RIAA Rejects Reduced File-Sharing Judgment
Posted on: January 31, 2010After having offered to settle the case with Jammie Thomas for as little as $25,000, down from the $1.92 million original verdict, and from the most recent $54,000 judgment reduction on appeal.
Last Friday the case of accused file-sharer Jammie Thomas grew more complex after Judge Davis of the United States District Court lowered the original $1.92 million verdict against Jammie Thomas, the first person convicted of illegal file-sharing in the US, from $80,000 per song to $2,250 per song, saying “statutory damages must still bear some relation to actual damages.”
If you recall, back in June 2009, the jury awarded the recording industry $1.92 million in statutory damages as a punishment for using the KaZaA file-sharing program to download 24 songs which amounted to $80,000 per song.
“The need for deterrence cannot justify a $2 million verdict for stealing and illegally distributing 24 songs for the sole purpose of obtaining free music,” reads the ruling. “Moreover, although Plaintiffs were not required to prove their actual damages, statutory damages must still bear some relation to actual damages.”
So after having saved some $1.866 million dollars you'd think the case would be closed and all parties would go their separate ways. Think again.
Not only is Thomas appealing the new $54,000 judgment, but it turns out she even rejected an offer by the RIAA to settle for even less – $25,000 – with all proceeds going to a charity benefiting musicians.
“Jammie will not accept anything offer that requires her to pay money to or on behalf of the Plaintiffs,” said her attorney joe Sibley less than an hour after having received it. “Thus, your offer of settlement is rejected.”
So much for playing nice.
Sibley counters that they plan to continue challenging the constitutionality of a statutory scheme that ordered her to initially pay more than $80,000 for each of her 24 illegally downloaded songs.
“We will ride this train to it's appellate end no matter how many future remittiturs are rejected,” he added.
The RIAA, seemingly pleased with itself for appearing gracious while at the same time able to continue the fight, calls her rejection a “shame” will prepare for a new trial.
RIAA General Counsel Steven Marks also expressed his sentiments in a statement:
After two unprecedented trials and a wave of national attention, there should be no doubt that illegal downloading is wrong and that there should be real consequences for those who ignore the law. The message is resoundingly clear. This case helped affirm the important principles of accepting responsibility for one's actions and compensating the people who create great music and bring it to the public. We've accomplished what we set out to do, and now we seek to resolve this matter fairly and expeditiously. We hope Ms. Thomas-Rasset accepts our offer.
Personally, I think I'd take the $25,000 settlement offer and run, but for some 25 thousand might as well be 25 million or billion, especially in today's economy.
Either way, it's nice to know Thomas isn't giving up and fighting for what she thinks is right.
Stay tuned.
jared@zeropaid.com
Jammie Thomas-Rasset Says No to RIAA's Proposal
Posted on: January 31, 2010
Jammie Thomas-Rasset, the central figure in nation’s first file sharing case against an individual to have gone to litigation has refused to pay the settlement of $25,000 proposed by the recording industry for the charges to be dropped.
The initial decision, which demanded the defendant to pay damage awards of $1.92 million for sharing 24 songs on Kazaa, was later reduced to $54,000 by the federal judge in the case. Ultimately, following the ruling of U.S. District Judge Michael Davis, the RIAA offered Thomas-Rasset the alternative to settle out of court in exchange for the sum of $25,000.
According to Joe Sibley, lawyer of the defendant, Thomas-Rasset decided to reject the proposition. “I think it proves our point. They want to use this case as a bogeyman to scare people into doing what they want, to pay exorbitant damages”, Sibley explained in a telephone interview.
Thomas-Rasset’s rejection of the settlement could lead to a new jury trial for deciding the amount of damages the defendant must pay, or an appellate court might interfere in the case and reconsider Davis’ overwhelming decision. In the meantime, Thomas-Rasset has the possibility to legally confront the justness of the reduced awards, which the defendant’s lawyers insist is still exaggerated.
The Copyright Act stipulates that damages must not exceed $150,000 per track. While the jury in Minnesota decided upon $80,000 awards for each individual song, U.S. District Judge Michael Davis subsequently reduced that amount to $2,250 per song and expressed his disapproval regarding the $1.92 million verdict, which he described as completely out of rule compared to the charges filed in the case.
