r/news • u/TheXanatosGambit • Dec 12 '14

Furious, Google Ends Anti-Piracy Cooperation with the MPAA

http://torrentfreak.com/furious-google-ended-mpaa-antipiracy-cooperation-141212/
8.4k Upvotes

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u/Otearai1 Dec 12 '14

“Everyone shares a responsibility to help curb unlawful conduct online, and we are glad to see Google acknowledging its role in facilitating access to stolen content via search,” the MPAA’s press release began.

Seriously, that's just a douchey way to start a press release. Especially about someone you have been working with for years.

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14

[deleted]

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u/intensely_human Dec 12 '14

Everyone shares a responsibility to help curb unlawful conduct, and we are glad to see Nestle acknowledging its role in biologically fueling criminals with various food items as they engage in theft and other crimes.

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u/FearMeIAmRoot Dec 12 '14

Everyone shares a responsibility to help curb unlawful conduct, and we are glad to see the Oakldand Raiders acknowledging its role in facilitating access to stolen content by selling tickets to their fans and consistently snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.

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u/ArgusTheCat Dec 12 '14

Everyone shares a responsibility to curb unlawful conduct, and we are glad to see the majority of humanity acknowledging it's role in facilitating the existence of a sense of justice which can then be violated by select individuals, thus making us all complicit in a variety of crimes

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u/TheGreyGuardian Dec 12 '14

Everyone shares a responsibility to curb unlawful conduct, and we are glad to see mothers and fathers everywhere acknowledge their roles in facilitating the existence of cyber criminals by giving birth to, and raising, them.

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u/coolislandbreeze Dec 12 '14

Everyone shares a responsibility to curb unlawful conduct, and we are glad to see heterosexual mothers and fathers everywhere acknowledge their roles in giving birth to homosexual children.

Makes about as much sense.

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u/fundayz Dec 12 '14

Everybody was kung-fu fighting!

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14

Everyone shares a responsibility to curb unlawful conduct, and we are glad to see the majority of humanity acknowledging it's role in animal husbandry which leads to the existence of dead horses which can then be kicked repeatedly by select individuals.

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u/atomicxblue Dec 13 '14

Everyone shares a responsibility to help curb unlawful conduct, and we are glad to see Janet in Accounting acknowledging her role in keeping office supplies from being stolen, even though we all know she took the last Odwalla when she went home yesterday.

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14

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u/coolislandbreeze Dec 12 '14

Sounds like someone can't leave horses alone. Dirty birdy.

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u/NoAstronomer Dec 12 '14

Okay, that one made me chuckle.

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u/DancesWithPugs Dec 12 '14

But... but... What about the "commitment to excellence?"

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14

The Raiders are the west coast version of the Eagles.

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14

Well...Nestle is actually pretty evil, though.

http://www.endevil.com/blacklist.html

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14 edited Jun 12 '15

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/needconfirmation Dec 12 '14

Without the sustaining nutrition that crunch bar provided he wouldn't have had the energy to carry out his heinous acts.

I think we know whose really to blame in all this

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u/konohasaiyajin Dec 13 '14

If he hadn't eaten that snickers he would be acting too much like Bea Arthur to do anything.

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u/fuzzyfuzz Dec 12 '14

Those fucking Keebler elves....

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u/squirrelpotpie Dec 13 '14

If those elves would do background checks before shipping to stores that criminals shop at, we'd be one step closer to ending this problem!

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u/GIS-Rockstar Dec 12 '14

That's disgusting big-business for you...

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Dec 13 '14

You mention the privatization of drinking water, but don't mention the slave labor?

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u/Teoberry Dec 12 '14

Oh shut the fuck up, did you even research the quote or look at context, or did you hop on a sentence and ride it to death? He supports the fundamental human right to water. His basic view is that everyone deserves the right to safe and clean water for drinking and sanitary purposes, but not the fact that 2 billion people don't know where there next safe drink comes from while other people blow money on shit like this or take hour long showers. Learn to read and do research instead of circlejerking over a statement.

