Mininova Uploader Gets Three Years Probation
A Californian resident of Irvine has plead guilty to sharing ‘The Love Guru’ through BitTorrent. After getting his hands on a leaked copy of the film, the man decided to upload the film to Mininova. The 31 year-old man confessed and agreed to a sentence of three years probation.
Back in 2008, Jack Yates, an employee at a Los Angeles duplication company, decided to make a private copy of Paramount’s ‘The Love Guru’.
Yates was asked by his employer to make a promotional copy for the Jay Leno show, but made an extra copy which he shared with friends and family.
Yates’s actions didn’t go unnoticed by his employer and the FBI, who tracked him down through the company’s surveillance cameras. Yates was later arrested and admitted that he distributed the movie among friends and family. The arrest led to a sentence of six months in a federal prison from which he was released in September last year.
The damage done by the leak didn’t stop there though. A member of the Yates family passed the film on to Mischa Wynhausen, who decided to upload it to Mininova. Following an FBI investigation, Wynhausen, a 31 year-old from Irvine CA, was busted as well.
Wynhausen confessed to uploading the film to Mininova and accepted a sentence of three years probation.
Although Wynhausen’s offense is considered to be more severe than that of Yates, he doesn’t have to serve time in jail. According to Thom Mrozek, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney’s Office, this difference is in part because Wynhausen cooperated with the FBI, while Yates initially lied about his actions.
On BitTorrent the movie was never a big hit, despite the fact that it was available online before the theater release. This lack of interest mimics the box office earnings. With a production budget of $62 million, ‘The Love Guru’ was a big flop for Paramount Pictures, bringing in little over $40 million at the box office worldwide.