Judge Davis’s decision to reduce the amount of damages in a Copyright Act case is a premiere in the nation’s history. Hopefully, this precedent will influence future legal court verdicts to better reflect the reality and establish a more reasonable standard for damage awards in similar cases.
http://www.p2pon.com/2010/01/29/jammie-thomas-rasset-says-no-to-riaas-proposal/ Post LinkLessons The Next Big Torrent Sites Will Learn From Mininova
Posted on: January 31, 2010 |
The second biggest BitTorrent site in the world, Mininova, recently lost an important court case. The result of the loss is that almost the entire site was taken offline. BitTorrent analysts have analyzed the case and provide important recommendations. |
Pirates Are The Music Industry’s Most Valuable Customers
Posted on: January 31, 2010Have you ever heard one of the major movie studios complaining about the decrease in sales of VHS tapes? We haven't. The music industry on the other hand continues to blame the decrease in physical sales on digital piracy, ignoring the fact that there's a generation growing up that has never owned a physical CD.
Yesterday the music industry lobby group IFPI presented its 2009 figures, again putting the blame for decreased physical sales on file-sharers. Unfortunately, most mainstream media outlets simply reposted the IFPI press release and their flawed analysis. In general, no effort is made to actually balance out or check the message being sent out to millions of readers.
In their annual Digital Music Report, IFPI states that file-sharers are half as likely to buy physical CDs than the average music buyer. Although the report is about digital music, they carefully avoid saying anything about file-sharers and digital sales. That would actually show a completely different picture as we will explain below.
The music group made this statement based on an IFPI-commissioned study that was executed by Jupiter research. Although IFPI refused to share the entire research report with TorrentFreak, we can conclude the following from the two pages that were published online.
Compared to music buyers, music sharers (pirates) are...
* 31% more likely to buy single tracks online.
* 33% more likely to buy music albums online.
* 100% more likely to pay for music subscription services.
* 60% more likely to pay for music on mobile phone.
These figures (as reported by the music industry) clearly show that file-sharers buy more digital music than the average music buyer. In fact, the group that makes up the music buyers category actually includes the buying file-sharers, so the difference between music sharers and non-sharing music buyers would be even more pronounced.
How can this be true and why was there no mention of this in the Digital Music Report? They must be spending less on digital music then, right? But again, this is not the case at all. On average, file-sharers actually spend more than non-sharing music buyers. At least that's what Mark Mulligan, Vice President and Research Director at Forrester Research who conducted the study for IFPI told us.
Mulligan has his hands tied and couldn't say much about the findings without IFPI's approval, but we managed to get confirmation that paying file-sharers are the music industry's best customers. “A significant share of music buyers are file sharers also. These music buyers tend to be higher spending music buyers,” Mulligan told TorrentFreak.
So why do file-sharers download music without paying? According to the annual IFPI report, one of the main reasons people share music is because it's free. This leads the music industry group to conclude that they are cheapskates and not willing to pay for music at all. But, as the above clearly shows, they are misinterpreting this finding, and we'd like to explain why.
In the digital age, people's demand for music has changed significantly, but their budgets are still limited. The average file-sharer is currently spending $100 a year on music according to IFPI's own research, not really a group that can be classified as freeloaders. However, their demand for music simply exceeds their budget and that's where they start downloading music on file-sharing sites, because it's free.
Just to be clear on our motivation to balance the ‘facts' as reported by IFPI. We are not advocating that all music should be free and neither do most of the music lovers who share files online. However, the music industry continues to ignore that file-sharing is much more of a signal from the market that it is the increased demand for music that fuels piracy.
The solution to the problem is relatively easy. Start offering more unlimited and unrestricted music services and piracy will go into a free-fall. File-sharers are already paying for digital music, and they pay more than the average music consumer. File-sharing is simply a market signal showing that there is a need to compensate for the lack of high quality and affordable subscription services.
If anything, the music industry should have more respect for file-sharers, as they are their most valuable consumers. They are ahead of the curve and actually leading the way for the future of digital music, buying more digital music than anyone else. It's the music industry that has to change, not the other way around.
Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.
http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/kSC1apjB4H0/ Post LinkACS:Law Threatens More than 150 Innocent People
Posted on: January 31, 2010Which?, the largest consumer body in the UK, receives dozens and dozens of letters from people claiming to have been falsely accused of illegal file-sharing.
Which?, the largest consumer body in the UK with over 650,000 members, is reporting that more than 150 innocent people have received warning letters so far from ACS:Law, a UK-based law firm that “specializes in assisting intellectual property rights?holders exploit and enforce their rights globally,” accusing them of illegal file-sharing and offering each the chance to settle the matter out of court. Settlement fees range between ?300-500 ($497-828 USD).
ACS Law says its letter writing campaign is protecting the copyright of its clients. But Which? had heard from more than 150 consumers who believed they had been wrongly accused, with even more getting in touch as a result of these latest letters.