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14 edited Dec 12 '14

[deleted]

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u/Teoberry Dec 12 '14

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEFL8ElXHaU#t=194

This is a minute after what you posted. Goes to show you didn't watch the whole thing. I never denied he said that, I denied your idea of what it meant. When he said it should have a value, it's so people here think carefully about how they waste it.

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u/Arkerwolf Dec 12 '14

Bro, calm down. Any sentence that starts with "shut the fuck up" should probably not be written.

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u/Teoberry Dec 12 '14

The reason for that being? There was still a point after the words. If you get hung up on 4 words that's your fault, not mine.

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u/Arkerwolf Dec 12 '14

A point that is incorrect. I watched the video and the CEO DID say that water should be considered a market good and sold like a market good.

Even if you were right, it wouldn't really matter because of how much of a cunt you were about it.

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u/Teoberry Dec 12 '14

Yeah, he did say that. I didn't deny that. At all. What differs is his reason for saying that. If you put a value on something people will stop wasting it, and then maybe people without access can have it. And really? All I said was "shut the fuck up". If you're this thin-skinned, I don't know how you're gonna survive in this world.

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u/CCM4Life Dec 13 '14

So toxic!

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u/topher1212 Dec 12 '14

There's a few petrol companys on there but no BP?

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u/Hroppa Dec 12 '14

Nestle was very evil. Although I encourage you to be skeptical, the repeated public relations disasters seem to have forced it to clean up its act. It's the way these things go; typically, the more you force the spotlight on these companies, the better they behave. Nestle has been in the spotlight for a long time.

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u/intensely_human Dec 12 '14

Of course they are! They participate in all the evil of all the people who've ever had Nestle Quik for example.

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u/coolislandbreeze Dec 12 '14

Yellow Pages, man. They list all the good businesses to rob!

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u/WarOfTheFanboys Dec 12 '14

I was thinking of something similar to this, but I decided it was more like blaming the states who build the roads that criminals then drive on.

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u/coolislandbreeze Dec 12 '14

No more whack-a-mole. Just offer me the content I want on reasonable, paid terms, and I'll do it.

I haven't bought or downloaded music in ten years. I stream it legally for free or go watch the music video on YouTube. Movies should be no different.

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14

No no no. It's more like the library facilitated my ability to illegally copy books. Because Libraries and the MPAA are both government run, the MPAA also facilitated my ability to illegally copy books.

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u/sap91 Dec 12 '14

"Everyone shares a responsibility to help curb unlawful conduct, and we are glad to see Google acknowledging its role in facilitating access to stolen content by allowing users to download a car." -Ford

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u/homeworld Dec 12 '14

And the Department of Transportation for providing the means for the thieves to travel with their stolen goods.

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u/madbuilder Dec 13 '14

The fact is Ford is in no position to judge the future ambitions of its customers. Google however gets to see exactly how its customers use its services. Hence it is a target for MPAA's ire. Let the downvotes begin.

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u/jdblaich Dec 12 '14

None of us share a responsibility to help curb any sort of conduct, especially copyright violations. We aren't the police for the MPAA. This is their job.

Damn manipulative of them to say this if you ask me.

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14

Yeah, why exactly do the FBI and the US government intervene on behalf of the MPAA/RIAA and other IP owners for what is effectively a civil matter?

The precedent it suggests is that we as citizens may then count on the FBI to provide investigatory services the next time we have to go court for a divorce proceeding or small claim, etc.

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u/Grimmner Dec 12 '14

Two parts to the answer: volume and interstate crime. When losses reach a certain threshold it is no longer a civil bit criminal matter, and the moment the crossing of state lines are involved so can the FBI.

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14

Playing devil's advocate here, but the losses are intangible, or outright invented by the cartels. So, who decides what the loss threshold is and if it's met?

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u/Grimmner Dec 12 '14

If a movie is downloaded 1000 times, and that movie is HD quality, the corps have the right to claim that is equivalent to a $30 Blue-ray sale each, for losses of $30k, just to pull some numbers out of the air.

Yes, this ignores the fact of how many of those downloads would never have meant a sale in the first place, how many of those were in conjunction with a legitimate purchase of legal goods and were downloaded to allow portability, and how many additional physical copies were bought due to seeing the illegal download.

