In recent years copyright holders have demanded stricter anti-piracy measures from ISPs, search engines, advertising networks and payment processors, with varying results.
Continuing this trend various entertainment industry groups are now going after companies that offer domain name services.
The MPAA, for example, has joined the domain name system oversight body ICANN and is pushing for policy changes from the inside.
A few days ago the RIAA added more pressure. The music group sent a letter to ICANN on behalf of several industry players asking for tougher measures against pirate domains.
The RIAA’s senior vice president Victoria Sheckler wants the Internet to be a safe place for all, where music creation and distribution can thrive.
“… we expect all in the internet ecosystem to take responsible measures to deter copyright infringement to help meet this goal,” she notes.
The music groups believe, however, that domain registrars don’t do enough to combat piracy. ICANN’s most recent registrar agreement states that domain names should not be used for copyright infringement, but most registrars fail to take action in response.
Instead, many registrars simply note that it’s not their responsibility to act against pirate sites.
“We […] do not see how it is an appropriate response from a registrar to tell a complainant that it has investigated or responded appropriately to a copyright abuse complaint by stating it does not provide non-registrar related services to the site in question,” Sheckler writes.
In what appears to be a coordinated effort to pressure ICANN and other players in the domain name industry, the U.S. Government also chimed in last week.
According to the U.S. Trade Representative, Canada-based Tucows is reported as “an example of a registrar that fails to take action when notified of its clients’ infringing activity.”
Despite the critique, it’s far from clear that Tucows and other registrars are doing anything wrong. In fact, the Electronic Frontier Foundation
“Domain registrars do not have an obligation to respond to a random third party’s complaints about the behavior of a domain name user. Unless ordered by a court, registrars cannot be compelled to take down a website,” notes Jeremy Malcolm, EFF’s Senior Global Policy Analyst.
“What the entertainment industry groups are doing is exaggerating the obligations that registrars of global top-level domains (gTLDs) have under their agreement with ICANN to investigate reports of illegal activity by domain owners, an expansion of responsibilities that is, to put it mildly, extremely controversial, and not reflected in current laws or norms.”
Law or no law, the entertainment industry groups are not expected to back down. They hope that ICANN will help to convince registrars that pirate sites should be disconnected, whether they like it or not.
Tag: USA
Maybe Obama’s Sanctions on Venezuela are Not Really About His “Deep Concern” Over Suppression of Political Rights
Oil. The answer is always oil.
The White House on Monday announced the imposition of new sanctions on various Venezuelan officials, pronouncing itself “deeply concerned by the Venezuelan government’s efforts to escalate intimidation of its political opponents”: deeply concerned. President Obama also, reportedly with a straight face, officially declared that Venezuela poses “an extraordinary threat to the national security” of the U.S. — a declaration necessary to legally justify the sanctions.
Today, one of the Obama administration’s closest allies on the planet, Saudi Arabia, sentenced one of that country’s few independent human rights activists, Mohammed al-Bajad, to 10 years in prison on “terrorism” charges. That is completely consistent with that regime’s systematic and extreme repression, which includes gruesome state beheadings at a record-setting rate, floggings and long prison terms for anti-regime bloggers, executions of those with minority religious views, and exploitation of terror laws to imprison even the mildest regime critics.
Absolutely nobody expects the “deeply concerned” President Obama to impose sanctions on the Saudis — nor on any of the other loyal U.S. allies from Egypt to the UAE whose repression is far worse than Venezuela’s. Perhaps those who actually believe U.S. proclamations about imposing sanctions on Venezuela in objection to suppression of political opposition might spend some time thinking about what accounts for that disparity.
That nothing is more insincere than purported U.S. concerns over political repression is too self-evident to debate. Supporting the most repressive regimes on the planet in order to suppress and control their populations is and long has been a staple of U.S. (and British) foreign policy. “Human rights” is the weapon invoked by the U.S. Government and its loyal media to cynically demonize regimes that refuse to follow U.S. dictates, while far worse tyranny is steadfastly overlooked, or expressly cheered, when undertaken by compliant regimes, such as those in Riyadh and Cairo (see this USA Today article, one of many, recently hailing the Saudis as one of the “moderate” countries in the region). This is exactly the tactic that leads neocons to feign concern for Afghan women or the plight of Iranian gays when doing so helps to gin up war-rage against those regimes, while they snuggle up to far worse but far more compliant regimes.
