Many people are drawn to BitTorrent news as it can be both exciting, confusing, intriguing and amazing all at the same time. Today we can report on a story which has all of these elements.

Seemingly out of nowhere appears Torrent411.com. Dubbed “The Torrent Yellow Pages”, this site will have the Canadian recording industry – ADISQ and CRIA et al – tearing out its hair out today. Hosted in Malaysia, from a standing start it already has 109,006 members, which is a couple hundred more than QuebecTorrent.

In fact, all of the QuebecTorrent user accounts have been transferred there – plus all the ratio stats and pretty much everything else. Adding insult to injury, categories that were removed on QuebecTorrent in a failed attempt to avoid legal action in Canada, have now returned. “No censoring blacklists will be tolerated on the site!” claim the Torrent411 admins.

It’s hard to imagine a bigger kick in the teeth for the media industry than this. A notice on the homepage reads:

Welcome to one and all! It is with great pleasure that we launch the Torrent411.com site today. All the team of Torrent411.com wishes you the most cordial of welcomes! Here you will find all the torrents imaginable which will be for you for thousands ofÂ’ hours to come! Filled with surprises that await you!

Of course, Sebastien Brûlotte, aka ‘Doditz’ the ex-administrator of QuebecTorrent, is abiding by the terms of his injunction to the letter. He assured us that he had no part in the creation of the new site and this is backed up the admin team at Torrent411: “All the members of theÂ’ team behind QuebecTorrent.com were preserved, except for late Doditz, our old Admin, who by court order could not join us.”

One area where the sites aren’t quite identical is the number of peers currently being tracked. Of course, to comply with the injunction QuebecTorrent is currently tracking zero peers but already there are instructions on Torrent411′s homepage to get the site’s old torrents working – either a simple edit of the .torrent file’s ‘announce url’ to match the format on Torrent411 – or users can simply re-download matching torrents from the site and use those instead.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Solange Drouin, managing director of ADISQ, an organization that represents the music industry in Québec, said in a response to the shutdown: “We wait to see the result of this first lawsuit. We hope that this result will have a dissuasive effect. If it is not the case, it is possible that we will engage in actions against similar sites.”

Some may be under the impression that the closure of QuebecTorrent is a big legal victory for the entertainment industry. Although undoubtedly the media companies will be delighted that the site has been shuttered, due to how the case ended we’re not really much closer to the answer of torrent site legality in Canada.

Instead of mounting a poor defense, in the end QuebecTorrent chose not to mount one at all. The site’s lawyer, Sébastien Leblond, said that part of the reason for accepting the injunction to close the site was that Doditz, the site admin, wanted to avoid the case setting a bad anti-torrent legal precedent: “Instead of going to war without the proper equipment, we decided not to hurt the big case,” said Leblond.

In comments to the National Post, Michael Geist, a law professor at University of Ottawa, said he wasn’t surprised that 28 year old Brûlotte decided not to fight:

“The prospect of both the legal fees and the big organizations on the other side who are prepared to spend millions of dollars on litigation has an enormous chilling effect. Invariably, individual users, web sites, cave in the face of these kinds of legal demands.”

So, the entertainment might make it seem that the outcome of this case is a huge victory, the reality is more nuanced. Here is a message from ‘Doditz’ which should hopefully shine some light on what actually happened with the case:

Statement from Sébastien Brûlotte, aka ‘Doditz’, owner of QuebecTorrent

It is with regret that we decided to comply with an injunction against our torrent site, our company and myself as president of Québectorrent.com Inc.

I take the opportunity in this release to thank you for your support since the opening of the site, as well as throughout the judicial proceedings. Without you, this whole adventure would not have been so rewarding. Together with the community we have helped give visibility to artists by making available an alternative platform for cheaper distribution and equally effective wider recognition of their works.

I also want to explain my decision not to challenge the injunction we were served with, against which we have always expressed our disagreement.

The upheavals have caused “torrent” and “p2p” sites to have a significant impact on trade and distribution of music, movies and any work protected by copyright.

