thonglife

RapidShare Kills Links of Suspected Copyright Infringers.
Hosting site has deleted more than 1,000 links.

Posted: 4:05 PM PST Nov 07, 2007
DUESSELDORF, Germany - Links to copyrighted adult content posted in file-sharing forums by some of the most prolific users of one-click hosting site RapidShare have been rendered useless.

While moderators at RapidShare, which reportedly is operated from Switzerland by its German owner, traditionally has disabled single links following copyright-infringement complaints, this apparently is the first time the site has disabled all links posted by users suspected of copyright infringement. As of last week, some users who posted more than 650 links saw their accounts virtually shut down.

By Oct. 31, users of Forumophilia.com, a message board where users post links back to RapidShare leading to downloaded adult content, had received the message "This file has been deleted. Reason: This file is forbidden to be shared! Complaints received." when trying to open a link.

A poster known as "kuifje," who has posted more than 650 links, saw almost all of the links disabled. Other posters, some of whom also had posted hundreds of links, met the same fate.

"That may be due to a verdict of the Court of Appeals in Cologne, with which RapidShare ... was put out of liability in cases where they don't know where the URLs are being distributed," German attorney Daniel Koetz told AVN Online. "Once they know, they are obliged to scan the forums by themselves. ... They might have new scanning methods and are obliging the Cologne verdict."

Koetz sued RapidShare on behalf of a German photographer with the backing of 10 American photographers and filmmakers, while German-based music rights organization GEMA filed separate suits against RapidShare.com and RapidShare.de. The decisions held RapidShare liable for illegal and allegedly stolen material on its sites, despite the company's contention that it was not responsible because it did not post the material but simply hosted it.

RapidShare is owned by Christian Schmid of Germany. The site, by many accounts, is considered one of the largest resources for stolen motion-picture files, software, music, games and adult photos and videos.

A note on the site's page, however, warns users that "illegal files will be removed immediately after notice. Furthermore, we will add them to our file filter, so they can't be uploaded again."

Emails seeking comment from RapidShare officials went unanswered.

As link posters at Forumophilia.com became aware of the situation last week, most expressed anger, while some were willing to look at the other side of the coin.

"Let's face facts - everything the estimed (sic) kuifje has uploaded belongs to someone else," a user named "cuckold" wrote. "And those people who do own it shot the porn with the expectation of being paid for their work. Do you want to work for free? Neither do I or the guys who shot all this hot porn.

"Let's be real about the porn industry wanting to protect their livelihood and try to see both side[s] of it. Why would anyone continue to make all this great porn if they didn't get any money for it?"

Koetz said the removal of the links is a bit of a victory for the adult industry, but it might not be a long-lived one.

"I'm afraid the infringers will move on to other shores," he said.

Aussie Rebel

Great news man I just had a look at that forumophilia and they are fuckin pissed

A.J. Angel

That's a good start! Let's keep it rollin'!

After Shock Media

Sweet, now how to convience the others as well.

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thonglife

Yeah.. they just switched to member's only trying to weed things out. I already have 10 nicks there though so good luck to them. Pornbb is currently experiencing some problems now and I predict that in about three months or so they will be nothing but a graveyard of dead links.. then I suppose bikinibikini will start to see some activity

sweetcuties

Good news

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TeenCat

oh ... its nice, but ... they did something what they have included in their terms and its a great news? they made press release that they deleted illegal content? what am i missing here? do i have to make press release that i woke up today?

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thonglife

The news is that the rapidshare orgy is about to end.. at least on public forums. The only reason they deleted anything is because they are receiving reports from vigilantes like myself and a number of others out there who are contributing to the cause to try and stop this free for all.,, and it's working.. so Demon will surely be pissed when he reads this because he'll still be stuck with all those rapidshare premium points and nothing to use them on.

The Demon

I love how you call yourself a vigilante and are really convincing yourself that you're "contributing" to the case. Furthermore, I am not mad nor do I give a shit. I get all the stuff I need no problems, and I don't use my "rapidshare points". I don't know what's worse, an anti or a "vigilante" porn pusher.

thonglife

You're always commenting in my threads so it's obvious you've got a hardon about something dipshit. BTW.. I'm not gay so please move on.

scottybuzz

they will all use megaupload now, but good victory! i suppose ill cancel my rapidshare premium pass now

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Diligent

Niiice...!

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thonglife

Megaupload/Megarotic actually removes links faster than Rapidshare does .. less than 24 hours.

