The RIAA Attacks Usenet
Written by enigmax on October 16, 2007Basking in glory after orchestrating a record punishment for a petty file-sharer in the US, the RIAA takes its legal campaign to the next level. Many may want newsgroups to stay under the radar but it’s too late - major labels have filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against Usenet.com and it won’t be going away.
In an ideal world, people would not talk about Usenet. In an ideal world there would be no such things as copyright infringement lawsuits. Sadly, we do not live in an ideal world.
Today we simply have to talk about Usenet and we have to talk about lawsuits.
Major record labels - Arista, Atlantic, BMG, Capitol, Caroline, Elektra, Interscope, LaFace, Maverick, Sony BMG, UMG, Virgin, Warner Bros. and Zomba have filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against Usenet.com.
According to Billboard, the complaint filed in the District Court in New York states that Usenet.com provides access to millions of copyright infringing files and, with a nod towards the Grokster Decision, apparently “touts its service as a haven for those seeking pirated content.”
During the Grokster court case, it was ruled that even if a service or tool has substantial non-infringing uses, its owners would be liable for the infringing activities of its customers, should it be deemed that they encouraged their customers to commit copyright infringement. The complaint says that Usenet.com encourages its customers to commit copyright infringement and furthermore, facilitates such actions with its infrastructure.
Therefore it’s no surprise that the lawsuit seems to hang on statements allegedly made by Usenet.com to their customers, claiming that they told them their service is “the best way to get ‘free’ music now that ‘file sharing websites are getting shut down.”
Usenet.com does state that it’s possible to get increased levels of privacy by using their extra ‘anonymous’ service: “Shh… Quiet! We believe it’s no one’s business but your own what you do on the Internet or in Usenet! We don’t log your activity. We don’t track your downloads, and neither can your ISP when you use Secure-Tunnel.com privacy package.” However, helping to ensure the privacy of your customers does not equal encouragement to commit copyright infringement and right at this moment, there doesn’t appear to be any other text on the site that would make Usenet.com fall foul of the Grokster Decision. More details should follow in due course.
The lawsuit states that despite repeated requests by the labels for Usenet.com to remove infringing content, Usenet.com continued to fill its servers with infringing material from the Usenet network and then charges its users for access. It’s claimed that many of the groups offered by Usenet.com have no other use other than to disseminate copyright works and are “explicitly dedicated to copyright infringement.”
The labels want Usenet.com to admit they are committing copyright infringement with a view to obtaining an injunction and damages. To date, Usenet.com has refused to remove content or discontinue offering certain newsgroups.
It will be interesting to see if other Usenet providers come out in support of Usenet.com.
Further updates to follow.
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137 Responses
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Ah fun so those of us who have ISPs that provide NNTP access can have our ISP totalled by RIAA. Glorious.
NNTP is not a P2P system, nor is it specifically for any purpose other than communication. It’s system of operation is more similar to DNS than anything else with files being uploaded to one server being transferred to others higher up on it’s provision, and slowly arrives at other servers. I still remember when one of the larger usages of NNTP was for porn sharing, however the huge amount of spam on most groups tends to make it a lousy way to get anything these days.
I have to say that the comments on this thread make the future of the internet look very dim indeed. You ‘informed’ people ranting about saving p2p and saving the internet and agreeing that usenet charges for warez? If you think that ‘Usenet’ charges for warez or agree with anything that those RIAA/MPAA slime balls say then you’re a complete and utter tool.
Honestly, to hell with p2p and torrents. They have drawn a crowd to the ’scene’ that need not even own a computer. Go back to your consoles and your word processors. We don’t want you on our internet.
- GEEK
The Recording Industry Association of America wants to communicate with TV News audiences. The company I work for just distributed this video package nationwide to TV News Stations. It already aired in Dallas and one network and one major news gathering service have requested tapes. This thing could be all over the news this week. The video you see was preceded by graphics which told stations who paid for the content and named the spokesman.
This is how the RIAA and other organizations get their news out and influence consumers… http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=f09_1198188234
It’s time to fight back against these greedy covetous pigs. I’d be almost sorry for them if the crap they ’sell’ wasn’t so bland and bad, I can’t stand most of it.
I have a request to the hackers and social engineers out there: Expose these people. Not the pig rich elite hiding in mansions. Their toadies and wage slaves. Publish names, addresses, photos, habits and clubs. The guy at the top is supported by those beneath him. Now, of course we won’t be violent or commit horrible ‘crimez’ against their toadies. Just tell them politely they are doing wrong, of course!
But, I somehow think the elegant mansion and gated community slush fund will only support the top guys and their smithers… Not the 10,000+ employees just doing their jobs but living in the real world with us.
you my friend are a simpleton that has no clue as to what you speak of
if it wasn’t for those folks who fill usenet you silly little script kiddies playing with torrents would have NOTHING
[quote comment="188314"]from my point of view it’s ok if they be bury it.
They advertise to agressive all over the net& making big $ with pirated stuff etc…
Keep it quiet and low.
And make no big bucks of it.
Like someone said the releases of scene crews were never supposed to go to p2p…yeah right! Who does believe such crap.
If usenet is going to die the stuff will be available somewhere else..it has ever been that way.[/quote]
you are stupid, i used to be heavily involved in the scene (i served coffee) and believe me we never wanted script kiddies getting ahold of our shit. never p2p’d never will
I don’t know about you but cox gives 60 days retention on binary downloads.. it works great and its free with your internet payments.
usenet and usenet.com are not the same thing
LOL. What a bunch of idiots.
Usenext is usenet? Holy crap, people need to learn to read or think or something. Usenext is a crappy idea, that’s like saying AOL is the internet. Usenet’s something else, if you don’t know, go read a book or something and stop looking stupid.
The internet’s dead, enjoy your restricted media broadcast network with metered bandwidth plans so only the wealthy can afford to publish anything.
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