MPAA want to close 5 more Filehoster

The Motion Picture Associaten of America (MPAA) wants to take more one-click-hoster from the network. In addition, the MPAA wants Megaupload go further one-click hosters on the collar. This was announced by Alfred Perry, spokesman for the worldwide protection of content from Paramount Pictures, recently at a conference. If the file hosters who are on the hit list of the MPAA, are in fact five portals - Putlocker, Wupload, Depositfiles, File and Serve Mediafire. According to the MPAA should combine these services annually 41 billion page views for the views, making it five for every person on this planet.

Is unclear whether Perry give here only loudly proclaimed or actual investigations are already underway for the file hosting services. Due to the high level of public attention in the case Megaupload closed already some one-click-hoster or voluntarily restricted its functions to prevent the content from piracy and to move the attention of the authorities.

Even if it is the announcement by Perry just a bluff, this could be the fear among the leaders again call to mind, without the MPAA must be active. Against the accusations by Alfred Perry is one of the aforementioned one-click hosters already fought. In a statement, insisted Mediafire careful not to file hosters who are after a dubious business model, to be lumped together. According to information provided Mediafire have never advertised for homeless Megaupload users and has always fought against piracy. Next we have never paid users to upload files and frequented also cooperating with the major music labels and movie studios. Must now respond to show how the respective file hosting services on the announcement by the MPAA.

Maybe Megaupload Boss Kim Schmitz gets lucky

The criminal charges against Kim Dotcom in the United States may never get to trial, the judge overseeing the case has told the FBI. United States district court judge Liam O'Grady said he didn't know if "we are ever going to have a trial in this matter" after being told Dotcom's file-sharing company had never been formally served with criminal papers by the US.

The comment has been seized on by Dotcom's lawyers, who say it could lead to the extradition case in New Zealand being tossed out. It follows a paperwork error by New Zealand authorities, who seized Dotcom's property without giving proper notice. The restraining order on his property was finally granted last week. Megaupload was the world's biggest file-sharing website and claimed it was responsible for 4 per cent of internet traffic. Dotcom faces a court hearing for extradition to the United States after a warrant was issued for him and six others on criminal copyright charges relating to music and movies on its computer servers. Lawyers acting for the US have said they will argue Dotcom should be extradited because he was a member of an organised criminal group, which carries a sentence of five years.

The US Government needs to get over the hurdle of a five-year jail sentence to meet the criteria for extradition. Copyright charges in NZ carry a maximum of four years. Judge O'Grady raised the prospect of there being no trial while hearing arguments over FBI applications to wipe Megaupload's vast database of members' files. He said further study needed to be made of the failure to serve Megaupload, adding; "I frankly don't know that we are ever going to have a trial in this matter."

He said the arguments around the future of the data on the 1100 computers servers seized from Megaupload could be "premature". He wanted more information on why Megaupload had not been served. The FBI's lack of service meant Megaupload was "kind of hanging out there", Judge O'Grady said. Dotcom's US-based lawyer, Ira Rothken, said it was the defence's understanding that it was not legally possible for Megaupload to be served with papers accusing it of criminal acts.

He said it would be possible to serve the company with papers for a civil case and - as happened in NZ - for individuals to be remotely charged with crimes. "My understanding as to why they haven't done that is because they can't. We don't believe Megaupload can be served in a criminal matter because it is not located within the jurisdiction of the United States." Mr Rothken said he would have expected the FBI to have had the same legal advice, having described the case as the "largest copyright case in the US, which also means the world".

Mr Rothken said a key defence against extradition was the claim by Dotcom and others that they were accused of offences not covered by the law on extradition. Prosecutor Jay Prabhu told the Virginia court hearing it might not matter because Dotcom owned 68 per cent of the company. He said it was not a case of a corporation which might normally turn up. "It's seven people who actually don't want to show up." Meanwhile, legal negotiations are under way to have jewellery and personal effects belonging to Dotcom's wife, Mona, returned.

The MISTAKES of Kim Schmitz and Megaupload

U.S. authorities have closed the file hosting service MegaUpload and arrested four employees of the company, including Megaupload-chief Kim Schmitz aka Kim dotcom. The Megaupload operators should have earned about 175 million U.S. dollars with the service. The U.S. Justice Department accused the operators of the file hoster Megaupload widespread copyright infringement and is associated with the site prior to seven individuals and two companies.

$ 175 million income! Very lucrative the whole thing!