Any rational person who watched the entire top echelon of the U.S. government drop what they were doing to make a pilgrimage to Riyadh to pay homage to the Saudi monarchs (Obama cut short a state visit to India to do so), or who watches the mountain of arms and money flow to the regime in Cairo, would do nothing other than cackle when hearing U.S. officials announce that they are imposing sanctions to punish repression of political opposition. And indeed, that’s what most of the world outside of the U.S. and Europe do when they hear such claims. But from the perspective of U.S. officials, that’s fine, because such pretenses to noble intentions are primarily intended for domestic consumption.
As for Obama’s decree that Venezuela now poses an “extraordinary threat to the national security” of the United States, is there anyone, anywhere, that wants to defend the reasonability of that claim? Think about what it says about our discourse that Obama officials know they can issue such insultingly false tripe with no consequences.
But what’s not too obvious to point out is what the U.S is actually doing in Venezuela. It’s truly remarkable how the very same people who demand U.S. actions against the democratically elected government in Caracas are the ones who most aggressively mock Venezuelan leaders when they point out that the U.S. is working to undermine their government.
The worst media offender in this regard is The New York Times, which explicitly celebrated the 2002 U.S.-supported coup of Hugo Chavez as a victory for democracy, but which now regularly derides the notion that the U.S. would ever do something as untoward as undermine the Venezuelan government.
The real question is this: if concern over suppression of political rights is not the real reason the U.S. is imposing new sanctions on Venezuela (perish the thought!), what is? Among the most insightful commentators on U.S. policy in Latin America is Mark Weisbrot of Just Foreign Policy. Read his excellent article for Al Jazeera on the recent Obama decree on Venezuela.
In essence, Venezuela is one of the very few countries with significant oil reserves which does not submit to U.S. dictates, and this simply cannot be permitted (such countries are always at the top of the U.S. government and media list of Countries To Be Demonized). Beyond that, the popularity of Chavez and the relative improvement of Venezuela’s poor under his redistributionist policies petrifies neoliberal institutions for its ability to serve as an example; just as the Cuban economy was choked by decades of U.S. sanctions and then held up by the U.S. as a failure of Communism, subverting the Venezuelan economy is crucial to destroying this success.
Apartment Complex Claims Copyright Of Tenants’ Reviews And Photos, Charges $10k Fee For Criticism
If you wanted more bad reviews than you could shake a legally-unenforceable clause at, you’d do this:
[Windermere Cay’s] Social Media Addendum, published here, is a triple-whammy. First, it explicitly bans all “negative commentary and reviews on Yelp! [sic], Apartment Ratings, Facebook, or any other website or Internet-based publication or blog.” It also says any “breach” of the Social Media Addendum will result in a $10,000 fine, to be paid within ten business days. Finally, it assigns the renters’ copyrights to the owner—not just the copyright on the negative review, but “any and all written or photographic works regarding the Owner, the Unit, the property, or the apartments.” Snap a few shots of friends who come over for a dinner party? The photos are owned by your landlord.
The Florida apartment complex claims the stupid clause is needed to prevent “unjust and defamatory reviews.” It makes this claim — not in a statement given to Ars Technica (which was tipped off by a resident) — but in the introductory paragraph of the Addendum. From there it gets worse. Doing any of the following triggers a $10,000 fine, with $5,000 added on for each additional “infraction.”
This means that Applicant shall not post negative commentary or reviews on Yelp!, Apartment Ratings, Facebook, or any other website or Internet-based publication or blog. Applicant agrees that Owner shall make the determination of whether such commentary is harmful in Owner’s sole discretion, and Applicant agrees to abide by Owner’ determination as to whether such commentary is harmful.
Then come the copyright demands.
Additionally, each Applicant hereby assigns and transfers to Owner any and all rights, including all rights of copyright as set forth in the United States Copyright Act, in any and all written or photographic works regarding the Owner, the Unit, the property, or the apartments. This means that if an Applicant creates an online posting on a website regarding the Owner, the Unit, the property, or the apartments, the Owner will have the right to notify the website to take down any such online posting pursuant to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
Of course, when confronted by Ars about the Addendum, the property managers claimed this was all someone else’s fault.
Asked about the Social Media Addendum by Ars, Windermere Cay’s property manager sent this response via e-mail: “This addendum was put in place by a previous general partner for the community following a series of false reviews. The current general partner and property management do not support the continued use of this addendum and have voided it for all residents.”
I would imagine the support was removed and addendum voided shortly after Ars publicized it, and not a moment before. According to Ars, the resident who contacted the site was asked to sign this suddenly-unsupported addendum only “days before.” But Windermere Cay’s management now very likely regrets ever including it in the first place. Like so many others before it, Windermere Cay is learning that attempting to preemptively shut down criticism with bogus clauses and high fees almost always results in more criticism. Its Yelp page is swiftly filling up with negative reviews and — like every other emotionally-charged incident on the internet, has already achieved Godwin.
