MPAA to Sue Over Movie File Sharing

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November 5th, 2004, 12:55 PM
acdspit00

MPAA to Sue Over Movie File Sharing

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...av=rss_topnews

They claim to be sueing over 200 users for file sharing at 5000 a pop. Doesn't this attack at home privacy. So are they teaming up with the P2P program admins and pulling up the ip's for their users and than teaming up with the ISP providers and finding out peoples names? How far are they going with this and what does this mean to the online community in the way of privacy and having to watch your back everytime you do something shady because of 24/7 monitoring of internet traffic.
November 5th, 2004, 01:29 PM
nihil

Quote:

So are they teaming up with the P2P program admins and pulling up the ip's for their users and than teaming up with the ISP providers and finding out peoples names?

In a word NO!..................the MPAA will face exactly the same resistance as the RIAA. It is simple economics really, it would cost the ISPs and P2Ps money to administer..............why should they foot the bill?

Furthermore, if they do not respect the privacy of their customers they will lose revenue, as well as incurring costs. They will do nothing unless forced to do so by a court of law.

Like the RIAA the MPAA will have to attempt to get support of the courts, which I don't expect them to get easily. Their only real hope is if they can get file sharing criminalised, which it is not at the moment.

Well, that's the way I see it. File sharing is actually a breach of contract, rather than copyright. It is very firmly in the jurisdiction of the civil courts, not the criminal ones.

EDIT: Obviously, if you charge people to download copyrighted material that is PIRACY plain and simple.
November 5th, 2004, 02:42 PM
phishphreek

Do I think they have a "right" to sue? Yes.
Do I think that is right that they are suing? No.

Anyone who wants to get a movie is going to get it regardless of transport.

Take me for instance. At first, I was just buying DVDs.
Then I would buy and backup my DVDs because of scratches, no returned loaners, etc.

Then I had a bunch stolen from me that I did not have backups for.
So, I went to the video store and joined their "all you can rent for $19.99/month" deal.
I replaced all that was stolen from me at a rate of 3 a day.

I could have done the same thing over the internet... but it would have taken me a lot longer.

Would it have been illegal for me to download all of the movies? Not sure, since I already owned a copy of it... so I still had a so called "license" for the movie, just the media was missing.