Has Copyright owners actions affected your choice?

[one eyed jack]

@OEJ I understand your reservation RE Bpaws letter. A thought has crossed my mind however, is it your belief that the people targeted by GEIL are the same "Type of person" that you have described with regard to selling HDD worth of stuff? I can understand your view if it is, I dont agree, as I know how bittorrent works, and there is no money involved at the local level that GEIL are targeting.


I understand they are varying degrees of the same theme. I did post a while back on this thread of the chap selling 500 gig hard drives with films he has downloaded off the internet and getting twice the hard drive cost as profit. This person I believe is not proficient in the internet to monetise his il gotten gains other than knowing how to download via a p2p client. This is where it gets very murky for me and why I asked what an innocent person looks like

Given that it was more mainstream films I he could get royally shagged big time by FACT if they knew he was selling in high volumes but I know he has a day time job so I imagine he is making a few sales to justify this action but does that make him any less innocent if he got caught in the GEIL net?

Think carefully about your answer and then think about it if he got caught by FACT? If you check the small print on the warning card at the beginning of any DVD you will see in some cases what kind of figure they could push for if he was found guilty. They wouldnt get it because their fines could be up to ?20,000 per title depending on the film

He might not even get a custodial sentence but he will have to pay a fine that will exceed what GEIL are offering, depending onthe severity of his crime that is.

Hickster: GEIL to me are targeting a protocol that by its nature uploads a small fraction of the download, that way they can say "Look people are uploading", that of course is ridiculous, but that is what the fight is against.

I cannot confirm or deny these allegations but it would seem to be that if people are uploading it are you suggesting that they are only downloading an incomplete file to entrap people??? How would you know that?

Hickster: I personally feel that the Internet has so changed the landscape of the World and it's business setup that thinking out of the box is necessary. I feel there should be a law change that allows a "Person use" division of law, anyone found copying and selling should be punished, but those who keep for themselves should be passed over. I am NOT saying this is morally right, but I do see it as a way forward.

Im sure this is already widely accepted but how does that apply where GEIL is concerned? Are you suggesting that people who were members of a site deleted the old files so felt because they paid for it that they were licensed to download it for free from the internet? How are we to determine this is true if that is the case? I'm sure that would be used as an excuse Just not sure how they would justify it if it was being sold on where its not their right to do so.

[bpaw]

Sorry OEJ for the delay in answering your as always interesting response!

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bpaw: ...The letter still has the "threat" of Court action. Or is it an admission that you know that GEIL are not prepared to go to Court?

OEJ:I can see why he would say that but for me I would say that courts are expensive and time consuming and the results are more based on strategy than moral rights or wrongs and we can find plenty evidence to support this in this in the media.

If it was a question of morality then would this all even be an issue by your reckoning?
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It is a legal issue. See NPO:

?Within six months of the date of disclosure, the First Applicant shall provide to the Respondent a written report stating precisely from the relevant names disclosed how many of those persons (1) were sent letters of claim; (2) makes a positive and expressed confession of liability; (3) by their own volition accepts the First Applicant's compromise agreement without an expressed confession of liability; (4) requests the Applicants commences proceedings; and (5) against whom the Applicants have issued legal proceedings.?

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bpaw: Secondly, the picture you describe as regards endemic piracy suggests these are not paying customers anyway.

OEJ:How does that suggest anything than what it is??? How are we to determine who is paying for it versus freeloading??? Just saying it doesnt make sense that if they are paying for it why would they download it??? It makes no odds to me if they joined someone elses site and expected to get mine for free...Or did I misunderstand your point?
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A misunderstand, I think. My idea of a ?prolific uploader?. I thought you were talking about the people who make copyright material available for download on servers. These I regard as people who are unlikely to pay for such material.

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bpaw: Thirdly, the major pirates are out of reach of casual monitoring of o2 customers. The ones seeking kudos are making material available and are hosted on servers. Try sending an LoC to a US server.

OEJ:Again, as explained, this has been done many times over the years with the same result of those servers removing the content to have it re-upped as a renamed link the same day or within minutes of removing the link. Again, time consuming and inefficient a method
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I?m sorry OEJ. I think we are a bit cross wired on this. I?m simply going by Julian Beckers original assertion that GEIL are going after the uploaders, not simply someone who has downloaded one video.

