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| U.S. Govt. Equates Megaupload to Bank Robbers Posted: 14 Jun 2012 04:12 AM PDT
This issue was previously acknowledged by Judge O'Grady, who had doubts that the case would ever go to trial due to this procedural matter. However, the Government believes that the case should continue. In a response filed today, Attorney General Neil MacBride argues that the notion that a non-U.S. company can’t be served should be rejected by the court. “This line of reasoning leads to the incredible conclusion that foreign corporations can commit crimes in the United States without risk of being brought to justice here,” McBride writes, adding that it would be unprecedented to dismiss the case at this time. According to the Government the federal rules shouldn’t be interpreted so narrowly. A company should only be served on a U.S. address if they have one, it is argued. “The provision should be interpreted to require mailing a copy of the summons to the organization's address or to its principal place of business in the United States, only where such an address or place of business exists.” Moving on to the money side, the U.S. asks the court to reject Megaupload’s request to return seized funds so these can be used to aid the company’s defense. Previously, the company pointed out that the Government’s argument that all revenue the site ever made came from “infringements” is flawed. However, the U.S. stands by this assessment and tells the court that returning Megaupload’s assets is no different from handing back stolen money to a bank robber. “The Government's interest in forfeiture is virtually indistinguishable from its interest in returning to a bank the proceeds of a bank robbery; and a forfeiture-defendant's claim of right to use such assets to hire an attorney, instead of having them returned to their rightful owners, is no more persuasive than a bank robber's similar claim," MacBride writes. In addition to the above the Government points out that Megaupload’s motions should be rejected, because the court hasn’t yet decided whether defense lawyer Andrew Shapiro of Quinn Emanuel Urguhart & Sullivan is subject to conflicts of interest. Shapiro’s law firm previously defended media companies that may be called in as witnesses in this case. Attorney General MacBride concludes by asking the court to strike Megaupload’s requests. It is now up to Judge O'Grady to come to a decision on the various issues that were raised. It is clear that the Megaupload case is heating up, even before getting into the factual allegations of the indictment. While it’s too early to conclude anything, the above suggests that the Government is uneasy with the strength of Megaupload’s defense. Source: U.S. Govt. Equates Megaupload to Bank Robbers
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| TV Network Censors Journalist Who Criticized BitTorrent News Report Posted: 13 Jun 2012 11:00 AM PDT
At the end of May a TV channel owned by Central European Media Enterprises, a company with more than 50 million viewers and one in which Time Warner has a 34% stake, broadcast ‘Copyright’, a TV show which investigated the activities of Zamunda and ArenaBG. The show made many claims about the sites, not least that users are compelled to pay to use them and that Zamunda generates more than 150,000 euros in revenue every month as a result, allegations the site denies. The show went on to press the one-download-one-lost-sale mantra, suggested that a “3 strikes” regime should be considered to deal with infringement, and criticized local ISPs for providing high-speed connections used for pirating. BTV also claimed to have contacted the operators of Zamunda so that their side of the story could be heard, but a source close to the site told TorrentFreak that after initially making contact and getting Zamunda’s attention (just 3 days before the show was aired), the show failed to respond to further contact from the site. The end result, critics say, was an ‘investigative’ report biased towards rightsholders at a time when bTV is not only promoting its just-launched Voyo PPV service, but simultaneously running an anti-torrent site campaign of its own. One critic who went further than most was author, journalist and blogger Ivan Stamenov. He recorded a detailed rebuttal of the show’s claims in a 30 minute podcast titled “bTV and Torrents: A Shock Dose of Ignorance” and posted it on YouTube. “I created a podcast exposing extremely biased reporting on bTV. The story was about torrents, piracy and internet censorship,” Stamenov told TorrentFreak. Stamenov said he was surprised by the popularity and favorable reception his podcast received. As a bonus the show also reached the ears of its main target – bTV – but their response was not exactly what Stamenov had hoped for.  “To put it simply, they censored my podcast on YouTube, claiming it was their own intellectual property. Well, my voice is not their property. The soundtrack I used in the background was not their property either,” Stamenov told us. An additional copy posted to a site called Vbox fared no better. But as illustrated by the image below, one thing that Stamenov did include in the YouTube video was an intro which partially featured an image of the bTV logo. He fears that bTV used the inclusion of this graphic as an excuse to take down the entire video.  “The only way for bTV to get out of this mess with dignity is to apologize to viewers for its foul and treacherous anti-piracy campaign, and revise their attitude,” Stamenov concludes. Currently, Bulgarian copyright law is undergoing revision. According to an activist who spoke with TorrentFreak, leaked documents suggest that the proposed changes, including making copyright infringement a more serious offense, are almost exclusively in the favor of rightholders. Future tightening up of the law aside, silencing other people’s content today appears to be a mere flick of a switch away. Source: TV Network Censors Journalist Who Criticized BitTorrent News Report
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Two weeks ago Megaupload’s lawyers filed a 
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