RapidShare Targets Sites Over Trademark Abuse

Ernesto
April 25, 2010
101
rapidshare
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RapidShare has been sending out legal threats to link sites and search engines that use its trademark to encourage users to download copyrighted material. The company is demanding that these sites cease their operations and hand over their domain names to RapidShare, voluntarily or through domain disputes.

A few weeks ago we revealed that Rapidshare was looking forward to collaborating with the entertainment industry, and that it would increasingly terminate the accounts of persistent copyright infringers.

This move is part of a new strategy for the file-hoster, which will also see it go after third party sites who use the RapidShare trademark to ‘promote’ or encourage copyright infringement.

“We are extending our efforts to proceed against linking-sites, against so called RapidShare search engines and against individuals who abuse our trademark to distribute copyright protected content,” RapidShare’s departing CEO Bobby Chang wrote to the entertainment industry.

Several weeks later it seems that RapidShare is indeed keeping its word. The company has recently sent out requests to a slew of site owners demanding that they stop abusing the RapidShare trademark for nefarious purposes. In addition, RapidShare has filed several domain disputes against similar sites, hoping to scoop their domains.

Among the targets are Rapidshare.net, Rapid.org (formerly Rapidfind) and Rapidshare4movies.com, all sites that allow users to find content available on RapidShare.

In the letters sent by RapidShare’s lawyers, site owners are asked to stop encouraging people to use RapidShare for copyright infringement (i.e. close their sites) and transfer the domain to RapidShare within two weeks. Among other things, the lawyers cite trademark abuse and unfair competition as the reasons why RapidShare is taking these actions.

Whether this strategy is in the best interests of its users has to be doubted. TorrentFreak spoke to several site owners who were targeted by RapidShare and none of them are planning to capitulate.

“We find it amazing, considering the amount of traffic and inevitably premium memberships we drive towards Rapidshare, that they target us in such an aggressive manner and turn on their own customers,” the founder of Rapid.org told TorrentFreak.

“We will not comply with ludicrous threats, such as to hand over the domain, and we will continue building our already large community. If at any point it becomes necessary for us to support alternative filehosts and/or create our own, we are capable and willing to do just that,” he added.

Aside from legal pressure, the file-hoster has also filed several WIPO domain disputes in the last week against sites that use the word ‘RapidShare’ in their domain names. If successful, these disputes could shutter many popular sites that were built on the RapidShare brand.

In the legal paperwork RapidShare clearly states that it does not want its site to be used for copyright infringement. By closing the linking sites and search engines they most likely hope to improve their relationship with the entertainment industry and avoid being shut down themselves.

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Verthik

They just killed themselves. Good riddance I say. Rapid$hit always was a crappy file hosting site.
WhatTheName

Bad move. :(

But wait… the biggest RS link site, rslinks.org, does not get sued at all?

Why?
steve

rapidshare have such an established brand, i doubt they will suffer, its more about long term survival
ytb

wow so silly – 99% of rapidshare users are pirates
m0e

If rapidshare doesn’t want my business, no biggie, I’ll take my business elsewhere.
Anonymous

I have already taken my “business” elsewhere. There are many other better “cyberlockers”.

Incidentally, why is FileRama not responding?
I don’t get it…

If it wasn’t for sharing pirated files, why would RapidShare exist in the first place? Why would there be a need for such service?
9ninety9

who cares about Rapid$hite anyways.
24235426

haha this is the most ridicolus thing i have ever read! Rapidshit is committing suicide by doing this. Plenty of better filehosts out there. Bye bye rapidshit!
LV

What is currently the best alternative to rapidshare?
I have rapidshare but I’m not renewing when the account expires.

Thanks
shell

^^^ EXACTLY, If they disappear off the web I wouldn’t even notice. Slow, limited download speed combined with pay2download system, c’mon.
Headshot!

What the… They are shooting themselves in the fucking head!

Oh well, goodbye.
anonymous

in other words they are creep-arseing round the entertainment industry, trying to maintain their own dowloading site status. the fact that they are signing their own ‘death’ warrant, as far as popular useage is concerned, is irrelevant. bit silly, really.
duane

They should be careful what they wish for, but at the same time they deserve everything they get.
Anonymous

@2

Nobody is getting sued here. They can’t claim trademark for rslinks.org because they have no claim. The name rslinks doesn’t violate the trademark “RapidShare”.
Windoze

Hahahaha. If the fuckers weren’t actually hosting those files no one could ‘search’ it!

