censorship Megaupload to Sue Universal, Joins Fight Against SOPA

[+M2Ys4U Subscriber¹]

File-hosting service Megaupload has told TorrentFreak that it will sue Universal for wrongfully taking down its content from YouTube. Universal took action Friday to remove a Megaupload-produced pop video which featured leading artists singing the cyberlocker service?s praises. The move has also prompted the company to enter the SOPA debate, with a call for like-minded people to join forces and fight for an Internet without censorship.

Last Friday, file-hosting service Megaupload surprised the Internet by launching a campaign fronted by a Printz Board-produced song featuring some of the world?s most prominent recording artists.

Needless to say, the spectacle of P Diddy, Will.i.am, Alicia Keys, Kanye West, Snoop Dogg, Macy Gray, Chris Brown, The Game and Mary J Blige all declaring their love for Megaupload was too much for the IFPI and RIAA.

As the story began to spread and the Mega Song trended on Twitter, it was suddenly blocked by YouTube, a victim of Universal Music Group (UMG) and IFPI copyright takedowns.

What followed late Friday were demands from Mega founder Kim Dotcom for YouTube to reinstate the video (full details in our earlier article), and counters from Universal to take it down again. With the weekend over, the controversy is alive again.

?Let us be clear: Nothing in our song or the video belongs to Universal Music Group. We have signed agreements with all artists endorsing Megaupload,? Megaupload CEO David Robb told TorrentFreak this morning.

?Efforts to reach out to UMG and open a dialog about this abuse of the DMCA process were answered with unfounded and baseless legal threats and demands for an apology.?

Threats against Megaupload from the mainstream entertainment industries are nothing new, yet thus far the movie and music groups have refrained from legal action. Nevertheless, the name-calling persists.

?Regrettably, we are being attacked and labeled as a ?rogue operator? by organizations like the RIAA and the MPAA, which represent some of the music and movie industry. They are wrong,? says Robb.

?Our record of closing accounts of repeat infringers and taking down illegal files proves we stand against piracy and care about the rights of content owners.?

But while Mega insists it always complies with legitimate takedown requests as required by law, the RIAA and their member labels want much more, as their championing of the Stop Online Piracy Act illustrates.

?UMG is currently lobbying lawmakers in Washington for legislation that would allow them to not only delete specific content from a website, but to delete entire websites from the Internet. After this demonstration of the abuse of power by UMG, we are certain that such an instrument of Internet censorship should not be put into the hands of corporations,? says Robb.

Those corporations, Robb suggests, may have already abused their existing powers to censor the Mega Song campaign on YouTube for commercial ends. Mega will shortly relaunch Megabox, a label-worrying iTunes competitor that will give artists 90% of all sales, a far bigger share than many currently enjoy.

But whatever Universal?s motivations for the takedowns were, according to Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom the label will now have to justify their actions in court. TorrentFreak can confirm that Mega?s legal team have already been instructed to sue Universal over the illegitimate copyright takedown of the Mega Song, an act which Kim says was an attempt to sabotage their viral campaign.

Furthermore, having previously been restrained on the issue of SOPA, it now appears the Mega Song takedown has prompted a change of course by Megaupload.

?We thank everyone for the massive support. Let?s join forces and fight for an Internet without censorship. Stand up and oppose new laws like SOPA and PIPA, which are being written this month in Washington,? says Mega CEO David Robb.

?Let your local representatives in Congress know what you think. Join organizations that are promoting free speech and innovation. Let?s not allow corporations to create an Internet dictatorship with the massive censorship firewall they are lobbying for in Washington.?

A TorrentFreak request for comment from an RIAA spokesperson remains unanswered.

Source: TorrentFreak

[Denis W. Veteran]

This is going way too far now.

[Lexcyn]

So wait .. Megaupload paid and had deals with these artists for the endorsements, but their record companies didn't like what they were saying so they had the video DMCA'd?

L O L.

The recording industry hits a new low.

[ANON86364]

Absolutely disgusting. Only more proof of the corrupt intentions these b****s have. I am really afraid for this country if our politicians are so greedy and selfish to allow this law to be passed. It's saying something in itself that we have to worry about something like this having a chance to become law.

