TorrentFreak

This week’s collective action against the PIPA and SOPA bills in the United States was unprecedented and mighty. But have you noticed that we’re always on the defensive? We cannot win or even maintain our rights to free speech that way.

Collectively, we Australians can be a cowardly bunch, so scared of an unknown invader that we will sell our sovereignty for the illusion of protection. This fear is symbolised in the movie ‘Tomorrow When the War Began,’ a film of dubious quality that portrays an Australia under invasion from some shadowy Asiatic power.

Cory Doctorow held a presentation just before the turn of the year, showing how the current copyright wars are just a skirmish in the battles yet to come. It is a very strong omen that gives you an idea just how much is at stake in the coming two decades.

Last month, the Gamer/Law legal blog published an article which in many ways failed to understand what so-called pay-up-or-else anti-piracy schemes are all about. Now the owner of Gamer/Law is back with an open letter titled “To those who defend game pirates”. Since it’s published in Edge, probably the best print-based games publication ever made, I simply can’t let this one lie.

In the debate about the American “Stop Online Piracy Act”, some have hailed the decade-old American DMCA as a law that was somehow beneficial for the development of new services on the net. This is not only a complete misconception, but a very dangerous one at that. The DMCA was basically a wet dream come true for the copyright industry, and the “safe harbor” provisions have gradually shifted the environment to suppress free speech and expression in favor of the suppressing industries: the copyright industries.

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 [...]