Feds Say They Have Accused Fraudster’s Ankle Bracelet in Custody
Unfortunately, he’s not in it at the moment.
Paul Ceglia, who once sued Mark Zuckerberg claiming half of Facebook, and who last appeared here back in Assorted Stupidity #39 after his ninth set of lawyers withdrew from that case, has disappeared. His case against Zuckerberg was, surprisingly, dismissed after the judge found it was based on fabricated evidence, and Ceglia was later charged with fraud. Ceglia denounced that move, indignantly pleading not guilty. “I have no interest in a plea deal of any sort,” he told Ars Technica in August, facing a May trial date. “The very idea of it suggests that I have done something wrong. Of course I intend to go to trial,” he said.
He seems to have changed his mind, or else he went on an unapproved vacation and forgot to take his electronic-monitoring bracelet along. Maybe he was just concerned about tan lines?
Ceglia had been released on $250,000 bond and was required to give up his passport, so most likely he has gone to ground somewhere in the United States. A federal marshal was unable to confirm that, though, telling a reporter that he did not know whether Ceglia was still in the country. “Our responsibility is to locate him,” he told the reporter, which at first seemed like stating the obvious but now seems like a polite answer to what was probably a stupid question.
“I can confirm that the suspect has disappeared.”
“Do you know whether he’s still in the country?”
“We don’t know where he is. That’s what ‘disappeared’ means.”
The judge presiding over the case said he was “cautiously optimistic” that Ceglia would return to the jurisdiction in the near future, though he didn’t say why. Since Ceglia most likely is still in the U.S., because he doesn’t have a passport and our borders are hermetically sealed, it probably is just a matter of time before he is recaptured. Although it could take a while if he were to do something especially sneaky like, let’s say, get a job with the Homeland Security Department. That’s the last place they’d look, or at least it used to be.
AT&T’s Cozy NSA Ties Brought Up In Attempt To Scuttle DirecTV Merger
Before there was Edward Snowden, there was of course the notably less celebrated Mark Klein. As most of you probably recall, Klein, a 22-year AT&T employee, became a whistleblower after hehighlighted how AT&T was effectively using fiber splits to give the NSA duplicate access to every shred of data that touched AT&T’s network. Of course, once it was discovered that AT&T was breaking the law, the government decided to just change the law, ignore Klein’s testimony, and give all phone companies retroactive immunity. It really wasn’t until Snowden that the majority of the tech press took Klein’s warnings seriously.
AT&T’s been loyally “patriotic” ever since, often giving the government advice on how to skirt the lawor at times even acting as intelligence analysts. Business repercussions for AT&T have been minimal at best; in fact, you’ll recall that Qwest (now CenturyLink) claimed repeatedly that government cooperation was rewarded with lucrative contracts, while refusal to participate in government programs was punished. In fact, the only snag AT&T’s seen in the years since was to have its European expansion plans thwarted, purportedly by regulators uncomfortable with the carrier’s cozy NSA ties (AT&T instead simply expanded into Mexico).
Fast forward a few years and The Hill is now claiming that AT&T’s relationship with the NSA could harm the company’s $48 billion attempt to acquire DirecTV. This claim is apparently based on the fact that a coalition of AT&T business partners, called the Minority Cellular Partners Coalition, is warning the FCC in a letter that AT&T’s enthusiastic voluntary cooperation with the NSA shows the company’s total disregard for consumer privacy.
“(Despite immunity) the Commission is still obliged to execute and enforce the provisions of § 229 of the Act, see 47 U.S.C. § 151, and it is still empowered to conduct an investigation to insure that AT&T complies with the requirements of CALEA. See id. § 229(c). And the Commission is obliged to determine whether AT&T is qualified to obtain DIRECTV’s licenses in light of its egregious violations of CALEA. This is particularly true given AT&T’s continued and ongoing pattern of misconduct. Accordingly, the Commission should investigate AT&T’s complicity in the PSP to determine whether AT&T engaged in unlawful conduct that abridged the privacy interests of telecommunications consumers on a vast scale and, if so, whether AT&T is qualified to obtain DIRECTV’s licenses.”
