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ONE OF THE world’s biggest file-sharing websites has been shut down following a major action against piracy by the US Department of Justice and the FBI.
In another Hollywood versus the Internet row, the movie industry had claimed that the site was making money off pirated material.
According to the US indictment, the founder Kim Dotcom (formerly Kim Schmitz) earned $42 million last year. He was arrested in New Zealand last night, along with three of the site’s other operators.
MegaUpload’s subsidiary site MegaVideo has also been closed.
MegaVideo was particularly popular in Ireland as television shows that don’t air here until weeks (or months) after they are shown in the US could be watched as soon as they were broadcast.
Worldwide, MegaUploads sites had about 150 million users and 50 million daily hits.
Hosted sites
Although the company is based in Hong Kong, US prosecutors took action as some of the alleged pirated content was hosted on leased servers in Virginia.
The US told New Zealand authorities that those arrested facilitated millions of illegal downloads of films, music and other content. Prosecutors claim that the copyright holders could have lost at least half a billion dollars as a result.
During the raids at several properties, New Zealand police seized guns, artwork, $8 million in case and luxury cars.
Extradition proceedings have already started in New Zealand today. The presiding judge asked photographers to stop using their cameras but Dotcom insisted they were allowed to take photos.
He added that there was “nothing to hide”.
Hacking
Self-labelled internet protectors retaliated to the news of the shutdown by hacking into the Justice Department’s website. Anonymous claimed responsibility for the attack, which left the site down for hours.
The act is being treated as “malicious”, federal official said. The website of Motion Picture Association of America was also attacked.
The FBI, Universal Music, RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) and Hadopi – a French government agency – were also on the ‘hitlist’.
Sky News reports that the anarchistic group has warned that it has launched what will be its biggest ever attack on US government sites and other European targets.
They are calling the loosely coordinated attacks #OpMegaUpload.
-Additional reporting by AP
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A sad day : (
disgraceful behaviour by the authorities….if mega got taken down …whos next …. No Internet Censure….. SAVE OUR INTERNET
How long before the next Megavideo appears? In fact there are many more similar sites out there (Videobb, anyone?) .
If something can be seen and/or heard, it can be recorded, copied and transmitted. And it gets easier with each passing year and each new advance in technology – hardware, data encryption and software usability .
Copyright is dead, like it or not.
Explains why I couldn’t watch anything last night
Never liked Mega Video because of the 70mins limit.
easy to get around that one
Not worth the hassle changing proxy settings etc. every 70min
^the OP comment above has 72 likes.
Mind. Blown
i don’t even use megavideo to watch tv or movies, i just use ******* :)
Soon our comments will be Blanked out.
The idea that free access to unlimited hours of television and film content as an non revocable right is clearly wrong. I have no defense of large corporations overcharging for their goods but the aspirations of many artists to make an honest living creating content for people to watch and enjoy is seriously undermined when people expect to be able to enjoy it for nothing, do those same people work? When they expend, time and energy doing something in which another derives a clear benefit do they not expect to get paid or are they happy to allow others enjoy the fruit of their labor for nothing. Furthermore unlike a lot of goods and services, music and filmed entertainment is often good value, a 2 hr experience of watching a desired film or TV series is available legally for less than the price of a cup of tea, furthermore paying for it ensures that does who aspire to create similar content do not have to be independently wealthy to pursue such an ambition as a livliehood, people should absolutely resist any attmepts to be ripped off but eschewing a sense of just entitlement to unlimited free access to the fruits of other peoples labour is not a sustainable argument, if you expect to get paid when you create something of value for another, do you believe such a right is exclusive to you, will if you dont then you have to appreciate you need to pay something ( aint it is increasingly less with all of the subscription options) for the enjoyment your derive from listening of watching their work. Im glad mega video is gone, it was pure shite service anyway and the idea that they deserved to make millions out of illegally broadcasting other peoples stuff is clearly wrong as well.
tl;dr
Have to wholeheartedly agree on your observation Economicopoly.
I am beginning to think that an increasing amount of Irish people expect everything for nothing.
You’re right of course but what needs to be put in place is an alternative where shows screened anywhere are available for viewing within hours or even simultaneously outside of their core territory. Only then will pirating drop to a level where only those who don’t want to pay will resort to it. The price for legitimate consumers needs to be kept low to encourage them to participate
Are you Lars Ulrich?
