Torrentfreak: “Top 10 Domains Hit By Google Piracy Takedowns 2014” plus 1 more |
Top 10 Domains Hit By Google Piracy Takedowns 2014 Posted: 30 Dec 2014 01:40 AM PST As 2014 draws to a close it is notable that despite dozens of sites being blocked around Europe and millions of infringement notices going out to US-based Internet users, piracy appears to be just as prolific as it ever was. There appears to be very little copyright holders can do to stop their content appearing online and as a result countless millions of ‘infringing’ URLs become indexed by the world’s leading search engines. Once this happens it’s largely too late to do anything really significant to turn back the clock on availability. Nevertheless, entertainment companies still want to make life as difficult as possible for online pirates. As a result they send out millions of takedown notices, not only to sites hosting content, but also to search engines such as Google, Bing and Yahoo. These companies are remarkably quick to respond. Google, for example, processes most DMCA notices in a matter of hours, despite receiving one million requests per day and on one occasion 11.6 million takedowns in a week. Every single one of these takedowns is logged in the company’s Transparency Report which has become a valuable source of insight into the company’s responses to copyright and the wider picture online. Listed below are the top 10 domains for which Google received the most notices during the past year (Dec 28, 2013 to Dec 29, 2014). File-hosting and MP3 search engines dominate the list, so it comes as little surprise that the major record labels (under the BPI umbrella) sent the most notices during the course of the year. It’s also noteworthy that despite the high-profiles of sites such as The Pirate Bay and KickassTorrents, those sites were relegated to 18th and 29th places respectively in the takedown charts. In fact not a single torrent site made the top 10 this year, with the nearest torrent-related domains being torrentz.pro (#11), torrenthound (#12) and come.in (#13).
Finally, it’s worth noting that there is a site for which Google receives millions of notices but isn’t listed in any of its reports. It’s possible we’ll never know the numbers involved, but YouTube itself is likely to be in the official top 10. Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Movie Studios Fear a Google Fiber Piracy Surge Posted: 29 Dec 2014 10:08 AM PST Google is slowly expanding its fiber to the home services in the United States. Most recently Austin, Texas, was added to the list and a few dozen other cities will follow soon. Promising free Internet and blazing fast gigabit per second connections at a relatively low price, many consumers are happy with Google’s new product. Hollywood on the other hand fears the worst. While great connectivity offers commercial opportunities for entertainment companies, some are overly worried about the negative consequences. Earlier this week we received a leaked presentation covering the results of a Google Fiber survey conducted on behalf of Warner Bros and Sony Pictures Entertainment. The research was conducted in 2012 and aimed to get a baseline of the piracy levels, so changes can be measured after the rollout. The survey respondents came from Kansas City, where Google Fiber first launched, with St. Louis residents as a control group. In total, more than 2,000 persons between 13 and 54 were asked about Google Fiber, their piracy habits and media consumption in general. The results reveal that more than half of those surveyed were very interested in Google’s offer. This includes a large group of pirates, which make up 31% of the entire population. About a third of these pirates said they would download or stream more with Google Fiber. Perhaps even more worrying for Hollywood, about a quarter of the non-pirates said they would start doing so if Google comes to town. The most interesting part, however, is that the research tries to estimate the studio’s extra piracy losses that Google Fiber could create across the nation. Drawing on an MPAA formula that counts all pirated views as losses the report notes that it may cost Hollywood over a billion dollars per year. That’s a rather impressive increase of 58% compared to current piracy levels. The research also finds a link between piracy and broadband speeds, which is another reason for Hollywood not to like Google’s Internet service. According to the report this is “another indication that piracy becomes more attractive with Google Fiber.” We will refrain from analyzing the methods and the definition of piracy losses, which deserve an article of their own. What’s most striking from the above approach is the way the studios frame Google Fiber as a piracy threat, instead of looking at the opportunities it offers. For example, the same report also concludes that 39% of the respondents would use paid streaming subscription services more, while 34% would rent and purchase more online video. Yet, there is no mention of the potential extra revenue that will bring in. Judging from all the piracy calculations, statistics and projections, it appears that Hollywood is mostly occupied with threats. But of course there’s nothing new there. Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services. |
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