• Music, movie giants join forces to freeze Kim Dotcom assets
    29 replies, posted
[QUOTE]Music and movie giants have joined forces to freeze Kim Dotcom's assets, but they'll have to negotiate conditions first. Lawyers appeared at the High Court in Auckland on Monday on behalf of four music industry companies and six Hollywood film studios seeking to have Dotcom's assets frozen ahead of their claim against him. The record labels are understood to be Warner Music, UMG Recordings, Sony Music and Capitol Records, while the film companies are 20th Century Fox, Disney, Paramount, Universal, Columbia Pictures and Warner Brothers. The companies say the now defunct file sharing website Megaupload and its key operators, including Dotcom, facilitated, encouraged and profited from massive copyright infringement and want Dotcom's New Zealand assets to remain frozen while their case is under way. Lawyers appearing for Mr Dotcom and his wife Mona said the estranged pair were prepared to maintain the current freeze, but the companies needed to offer security first. Mr Dotcom's lawyer Robert Gapes said the companies should put up $NZ250,000 ($A232,742) for Mr Dotcom, and a further $NZ250,000 for Mrs Dotcom. Mark Gavin, who appeared for Warner Music Group, questioned the basis of the $250,000 figure while Matthew Sumpter, who appeared for the film companies, said there was no evidence of any suffering or loss to Mr Dotcom. But Justice John Fogarty said the amount was "peanuts" for such wealthy clients, and said the Dotcoms could suffer damages by having their capital tied up. "We're talking very small change here." He asked the parties to negotiate the conditions of the freeze. If they can't sort it out themselves, they'll be back in court later this month. In April, an application to extend restraining orders on Dotcom's assets - including cars, jewellery and other property - that have been in place since his arrest in January 2012 was declined. However, the Crown, on behalf of the US government, appealed the decision to allow Dotcom to get his assets back. That hearing is due to be held on July 30, and lawyers for the studios want to have their separate application to have Dotcom's assets frozen in relation to their civil case to be heard beforehand, probably in mid-July. The US government wants to extradite Dotcom, who was arrested in New Zealand on its behalf, so he can face copyright infringement, money laundering and racketeering charges relating to Megaupload. Ongoing court battles have meant the extradition hearing has been delayed a number of times.[/QUOTE] [URL="http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2014/06/09/music-movie-giants-join-forces-freeze-kim-dotcom-assets"]http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2014/06/09/music-movie-giants-join-forces-freeze-kim-dotcom-assets[/URL]
Sounds painful
[QUOTE=Chrisordie;45042318]Sounds painful[/QUOTE] tell me about it, I sure wouldn't want my 'assets' frozen
[QUOTE]Megaupload and its key operators, including Dotcom, facilitated, encouraged and profited from massive copyright infringement and want Dotcom's New Zealand assets to remain frozen while their case is under way.[/QUOTE] Fuck off, total bullshit.
So, he is just being a scapegoat for them?
They seem to be spending a lot of money on lawyers and stuff fighting people like Kim Dotcom and others who pirate but they don't seem to care as much about making their content accessible to places outside of the US.
I can only imagine how they must be fighting. It must be something like this: [IMG]http://i.imgur.com/TnpxlRY.png[/IMG]
MPAA and RIAA are the worst.
[QUOTE=Aide;45042530]MPAA and RIAA are the worst.[/QUOTE] Yes they are and this hatred goes way back. This is not very related, but I remember back in the day I downloaded a huge pack of music from DC++ and all of the albums were tagged "RIAA are FAGGOTS"
[QUOTE=Aide;45042530]MPAA and RIAA are the worst.[/QUOTE] In Japan we have the equivalent of the RIAA called JASRAC. They're jokingly called "Japanese Asshole Skinflints who Restrain All Civilians" on the internet.
Why? Who uses Mega to pirate anyway?
I don't really like the guy, but I'm on his side now. It's bullshit.
[QUOTE=Laserbeams;45043612]Why? Who uses Mega to pirate anyway?[/QUOTE] It's still about Megaupload. Defunct and offline for over two years now and they're still crying about it.
Wait, freeze his assets? Like, all of them? Is it okay for them to basically end his life just because he may have lost them, at the very most, a few million between multiple multi-billion dollar companies? [editline]9th June 2014[/editline] Not to mention that how pirates used his site was hardly his fault.
[QUOTE=Jamsponge;45044783]Wait, freeze his assets? Like, all of them? Is it okay for them to basically end his life just because he may have lost them, at the very most, a few million between multiple multi-billion dollar companies? [editline]9th June 2014[/editline] Not to mention that how pirates used his site was hardly his fault.[/QUOTE] "muh lost sales, bawwww" - basically why they did it even though it probably didn't amount to that much in the end.
[QUOTE=Jamsponge;45044783]Wait, freeze his assets? Like, all of them?[/QUOTE] They do this to ensure you wouldn't be able to put a fight in court.
So much corruption
[QUOTE=Laserbeams;45043612]Why? Who uses Mega to pirate anyway?[/QUOTE] It would be nice to know what sort of files Megaupload was mostly used for. Or have people really downloaded entire films off of Mega by the thousands?
I think the government should hurry up and stop letting these supermassive corporations control them and exert at LEAST a tiny bit of control. The mere fact that the US allows these companies to sue a company non stop like this(who didn't even break the law or infringe upon anyone) and then just watches them try to prevent Kim from doing anything about it again and again is astounding. I know this is taking place in another country but they wouldn't be able to do it if the US bothered to limit them in the US and it didn't happen in the first place.
Rape, Murder, Terrorism, well that's not so bad... He downloaded that film for free? CALL THE MOTHERFUCKING ARMY!!!
I didn't like or ever use Megaupload, but this is bullshit.
not too many people use direct download sites for movies and games and shit anymore as far as i know. they still do for music, though
I remember watching so many fucking movies on Megaupload. The Megaupload player was really nice.
[QUOTE=Ninja Gnome;45052160]not too many people use direct download sites for movies and games and shit anymore as far as i know. they still do for music, though[/QUOTE] Movies and games are much larger in terms of file size, so downloading in several sessions is necessary for people with shittier connections.
[QUOTE=rbreslow;45052241]I remember watching so many fucking movies on Megaupload. The Megaupload player was really nice.[/QUOTE] But... *you have already watched 90 mins today... please wait a bit before you can continue*
[QUOTE=gk99;45052057]I didn't like or ever use Megaupload, but this is bullshit.[/QUOTE] Megaupload was great because you didn't have to sift through 20 miles of bullshit to get a file. It was click here, wait a minute (and if you could be bothered to google it, punch in a javascript command to remove that too), and download. You weren't restricted to 50kB/s, and you weren't prevented from downloading large files. I never happened to use it much, but it was simple, it worked, and it didn't make getting an archive for a modpack a second job.
[QUOTE=Zephyrs;45053415]Megaupload was great because you didn't have to sift through 20 miles of bullshit to get a file. It was click here, wait a minute (and if you could be bothered to google it, punch in a javascript command to remove that too), and download. You weren't restricted to 50kB/s, and you weren't prevented from downloading large files. I never happened to use it much, but it was simple, it worked, and it didn't make getting an archive for a modpack a second job.[/QUOTE] I always downloaded stuff from Rapidshare or Mediafire. Megaupload was something that only really mattered to me if I was in the mood to go play the HL2 beta.
Megaupload was hilariously fast. I got 12MB/s down.
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