My Question – Say for Example you pay a Sky Subscription – it shows series X over a 5 month timeframe. So you’ve paid Sky, Sky has paid whoever it pays for the Series – therefore why can I not go online and watch the entire serverx as shown in US over a weekend – they still get my money, correct?
serverx should have said series x
I’ve just a couple points to make. Firstly, why are they trying to push for SOPA and PIPA so much when they can obviously shut down these big sites without it? Even arrested guys in New Zealand and other countries.
Second, I hate the way they call us all pirates. I pay for sky plus tv license. I just started watching shows like Homeland which started on RTE 2. What’s the difference if I watch these shows ahead of time online? I’m already paying sky and RTE for these shows, so how are they losing out?
Just show these shows at the same time everywhere. They did it for Lost and 24 and I stopped downloading these shows because it was just easier to watch them on telly.
A pirate is a person that download these shows and movies, put them into dvd sleeves and sells them at street corners and markets. NOT the people just watching online.
I forgot my third point :)
Oh yeah, big fucking deal. Videobb, Novamov, honestly too many to mention will just take up the slack. Oh and when these sites are taken down, the time taken for these sites to get more popular other sites will be growing to fill the gap.
hear hear well said man….agree wholeheartedly ….. SAVE OUR INTERNET …. NO INTERNET CENSURE
Good. These guys did nothing to stop a film I worked on for over 8 years being robbed and distributed for free over their site and made money of it. If you think these guys are some kind of Heros and continue to support sites like this by stealing hard work by others, you won’t have any more films or tv of any quality to watch.
Your business model is broken. Try thinking outside the box.
you worked on a film for 8 year and it was robbed – you should work with people you trust.
Fu*k your films
thanks Dave.
If it took you a protracted 8 years to complete a film, perhaps you should consider a career change my artisan friend.
take it easy. the mans only sharing his past experience and an opinion.
thanks Sean! Its OK, all in a good exchange eh!. I’m actually someone who this effects. I know there is a common belief that all people who make features and TV must be loaded so its OK to take things for free. but then the writer doesn’t get paid his share, the big corporations who distribute can suck it up, but the creators get squeezed. All film makers build great trust with the people they work with but have no control over others ripping a DVD or recording a film from the cinema and putting it up on their site to make money for themselves. If you really want to know it takes an average of 4 years to finance a feature film, then, when its animated, 3 years to produce. I’m about to start another one. I’d prefer when I finish this one someone was not allowed to get away with making money off the hard work of the 200 to 250 people who worked on it by sticking it up on their site illegally. You can nearly all films legally for next to nothing online now. It feels good to pay for the labour of others, in my opinion, if you have any respect for those artists. Then again a lot of people feel if I can take it for free then why not? When no-one is looking at home. It would be a different feeling walking out of your local music shop with a dvd or CD under you arm. I love my uncensored internet, freedom of information and free content, as long as the people making it are OK with giving it away for free. It is a great way to create awareness. Obviously the people who watch movies on sites like megavideo like the movies they are watching, They just aren’t grateful or respectful to those who made it.
I am with you on this one Paul. Why is it ok for these sites to make money off of other peoples hard work?
Agree wholeheartedly Paul but I want a Netflix style flat rate alternative to the XtraVision/Cinema extortion that happens normally. You deserve payment for your work as we all do and artists and creative types need monetary incentives to keep doing what they do. I bet you don’t see half the profit off cinema showings or rentals compared to the middlemen?
Louis C.K. had it right – I recently bought his latest show for 5 US dollars. I never paid for any of his stuff before (it’s all on Youtube anyway) so I felt it was about time I gave him a few quid. It seems I’m not alone – he made about half a million dollars out of it, and every penny went to him, no label or corporation taking a cut.
I, like most people who contributed, probably never would have heard of him without the ‘free’ clips first, though… so it seems piracy does work.
I’m inclined to only buy it if it’s worth buying.. If its good I’ll want my own copy.
This saves me wasting money I cannot afford to waste on buying albums or movies that may turn out to be crap.
I felt robbed for paying to see A.I., I don’t know how many albums I bought where the singles were the only good songs. Whereas now I can hear the album and if I like it then I want to pay the artist for their work – but would be more inclined to buy direct from their sites or buy merchandise / go to a gig because then at least I know more of the money is getting to the artist rather than their record label.
I agree wholeheartedly with you on this Shanti Om, for too long we were left no choice but to fork out 22.99 to hear an album from a band we just heard of, with one song you liked only to find out the other 12 songs were pure tripe.