“My 78 year old father yesterday received a letter from ACS law demanding ?500 for a porn file he is alleged to have downloaded,” reads one letter. “He doesn’t even know what file sharing or bittorrent is so has certainly not done this himself or given anyone else permission to use his computer to do such a thing.”
ACS:Law first began the offensive early last December, referring to it as a “revolutionary business model” that “generates revenue for rights holders and effectively decreases copyright infringement in a measurable and sustainable way” unlike the “costly and ineffective” anti-piracy measures of other companies.
After careful review it decided to drop a number of cases against an initial 15,000 suspected file-sharers across the UK, limiting it to only those it deemed “viable” or “beneficial to its clients.”
Apparently their “careful review” wasn't careful enough and a number of innocent people have still managed to be ensnared in their P2P dragnet.
“I have never been in trouble for anything and I am at my wits’ end,” complains another innocent person in a letter to Which? I feel guilty even though I am not.”
The problem is that people are being scared into settling, guilt or innocence aside, without benefit of trial, and Which?, concerned as ever about the rights of consumers, is none too happy about the matter.
Matt Bath, Technology Editor for Which, continues:
Innocent consumers are being threatened with legal action for copyright infringements they not only haven’t committed, but wouldn’t know how to commit. Which? is concerned that many people will be frightened into paying up rather than facing the stress of a court battle.
Over 150 people have turned to Which? for help already. We’d like to see an end to these letters being sent to innocent people and encourage copyright owners to focus their attention on those who are deliberately breaking the law.
So what to do? I recommend reading Being Threatened's “Speculative Invoicing Handbook.” The guide is an excellent step-by-step playbook that details how readers can stop extortion attempts such as ACS:Law’s and just what to do if you’re wrongly accused of illegal file-sharing. It lays out what one should do step by step, from letter of response to examining what information is available about you on the Internet and what it may mean for the case against you.
Stay tuned.
jared@zeropaid.com
Microsoft Sues Prominent BitTorrent Tracker For $43m
Posted on: January 31, 2010
In recent years we've seen plenty of legal action against the owners and operators of BitTorrent sites, mostly initiated by the movie and music industries.
This week, Microsoft joins the fight as the software company announces that it will pursue LinkoManija's alleged operator Kestas Ermanas and his company in court.
The action against Lithuania's largest BitTorrent site, which is in the top 10 of the most visited websites in the country, has been approved by the US headquarters of the software giant.
The defendant and his company are accused of facilitating copyright infringement of Microsoft's Office 2003 and 2007 through their involvement with the BitTorrent tracker.
Together with local anti-piracy outfit LANVA, Microsoft has requested 107 million Lithuanian litas ($43 million) in damages at the Vilnius Regional Court. However, under Lithuanian law Microsoft can get up to $53,000 in damages at maximum.
In response to the demands from Microsoft, the assets of Kestas Ermanas and his company were seized and associated bank accounts frozen.
TorrentFreak briefly spoke with the defendant who is pretty shaken up by the news, but is claiming Microsoft sued the wrong people. We were told that as of 2010, he and his company no longer run LinkoManija. Kestas and his company operated the site until December last year.
Kestas further told us that Microsoft's move surprised him, as the company has never sent a torrent takedown request to the popular BitTorrent tracker. “We informed them that we wanted to cooperate with them, they just had to give us the links to the infringing torrent files,” Kestas said, adding “they never wrote back to us.”
In addition to Kestas and his company, Microsoft is also pursuing legal action against LinkoManija's users. In November last year, 106 users of the site were reported to the police and one of them will go on trial next month.
Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.
http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/dy_E_ZS1lYY/ Post LinkOldest BitTorrent Site Knocked Down, But Not Out
Posted on: January 30, 2010Founded in 2003, UK-based FileSoup was one of the original torrent sites. Online for longer than even the mighty Pirate Bay, the site developed a great reputation and a warm community.
After many years of keeping a low profile, on Monday 27th July 2009, police and the MPAA-funded anti-piracy group FACT conducted a raid on the home address of the owner – known to all in the torrent community as ‘TheGeeker'.
It didn't matter that since 2005 FileSoup hadn’t operated a tracker and never hosted any copyrighted content, Geeker's offense was initially labeled as “Distribute Article Infringing Copyright”. The full details of the raid and aftermath can be read in our previous article.
Despite all the turmoil, Geeker was never asked or told to close down the site, so naturally it stayed open, supporting the loyal and passionate community it had built over the previous 6 years.
But then, on January 6th this year, without warning FileSoup simply vanished. Of course, as the days went by there was the usual speculation, but the reason for the disappearance was not as sinister as some believed.