RapidShare, the reason you’re still online is because of PIRATES and nothing else!
Eric

Megaupload is much better than RapidShare for non premium users
Silly

They may be killing sites which did not pay them or which they did not launch themselves…
Bud

Rapidshare is a pain in the A#@

Adult movies @
http://www.cherrytorrents.com
anonim

@14

It’s not about the domain names. The point is the content of the site.
Lord Mandy

Rapidshare and similar pirate sites will be blocked in the UK soon anyway.
dixon

they ask the World Intellectual Property Organization for help?! LOL

how ironic when their whole business is to steal everyone else’s intellectual property
anon

Rapidshare is dead to me.
anon2

@#19
then let the fun begin. would like to see the UK government taken to court numerous times because sites are being blocked/taken down needlessly and under false accusation from the entertainment industry. after all, it was the MPs that chose for the stupid DEB to be made law, following the lies told concerning losses to the industry. also waiting to see what the EU says about the invasion of UK citizens privacy and violation of human rights (guilty until proven innocent!). they deserve all they get!!
zacknelson

nobody renew premium or use rapidscam anymore.

stop supporting these snakes.

best alternatives: hotfile, mediafire, megaupload
Anonymous

how about blocking referrer and changing rar names? wouldn that solve everything?
neb

Hogwash. Rapidshare has never been concerned about “copy right” infringement. They want to be paid to not do the thing they do.

I guess I’ll have to get a bigger bed for these folk.

Napster?
File Sharer

“We will not comply with ludicrous threats, such as to hand over the domain, and we will continue building our already large community. If at any point it becomes necessary for us to support alternative filehosts and/or create our own, we are capable and willing to do just that,” he added.

Great news and what I would expect! For rapid to do this is just out of this world. They are basically saying we have always had a tos but we are going to kiss the mafiaa’s ass (maybe even suck them off). I have lost all respect for the company.
Unauthorized Content Consumer

I know I’m gonna sound like Mr. neotard, but…

If the sites existed solely and strictly to induce piracy and blatantly waving the name around of another ‘company’ in the faces of RS and the entertainment industry lawyers, then I have to agree with RS.

Come on. I think ‘fair is fair’. Search engines such as ISOHunt and Demonoid offer legitimate services such as making creative commons content available to the entire world, and they offer services based on their own merits and identity. Of course there may also be unauthorized content distributors and consumers, but heck that’s their business. ;)

Besides, I can’t believe anyone actually uses RS. They’d be better off just being a search engine and hosting magnet links and charge a monthly fee of a buck or two to give access to them.

meh. xD
Sketch@1337x.org

Who gives a shit? Rapidcrap sux donkey balls anyways.
heh

I find it rather pathetic that people are mocking rapidshare with names like rapidshit. Back when I used rapidshare I would easily pull download speeds of 4mb/s… it was well worth the small subscription fee for the premium service.

If they offered a legal download service for good content in the future id be more then willing to pay a subscription fee for the ease of use of getting high quality content fast without drm.

I support rs decision for the ceist and desist letters. I however do not support their idea on seizing the domain names. That’s complete bs.
Dude

I really dont understand why so many people use rapidshare. Their maximum file size and super slow download speeds make me never consider using them unless it is a last resort. Megaupload all the way!
Jigsy

RapidShare is like a dinosaur, and they’re in line for extinction.

And this just goes to prove it.
JonnieHayward

=======================
RLSLOG.net was suspended by its German hosting company after removal request from law firm representing Universal Music, although we never hosted any files or copyrighted data on our server. Our site is strictly informative.

We are currently looking for new home.

If you have any tips or offers for great dedicated server, we would appreciate your help (QuadCore, 4GB RAM+, SCSI/SAS/SSD, preferably in Europe, not in Germany though). Please contact us at rlslog [@] gmail.com
GP

@2: They can’t file a trademark dispute over a domain name that doesn’t have rapidshare in it.
GrX

lol this world and its ways make me laugh

they didn’t want us sharing uploading making available re-distrubuting content so people turn to services like rapidshare and others so they dont have to get caught uploading

so they close down these sites and start getting pissy so we then have no other option than go back to torrents then they moan because were sharing and uploading…

we just can’t win.

Then there will be the “your not suposed to win” crowd ok.

so all the usa gets over 30 different legal services from music to tv to movies all free but anyone outside the usa can’t use these services

what is the rest of the world meant to do ? its clear we want that content and their removing every way in which we can obtain it

and then offering no way what so ever to actually buy the same content its sheer madness is what it is
Anonymous

Rapidshare was always going to crumble, it’s just a matter of time before they start handing over customer details to the entertainment industry. That’s where this is moving to.