Of course, that’s simply not happening. While the NSA cooperation can be used as a broader example of AT&T’s character (like the repeatedly nonsensical claims the company makes when it wants a merger approved, or how AT&T tries to charge its broadband customers extra for no deep packet inspection), it’s incredibly unlikely that the same government that granted AT&T’s immunity will turn around and sign off on using AT&T’s behavior to squash a merger. If the merger is blocked, it will be due to more practical considerations — like the fact that DirecTV is a direct competitor to AT&T and eliminating them would lessen competition in the pay TV space. When it comes to AT&T’s relationship with the NSA, it’s pretty clear by now that these particular chickens may never come home to roost.
Rightscorp Hemorrhages Cash, Profit from Piracy Remains Elusive
In copyright enforcement circles the terms ‘piracy’ and ‘profit’ are often cited in close proximity. Entertainment companies bemoan the alleged profits made by ‘pirate’ sites at the expense of creators, while the same entities claim that piracy is killing their business, even while making billions.
Somewhere in the middle ground lie the groups that seek to turn piracy into profit by punishing the infringements of others. Traditional ‘trolls’ seek thousands from alleged Internet pirates via the courts, but companies such as Rightscorp Inc chase individuals for relatively tiny sums – $20 per shot – for unauthorized content downloads.
It’s a strategy the company insists will eventually pay off but if the latest set of results filed by the Los Angeles-based outfit are anything to go by, investors should be wary of holding their collective breaths.
In a call with investors yesterday things appeared to start reasonably well. Rightscorp President, COO, CTO, and CFO Robert Steele began by reporting how well the company had performed in the final quarter of 2014. Total revenues were almost $242,000, up 56% from the $155,300 achieved in the same period of 2013.
For the full year, things looked even better. From January 1 to December 31, 2014, Rightscorp pulled in close to $931,000 in revenues, that’s 187% up on 2013 when the company generated just $324,000. Steele said the growth in the company’s revenues can be attributed to two key areas.
Firstly, the growing number of copyrights for which the company has contracts to extract settlements from customers. On December 31, 2013, Rightscorp were detecting infringement on approximately 30,000 titles but by the same date in 2014 that had skyrocketed to around 230,000.
Secondly the company says it is getting more and more ISPs on board. It now claims to deal with 233 and has received settlements from customers of five of the top 10 US ISPs including Comcast, Charter, CenturyLink, Mediacom and Suddenlink. The idea is that more ISPs participating should mean more notices being forwarded and a more healthy bottom line for the company. But that’s only the theory.
The problem for Rightscorp is that when compared to the revenue being generated from infringements, its costs are astronomical. It pays out around half of its revenues to its rightsholder clients, which in 2014 amounted to $465,364. But when one looks at the bigger picture that’s much, much less than half of the company’s problems.
In 2014 the company spent around $139,000 on sales and marketing. Its wages bill increased from $637,000 in 2013 to almost $1.15 million in 2014. And last year its lawyers earned more too.
In 2014 the company’s legal bills neared $481,000, that’s up from $355,500 in 2013. The increase is attributed to legal action being taken against the company, including harassment cases currently in the pipeline.
All told, Rightscorp incurred operating expenses of $4,329,602 during the twelve months ended December 31, 2014, versus $2,134,843 for the twelve months ended December 31, 2013.
So, with revenues of approximately $931,000, that’s a loss of around $3.4 million for 2014. The company lost ‘just’ $1.81 million in 2013. Nevertheless, Rightscorp still see their situation as positive.
“We recorded our strongest year yet with an astounding 187% year-over-year growth,” Steele said. “We are confident that by focusing on these growth metrics, we will be able to capture significant growth ahead.”
The company’s latest 10-K filing paints a more gloomy picture, however.
“The Company has not yet established an ongoing source of revenues sufficient to cover its operating costs and to allow it to continue as a going concern,” the filing reads.
“The ability of the Company to continue as a going concern is dependent on the Company obtaining adequate capital to fund operating losses until it establishes a revenue stream and becomes profitable. If the Company is unable to obtain adequate capital it could be forced to cease operations. Accordingly, these factors raise substantial doubt as to the Company’s ability to continue as a going concern.”
While the company’s accounts give cause for concern, the precarious situation is only amplified when one examines Rightscorp’s over-exposure to a limited number of copyright-holder clients. In 2014 a total of 76% of Rightscorp sales came from one client, BMG Rights Management. The company’s contract with Warner Bros. accounted for a further 13% of sales.
If the former pulled the plug (and after a one year contract BMG only needs to give 30 days notice to do so) it could be game over for Rightscorp.
Detective Who Was Recorded Assaulting An Unarmed, Handcuffed Suspect Acquitted Of All Charges
Both a cop and his prime homicide suspect have walked away free men. But it’s the cop who’s gathered most of the attention. Donald Love was picked up by Milwaukee police on August 14, 2013, after his infant son died in a local hospital of traumatic brain injuries. Love wasn’t just a “person of interest.” He was alone in the house with the infant at the time the injury occurred.