A few days before FileSoup went down, TorrentFreak was told by a number of readers that a company they had rented seedboxes from had simply stopped responding. Despite their claim to offer “premier customer satisfaction,” JMHServices.com disappeared leaving many of its customers out of pockets, some by hundreds of dollars. In an email, NetDirekt, a provider that JMH co-located with, confirmed that the company had not been paying their bills.
Unfortunately, JMHServices was FileSoup's host too, and when they went down, so did the site.
On Monday 11th, Geeker returned to the police station to answer his bail and was again interviewed at length about FileSoup. Various items that were originally seized were returned, including a mobile phone, sat nav and video camera.
Understandably this experience with the police is proving upsetting for Geeker, the JMH situation was yet another kick in the teeth and for a while it looked like FileSoup would be no more, such is the pressure.
Geeker told TorrentFreak that the goal for FileSoup right from the very beginning was always to be a really friendly and open community site all about BitTorrent and filesharing – a place where people could come and find out everything they needed to know in a fun and helpful atmosphere, not just to get torrents.
“It is so upsetting for me and for every member I've heard from since Filesoup went offline, to think that we're all going to lose the friends and the site we all worked so hard to build up over the last 6+ years,” Geeker explains.
But things are looking up.
The hunt is now on to find people with the necessary expertise, knowledge and free time to bring FileSoup back as a great community site.
“Over the next couple of weeks, I'm hoping to find and speak with some like minded people to help me, so fingers crossed, if everything works out well, Filesoup could be back online again real soon,” he told us.
Geeker's new bail date is currently set for Tuesday 13th April. I'm sure our readers will join us in wishing him well.
Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.
http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/V4nnc2y-6Hk/ Post LinkMicrosoft Launches Lawsuit against Large Torrent Tracker
Posted on: January 30, 2010
Microsoft promised some time ago to increase its efforts in fighting piracy and now it seems determined to stick to that promise. Recently, the giant sued LinkoManija, the largest Lithuanian BitTorrent file-sharing tracker site, whose founder Kestas Ermanas is asked to pay an enormous $43 million in damages.
In its endeavor Microsoft received help from anti-file sharing agency LANVA.
Allegedly, Ermanas, whose assets and company have been seized following the lawsuit, was accused of assisting in copyright infringement. LinkoManija provided links for illegal copies of Microsoft's Office 2003 and 2007 software.
I guess Microsoft could really use that money...
http://www.p2pon.com/2010/01/29/microsoft-launches-lawsuit-against-large-torrent-tracker/ Post LinkiTunes Offers 'Hope for Haiti Now' Album as Free Download
Posted on: January 30, 2010
Following the success of Hope for Haiti Now benefit concert, the performing musicians have decided to include all featured songs on an album, which can be downloaded online via iTunes.Com. To the delight of thousands of music fans everywhere, the fund raising concert offered memorable performances from popular artists, brought together by the humanitarian cause of supporting the people in Haiti, involved in the tragic events on January 12.
Including songs from prominent names such as Madonna, Justin Timberlake, Alicia Keys, Beyonce, Mary J. Blige and Stevie Wonder, as well as the popular song adaptation of Bill Withers’ “Lean On Me”, performed by Sheryl Crow, Kid Rock and Keith Urban, Hope for Haiti Now album is expected to enjoy a lot of appreciation among fans and therefore, maintain the momentum of the recently initiated fund raising campaign.
According to sources such as The Examiner, all album sale profits will be donated to the Red Cross, United Nations World Food Program, UNICEF, Partners in Health, Clinton Bush Haiti Fund, Yele Haiti Foundation and Oxfam America, to support their effort of helping the victims of the devastating earthquake in the Caribbean.
Previous fund raising events achieved good exposure, with Hope for Haiti Now telethon bringing in around $58 million for the people of Haiti. Organizers of the campaign are pleased with the feedback received so far and are optimistic that they will be able to further increase existing earnings through Hope for Haiti Now album sales.
Including a number of 20 tracks, the Hope for Haiti Now album can be downloaded online for $7.99, while individual downloads of the featured tracks are available for only 99 cents each.