I would ask OEJ, given the nature of p2p, is it better to go after ?Seeders? or ?Leechers??

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bpaw: Fourthly, the serious downloaders are hiding behind VPNs like the one that Aleriza Torabi offers.

OEJ:This is where your valid argument appears to be flawed by the very words you type.

These flaws you speak of can be attributed to anything invented by man. Was this not indeed addressed by the judge? I think an allowance has been made which is why I understand the opposition in defence of innocent persons being caught up in the net which is why the courts are involved so intimately.
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Absolutely. The judgement is a result of the issues of monitoring and ISP subscriber. Reading through the Judgement is pretty much a testimony to the fact that the evidence provided by the claimants does not warrant any assertions whatsoever.

Remember OEJ that GEIL have had to bow down big style from their original assertions. The Judge balanced the issues against the right for GEIL (On behalf of the Copyright holders) to protect their copyright. This has to accepted by the Courts which is part of law. But it is an NPO to gain names and addresses of ISP subscribers.

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bpaw: Consider my alternative LoC again. You have already said that you didn't expect to see anything come from this. What is being asked for is for sure going to make people fight it, innocent or not. It maybe that only 10% or less pay up.

100 x ?500 is ?50,000. 1000 x ?40 is ?40,000. We are not talking way out figures here. But one claim is better for your reputation than the other, and offers the chance for further custom.

OEJ:I am not actively involved in this scheme. The sites content is being represented and acted on my behalf. I do understand your logic but I dont have the time or staff to implement that
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Fair enough. I understand the finances and costs involved. It did make you consider though.

I saw that digital sales reached over ?1b whilst ?physical? sales fell by just over 17% in 2012. It proves there is still mileage in selling a digital product, and adaption is better than taking actions that may harm sales.

I hear your voice (In typed words) OEJ, and I for one would like you personally to gain just rewards in sales of the material you produce. I just can?t agree with what GEIL are doing because I, others and the NPO Judge see it as flawed.

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bpaw: And I know that you are still not prepared to offer an opinion on the fact that less than 1,000 subscriber names came out of nearly 3,000 IP addresses.

OEJ:In the spirit of answering a question I cannot rightly answer I would have to shrug my shoulders and admit I'm clueless on this aspect of your enquiry. In truth I did not even know that. What does this mean? It has fallen short of expectations? Again I am not pinning my hopes on getting rich from this. Ive already explained my motive for involvement
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I did explain earlier in this thread, but a brief thought from me is:

The leaked emails from ACS:Law had two spreadsheets which contained over 11,000 IP addresses monitored by Alireza Torabi which was sent to BskyB to match subscriber names and addresses.

Looking at the spreadsheets, just over 25% of the IP addresses had one entry under the name, which was ?Unknown?. This was BskyB saying that the IP address provided to them at the precise time of monitoring did not match up to any subscriber who had that IP address.

The original over 9,000 IP addresses monitored by Alireza Torabi for GEIL on behalf of all producers were submitted in evidence in Court for the application of the NPO. As only BDP were granted, GEIL were only able to submit nearly 3,000 IP addresses on behalf of BDP to O2 for matching the subscriber names and addresses. O2 came out with a statement in the technology press and say they matched below 1,000 subscriber names from the near 3,000.

Now I ask you OEJ not as a producer, but just as an interested observer. If a near 3,000 IP addresses were originally monitored, how many names would you expect back from O2? Would you expect 33%? I tell you OEJ, this had me flabbergasted!!!!

The BIG question is, how can this be if the monitoring software was declared OK by ?Expert witness? Clem Vogler?

The easiest way to shut me and others up (Maybe not all!!!) is for you, Julian Becker or a piece from GEIL in the press that gives a low down on how precisely the evidence is gathered. A say so from a sixty-something person, who gained his IT knowledge in the nineties and who self admits he is not an IT expert now, you have to admit smells like a well oiled scam.

[bpaw]

Sorry, a correction is needed from my previous post:

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bpaw: Fourthly, the serious downloaders are hiding behind VPNs like the one that Aleriza Torabi offers.

This is where your valid argument appears to be flawed by the very words you type.

