TorrentFreak

A few days after top lawyer Robert Bennett announced he would defend MegaUpload vigorously in their upcoming trial, he has been forced to withdraw from the case. A source says that this drastic decision was made because the case conflicts with the interests of another client of Bennett’s law firm Hogan Lovells. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to conclude that the pressure most likely came from the entertainment industry.

Two of the largest Internet providers in the Netherlands clashed in court with the local anti-piracy outfit BREIN today. The ISPs argued that blocking The Pirate Bay would be useless, even dangerous, as it could take down the entire network. In addition they feel that this type of censorship violates basic human rights such as freedom of expression. BREIN disputed these concerns and said that the ISPs want to keep The Pirate Bay online because they profit from the site.

Earlier this year convicted movie cammer Timothy Epifan filed a lawsuit against Somerset County police and the MPAA for arresting him with deadly force and breaking his leg. The case is still ongoing, but Epifan has struck a deal with the Hollywood group meaning that the MPAA has been dropped from the lawsuit.

A prominent lawyer involved in the ever-growing pay-up-or-else anti-filesharing schemes in the United States has been admonished and punished by a judge. Evan Stone had asked the whether he could contact ISPs in order to discover the identities of alleged file-sharers, but the court said he’d have to wait. Stone ignored the court but was ultimately found out, which resulted in him picking up a $10,000 fine.

Audio DRM has all but dissapeared from MP3s. Apple said earlier this year that there would be no more DRM on music available via the ITunes music store. However, as prolific writer and blogger Cory Doctorow has found out, they still require DRM on their Audiobooks.

Day six of the copyright infringement trial between anti-piracy group AFACT and Aussie ISP iiNet. In addition to ongoing cross-examination of a DtecNet anti-piracy boss, a forensic investigator and veteran of the KaZaA case took the stand, admitting that an IP address alone is insufficient to identify an exact individual.

Back in 2007, the Z-Cult FM comic book tracker experienced difficulties when it came under legal pressure from Marvel and DC Comics to remove torrents linking to their copyright works. The site complied and extended this service to other publishers but in the end, this courtesy ended up draining the life from the site.