TorrentFreak Email Update |
- Stallone “Sad” at Expendables 3 Leak But Kellan Lutz Upbeat
- Sky TV Bans ‘VPN’ Ads on Copyright Grounds
- Lionsgate Fights Expendables 3 Piracy With Thousands of Takedowns
- IFPI Wants Major Torrent Sites Blocked in Days
| Stallone “Sad” at Expendables 3 Leak But Kellan Lutz Upbeat Posted: 05 Aug 2014 04:05 AM PDT
Last evening stars of the show were treading the red carpet in advance of the movie’s world premiere at the Odeon in Leceister Square, London, and of course questions turned to the inevitable topic. Sylvester Stallone, who plays Expendables leader Barney Ross, was the first to be questioned. The 68-year-old said that while piracy leaves him sad, for some it had become a habit. “That makes me feel really sad, but you know I understand that a lot of people have accepted that’s kind of a way of life,” Stallone said. But while Stallone expressed disappointment, he also suggested that as a big star he probably wouldn’t be so affected. Others would, however. “I think it’s unfortunate because it isn’t about me, i’m ok, but there’s thousands of people that won’t make movies. They won’t get a chance because they’ve lost a lot of money, that’s the trouble,” the star said. Interestingly, another star of the movie viewed the leak in a more positive light. Kellan Lutz, who plays former Navy Seal John Smilee, said that while people are downloading illegally, that try-before-you-buy would lead them to still purchase theater tickets. “So for the people who downloaded it, I actually think they’re gonna wanna watch it in the theaters because it’s a good movie,” Lutz said. “They’re gonna watch it online, then they’ll be like ‘I gotta watch this in theaters now’, because all the one-liners that kind of go under-layered throughout the action, you just can’t hear that on a little iPad or computer,” the 29-year-old noted. But while Lutz was looking on the bright side, Lionsgate continued to work flat-out behind the scenes in what they see as a damage limitation exercise. As reported yesterday, the company has been issuing thousands of takedowns to remove unauthorized links to the movie online. This is in addition to legal action being taken against several torrent and other file-sharing sites. Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.    |
| Sky TV Bans ‘VPN’ Ads on Copyright Grounds Posted: 04 Aug 2014 11:45 PM PDT
Restricting content availability to certain ranges of IP addresses, or ‘geo-blocking’ as it’s know, allows content providers to dictate who gets access to films, TV shows and music, at what price, and when. As a result, citizens of countries such as Australia regularly complain that they’re denied content quickly and then charged more for it when it arrives. As expected, however, many citizens choose to break down these borders by using VPNs and proxies, which enable them to access services such as Netflix regardless of their region. Last month, Kiwi ISP Slingshot admitted that its VPN-like ‘Global Mode’ service was actually designed to provide its customers with access to Amazon Prime, Hulu, Netflix US, and BBC iPlayer. Now it appears that the admission will have consequences for Slingshot after a major broadcaster refused to run its ads on copyright grounds. A spokeswoman for Sky TV confirmed to Stuff that a series of advertisements containing references to Slingshot’s Global Mode were rejected by the company. “We are a business that pays people who create television so we are against any form of piracy or the undermining of intellectual property rights,” Sky TV spokeswoman Kirsty Way said. Slingshot general manager Taryn Hamilton decried the move as “unjustified and petty” and said there would be no need for Global Mode if providers would offer content in a timely fashion at a fair price. “When and if local companies manage to finally crack that, then there will be no need for the service. But, until that time, people will use services like Global Mode so that they can see decent TV without having to get a second mortgage,” Hamilton said. Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.   |
| Lionsgate Fights Expendables 3 Piracy With Thousands of Takedowns Posted: 04 Aug 2014 02:05 PM PDT
