isoHunt vs the (C)RIAA
p2pnet news view Freedom | P2P:- “That`s the best story about BitTorrent I`ve read in some time,” says Nicholas Deleon in TechCrunch, going on:
“Take a few minutes to read all of it.) He`s currently facing an MPAA lawsuit that could well result in fines in the millions of dollars. (TorrentSpy was ordered to cough up $100 million last year.) And even if Mr. Fung doesn`t have that kind of money, and he doesn`t, the MPAA is prepared to pursue any judgement ‘for the rest of his life.’ The MPAA sounds like it means business.”
The piece Nicholas is referring to is Robert Thompson’s Financial Post write-up entitled ‘I’m doing this for the future,’ a quote from isoHunt founder Gary Fung, based in Vancouver, BC.
Continues Nicholas, “So here`s what`s going on. The MPAA, on a high after being award $100 million in a lawsuit against TorrentSpy, is going after isoHunt, one of the biggest torrent sites out there. The site, which is for-profit, is run by Mr. Fung and a small staff. It makes money with advertisements, not by ’selling’ movies or whatever. But try telling that to the MPAA, which is prepared, apparently, to follow Mr. Fung to the ends of the Earth to get its pound of flesh.”
And that says it all — apart from the fact the MPAA (Motionless Picture Association of America) is the front for a small herd of Hollywood dinosaurs who still live in the dark ages of the physical universe.
In September last year, “Canadian BitTorrent and P2P search engine isoHunt has become the first such site to go from defense to attack in the online file-sharing wars,” said p2pnet, adding:
“In a landmark case, it`s suing Canadian RIAA clone the CRIA (Canadian Recording Industry Association of America), asking a court in British Columbia to make the first ruling on whether or not BitTorrent search engines should be held liable for .torrent files that might link to copyrighted data.”
However, Fung’s efforts to turn the tables on the CRIA appear to have failed.
For the moment.
Because according to Billboard, isoHunt has, “lost the second round in its legal battle to be declared legal in Canada”.
But, “It means that CRIA wants to be sued the long and painful way by Action,” tweets Fung, who recently decided Twitter would be one of his main forms of communication
“Fine.”
And to @Billboarddotcom, which includes a pile of steaming, innacurate equine excreta from CRIA mouthpiece Graham Henderson, “don’t talk to us again with your word play”.
Definitely stay tuned.
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi
TechCrunch – MPAA will hound isoHunt founder till the End of Days, July 14, 2009
Financial Post – ‘I’m doing this for the future’, , July 13, 2009
p2pnet – isoHUNT sues record labels` CRIA, September 6, 2009
Billboard – P2P isoHunt Loses Appeal, July 31, 2009
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August 3rd, 2009 at 11:33 am
MPAA is prepared to pursue any judgement âfor the rest of his life’
.. What a coincidence, its this attitude that has me avoiding all movies for *the rest of my life*.
August 3rd, 2009 at 1:44 pm
I don’t see why he should be found guilty if that day ever comes. He himself is not providing any copyrighted material at all. He is just using google in an advanced way right?
August 3rd, 2009 at 6:44 pm
And he enforces a strict copyright policy. Anytime a copyright holder makes a formal complaint about an infringing link, he deletes it. And since the majority of the torrent files aren’t even hosted on or tracked through his server, he really has no way to stop any kind of infringing activity, even if he wanted to. All anyone has to do is type the name of a film, album, application, book, etc plus the word “torrent” into google, and the results give them all the tools they need to find whatever they want. Even if he shut Isohunt down, or filtered any links from The Pirate Bay, Demonoid, Mininova or any of the major trackers being targeted by the MAFIAA, it wouldn’t stop any kind of filesharing at all. All of the MAFIAA’s efforts to curb filesharing have done diddly squat; people will always be able to find what they’re looking for no matter what they do, it will just take a bit more work for them. Isohunt doesn’t cause piracy, it only makes it easier for those looking to download digital material.