous, * How to Optimize Your BitTorrent Download Speed, * How To Encrypt BitTorrent Traffic, * Start your own BitTorrent tracker”[/quote]
They never told you it was a good idea. There are “how-to”s on the web to learn how to kill people, or to make deadly poisons, but they dont endorse doing so.[/quote]
Even more so, torrents aren’t illegal. Therefore endorsing torrents is not illegal.
Here’s How I see it… Sure, many of you may argue “it’s just a small quote how can it be CC infringement?” or that it’s pointless etc. the fact of the matter is size of the quote doesn’t matter. This is refered to a special type of CC Infringement… it’s called Plagerism… Did you know you can get kicked out of college for copying something trivial such as a statistic of how many chemicals are in cigarette smoke if you don’t cite your source example: According to the American Medical journal xyz… there are X number of chemicals… now lets say I just wrote a paper and said “with over X number of chemicals in a cigarette” did you know just having the damn NUMBER alone is enough to be brought up on criminal charges???
Wow… This sounds familiar… HD-DVD Key anyone? 09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56…. etc… not gonna list the whole thing… but remember how many people got threatened with lawsuits / takedown notices for POSTING A NUMBER…
The point is… They did not cite where they got it from, they did not use MLA, or APA, heck screw all that shit… they didn’t even mention torrentfreak, instead they twisted the facts around and completely plagerized… I say Torrentfreak *should* complain and make their valid arguement as I know they’d have no problem if Torrentfreak forgot to quote CNN or MSNBC, or ABC, etc… god forbid TorrentFreak forgot to cite one of them… wow…
BTW, I saw a manager at McDonalds yesterday as he took the 35mm Camera away from a child and broke it in half… the mother was outraged and started demanding an explination… his reasoning was “The interior of this restaurant is copyrighted. by photographing it, the film and photo becomes the property of McDonalds Corporation.” he then proceeded to pull out a corporate notice explaining that video cameras and still cameras would not be allowed inside Mcdonalds restaurants and showed a “you tube” type video player with a Mcdonalds employee smiling in the window… he then explained to the lady that if he allowed her to keep the camera she would be facing criminal copyright infringement lawsuits.
What is this world coming to?
The worlds going to hell. We’ll all be forced to release our wages to corporations soon so we are allowed to live in their corporate owned land.
This is going to get much, much worse.
Most people are complacent and won’t do anything, but bit by bit peoples rights are taken away.
Nothing can be done to stop it i fear, as there just are too many people who can’t see the real picture.
O God, afraid to say these idiots live in my country…
Happily they do offer a form on their site to report piracy (http://www.anti-piracy.nl/meld_piraterij/meld_piraterij.asp), so I suggest we all put down their act of piracy right there.
Mind you, I’d do it from an internet cafe, not from my own computer…
Plagiarism does not apply here.
For starters, plagiarism is claiming the work to be your own, not simply “forgetting” to cite.
Secondly, penalties for plagiarism at colleges and in journalism only apply to students and journalists. The fact that you can be kicked out of college or lose your job as a journalist does not mean anything in law.
If there is any recourse, it would be through a copyright infringement suit, and it’s unlikely it would be found as anything other than fair use.
Doesn’t matter anyway, they cited the original author of the quote, the owner of sumotorrent.
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