The album includes the following songs:
1. Send Me An Angel by Alicia Keys
2. A Message 2010 by Coldplay
3. We Shall Overcome by Bruce Springsteen
4. Time to Love / Bridge Over Troubled Water by Stevie Wonder
5. I’ll Stand by You (with The Roots) by Shakira
6. Motherless Child by John Legend
7. Hard Times Come Again No More (with the Roots) by Mary J. Blige
8. Breathless by Taylor Swift
9. Lift Me Up by Christina Aguiler
10. Driven to Tears by Sting
11. Halo by Beyoncé
12. Lean on Me (with Keith Urban & Kid Rock) by Sheryl Crow
13. Like a Prayer by Madonna
14. Hallelujah (with Charlie Sexton) by Justin Timberlake
15. Let It Be (The Roots) by Jennifer Hudson
16. Many Rivers to Cross by Emeline Michel
17. Stranded (Haiti Mon Amour) (with Rihanna, Bono & The Edge) by Jay-Z (Live Version)
18. Alone and Forsaken (with Dave Mathews) by Neil Young
19. Rivers of Babylon / Yele (Medley) by Wyclef Jean
20. Stranded (Haiti Mon Amour) (with Rihanna, Bono & The Edge) by Jay-Z (Version 1.0)
Watch Jay-Z, Bono and Rihanna in 'Hope for Haiti Now' concert:
musiCORE – A New Zero Day Music Album Direct Download Service
Posted on: January 30, 2010A while ago we featured a service titled 0DayMusic, a service that let you download English music albums via direct download links. Here’s another similar service – musiCORE. musiCORE indexes download links to scene released music albums and has great pre times as well as better availability of files (since they use a file spreader service to upload each release to multiple hosts) than most other similar sites out there. A SceneNotice was recently pre’d which labeled this site as a ‘0sec HTTP...
TalkTalk: Digital Economy Bill Will Not End but Encourage Piracy
Posted on: January 30, 2010TalkTalk Wants Facts, Facts
Despite his friendship with David Cameron – leader of the Conservative Party, TalkTalk director Charles Dunstone has announced that he is determined to carry on his firm’s battle against laws aimed at cutting down illegal file-sharing on the premises of a Conservative governance. Thanks to Dunstone’s implication, TalkTalk’s "Don't Disconnect Us" campaign focused on dismantling the Digital Economy Bill, is gaining more considerable ground.
At a reception hosted to attract MPs and officials to his cause, the head of UK’s second largest ISP has publicly expressed his concern that the measures proposed in the Digital Economy Bill will have a negative impact upon his firm. Culture secretary Jeremy Hunt, as well as the ORG, Liberty and Which? groups were present at the reception and discussed the disadvantages associated with the much-debated set of laws.
Compared to rivals Virgin Media, BT and other major companies in the Internet industry, TalkTalk has established itself as the most incisive and outspoken opponent of the government's policies in its branch. Dunstone believes the reserved position of these prominent names in the Internet business regarding government’s scheme is an indicator that they might be considering becoming paid content providers. Ruling out any rumors suggesting that TalkTalk might also be tempted to switch sides, he explained that "it's not our job to sell music".
Dunstone attacked the recording industry head on, stating that it had "treated its customers so badly they have effectively gone on strike". Other participants at the reception, who preferred to adopt a more flexible attitude, didn’t approve of his aggressive approach. Open Rights Group’s executive director Jim Killock said that the primary goal should be to encourage and facilitate the collaboration between ISPs and record labels in order to promote more desirable, higher quality legal download services.
At present, the Digital Economy Bill is waiting validation by the committee at the House of Lords. Killock hopes the government law won’t enter into effect until after the elections, in which case officials might reconsider revising its stipulated measures.
http://www.p2pon.com/2010/01/28/talktalk-digital-economy-bill-will-not-end-but-encourage-piracy/ Post LinkUK ISP Increases Connections Speeds, Will Throttle P2P
Posted on: January 30, 2010BT network upgrades will mean much faster broadband speeds, but new traffic management equipment will restrict P2P bandwidth.
UK ISP BT has launched a new Infinity broadband service that will give residential customers a 40Mbps download speed, and up to a 10Mbps upload speed. The current highest residential speed service it offers is 20Mbps.
The catch? The new traffic management equipment will throttle the bandwidth available to P2P applications and services during peak hours. Peak hours are typically from 4pm to midnight on weekdays, and from 9am to midnight on weekends.
The ISP says the basic 40Mbps service will be offered for ?19.99 ($32.50) per month on an 18 month contract.
Only those who opt for BT's most expensive tariff, ?24.99 ($40.60) per month, will get the 10Mbps upload speed. With the basic package upload speed is up to 2Mbps.
“The internet is essential to our customers’ lives and they are demanding more and more as richer and even more compelling services become available,” says Gavin Patterson, chief executive officer, BT Retail. “BT Infinity gives customers the capacity and reliability they need in an instant and at a great value price they can afford.? We want to give our customers the best possible online experience and are committed to rolling out super-fast speeds across the UK.”
Faster speeds are always good news, but the increase in P2P throttling will only mean more people will simply turn to VPN services if they haven't already.
