TorrentFreak

Last week file-sharing site Megaupload found itself at the center of a huge controversy. After some of the world’s leading artists endorsed its service, Universal Music forced the song offline and was met with widespread accusations of censorship. Today TorrentFreak hands its Sunday guest slot to Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom, who tells us the row with Universal started much earlier than we thought….

Last week, Megaupload’s Mega Song was on its way to becoming a viral hit, only to be removed from YouTube by a Universal Music takedown demand. Following the filing of a Megaupload lawsuit the song is now back online, but Universal are standing firm. The label says that they have a private arrangement with YouTube [...]

One of my first large keynotes, in 2007, was called Copyright Regime vs. Civil Liberties. In the 15-minute original keynote at OSCON, I outlined all the civil liberties that were at risk because of enforcement of the copyright monopoly, and that the copyright industry brutally understood these liberties needed to be killed to preserve their business. What was fringe paranoia five years ago is now becoming the law of the land.

It is said that those who don’t study history are doomed to repeat it. In the case of the copyright industry, they have learned that they can get new monopoly benefits and rent-seeker’s benefits every time there is a new technology, if they just complain loudly enough to the legislators.

Ubisoft is known for laying the blame for many problems on the unauthorized downloading of its games. Stanislas Mettra, creative director of the upcoming game ‘I Am Alive,’ confirms this once again by saying that the decision not to release a PC version is a direct result of widespread game piracy. However, those who look beyond the propaganda will see that there appears to be more to the story than that.

During the last year Netflix managed to outgrow BitTorrent in terms of the amount of US Internet traffic it generates. A promising finding for Hollywood as it shows that there’s an overwhelming interest for the legal movie streaming service. At TorrentFreak we wondered what might happen if all US BitTorrent users made the switch to Netflix, and the results of this exploration are quite intriguing.

Through new legislation the copyright industry is trying to gain unprecedented control over the Internet. Very worrying plans that need to be stopped, but there is also something to learn from. Perhaps we should be grateful that the copyright industry, in their distorted sense of entitlement to the world, are pointing out crucial weaknesses that need to be fixed.