They are accused of being responsible for a number of online piracy of copyrighted works on a large scale. You deserve to criminal activities with some 175 million U.S. dollars and have caused a damage of around 500 million U.S. dollars, divide the FBI and the U.S. Department of Justice jointly. The focus of the U.S. authorities are the companies Megaupload Limited and the persons behind VestorLimited. This threatens to various offenses by 5 to 20 years in prison It would involve one of the biggest cases of criminal copyright infringement in the United States, said the U.S. Department of Justice.

$ 175 million worth! An anonymous "shell company" in an "offshore" Land costs only a few $ 1,000. Directors and shareholders are only "name with smoke and mirrors" completely ANONYMOUS!

The mastermind of Megaupload, according to the U.S. authorities, the 37-year-old Kim Schmitz aka Kim Dotcom aka Kim Tim Jim Vestor, who lives in Hong Kong and New Zealand officially. He founded and was director Megaupload and sole member of Vestor Limited, a company belonging to the several Megaupload related websites.

Officially live in a country which is under the British Crown, and therefore EU law? Thats really stupid. And the sole shareholder? With fully own name! So, not an anonymous "offshore - Attorney Director!"

In addition to Kim Schmitz are also resident in Germany Finn Batato (Chief Marketing Officer), Sven Echternach (Head of Business Development), Mathias Ortmann (Chief Technical Officer and co-founder), who lives in Slovakia Julius Bencko (graphic designer), the Estonian Andrus Nomm (head of software development) and the person responsible for the network structure Dutchman Bram van der Kolk accused. Schmitz, Batato, Ortmann and van der Kolk, were arrested today at the request of U.S. authorities in New Zealand. Bencko Echternach and Nomm are still on the run.

Living in Germany ...? How stupid must be there? Slovakia belongs to the EU and therefore has to comply with EU laws. To New Zealand ... see above!US, Netherlands and Canada - all under copyright law.To purchase a villa on  OWN name in New Zealand and from there;-) copyright hurtful actions NOT AVOID!

THAT was the problem. MEGAUPLOAD yes because no laws had broken in the true sense. But when reminders go to delete files that are not followed copyright laws- is PUNISHABLE!

The FBI initiated into investigation of Megaupload, but also the law enforcement authorities of other countries were involved, such as the Federal Criminal Police Office. In February 2010 it was reported that Schmitz bought a rated at 30 million U.S. dollars Villa in New Zealand.

In addition, more than 20 raids conducted in eight countries, while Possession valued at approximately $ 50 million dollars and the server from Megaupload in the U.S., Canada and the Netherlands seized. In addition, 18 domains were confiscated. Megaupload.com had claims to more than 1 billion visits, more than 150 million registered users and 50 million daily visitors. The service was financed by advertising and paid premium accounts. The business model of Megaupload had been aimed at users that upload popular copyrighted works, which are then offered for download millions of users. Here is the offer has been structured so that most users were prevented from using it for long-term retention of personal data as files are deleted if they were not downloaded on a regular basis. Of users were also rewarded financially for the uploading of popular content instead of their accounts blocked.

Megaupload Files of foreign customers are lost

As you may recall, the MPAA is among those who have said that Carpathia, the hosting company Megaupload used, must retain the data on its servers -- even though the Justice Department has said it's done with it and Carpathia was free to delete the evidence. Others, of course have also asked for access to their data. And, most importantly, Megaupload itself has asked if it can keep the data. Carpathia wants nothing to do with it, because it's costing the company $9,000 per day to hang onto the servers without doing anything else with them.

However, in response to all of this, the MPAA has again gone to the court to suggest that if Carpathia gave the content to anyone else, that alone would represent copyright infringement.

The sale or transfer of those copies from Carpathia to Megaupload or any other third party would constitute an unauthorized "distribut[ion] ... to the public" under the Copyright Act

That seems like a pretty big legal stretch by the MPAA's typically overreaching lawyers. Depending on who the content was transferred to, it doesn't automatically mean distribution "to the public."

Of course, the continued insane paranoia of the MPAA continues to shine through in this filing as well. It insists that if Megaupload is given back the servers, it will ship them to some other jurisdiction and immediately relaunch the site:

"A sale or transfer of the servers to Megaupload (or any of the defendants) would raise a significant risk that Megaupload will simply ship the servers, hard drives or other equipment -- and all of the infringing content they contain -- to a foreign jurisdiction and relaunch the infringing Megaupload service, which would result in untold further infringements of the MPAA members’ copyrighted works. If so, the renewed criminal enterprise might be beyond any effective legal remedy."

This also seems like a reach. All of the principles are under arrest and facing extradition to the US where they'll face criminal charges. One would imagine they all recognize that it doesn't do their case any good to set the site up again in another jurisdiction.