OEJ:These flaws you speak of can be attributed to anything invented by man. Was this not indeed addressed by the judge? I think an allowance has been made which is why I understand the opposition in defence of innocent persons being caught up in the net which is why the courts are involved so intimately.
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Absolutely. The judgement is a result of the issues of monitoring and ISP subscriber. Reading through the Judgement is pretty much a testimony to the fact that the evidence provided by the claimants does not warrant any assertions whatsoever.

Remember OEJ that GEIL have had to bow down big style from their original assertions. The Judge balanced the issues against the right for GEIL (On behalf of the Copyright holders) to protect their copyright. This has to accepted by the Courts which is part of law. But it is an NPO to gain names and addresses of ISP subscribers.

[bpaw]

As an addition, there maybe a misunderstanding here.

For those who don't understand a VPN.

VPN stands for Virtual Private Network. This is a method for a computer behind a public IP address (As in a router) to "dial in" to another network. A VPN provides another IP address to the dial in user. An example is below:

Router public IP address: 222.222.222.222
Router internal IP address: 192.168.0.1
Computer internal IP address: 192.168.0.2
Computer gateway: 192.168.0.1 (The place a computer gets its internet)

Computer dials a VPN IP of: 111.111.111.111
Computer internal IP address: 192.168.0.1
Computer external IP address: 111.111.111.111
Computer gateway: 111.111.111.111 (The place a computer gets its internet)

Three things are important with this:

The original router public IP address of 222.222.222.222 is replaced by the VPN IP address of 111.111.111.111.

The public IP address of 222.222.222.222 might fall in the address range of an ISP (Like O2).

The public IP address of 111.111.111.111 is not an ISP IP address, so can not be on the list of O2 or any other ISP range of IP addresses. This will not be monitored.

That is why people who want to download copyright material choose to use a VPN.

Alireza Torabi, who monitored IP addresses for GEIL offered a VPN service at his xypy.net server.

Can anyone see the reason why this is wrong?

[one eyed jack]

Duuuuude!

You seen this?


Its been viewed 116,000 + times!!!

I aint greedy but if every one of those viewers gave me 25p to view a scene i wouldnt be complaining about piracy

Really hard to see your points Hickster and bpaw, you can blind us with morals and science of right all day long. I know what side of the fence i m on with this issue

You say it aint theft and technically it aint but its like someone gaining access to your house and giving away all your beers!!!!!

Rubbish or old or whatever i paid all concerned for a product as my investment

Copyright infringement is copyright infringement Nuff said! That scene was most likely ripped from a DVD as there is no watermark on it (or zoomed in hence the blurry picture quality

You will never understand because you aint in my trousers wearing my shoes!

[Hickster]

@OEJ wrote "You seen this?
http://bgafd.co.uk/forum/read.php?f=2&i=190187&t=190187"

Err no I have not, but your language is interesting. You mention

"I aint greedy but if every one of those viewers gave me 25p to view a scene i wouldnt be complaining about piracy"

Yet you are backing GEIL who dont want 25p but SEVEN HUNDRED POUNDS

Not nice, and also why when you have the evidence, dont you pursue THEM?

[one eyed jack]

Not nice, and also why when you have the evidence, dont you pursue THEM?

What evidence is there? Somebody else using a pseudonym on a tube site with no contact.

I could ask for the removal, sure but it will be right back up there via another user. Thats how tube sites work

I used to chase people, used DMCA notices, used DRM,used tokens on the site. Now I'm with GEIL, maybe in the future with someone else who takes up the fight, maybe GEIL 2.0 who knows? If youre in this game and you dont look like you are doing nothing about this problem it sends out a signal you are ok to let it happen.

You make it sound as simple as just removing it. If only you really knew you might understand but again all you see is me wanting seven hundred poiunds and totally missed the point I made...

Even if you gave it away for cheap people still wouldnt want to pay for anything they can get for free but yet they are all innocent....All 116,977 views of them...and thats just xhamster. This doesnt include all the usenet groups and other tube sites

I ask for 25p per view? How much do you think I'll get? I could say pretty please, be kind. What good will that get me?