Even the CEO of Rapidshare has left, more than likely because of what they’re trying to do now.

We should move away from these cyberlockers though and onto more decentralized systems, that’s what we should be looking at, not supporting these people who are gonna end up fucking us all over once they’ve made their money.
Master of My Domains

Rapidshare is simply paying lip-service to the **AA’s demands – they know these index sites won’t just hand over their domains without a fight.

But now Rapidshare can go crawling back to the **AAs and say “We tried. It didn’t work. Boohoo”

In the end, there’s little question that Rapidshare will be killed off – and add yet another tombstone to the P2P graveyard. But this will amount to little more than a speedbump on the filesharing superhighway.
GrX

rapidshare is not designed to upload or share copyrighted content.

this is why they give you 5GB of data to download a day this is why you can buy traffic packs of 10gb/20gb/50gb/100gb

this is why they let you upload 100mb/200mb files as users or upto 700mb 1 single click files as premium users and or higher.

if i was to use their service for not copyrighted content what would it be?

pictures of flowers cats hanging baskets

at 5gb a day for a week i could effectively download the whole internet with of images and pretty pictures of flowers.

pfft.. come on

i fail to see why anyone would use this service at all if copyrighted content wasn’t available.

and i fail to see even more why someone would pay 5/10 bucks a month for a premium account that hosts nothing at all useful.

who are they trying to fool?
Crayon

@38, those images and pretty pictures of flowers are probably copyrighted as well.
GrX

lol you know i was thinking that as i hit submit somewhere someone would lay claim to the copyright.

so if its got to the point of images graphics colors and pictures being copyrighted

what use is the internet anymore?
if you pandered to their stupidity as soon as you loaded up a website any website with images or pictures or anything it would be copyright to someone or other.

its sheer madness
dwpbike

rapidshare blocked me from pron download last night. so i go find torrent. this makes for a better world?
Failure

Megaupload is far better than rs. No download limits and no stupid 200MB file limit.
GTFO Rapidshare.

Look at rapidshare’s traffic on alexa, it’s tanking
Anonymous

Never bothered with rapidshare. I would rather use a free torrent service. I don’t mind waiting for a film to download at 300 kb/s. I won’t die waiting for my movies
GrX

@43 people use one click hosters for many reasons main reason is they dont want to share i.e. upload and risk the people ready to catch you who’s already in the swarm

another reason is all this stupid invite only crap people may not have a friend on the inside and choose not to be left out unlike the rest of the lucky ones around the world who’s manged to get a golden invite lol

personally i use many methods for obtaining stuff and none of them torrents, torrents are great in idea but all these sites have killed the population with invite only crap

so in my eyes the only thing left for these people is p2p or cyberlockers or that service that should not be spoke about :)
Christy Canyon ( . ) ( . )

My bewbs are too big for Rapidshare anyway.
Alberto

Surprise, surprise, TorrentFreak is bitching against Rapidshare again – who would have thought of that?

Btw. Rapidshare isn’t the first company suing people who use their trademark as domain-name without permission…
mandywoo345

If you put “A GE” and “MIN GLE” together, then you will get the url.

It’s a nice and free place for Younger- Women and Older Men, or Older Women and Younger Men, to- interact with each other. Maybe you wanna check out or- tell your friends
Mr.Mogo

“The company has recently sent out requests to a slew of site owners demanding that they stop abusing the RapidShare trademark for nefarious purposes.”

what?
is Snidely Whiplash using Rapidshare now?
Jack Masoninic

Well, luckily rapidshare is just one of MANY free file hosting companies out there to use. No big deal. I prefer the Russian sites myself.

anonymous-vpn.tk
Bobby Chang

This is our rapidplan to rapidfail.

We’ve always wanted to get in the rapidbed with the rapidmafiaa, and this the perfect rapidchance.

As for our rapidusers, we really do rapidhope they’ll keep rapidpaying for our rapidservices. Sadly, we are aware that only rapidpirates use our rapidservice, and the rapidmafiaa doesn’t rapidlike that, so we are being rapidforced to rapidchange.