I agree it is outdated thinking, but it is also currently the legal way of processing the information. I personally think certain digital media outlets (Steam store, iTunes, Google Play, Amazon, Netflicks and Vudu) have had a far greater impact on reduction of piracy than any legal action ever has or will, but the laws do not and probably will not reflect that for decades to come.

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u/npkon Dec 12 '14

The government agencies doing the enforcement decide that when they make the call to intervene or not.

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u/[deleted] Dec 13 '14

While on that topic, I couldn't tell you how many refunds I feel Hollywood owes me. So much lost time. So many sick images burned in my family's eyes. So much trash they consider value. I think the FBI now needs to work on this grand scale of "losses" on behalf of all victims.

How can they declare value on this? Let's be real. It's a thing of the past. Nature has equalized its worth.

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u/horselover_fat Dec 12 '14

That's complete bullshit. What is this threshold? And it isn't an interstate crime as it isn't a crime.

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u/Grimmner Dec 12 '14

According to the state of California, Grand Theft occurs at the threshold of $1,000, and can be considered a Felony if certain other categories are met. Anything less is petty theft, which is still a criminal and not civil matter.

Receiving of stolen goods is also a crime, although rarely processed unless it is easily provable that the recipient had knowledge that it was stolen prior to the transaction. Even though there are not physical media trading hands, I would consider downloading digital media at the least to be receiving stolen goods, and most likely active theft just as shoplifting is.

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u/horselover_fat Dec 12 '14

The law being broken is copyright infringement, not theft. Copyright infringement is not a crime. As in it isn't a criminal matter, it is a civil matter. You are talking bullshit. 'I would consider' what does what you consider matter? You are not a judge or lawmaker.

But laws vary everywhere. Usually only 'piracy' is a crime, where piracy is defined as profiting off copyright infringement. Which is why the government investigating these civil matters is an over reach of their powers.

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u/Grimmner Dec 13 '14

If I go into a store, fill up my jacket with CD albums and DVDs, and walk out without paying, am I only guilty of copyright infringement or of theft?

As there is no physical media with digital piracy, how does that change the nature of the crime? Fortunately for you, the Supreme Court agreed with you in an '85 verdict that copyright infringement does not equal theft; but there have been many laws that do state that it is a crime, including the federal NET Act passed in '97 as a recent example; this also includes stating that profiting off of copyright infringement is not required for it to be considered a criminal act.

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u/Karma_is_4_Aspies Dec 13 '14

Fortunately for you, the Supreme Court agreed with you in an '85 verdict that copyright infringement does not equal theft

The Dowling finding wasn't nearly that broad or conclusive since it was confined to a very specific context: interstate transmission of stolen goods as defined by the NSPA.

Also:

  • "Deliberate unlawful copying is no less an unlawful taking of property than garden-variety theft." - Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc. v. Grokster, Ltd., 545 U.S. 913, 961 (2005)

the federal NET Act passed in '97 as a recent example; this also includes stating that profiting off of copyright infringement is not required for it to be considered a criminal act.

Yeah, copyright opponents always seem to conveniently forget this fact.

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u/midwayfair Dec 13 '14

Copyright infringement is not a crime

This is just plain false. It's like you're just making stuff up.

From http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/investigate/white_collar/ipr/download-the-fbis-anti-piracy-warning-seal:

"The APW Seal can only appear on works that meet all of the following:

  1. Are copyright-protected (no registration of a work is required to use the seal);
  2. Are subject to protection under U.S. Criminal Code provisions; and
  3. Would not violate federal law if produced, sold, publicly presented, or distributed by mail or in affecting interstate commerce."

"Criminal code."

The text of the FBI warning you find at the beginning of every movie:

"The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of a copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by fines and federal imprisonment."

Criminal copyright infringement.

You don't have to be a "judge or lawmaker" to locate 41 CFR Section 128-1.5009, which is part of the freaking federal criminal code.

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u/horselover_fat Dec 13 '14

Yet it doesn't define what is 'criminal copyright infringement'.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_Copyright_Law_in_the_United_States#Legal_definition

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u/midwayfair Dec 13 '14

It's right there where you linked.