Happened a lot to me as a teen and before the download option became available. I must have wasted hundreds on albums I listened to 2 or 3 times as I was only interested in 1 song and would change it after that one song played.
Now if I like a band, ill youtube them and listen to their songs then check which album has most of the songs I like and digitally purchase it, that go’s in on CD then for the car.
I’m just pirating a hollywood movie as we speak and I’m gonna post it to a friend. Take that An Post, your in deep shit city with the FBI now.
I’m predicting it now yo. This is the beginning of a ridiculously huge internet war. smh
YO!
For the record, I don’t think pirates online should be making a living from this endeavour. If you are going to rob the revenue for something else, you shouldn’t be benefiting financially for the privilege..
But being able to try before you buy I have no objections to. If I like an album or a tv series, or a movie – then I will buy it, because I feel it was worth the money. Surely that should improve the quality of movies and perhaps reduce the amount of woeful you know what out there?
That is was a pirate does, rob to make ones self richer. What your looking for the is the online Robin Hood and the Merry Men, different crowd altogether.
Only started using it last week. Really hope I got all the episodes of dexter series six downloaded before the site was brought down :(
Why not go out a buy a copy of Dexter or sign up and watch it legally somewhere? Netflix will send some money to the people who made it. I understand how easy it is to downlaod something for free as you are a fan and can’t get it anywhere else. But by downloading it illegally from a pirate site you are robing the guys who wrote it, the camera man, the director and the guy who created it. Keep watching pirate versions and there won’t be any more Dexter series cause the big studio is making more money of fuppin American Idol. Its happening to so many cool shows and films because those who feel its OK to support these lovely pirates, can’t be arsed to pay, so the show gets cancelled. If it continues, all we will have left will be shit reality shows and the same 4 Hollywood blockbuster stories every year. The music industry is nearly getting it right as its making it easier for people to download music and pay. and musicians can choose to give away their work for free if they like. Its not quite the same for film makers. If someone gives you something for free, that they have made, take it gladly with their blessing. If someone steals from someone else, then gives it for free, don’t take it. If you have respect for the creator at least. otherwise you’re just taking stolen goods and the guys who pretend they are these robin hood types, will make a nice packet of you.
Dexter is on Netflix. €6.99 per month and completely legal
Only the first 2 seasons of Dexter are on Netflix. None of the shows I watch (True Blood, Burn Notice etc) are on it. If Netflix or another service had a better selection and more recent episodes I would have no problem paying to use the service.
FUCK YOU!!! US, FBI and Hollywood.
While you fucking the whole of USA any chance I can have a quick ride?
Best way I could see is, DO not host in the US and so not allow the US access to a site, that will keep the Feds away
Rapidshare is still running :-) and when they close it something else will open up :-)
movpod is very good
i use RS all the time and done so for years …i subscribe every 3 months …they are based in switz though …mega had servers in virginia thats how the feds were able to strike …i notice RS is deleting certain links and dont host porn which mega did …but it will be interesting to see what happens …hotfile gone now mega …NTI was taken down …but pirate bay beat the courts …fileserve and filesonic and multiupload still going also …mr dotcom must have rattled some one so they went after him …fair play to ANONYMOUS for doing what they did…. NO INTERNET CENSURE …… SAVE OUR INTERNET
Shouldn’t it be ‘the site was making money from pirated material’?
As Mr.Dotcom didn’t participate personally in the scheme the appropriate way of approaching the situation would’ve being to send him a notice letter informing him to take down the content before they done their movie-styled stunt, this is nothing more than an illegal show-off stunt committed by the Americans.
Earlier this week I downloaded Snow Patrol’s latest album for free. Tonight I paid them €50 to see their live show in the O2.
That is the new business model for music, like it or not that is what the masses demand and they WILL be satisfied one way or the other.
Protect our Internet. ….
Sad day for the Megaupload employees, but its not so bad for the rest if us really. Anonymous have our backs and there are still a million other sites and methods to stream or download stuff (for free – who the hell was paying to use Megaupload anyway!??).
It would have been much worse if they’d targeted the more popular free sites. That would have had more impact on a whole. Damn it, I’m giving them ideas now.
I think streaming made it to easy for the masses Ian. Eventually it will go back to where it was, back to newsgroups and darknet for the ‘real’ pirates :)
Just listening to the last word and they mentioned something about the government cracking down on online piracy. There is really a global push at the moment!