If you like the word rapid, beware: We are going to rapidsue every last one of rapidyou for using it anywhere on the rapidnets. We know that if it weren’t for all you awesome rapidpirates we wouldn’t even be in rapidbusiness, but we can overlook that for now because the mafiaa has lots of rapidmoney.
Rboy

Is Rapid$hit stupid or what? The only reason these sites exist is to download copyrighted stuff. They are able to skirt the law by not providing an index or or encouraging people to download copyrighted stuff but instead leave that other sites.

By attacking these sites they are committing suicide. I have noticed rapid share links are starting to disappear from these sites. Some sites that practically insisted on rs links are have dropped that requirement.

RS is dead and dying fast. My premium account has expired and I doubt I will renew. RS will be dead for all intents and purposes very soon.

In my opinion a true archival site not set up to facilitate copyright infringement would charge for storage space and time not uploading or downloading.

Finally for those who don’t know there is a program called JDownloader (free) you can load links in this program and it will download from these sites so you don’t have to sit there and download each link manually.
CDXX

@34

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOx3!!!!!

My most favorite site EVER!!! What am I to do???
your son

^^^smoke a pole thats what you can do
ito

It souldn’t bother anyone the slow speed or the periods of waiting between downloads on RS if it is free :) You can use USDownloader and paste all your links on it then let it run and forget about it. The next day, or later that same day, all your links are done. That’s what I hear from these internets :) Also, Mediafire is awesome.
fred

RapidShare is on a mission to seem supportive of copyright laws. It’s amazing they can do this with a straight face :|
Anonymous

People will switch to Megaupload, Hotfile, or any of the other major file hosters. If Rapid.org shuts down, I’m sure a Mega.org will show up.
unknow

rapidshare will be like another mininove !~!!!!!!!
SweetJesus

Wow, rapidshare shooting themselves in the foot. Some of these search sites are huge and send a shit ton of traffic to rapidshare which inevitably converts into paying customers… Plus they do it without commission from rapidshare.

Really dumb move on their behalf if they follow through, but honestly I think its all a pony show for the entertainment industry… WIPO is a joke and it can take years to go through with a complaint (We filed a complaint against a local competitor who registered the .net and .org of our company name) and it took over a year with trademark documents in hand.

Seems like if they really wanted to take these sites down, they could flex some of their mighty dollars and actually get it done.

Anyways, hotfile and megaupload are getting bigger than ever (megaupload will pass rapidshare shortly) so its not like the community will be short on file lockers. There are probably 50 similar ones waiting to take rapidshare’s (shrinking) share of the market.
neostyles

I love watching people condemn a site as soon as the site decides to stop defying the law.
i see you fail

nostyle is obvious
Anonymous

I’ve got 5 million rs points
Who needs premium accounts?
Cause with this latest bullet to the chest im leaving them in the dust.
KloWn

Well, can’t commit suicide anymore clearer than that ;) Bad move RS
Ninja

Bad move. RapidShare R.I.P.

Maybe it’ll set an example for other cyberlokers not to bend over for MAFIAA so easily,
Ninja

tf, we need an edit option… typo *cyberlocker*

Hope you can add one =)
zenith

I don’t approve of Rapidshare’s recent tactics, but they provide, in my opinion at least, an invaluable service. When I’m looking for some obscure music or book file and I’ve exhausted all other options, Rapidshare inevitably comes through for me. Yes, downloads are slow and without a premium account you have to wait a while to begin the next download, but the amount and variety of stuff they host is orders of magnitude higher than their closest competitors like Mediafire and Megaupload. So, out of my preferred ways to download, Rapidshare comes last, but without it I wouldn’t have a large portion of my experimental music and sci-fi book collection.
Whatever

There are 3(4) possible endings to threats from the MAFIAA:
1. Site dies immediately by losing in court.
2. Site wins in court and stays.
3. Site tries to please MAFIAA which inevitably leads to a slow death of the site. Now the MAFIAA can prove in court that Rapidshare is guilty of doing something wrong.
(4. Site tries to displease the MAFIAA, loses in court and stays but thats only reserved for TPB)

Rapidshare has chosen option 3 and wants to die slowly like mininova.

#65 Ninja
Would be nice idea, however some (like spammers,trolls…) would start changing (their) texts in such a way that it would probably become unreadable with replies not only referring backward but also forward (to combat that active moderation would be needed).

But there is another way: i just forgive you your typo’s, Ok ? :-)
Peter Clements

it’s fair enough – although Rapidshare has been used by sharers for a long time, but at the end of the day they are a legitimate business and they don’t want to be closed down.

Take all the emotional ranting out if this debate (whether pro or anti file sharing) and those are the facts you’re left with.