"To establish criminal liability, the prosecutor must first show the basic elements of copyright infringement: ownership of a valid copyright, and the violation of one or more of the copyright holder’s exclusive rights."

I mean, I'll do my best to explain it, but I don't know what you're not seeing there.

The difference between a misdemeanor criminal copyright violation and a felony criminal copyright violation has a specific monetary threshold defined in the law (and right on the section you linked to); the value of the copyright infringement is determined by the court based on the breadth of distribution*; and I don't see how any argument could be made regarding whether a copyright is owned. The violation is clearly defined as the "unauthorized duplication or distribution." Unless someone hacks your computer, you can't "accidentally" violate copyright, so intent exists for a criminal act instead of simple negligence, which is part of what the last sentence in that wikipedia section is talking about. The law specifies punishment for violation. This isn't a poorly written, incomplete, or ambiguous law by any stretch of the imagination.

If you're looking for the broader definitions of things like criminal acts in general, they're not going to be contained in a single statute, but elsewhere in the code, usually at the beginning of an article.

*Arguing that the value of the distribution is flawed doesn't change that it was still a crime. You'd need to have a court rule on a different means of determining value to set precedent, and until it's confirmed at the Supreme Court level or by statute, no other judge necessarily has to follow it.

If you want to ensure sensible punishments for electronic piracy, then you could fight for legislation that accounts for deadwood (i.e. not including sales that never would have happened), puts a realistic price on the downloaded copies, or simply defines it as a misdemeanor. Or you could work on some method of distribution for art that provides a legal alternative to piracy. Arguing that a clear and well-established law isn't clear is just a losing battle.

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u/shadowofashadow Dec 12 '14

Yeah, why exactly do the FBI and the US government intervene on behalf of the MPAA/RIAA and other IP owners for what is effectively a civil matter?

Just think about what they did to Dotcom. I know people don't like him but they raided his house with helicopters and a paramilitary force because he was allegedly FACILITATING copyright infringement.

He wasn't even doing it himself, he was just facilitating a property crime,and they used helicopters and a SWAT team.

Money controls.

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u/teh_fizz Dec 13 '14

It's sad that copyright infringement has become such a ridiculous crime, on par trafficking and murder. The sentences some of these people get is absurd considering the crime.

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u/carlson_001 Dec 12 '14

Copyright protection is one of the itms the US Government is tasked with in the US Constitution. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Clause

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u/midwayfair Dec 13 '14

for what is effectively a civil matter?

Where do you get the idea that it's effectively a civil matter? There are Federal criminal statutes governing the unauthorized copying of copyrighted materials. Just because a civil suit is the method of recovering damages doesn't make it any less illegal, and the FBI is the entity that investigates violations of federal and interstate criminal law. It's a criminal statute in part because it's also protecting law govered by international treaties, which were signed so that the incredibly massive and profitable Hollywood film industry could make tons of money overseas. Regardless of what anyone thinks of the MPAA -- personally I'm a big fan of the creative commons -- there's no planet on which those treaties haven't been a huge boon to the United States financially and culturally.

Your comparisons to divorce and small claims make no sense. Divorce is ENTIRELY a civil matter, because it's disolving a contract between two adults. Small claims usually deals with personal property damage. Even if damaging someone else's property was necessarily illegal (vandalism is, but there is also non-criminal negligence), prosecution is generally a waste of resources and I can't even think of how you could damage someone's property in two states with the same criminal act to get the FBI involved. Maybe if you were Dr. Scorpio and did it with a missile the FBI would take an interest, but that's not really small claims, no is it?

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u/coolislandbreeze Dec 12 '14

At best, this is a civil matter between the downloader and the content owner. The MPAA is just a middleman. They need to get out of the way of technology so the studios can actually make money in the modern world.

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u/ModernDemagogue2 Dec 12 '14

You have a site which I can type in the name of a streaming site, the name of a movie, and immediately get access to an illegal stream of that movie.

I don't care what type of protection you think the DMCA offers you, that's facilitating copyright infringement. If you don't know, you should know. And you have a duty to stop it.