Ive given a beggar on the street more for nothing because they only wanted a cup of coffee but I have given them enough for a sandwich

It costs a lot of time and a lot of money with the risk of no results but somethings got to be done

[one eyed jack]

While we are at it. I wonder how many of those who saw that clip were under age?

Thats a good argument to use against ATVOD who are set up to protect minors from viewing this kind of content but here we are, I just clicked on a link and there they are demanding websites sign up to their scheme to prevent them from doing business with their stringent regulations but allow sites like that to flourish openly.

Even though its for free you have to pay to buy a better quality download.

Let me state that again, you have to pay, for STOLEN content. Content they have no right to for having ripped off a DVD which clearly states the DVD is licensed for home use and to be kept away from minors and to be used responsibly and not to be made available by any other means, electronic or internet (its quite specific) but there you see it...All out there and for free. If you went to a website you wouldnt get that clip for free. I doubt minors would even go to a website knowing they would have to pay to access it

[Hickster]

@OEJ

You have the MORE EVIDENCE for the Tube Streamer than you have for targetting Torrent users.

Your desire to avoid the Regulation of ATVOD is of no concern to me, and has no bearing on this issue, indeed it shows the Industry up as resisting to be regulated. (Why should we be, they all scream, we are the AITA et all, we have the right to everything)

Interesting also that you yourself by watching that clip have "Copyright Infringed", how did it feel? Why did you do it? You already knew that Website was a Streaming site, I had told you if noone else had.

Do you really believe that all 161, 000+ views on that site, were different individuals? Do you not see some kind of advertising benefit to this, that someone might see your work and go buy some who would never usually have heard of you or seen your work?

The times have changed and the Adult Industry needs to adapt or die, Speculative Invoicing is the thrashing and screaming of an industry or people with no creative ideas to adapt to a new market. They want to cling to the old markets and methods. Adapt or die.

I say this as the BPI, who as you may know are dead against this method of generating income, have stated in the past that Piracy will destroy the Music Industry. Really? oh I see, the INDUSTRY yes, but it wont destroy MUSIC will it? Your colleague Julian Becker has some interesting views on People who make Porn for other reasons than Cash, but there it is, some people do it for the money, others for the joy of doing it. Find another method to market.

These websites that charge for "Stolen" content as you say, and cant be dealt with by Law as the internet has made the laws obsolete, you need a more creative way of marketing. The record industry DESTROYED the sheet music industry, remember what CD's did to vinyl?(No porn pun intended). Can you imagine the laughter and derision there would be if the wax disk industry was moaning as Vinyl had upset its sales? That my friend is capitalism, you live by it you die by it, what was it Ben Dover said about selling VHS tapes of his porn films for ?300? Come on looks like you guys ripped off your fans for years, if that is the case. Also as I have posted before, a number of complaints I have seen on here have stated that he uses old scenes in his new disks. does that mean that you should have to pay for the same thing over and over? It is a tricky path when you start on Morals. Best not to start down that route/

Safe to say I have provided you with enough evidence about the issues with the legal action you have signed up to. You have provided me opinion, that is very different to evidence. We will see how this all pans out, as I have said GEIL are saying the NPO appeal is a legal vindication, it is no such thing, when and I should say IF any of these cases ever goes to Court in a contested manner(Will never happen), it will be thrown out. Why? At the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal hearing for the originators of this Legal Action, Davenport Lyons, the prosecuting lawyer stated,

"and using IP addresses to accuse people of alleged infringement, was the "flimsiest" of evidence.

He pointed out that no case had been brought to court because they were not "sustainable in law"!

Well exactly!

[one eyed jack]

Im not avoiding ATVODs regulation. I just dont come under its remit.

Im a cameraman, film maker and editor. I have no idea how to design websites or the mechanics of it. About the extent of my knowledge is social networking and blogging and yes there is a similarity to that and what you are railing against.

Its no more concern to you as it is paid up members to websites concern to what you are defending, assuming most people on here actually subscribe to the sites they talk about, hence why this thread seems to just be you,bpaw and myself discussing this topic.

I can only imagine the people that have got in touch with you on the basis of this thread were actual downloaders worried that they might be caught for porn as im sure they would be very embarrasssed to be caught with titles like "Lesbian Lavatory Lust" or "Black Anal Transexuals On Heat" or some such colourful porn fare