The other ‘cyber locker’ may be forced to follow suit, too.

Remember, Rapidshare wasn’t conceived as a filesharing utility (in the sense the majority of people on this site understand the expression) – it was just being used as such, so all the sermonizing above is for nothing, really.
markie

My understanding is that Rapidshare don’t have their own search engine. So if that’s the case then people are just going to use a site that lets you search Rapidshare files. Really a no brainer.

Oh and how many customers would have a premium Rapidshare account if they could get all their favorite tv shows of movies for free elsewhere.

Paying for a premium Rapidshare to get tv shows or movies. So customers will pay for content. I guess the movie studios should look into that and say why can’t we make money this way.
Jesus with shaved balls

rapidshare is the best! the fastest! most convenient of all! hope it will never disappear
Anonymous

Man forget rapidshare!

It’s a piece of garbage.

I use hotfile…since I’ved discovered rapidshare and it’s disgusting practicces a while back.

I am so mad I need to go make a rant on this shit….

Seriously burn in ell rapidshare
1000blabbities

What?! Pfft.Forget rapidshare!

It’s a piece of garbage.

I use Hotfile…since I’ved discovered Rapidshare and it’s disgusting practices a while back.

I am so mad I need to go make a rant on this shit….

Seriously burn in hades rapidshare!

–1000blabbities.
http://blabbities.tumblr.com
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BIOS

So long, Rapidshare.
ZIOS

stupid rapidshare…

file sharers are what created you. you are traitors and should be ashamed of yourselves.
Casual Reader

Well as i see it.
They choose to try to support entairtainment industries with any available tool they have, instead fight em back.

The only problem is that they forget the fact that they pay their “running” bills thanks to their customers, not thanks to entairtainment industries. ;)
skybon

99% of those cyberlockers’ content consist of copyrighted stuff.

Happy suicide, RapidShare!
Nutman

@#2 The word rs is not copyrighted, rapidshare is. Oh and btw rslinks.org is no where near the largest RS link sites. It is a minuscule site with no where near the releases of dozens if not hundreds of other sites.
Lord Mandy

Anyone accused of piracy in the UK can easily pay a fee to deny the accusation, and then simply prove their innocence.
MS

For as long as Google continues to index them, the domain names used by these more specialised search engines is immaterial. Any search engine can use the word ‘RapidShare’ in an index page, if that’s what they’re referring to. So, a Google query that could be ‘ torrent’, could as easily be ‘ rapidshare’. Google will give you a nice list of links to index pages from the more specialised search engines.

Quick, we need legislation that allows the blocking of search engines… oh, wait, that’s a very scary thought. If politicians and judges are going to start blocking the small search engines, then the medium-sized search engines, where does it stop? As the biggest indexer of copyright-infringing content, even the mighty Google should be worried.
TerribleTony

And still rapidshare are trying to claw their customer base back, “We can host your files, but don’t worry, they’re not private or secure in any way, and we have every right to look at your data. And delete it too, if necessary.”
nick

The only reason why I’m on Rapidshare is that I can find everything in one place.
Show me another “legal” site with “legal” stuff, where I would be able to get or buy without any restrictions everything I want and I will be the first to move there.
lol

Turn on the internet, and the internet turns on you.

Your fate has been sealed RapidShare.

Good Luck.
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Dylan

MEGAUPLOAD FOR THE WIN.
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flakey

So many dumb comments to this piece of news. I have a paid account (which entirely fills my whole bandwith when downloading btw) and I’m glad they delete copyrighted content when they find it as well as playing this ‘we are all for copyright protection’ pretend game. If they didn’t appear as trying to be 100% legal they’d be going the napster way soon.
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Borderline Voter

“In the legal paperwork RapidShare clearly states that it does not want its site to be used for copyright infringement. By closing the linking sites and search engines they most likely hope to improve their relationship with the entertainment industry and avoid being shut down themselves.”

In other words “Please don’t us us” and then 99.9% of all their traffic disappera and then they are bust.
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NewEraCracker

Better kill those search engines that abuse RapidShare trademark that kill warez boards.

Good decision.

Long live Rapidshare.
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Tossers

There are better ways to download files than Rapidshits anyway.

This little turk cutting off traffic to his site just proved why he’s not cut out to be CEO. So those porn freaks will move their shit to another service and Rapidshare will die out.
adminscene.com

lol rsking hasnt got “rapidshare” in the domain so i dont think it will be taken down
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RapidShare Targets Sites Over Trademark Abuse

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