[(Spork)]

lets hope this is the beginning of the end for RIAA and other groups like them

[protocol7]

You should check out the home page of Naughty Dog's upcoming game The Last Of Us.

Their own trailer has been pulled from Youtube because of a copyright claim.

[+Warwagon MVC]

Not that I have a problem with it, but why is every single artist that hooked up with megaupload black?

[CrimsonBetrayal]

Not that I have a problem with it, but why is every single artist that hooked up with megaupload black?

Because they're racists?

[ITOps]

Seems somebody at Naughty Dog was quick on their feet :), they changed the video to load from gametrailers.com. Hopefully they have their lawyers have a talk and take some money from the labels shooting out DMCAs for things they have no ownership of. Or even better Youtube remove their right to automatically take down videos and make them go through the manual processing and provide proof of ownership.

[JianBing5]

This is going way too far now.

It went way too far years ago. The RIAA/MPAA are just showing more and more how scared they are that they're becoming irrelevant.

[CrimsonBetrayal]

Seems somebody at Naughty Dog was quick on their feet :), they changed the video to load from gametrailers.com. Hopefully they have their lawyers have a talk and take some money from the labels shooting out DMCAs for things they have no ownership of. Or even better Youtube remove their right to automatically take down videos and make them go through the manual processing and provide proof of ownership.

^^This...

Having automatic takedown of "copyrighted" material is a whole litigation suit waiting to happen. A computer cannot in good faith determine whether content was willfully and illegally used. It cannot tell with 100% certainty that the material is indeed infringing on a copyright. This has been proven time and time again. The justice system requires a criminal be found guilty without a reasonable doubt, this system does not. So who's playing God now?

[KiHu]

Needless to say, the spectacle of P Diddy, Will.i.am, Alicia Keys, Kanye West, Snoop Dogg, Macy Gray, Chris Brown, The Game and Mary J Blige all declaring their love for Megaupload was too much for the IFPI and RIAA.

P Diddy, Will.i.am, Alicia Keys, Kanye West, Snoop Dogg, Macy Gray, Chris Brown, The Game and Mary J Blige

Chris Brown, The Game and Mary J Blige

The Game

[Glassed Silver]

RIAA/MPAA and the likes need to be shut down.

With shut down I mean - put to non-existence and make laws that prevent the forming of such OBVIOUSLY overpowered "interest groups" that just run amok to cash in every nickel no matter how!

This is beyond sit back and laugh at the ridiculousness, it's dangerous actually and if you don't see worse coming, I testify you're blind and deaf without being a doctor!

Glassed Silver:win

[Gaffney]

Music theft is a real, ongoing and evolving challenge. Both the volume of music acquired illegally without paying for it and the resulting drop in revenues are staggering. Digital sales, while on the rise, are not making up the difference.

It's not piracy that's shrinking the music industry, it's due to the rapid growth of alternative media thanks to cable and the internet. Why listen to music when you can play around on facebook, youtube or forums?

People don't listen to as much music any more and the worst thing to do is to carry on with pop. Pop has no identity, it's nothing but a cash circle of boring unoriginal music. It's the same song played everywhere, how songs like Superbass can top the charts for so long proves my point.

What is going to happen is pop is going to become more and more redundant and pointless. Other genre of music is rising, youtube talent, small independent artists on itunes and artists with their own record company or part of a small one.

Thanks to the internet and cable tv, we no longer need massive corporations to control the music industry. Artists(the people we actually care about) can still easily make a living if their good. It's about time that music artists start earning realistic wages.

You don't need expensive music video's and you don't need a huge factory producing millions of CD's. All you need is talent, production equipment and the internet, gigs or TV.

However, consumer spending on music-related software and hardware increased dramatically over the last decade, providing a valuable new income-stream for technology companies such as

The cash isn't vanishing, it's just moving toward people's new interests. Don't think the corporations don't know it, their using the RIAA and MPAA to slow the trend down, is it working nope it's probably going against them.

[+M2Ys4U Subscriber¹]

Music theft is a real, ongoing and evolving challenge. Both the volume of music acquired illegally without paying for it and the resulting drop in revenues are staggering. Digital sales, while on the rise, are not making up the difference.

Copyright infringement is not theft.