Stay tuned.
jared@zeropaid.com
Verizon Denies Disconnecting File-Sharers
Posted on: January 29, 2010Spokeswoman says she was misquoted, that she didn't say it had “cut some people off,” but had instead said it “could” cut people off.
Verizon is denying a recent story that it's apparently enacted a “three-strikes” program on its own by disconnecting users repeatedly warned of illegal file-sharing.
“We’ve cut some people off,” is what
said Bobbi Henson, a spokeswoman for Verizon Online, initially said. “We do reserve the right to discontinue service.”
Now Henson is backpedaling on that statement, insisting the reporter's “notes are wrong,” that she had been misquoted, that she said Verizon “could” disconnect people not that it actually had.
“I'm not aware that we've ever terminated anyone's account for excessive consumption, although we reserve the right to do so,” Henson told DSL Reports. “That part of the cNet story is wrong. I did not say ‘we've cut people off'; I said we reserve the right to do so.”
cNet is defending its story by quoting an email between its reporter and Henson. In it she's asked for “any numbers you can give” about how many people have been disconnected for illegal file-sharing.
“David, we don't give out these numbers, but I can tell you that they are small,” was her reply.
So then the amount of people who've been disconnected is not zero as she insists, but a “small” number.
Verizon would then have us believe that it's ramped up DMCA letter campaign is simply a big bluff and not part of an voluntary “three-strikes” plan that the RIAA insisted it would begin asking ISPs to implement after ending its controversial strategy of suing music fans.
“This is not an automatic ‘three strikes' graduated response program,” adds Henson. “This program has been effective in reducing instances of repeat notices and has not resulted in the termination of any Verizon customer's service. Our goal is to protect our customers' privacy and due process rights while recognizing the importance of copyright protection and acquiring content legally.”
So then: (1) Verizon will forward a movie studio or record label's complaint of copyright infringement to one of its users; (2) it will threaten the user with disconnection in a form letter; (3) it apparently won't carry out that threat. As long as nobody figures out that third part then it's plan should work perfectly.
“We believe our program strikes a reasonable approach and is working very well,” says Henson.
With Cox already having said that it will terminate the accounts of customers who receive 4 DMCA letters in a 12 month period it's not too far fetched to think that Verizon has followed their lead, especially when its spokeswoman says it has!
Stay tuned.
jared@zeropaid.com
Top 10 Most Pirated Movies on BitTorrent
Posted on: January 29, 2010
This week there are three newcomers in the top 10. Sherlock Holmes is the most downloaded movie on BitTorrent.
The data for our weekly download chart is collected by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only. All the movies in the list are DVDrips unless stated otherwise.
RSS feed for the weekly movie download chart.
| Ranking | (last week) | Movie | Rating / Trailer |
|---|---|---|---|
| torrentfreak.com | |||
| 1 | (2) | Sherlock Holmes (DVDscr) | 7.7 / trailer |
| 2 | (...) | The Informant! | 7.1 / trailer |
| 3 | (1) | The Men Who Stare at Goats (R5) | 6.8 / trailer |
| 4 | (...) | Couples Retreat | 5.5/ trailer |
| 5 | (...) | The Book of Eli (TS) | 7.4/ trailer |
| 6 | (3) | Avatar (TS) | 8.9 / trailer |
| 7 | (4) | 2012 (R5) | 6.7 / trailer |
| 8 | (5) | Smokin' Aces 2 | ?.? / trailer |
| 9 | (6) | The Princess And The Frog | 7.9 / trailer |
| 10 | (10) | This Is It | 7.4 / trailer |
Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.
http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/-cWQgVAZF5s/ Post LinkDownload Torrents Remotely With ReactorFeed
Posted on: January 29, 2010
Downloading torrents remotely can come in quite handy when you’re at work, school, in a shopping mall or at a friend's place.
With ReactorFeed, brought to you by the people from ShareReactor, this can be done with relative ease.
Instead of downloading the torrent directly, users can simply add the torrent to their personal RSS feed. ReactorFeed supports torrents that are hosted anywhere on the web and is not restricted to one torrent site.
When added to your personal feed, the torrent will download automatically when your BitTorrent client is running at home. That is, if your favorite BitTorrent client has RSS support. Luckily, almost all popular clients do by now.
Additionally, users can choose to share their feed in public so it can be accessed by others with similar interests. For those who would rather keep their feeds private, it's recommended to set the feed as private, since URLs of the public ones are easy to guess.
Overall, ReactorFeed is a simple but extremely useful service for those who want an easy way to add torrents to their BitTorrent client on the go.
For those looking for feeds where the torrents are added automatically based on pre-selected content, we have a tutorial for that on our side-blog FreakBits.
Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.
http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/GDgiLRUfa3w/ Post LinkIFPI Loses “Deep-Linking” Case Against Baidu
Posted on: January 29, 2010
Search engine Baidu.com is not only China's biggest, but also a major player globally. It recently grabbed headlines when it was hacked by the ‘Iranian cyber army', the same outfit that took Twitter offline in December.
Baidu has become increasingly popular with the Chinese population for its MP3 indexing abilities. While its “MP3 Search” provides algorithm-generated links to millions of undoubtedly illicit copyright tracks hosted by others (so-called “deep-linking”), Baidu has always insisted that the provision of such links alone is entirely legal. Needless to say, IFPI, the global music group, disagrees strongly with this assertion.
“The music industry in China wants partnership with the technology companies – but you cannot build partnership on the basis of systemic theft of copyrighted music and that is why we have been forced to take further actions,” said John Kennedy, Chairman and Chief Executive of IFPI, in a February 2008 statement.
Bolstered by an earlier ruling against Yahoo China, by further actions Kennedy unsurprisingly meant “legal actions.” In early 2008, IFPI (Sony BMG, Universal Music and Warner Music) sued Baidu.com for $9m. Today the result of that case has been made public.
Beijing No.1 Intermediate People's Court has cleared Baidu on accusations of copyright infringement, with a court statement showing that simply providing search results does not breach Chinese copyright law. According to lawyer Sun Yan, the case against the search giant fell because IFPI failed to identify the actual sites hosting the illegal music downloads.
IFPI has challenged Baidu – and lost – in the Beijing No.1 Intermediate Court before. In September 2005, IFPI filed claims regarding nearly 200 music tracks it claimed were made available via Baidu. In 2006, the Court ruled Baidu was not infringing copyright. IFPI appealed to the Beijing Higher People’s Court which upheld the earlier ruling.
Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.
http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/dEFQQUIb4TI/ Post LinkMother Who Banned File-Sharing Still Held Responsible
Posted on: January 29, 2010Following accusations from record labels that their copyrighted works were being made available via a file-sharing network from a specific IP-address, the companies managed to obtain the identity of the person who paid for the Internet connection in question.
The subscriber, the mother of several young children, was taken to court by four record companies on allegations that around 1000 music tracks had been made available on her connection.
The woman said that although she was the owner of the connection, she had no idea about computers and file-sharing. She denied carrying out any infringements but suggested that one of her children could have been responsible.
The plaintiffs hoped the court would find the defendant liable as “Mitstörer”, which means that although the woman did not directly commit the infringements, it's possible she could be held responsible for not taking measures to stop them.
The Higher Regional Court of Cologne decided that even though the woman did not carry out the infringements and even forbade the use of file-sharing networks, parents still have a responsibility to monitor the behavior of their children, or take measures to ensure that file-sharing sites are blocked. This considered, the Court ruled in favor of the record companies.
This court case was about recovering the legal costs for bringing the copyright claim, which are calculated based on the value of the alleged infringements. The claim was for 1,000 violations at 50 euros per track (a value set by the court) which comes to a total of 50,000 euros.
According to Aldor Nini who helped with this article, based on the above the women will have to pay 2615 euros (less VAT) to the record companies' lawyer, 1368 euros to the court, and up to 2,615 (less VAT) to their own lawyer.
Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.
http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/9qNmZpuvFzE/ Post LinkPharrell Williams: Illegal Downloading is “Just Taste-Testing”
Posted on: January 29, 2010Tells audience at MIDEM, the world's largest music industry trade fair, that technology has increased consumer options and choices and that record labels are to blame for its struggles with digital music for trying to ignore it.
Pharrell Williams, Billboards' just declared producer of the decade, and Grammy Award-winning singer, songwriter, told an audience (Jan 23rd Video) at MIDEM (short for Marché International du Disque et de l'Edition Musicale), the world's largest music industry trade fair, that artists and record labels need to embrace technology if they want to succeed.
“Technology is just getting better not by the year, but by the moment,” he noted. “It can be effective if you know how to harness it, but if you don't know what you're doing you're gonna get left behind. I think that that is the new struggle is for us to keep up with the new technology that exists.”
He observed that record labels have erroneously tried to control technology and and digital music only to find that it cannot be controlled.
“A lot of them really ignored it and thought ‘you know, we have a huge monopoly and we can just do whatever we want to do,'” he said.
“I think Steve Jobs has sort of made it very clear that it's all about technology, and if you are the one that's riding that horse then you'll get to your destination,” he added. “If you're walking you'll be behind, which makes you a follower.”