At the time we had to take a decision about defending our interests before the courts, against both the recording and film industries, represented by ADISQ and APFTQ, we found that users and operators of sites such as “torrent” and “p2p” were governed by clearly outdated laws which are non-adapted to current and modern technology.

We urge our governments to intervene in this area and to legislate so as to reflect current realities and the needs of its population. It goes without saying that this reality does not only cover the interests and needs of distribution companies, which will inevitably adjust to the market. It covers more than ever, consumers of music and films, without whom the industries would not be affluent today. The legislature must listen to those consumers who are an important part of the population.

Also, I must respond to how ADISQ commented on the judgement of the Court. The vice-president of public affairs and CEO of ADISQ, Mrs. Solange Drouin, commented that “it was a first major victory for local industry against a torrent site and that other suits against such download sites could be considered.”

At the time the procedures we were served, we had hired an attorney who, for health reasons, had to stop representing us last March. Subsequently, in early May, we hired the law firm Fetch Legal Ltd to represent us. Our prosecutors indicated then that the progress of the case was limited, and that we should require a court deadline to enable them to bring the case to state, and position us well in our defense. Expertise was necessary to file a defense to counter that of ADISQ and the APFTQ. Only two months remained before the hearing. Our prosecutors recommended that we submit a request for surrender of the hearing. ADISQ and the APFTQ were opposed to this request. As a result, and following arguments from ADISQ and the APFTQ, the court refused our request for surrender, and ordered the trial to go ahead as planned on July 2008.

Given this state of affairs in the best interest of members who have supported us financially and helped “torrent” and “p2p” sites we chose not to mount a defense, rather than defend ourselves inappropriately.

It goes without saying that our intention was to avoid a legal precedent detrimental to any litigation of the same nature.

We believe we have made the right decision in this aspect, as pointed out aptly by Tristan Péloquin in his blog dated 10 July. We are surprised by the position of the ADISQ and the APFTQ to the effect that this ruling is a precedent, since in fact, there has never been a substantive debate about the issues raised by the dispute.

Ultimately, it was never our intention, in connection with the operation of our site, to allow the violation of copyrights, as claimed by the allegations contained in the judicial proceedings. We are convinced that the Court could make an interesting decision in the case if it had to assess contradictory positions, which it did not have to make…..

We still intend to abide by the terms of the injunction issued against us, but speak to correct certain statements made publicly in recent days.

Sébastien Brûlotte, president of Québectorrent.com

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Targeted in 2007, they faced the combined resources of the CRIA, ADISQ and APFTQ (the TV and movie companies) – and CIRPA. In all, 31 organizations went after QuebecTorrent, demanding $200,000 in punitive damages.

They ordered that the admin, Sébastien Brûlotte, aka ‘Doditz’, should close the site and never again engage in any similar activity, and post a message clearly indicating the closure of the site. At the time, Doditz didn’t comply. The full details of the case are available in an interview we conducted back in January.

However, the pressure became too great and on July 9th QuebecTorrent was forced to close after it received a permanent injunction from the Superior Court of Quebec. The judgment reads:

ORDER the defendants Sébastien Brûlotte and Quebectorrent.com inc., their officers, administrators, employees, representatives, mandator as well as any person acting directly or indirectly on their behalf or according to their instructions, as well as to any person informed of the present injunction to immediately close the torrents on these website Quebectorrent and to refrain from being involved in any website using the bittorrent technology, peer to peer, or any other technology allowing the download of any work protected by copyright.

QuebecTorrents had indicated all along that they intended to fight the recording industry but in the end, their combined resources proved to be too much. Solange Drouin, the managing director of ADISQ explains:

“We had envisaged three days of lawsuit, but they indicated last week to us that they would comply with the demands. In return, we agreed to drop the claim for $200,000 in damages brought against the site and its administrator.”

Indicating that she hopes the shutdown has an effect on other current and potential torrent site admins he goes on: “We waited to see the result of this first lawsuit. We hope that this result will have a dissuasive effect. If it is not the case, it is possible that we will engage in actions against similar sites.”

