One topic that pops up now and then around the world is that of copyright term extension, with claims that it’s needed to foster creativity, and recoup costs.

Of course, at this stage, it’s nonsense, since if you can’t make your money back within 70+ years, you’re never going to, nor will it encourage any more creation.

Explaining it all is this video by C.G.P. Grey. It’ll be handy reference when the inevitable extension act comes around sometime near 2018, when copyrights are due to start expiring again, in the US.

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

There’s a lot of misinformation about which companies and agencies can do what, and how they do it. People claim industry groups or random companies can search and send out letters at random, whereas the reality is the investigator must be authorized or they could be deemed guilty of copyright infringement themselves.

There’s also a lot of confusion about exactly how evidence is collected, with people sometimes believing that it can only be collected from corporate networks, or that private trackers are safe because investigators can’t share and so would be banned for their ratio. Much of this is untrue and these beliefs can make it easier to collect evidence.

The easiest way of all is to simply collect information from trackers. It’s an easy and quick way to do it, although as was revealed 2 years ago, it’s often quite inaccurate.

The next simplest way, which provides lots of data, is just to join a swarm and monitor. Some people believe that clients doing this will stand out, as modified clients will behave differently. The reality is that clients don’t have to be monitored at all.

Researcher Andrew Norton produced this video explaining how a vanilla µTorrent client can be used to identify and log peers without any modification or abnormal behavior.

The raw data shown in the video – all that’s needed for a lawsuit or allegation under most 3-strikes laws – is nothing more than basic communication data. However, it’s critical to note that this data, while it is evidence of activity, is NOT evidence of infringement in many cases.

We can’t testify that this is the method used by any company – they’re notoriously tight-lipped about their methods – but it’s quite possible that it’s being used and sold on as a very high priced service to customers. Selling simple and not always accurate or effective methods for thousands of dollars a week was revealed to be a key method of MediaDefender. Anyone reading this and intending to hire such companies would be advised to ask for a demonstration of their detection system first-hand.

It should, however, come as yet another wakeup call to those using blocklist-based software. Without any way to identify a client using this method, there’s no way to add its IP to the list. In fact, the public availability of block-list contents means it’s extremely easy to avoid being on them.

On the other hand VPNs, proxies and seedboxes will provide some protection, but the only real solution is to press for the peer-review of anti-P2P companies and their methods, but that doesn’t look like it will come any time soon.

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

The videos are placed in different categories such as Accidents, Animals, Cartoons and Commercials to make it more easy to discover videos you like. The downside to keeping the site clean is that all videos need to be approved by the Snotr staff before they appear on the site.

Niek stresses that it is not their goal to create the next YouTube killer, “if you’re looking for a place to dump your videos, stick to those sites. But in case you have some spare time to spend, try Snotr ” he adds.

Snotr had some really great features that other video services lack such as a slidebar for real-time video resizing, a clean interface and the possibility to upload high quality content. On the other hand, Snotr does not (yet) have an embed feature to share the videos on your website or blog (update, they have now).

Check out Snotr.

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

GNi signed an agreement with BitTorrent Inc., to provide an IP transit Internet address for streaming videos at one gigabit per second. GNi’s Service Level Agreement (SLA) with BitTorrent guarantees 99.999 percent uptime.

Ashwin Navin, president and co-founder of BitTorrent stated:

“BitTorrent is emerging as a key player for distribution of video content over the Internet and needs bandwidth providers that can keep pace with our growth. GNi’s reliability and flexibility were key factors in our decision to work with them, so we can focus on the best user experience for our service.”

GNi provides multi-carrier/multi-homed Internet transit, managed services and 24/7 “remote hands” support to maximize uptime, eliminate points of failure, and provide reliable service for mission-critical applications. GNi provides their service to clients such as Symantec, HP and the Oakland Raiders. GNi guarantees 99.999% uptime and High Quality service.BitTorrent inc. is planning a video download website to distribute movies online.

Derek Wise, president and CEO of GNi said:

“We’re excited about working with BitTorrent, Their video distribution model presents some interesting challenges that allow us to demonstrate our innovative approach to delivering the best Internet services and support.”

press release

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