Love was interrogated by detective Rodolfo Gomez Jr. This questioning was recorded. The highlight reel, as it were, doesn’t show much interrogation. It shows Gomez attacking the restrained suspect on two separate occasions. Love was punched, kicked and jabbed in the eye with Gomez’s thumb. The latter — and more excruciating “interaction” (caution: the video hosted here contains some very unnerving screaming) — occurred during Gomez’s “follow-up questioning,” and appears to have been provoked by Love’s justifiably angry yelling.
A jury acquitted Love of all charges more than year later. Another jury also acquitted Gomez of all charges, despite watching him assault a handcuffed man.
How do you defend someone against charges related to a videotaped beating? Well, you do everything you can to cast the person handing out the beating as the real victim. His defense lawyers helped, but they had to fight an uphill battle against both damning video footage and statements made by Gomez himself, most of which gave the indication that he had no idea how to handle a potentially dangerous individual.
First, Gomez admitted he said something he knew would provoke an angry response. Then he claimed his short-term memory went all haywire in the heat of the moment.
Michigan Attorney General Slaps Reporter With Bogus Subpoenas For Doing Her Job
Why is it always the state Attorneys General? Time and time again we see examples of state AGs who seem to think they’re above the law and can abuse their position to attack those they dislike. The latest? Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette. Apparently, he was none too happy that Huffington Post reporter Dana Liebelson was investigating juvenile prison conditions in the state, and had a representative from his office follow her for two hours across the state to slap her with two separate, but equally questionable, subpoenas, demanding all of her notes.
As Liebelson notes on her Twitter feed, she had had permission to visit the prisons, and agreed not to bring in a recording device. She noted that she followed all the rules that she was given for reporting from the prison — and yet, she immediately gets slapped with a subpoena demanding her notes.
And she wasn’t the only one. Another report notes that Schuette also sent a subpoena to Michigan Radio, demanding its recording of a prisoner/attorney interview.
THE PRAYER, IT BURNS!!!
Hiram Jimenez’ story isn’t as funny. See Jimenez v. Applebees. He went to Applebees for dinner, which is your first clue about him. He ordered the steak fajita, and the waitress dutifully served it. He then, apparently, believed that God gives shit about what happens in Applebees, or whether you are grateful for a shitty steak fajita, so Jimenez bowed his head in prayer.
Then the almighty taught him a lesson about eating in prole-shit-chain restaurants. God burned his goddamned face! Then, in a scene that sounds like it came from a Jerky Boys crank call:
[Jimenez] panicked, knocked his plate onto his lap and caused his prescription eyeglasses to fall from his face. Plaintiff said he tried to push away from the table with his right arm. He used his left arm to brush the food from his lap. He soon felt that he had “pulled” something in his right arm. He stopped applying pressure to the table, “let [his] [right] hand go because [he] felt pain,” and “banged” his elbow on the table.
Sky Will Hand Over Customer Data in Movie Piracy Case
Any regular reader of these pages will be familiar with the term “copyright troll”. These companies have made a business model out of monitoring file-sharing networks for alleged copyright infringements, tracking down alleged offenders and then demanding hard cash to make supposed lawsuits go away.
The practice is widespread in the United States but also takes place in several countries around Europe. Wherever the location, the methods employed are largely the same. ‘Trolls’ approach courts with ‘evidence’ of infringement and demand that ISPs hand over the details of their subscribers so that the copyright holder can demand money from them.
During September 2014, TorrentFreak became aware of a UK court case that had just appeared before the Chancery Division. The title – TCYK LLP v British Sky Broadcasting Ltd – raised eyebrows. From experience we know that TCYK stands for The Company You Keep and is the title of the film of the same name directed and starring Robert Redford, appearing alongside Susan Sarandon and Shia LeBeouf.
While the movie itself is reportedly unremarkable, the response to it being unlawfully made available on file-sharing networks has been significant. In the United States TCYK LLC has filed dozens of copyright infringement lawsuits against Internet subscribers in many states including Illinois, Colorado, Ohio, Florida and Minnesota, to name a few. Those interested in their U.S-based activities can read about them extensively on ‘troll’ watching sites DTD and Fight Copyright Trolls.
The big news today, however, is that TCYK LLC is about to start demanding cash from customers of the UK’s second largest ISP, Sky Broadband. TorrentFreak approached Sky back in September for information on the case but after several emails back and forth the trail went cold. We can now reveal what has transpired.