These lads, are legends.
Support their actions over the last few years 100%.
They are criminals in a corrupt and unjustified system, only there.
None of the bankers got their cars or property seized or confiscated in this way and they cost tax payers even more than the US claim these guys cost record and movies companies. I hope anonymous go to town on the whole lot of them as its clear we live in times now where the law works mainly for the corporate good and not the tax payer.
Amazed and appalled at the ignorance displayed by some people here. You just don’t get it so here it is in very simple terms…
1. It takes a lot of time, money and the creative efforts of HUNDREDS of people to make a movie. So you want all that for nothing….
2. It’s difficult to put a cost on making an album or set of songs. It depends how long it takes to make it(them) and…how long is a piece of string?! At iTunes and other sites you can listen to short extracts of the songs and then purchase only the ones you want…cheaply!
3. If you keep taking it for nothing it will eventually die! No music, No movies. Not that people won’t want to make them…the mechanisms for bringing creative efforts to reality will have been damaged and destroyed by the SCABS who take it for free…steal it!
These are industries involving people and jobs. If you want to steal their stuff and destroy the livelihoods of those who work to entertain you, then you say much more about yourself than you realise.
3. no they won’t stop make in them they will just be cheaper it will never die!
the money they are make in is Ridiculous anyway!!!!
so they end up shutting down all the sites we love what then?
I guess it’s back to paying for what you use. Internet technology means that it can be more reasonable and less expensive but not free.
A a huge movie / music fan! The crew of the film get paid week to week, the musician gets a record deal, gets tour dates, etc
Times are tight , i am all up for ,these sites , and i dont agree with paul, that it means that we wont get quality movies / shows anymore as there is always an investor that wants to invest in a worth while movie script or tv series! I think paul you should change profession
Have you ever heard of a poor person that works in the “movie” buisness ??
An investor who invests in something that you want to take for nothing will not be an investor for long.
i’m just gonna say it guys and sorry for my english i am not american….i really don’t think this FBI folks have fully realized how many millions of people they’ve pissed off all around the entire planet. i was on one of the anonymous video yesterday..and well… in less than 24 hours hackers,crackers and common internet people from each and every corner of the world, more than 50 nations involving all the major ones of europe asia and sud america ( but even north ) i counted them and it was just yesterday, have gathered to strike down with the most fearsome cyber attack the world has ever seen since the internet started…if theese guys will not give back megavideo/megaupload and get theyr hands off of the free internet i tell you they will face the most deadly and relentless cyber force existent and the attacks by it will be something that will let them regret baddly the old days of the cold war…people are DEADLY serius about this matter outside US..i can smell it in the air and i’m just a common random internet guy but i do fell the urge to let you notice about this in case it’s not evident enough.. people out there are exasperated by this…the thing with the FBI chief it’s just the begginning i can tell…and do you really think arresting some kids here and there will get you somewere? c’mon you arrest 1? 10? 100? 1000? i hope you realize
there will still be tens of millions out there whooping your ass really bad 24/7 from every direction. it is really worth risking all of this ( see the thing with the afore mentioned fbi chief) just to deny the little people some free enterteinment? the mega corporations nor the artists will ever EVER die becouse of this, it’s not like this kind of sites are a new thing..thy existed since a dacade..it’s how the market has evolved c’mon you cannot stop this, you will only hurt yourself, it’s just so stupid…but i know how stubborn the governament (espacially the US one) can be over such petty things at times so..
don’t say i didn’t warn you.
very good comment and lets hope so lol.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2EbR9QhKuZs&feature=share
it’s already happening.
count the nations read the opinions of the world web people from every continent. they started a war they cannot by al means win..they better acknowledge this before it’s too late.
damn sopa, but they have recently withdrawn sopa for now to make a few changes to it because even the people behind sopa admitted there were problems with it, so yes its been slowed down but we haven’t seen the last of it
as in shouldnt you at least get a piece of the pie from there advertising. They are nothing with out film makers but film maker will eventually be nothing without them.
That’s sad…since it’s all BS…SOPA/PIPA were junk + MU arrest was unfair + I don’t think swizz he has any legal connections to MU…imo it was all fabbed up to get other celebrity endorsements.
p.s. looks like someone is pissed – FBI vs ANONYMOUS video:
http://www.peeje.com/anonymous-hackers-we-legion-211/
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