While pirated copies of most blockbusters eventually find their way online, a high quality leak weeks before a box office premiere is relatively rare. To limit the availability of the movie Lionsgate has instructed several piracy monitoring companies to locate copies on various web services and target them with takedown requests. In little over a week, MarkMonitor, IP Echelon and Entura International have together sent out thousands of takedown requests targeting tens of thousands of URLs. In a sworn testimony submitted to a California federal court, MarkMonitor’s Director of Global Operations Edward Cho explains that his company alone has submitted over 2,000 takedown requests. “MarkMonitor, on Lionsgate's behalf, began issuing take-down requests to the operators of the websites identified through our searches. MarkMonitor has sent approximately 2,770 take-down requests covering, cumulatively, 10,846 unique host URLs,” Cho says. Interestingly, Lionsgate is not the only rightsholder going after leaked copied of the Expendables movie. The South Korean company Medialog also has a stake in the movie and is issuing takedown notices as well. These requests are not without problems as they target many legitimate sites. For example, Medialog’s takedown request to Google includes TorrentFreak’s original news article on the leak, as well as reports by The Verge, Consumerist and The Daily Dot. Even worse, the company even included the official Expendables 3 website among the allegedly infringing URLs. MarkMonitor does work directly for Lionsgate and Cho’s testimony is part of a new ex parte motion for a temporary restraining order the movie studio filed against the six file-sharing sites that were sued before the weekend. The sites in question, including Limetorrents, failed to respond to MarkMonitor’s takedown notices. If the court grants Lionsgate’s request the website operators will be ordered to shut down their sites. In addition their financial assets will be frozen until further notice. Since it’s an ex parte request the site’s operators won’t have the option to defend themselves before the order is issued. Lionsgate’s Executive Vice President Content Protection Robert Wenokur believes that these measures are warranted as the company is facing heavy losses as a result of the leak. “Individuals who view the Film in this manner may not pay for tickets at the box office when the Film is released later this month. Similarly, such individuals may not purchase or rent copies of the Film when it is released to the home entertainment market after its theatrical run,” Wenokur notes. Lionsgate’s request is quite extraordinary and unprecedented in a file-sharing case. There’s no doubt that other movie studios are keeping a close eye on developments, as the company’s approach may prove to be an effective way of targeting so-called rogue sites in the future. Whether it will do much to stop those who want to grab a copy of the Expendables 3 leak is doubtful though. Even if the six sites are shut down, there are still hundreds of copies of the movie online, and dozens are being added every day. Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.   |
| IFPI Wants Major Torrent Sites Blocked in Days Posted: 04 Aug 2014 08:24 AM PDT
The case, which centered around the now-defunct movie site Kino.to, concluded with both courts agreeing that provided any action is both balanced and proportional, Internet service providers could be forced to block copyright-infringing websites. Taking that decision and running with it, the IFPI in Austria has now written to the country’s largest Internet service providers with demands that they block several of the world’s largest torrent sites. In a letter dated today, five ISPs were given less than two weeks to block subscriber access to ThePirateBay,se, isoHunt.to, 1337x.to and H33t.to. IFPI says the sites are “internationally known piracy portals” which have already been blocked in UK, Belgium, Ireland, Finland and Denmark. The music industry group, which protects the rights of the world’s largest recording labels, notes that its blocking request is reasonable given that the sites’ engage in the unauthorized distribution of copyrighted material for profit. “The foundation for website-blocking in Austria was created following a four year process involving the European Court of Justice,” IFPI’s Franz Medwenitsch added in a statement. “The sites are all internationally known, structurally-infringing BitTorrent portals. Of course, we do not want to have access to the Internet itself blocked, only access to these four sites.” The ISPs have been given until August 14 to implement the blockades, but whether they will have any effect remains to be seen. The Pirate Bay, the world’s most-blocked torrent site, recently informed TF that despite years of blockages, its traffic has doubled overall. Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.   |
A long-running legal case involving an Austrian anti-piracy group, a local ISP, and both the Supreme Court and European Court of Justice came to an end this July.| You are subscribed to email updates from TorrentFreak To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
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