The Demon

Well, I'm assuming that you're referring to me in every one of your anti piracy threads so who's the one with the hard on? Please quit being obsessive, stick to porn.

bronco67

So they deleted 1,000 links.

Only 400,000 left to delete now.

thonglife

They've removed over 100K on the low end.... that's just a blurb from this article. Your help is always appreciated though.

papill0n

Very nice!!

Suck shit to the scum who spend so much time spreading stolen content.

just a punk

Good changes, but still far from the ideal - rapidshare must be closed. Period.

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Obey the Cowgod

fuckingfuck

What was the exact reason for deleting these files? Because they were threatened?

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AA

thonglife

Most files that are reported are illegal copies of full length member area videos from paysites or entire site rips with updates. Since that is illegal and copyright infringement, they are obligated to remove the files from their server. No threats involved whatsoever.

JohnnyJames

Sadly, Rapidshare and others may be missing the boat.

Legally, they will be hounded in the end.

They have HUGE traffic.

May be time to get a piece of the affiliate pie for themselves before they are forced to cease operations and lose all that traffic.

Just a (wishful?) thought.

thonglife

Sadly? My wishful thought is that their NOC be completely destroyed by a driveup truck bumb.

ibuydomains

I run a semi-popular file hosting service.

How would you recommend I deal with copyright infringers? Obviously I can't monitor every single upload.

fuckingfuck

Hire people to check every file, build a technology to identify stolen content,
do some other business or accept the consequences - as simple as that.

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AA

thonglife

First time violators.. terminate the account and ban the user account, email and IP. These guys with 4mb uploads don't care if their files are pulled.. they're back up in a matter of minutes. These are the guys you have to get rid of. Most folks don't want to spend another 6 months uploading again even if they are caught.

Aussie Rebel

Nice

fuckingfuck

which site is this screenshot from?

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AA

Pleasurepays

hahahahaha....

Paul Markham

Assume the average surfer does not own the copyright. Especially to 100's of movies.

Assume that a guy ONLY using a free mail is not likely to have a paysite.

Assume that a video of over 5 minutes is stolen.

So any dork using [email protected] and uploading 10 X 20 minute videos every day is probably a thief.

Or is this too simplistic?

What this needs is someone to be dragged into court and sued on the basis that a surfer uploading 100 GB of content or a full length mainstream movie or music CD is 99% certain to be a thief.

They hide behind the "We do not know and can't control it." when common sense tells you other wise. ISPs have to be made more responsible, they know it's stolen just hiding behind a loop hole.

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Paul Markham

What I do not understand is why are these people sitting there uploading so much content. Is it culture?

Or do they earn money from it?

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thonglife

In terms of Rapidshare, they earn so called premium points. Each time someone downloads one of their uploaded files, they are credited with those points... save up enough, you get a free month of Rapidshare. A lot of these guys are not paying for Rapidshare at all because so many people are downloading off their threads. Additionally, you have sites like Depositfiles that do indeed pay the user based on the amount of downloads they receive.

Now it's getting worse because they are using stealth/encryption url masking techniques which hide the rapidshare urls - making it next to impossible to to report. Then you have some free hosting sites that completely ignore any removal requests.. I won't name them here but there are two of them.

Shoehorn!

A step in the right direction.

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marko13

i think it is very good first step again illegal porn on the net...

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thonglife

I'm not sure if it's been talked about but some of the content producers need to flood adbrite with DMCA's. They won't listen to me and they are one of the bigger supporters of these forums.

d-null

it will be a continuing battle but it has to be done

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Paul Markham

Thanks for that. Seems to me it's more a culture thing for the supplier. The Torrent sites earn and accomplices to a crime, IMO, even though it's only an ethical crime.

What we need to do as an industry is get behind someone like you and pay you to watch our backs. Like I should shoot content and a traffic guy should drive traffic we need specialists not jack of all trades. We need to get as organised as the sites who are ripping us off are.

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thonglife

Thanks Paul.. I had been offered payments from a few sponsors already but, at that time, elected for some testimonials instead. However, I am spending way too much time going after this and it's cutting into my regular web work.

If anyone is interested in targeted protection for their content, please contact me at ICQ 322650118 or email: [email protected] for pricing and services. Tracking/verification will be available.

Paul Markham

I will talk to you about it. We need to start putting our hands in our pockets and paying experts to do this. Sponsors and affiliates.

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Blowout deal. 880 videos, 2,400 image sets, plus many RAW videos. $500.
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