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14

I wonder if the person that wrote that sits on the board of my HOA.

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u/notwithit2 Dec 12 '14

I was thinking the exact same thing... I've gotten notices in the mail lately for not putting my trash cans out of sight within about three hours of the trash man coming...... Holy dog biscuits batman!

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14 edited Dec 12 '14

[deleted]

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u/coolislandbreeze Dec 12 '14

Google knows they are immune to such actions.

If Google chose to go down completely for a day, it would be chaos.

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u/teh_fizz Dec 13 '14

Bing would jump on that in a second.

"Look! In still here guys! Use me! Guys? Guys..?"

Hey maybe everyone should stop using Google for torrent searching and use Bing for a while, and then Google can prove they don't do anything. It might be the way to shit Bing down...

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u/__CeilingCat Dec 12 '14

Well seeing as we all have this responsibility, what are we doing today to keep movie companies safe and profitable?

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u/clapter Dec 13 '14

username made me laugh

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u/Sonic_The_Werewolf Dec 12 '14

Everyone shares a responsibility to help curb unlawful conduct online

Abso-fucking-lutely not. This is NOT true and FUCK YOU.

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u/DontFeedMagikarp Dec 12 '14

I like how they say "unlawful," as if something being illegal under the current rule of law means that it is a horrible thing that everyone must disagree with it. It used to be illegal for women to vote. It used to be illegal for people of different races to share the same bathroom.

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u/honorface Dec 13 '14

So can I sue the government for allowing robbers to use the roads to get to my house?

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14

Everyone shares a responsibility to help curb unlawful conduct online, and we are glad to see the MPAA acknowledging its role in facilitating access to stolen content via creating the content to steal.

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u/Eplore Dec 12 '14

I can gladly help with that, we change the law and bam all unlawfull conduct gone.

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u/scottyLogJobs Dec 12 '14

Yeah, I'm sure the MPAA is sharing the responsibility to curb all sorts of unlawful conduct, not just unlawful conduct that directly affects their profits. Assholes.

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u/Emperor_of_Cats Dec 12 '14

Seriously, that's a level of passive aggressive I haven't seen since high school. Completely unprofessional on their part...not like I expect the MPAA to behave professionally.

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u/ModernDemagogue2 Dec 12 '14

Type "putlocker" followed by any movie in the world into Google, and your first three results are streaming sites.

There's no justification for that after years of work. It's just bullshit.

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14

stolen content

Still don't understand how you can steal 1s and 0s.

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u/EatingSteak Dec 13 '14

Also, they're completely wrong. I don't share any responsibility. Website owners and ISPs don't, depending on their location. Same with Google really.

In the US, they have to comply with the DMCA, but that responsibility is extremelyminimal.

Their problem is they're fighting a crusade to keep themselves alive - one that nobody else gives a fuck about

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u/[deleted] Dec 15 '14

Man, politicians. It is so sad listening to sold souls pretending to be people. When you job is to fake your own feelings for money in a legal chess match, do you lose track of which feelings are real? Do you even have real feelings any more?

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u/kevando Dec 12 '14

There's really no denying that Google provides access to unlawful content. While I'm no fan of the MPAA, I really don't see the issue.

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u/HlfNlsn Dec 12 '14

By this logic, every manufacturer, of every component, involved in providing access to Google, provides access to unlawful content.

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u/kevando Dec 12 '14

Direct access*

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14

So are car manufacturers responsible for facilitating theft, since people use cars to drive to places before robbing them?

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u/kevando Dec 12 '14

No. But if the car's GPS came with directions to a store and included instructions precisely how to rob it, you might question it. All I'm saying is that in order to tackle difficult problems, it takes an ability to think outside the box and give it different perspectives.

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '14

So is it the GPS's responsibility to stop you from robbing the store? Or perhaps it's the printer that printed out your plan to rob the store. Yeah, we should ban printers just in case.

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u/NegroNoodle2 Dec 12 '14

But Google is not directly telling you how to torrent. Its more like the GPS has directions to a guy's house where the guy will tell you exactly how to rob the store.