Doditz briefly told TorrentFreak: “I just wanna say thanks to all the people who supported the cause and me all along.”

This post will be updated shortly with an exclusive message to the BitTorrent community from Doditz.

Stay tuned.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

The legal background to the case is available in TorrentFreak’s previous interview with QuebecTorrent back in November 2007. Essentially, it’s felt that the decision in this case will impact the future of all Canadian BitTorrent trackers and have more serious implications, explained here by Micheal Geist:

This case is one worth watching – while the knee jerk reaction of some will be to call for the site’s immediate takedown, the legal principles that come from the case, including the liability for linking to unauthorized content and the responsibility of site owners for content posted by 3rd parties, could have significant implications for search engines, bloggers, and anyone else operating online.

TorrentFreak recently caught up with the admin, Doditz, and he told us: “First of all I had to change my lawyer because he got sick and can’t represent me anymore. The new lawyer is Sébastien Leblond and his team at Fetch Légal LTÉE.”

Doditz told us that the next big dates are the 9th, 10th and 11th July, where there will be a summary analysis of the case taking place in the Court of Justice in Montréal.

In an announcement to QuebecTorrent’s 85,000 members he said:

The eventual hearing will require adequate preparation, which will require active involvement of our lawyers in the next three months. Notably, this will require our defense, which will rest particularly on account of the jurisprudence involved with the subject, and the actual evaluation of the law.

Doditz says he will personally have to participate in this process and added that it’s possible that some of the site’s users could be asked to testify too.

Of course, with all this talk of legal action, talk of lots of expenses can’t be far away either. Indeed, the fear of increasing legal costs is often enough to make someone cave in to the demands of the media industry, and they know this all too well.

Nevertheless, QuebecTorrent is standing up and fighting. Doditz hopes that given the wider implications of a negative outcome in the case – such as those indicated by Michael Geist – this will enable him to raise the funds needed for an adequate defense and sensible outcome. He estimates they will need “approximately $15,000, plus applicable taxes, so about $5000 per month”.

A final message from Doditz: “Thank you in advance to all those who will allow QuebecTorrent to defend your rights and the exchange of international culture.”

Anyone wishing to help the cause, can do so by clicking here.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Following a Canadian newspaper article which branded them ‘The Pirates of Quebec’, two BitTorrent trackers have been targeted by a collective of Canadian music labels.

The administrator of the 1 year old, 46,000 member ‘QuebecTorrent‘ has received Cease and Desist letters from 4 record labels and is being threatened with further action if they don’t comply.

The demands are:

a) Close the site www.quebectorrent.com and any other site of similar nature which you operate.

b) You must agree to never again directly or indirectly operate any other service which enables the sharing of music.

c) You must post a message clearly indicating the closure of the site and inform your users that sharing music via p2p networks is forbidden by Canadian copyright law unless permission is obtained and royalties paid.

In contrast to the situation at Demonoid who chose to block Canadian users rather than close or re-locate, it appears that QuebecTorrent (QT) don’t want to take this lying down and are hoping to fight this action.

Currently the members are being rallied with a view to obtaining donations – the administrator of QT told TorrentFreak that their lawyer is charging 250$ CAD/hour and although he is financing some of the fight, he simply cannot raise all of the funds.

He told us: “The fees so far are confirmed at 2000$ CAD. I am asking the users for 1500$ and I will pay the rest.”

He also outlines two scenarios – if QuebecTorrent loses in court, it will be very bad for P2P as a favorable legal precedent for the majors would result in an anti-p2p ‘crusade’.

Equally, victory could create a favorable legal precedent for P2P which would benefit the whole file-sharing community.

In summing up, the administrator says that he has a stark choice – either people donate to support the legal defense of the site or he will have no choice but to close it in the face of pressure from these labels.

Anyone wanting to help QuebecTorrent fight should consider donating.

Stay tuned, updates to follow

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.