As for P2P specifically, he questions the whole notion of it harming artists being that the only reason they're downloading your music in the first place is because they're fans – they appreciate your work – and that they're really own “taste-testing” your work much as they do with anything else they consume.
“Is it really hurting you if a person really loves you and they really love what you do, you know?”
He described illegal downloading as “just taste-testing,” comparing it to the hors d'oeuvres handed outside restaurants to entice people inside, and that it doesn't stop you from buying, but instead gives you a “taste of what could be so great by buying.”
“People have so many options and choices, we should allow them to taste-test, to decide if that's something they wanna be involved with – from technology to products to food,” he said.
So what advice does he have for artists starting out today?
In a related article on the BBC he says that he recommends they “market” themselves and chase advertisers rather than record labels.
“I would probably build a site, a home for my music, a destination where people could come and see me and what I do and what I'm thinking about,” he says. “And then I'd probably assemble a team of kids that would go and bug the hell out of advertising agencies and marketing companies to use my music.”
Sounds like a good way to take control of ones music and embrace technology to me.
Stay tuned.
jared@zeropaid.com
Stay tuned.
jared@zeropaid.com
Game Scene Charts Issue 38 – December 2009 Edition Download
Posted on: January 29, 2010I know for a fact that a lot of you are waiting for this issue so here goes. TGSC or ‘The Game Scene Charts’ is a coded magazine for pirates, made by pirates. It’s a publication that comes directly from the warez scene and TGSC’s main purpose is to rank PC game release groups in the scene based on the number of pirated games they release in a particular period of time, usually a month. Groups gain points based on the type of protection they have to crack, number of non nuked releases they pre...
LeetLeech – Free Image Host With Unlimited Bandwidth & Storage
Posted on: January 29, 2010Chances are high that all of us have used an online image hosting service at least once in our lives (if you are a private tracker hunter you definitely would have used one to store ratio proofs :p). Right now there are thousands of Image hosts online, ranging from popular sites such as as ImageShack to lesser known sites such as the one we’re going to tell you about today. Most of the ‘free’ image hosting solutions usually come with some form of limitation such as bandwidth/storage...
Pimp Your Mobile – Torrent Tracker For 3GP Movies, Symbian/iPhone/Android Appz & More
Posted on: January 29, 2010Although there’ve been a lot of BitTorrent trackers popping up in the past couple of years, specialized mobile content trackers have always been a rarity. Out of the few such such that exist, Pimp Your Mobile (PyM) is one of the oldest trackers catering this niche. We first mentioned about PyM back in 2008 and the site has come a long way since then.They now have a better interface, have gone ratio free and more importantly, have better content. You can download applications, games, themes,...
CatTorrent Down No More – Audiobook Tracker
Posted on: January 28, 2010About three months ago we posted an article about CatTorrent, a specialized private torrent tracker that focused primarily on audio books. However back when the article was posted, the site was experiencing uptime issues and our readers were having a really hard time signup up for the site (check the comments here). It wasn’t only new users who were experiencing difficulties but existing members of CatTorrent were also finding it hard to navigate its pages. Good news is that these stability...
How To Change Language In Mass Effect 2 (PC)
Posted on: January 28, 2010Mass Effect 2 (PC) has still not even been released and we’re already getting bombarded with questions from avid followers of the game. We’ve already made a post highlighting some of the common problems people seem to be having with ME2 but here’s another popular question that was directed to our E-mail inbox; How do you change the in game language in Mass Effect 2? Usually, you should be able to do this during the installation process. In case you missed it, you can still change the language...
Court Orders ISP To Hand Over Torrent Site Operator Details
Posted on: January 28, 2010 |
The Swedish film industry lobby group, Antipiratbyrn, demanded that the Swedish ISP, TeliaSonera, handed over confidential customer information on users of the swetorrents.org BitTorrent tracker back in July. Today the court granted them that wish. |
TV.Torrents.Ro Invite Giveaway 02 – 100 Free Invitations
Posted on: January 27, 2010Back in November 2009, we conducted a free invitation giveaway for the popular TV Torrent tracker Tv.Torrents.Ro (Freshon.TV). Although more than two months have passed since that giveaway concluded, we’re still getting invite requests for the article from our readers, almost on a daily basis (this should give you a hint about TVT/Ro’s popularity). Anyways if you are one of those souls willing to get into TVT.RO, today could be your lucky day. We are again giving away 100 free invites and all...
Adobe Reader Lite 9.3 – Updater Disabled And Bloat Removed
Posted on: January 27, 2010Adobe’s Portable Document Format (PDF) is one of the most popular file formats today and it’s used in many office automation related tasks all over the world. Although there are many PDF reader applications around, Adobe Reader is perhaps the most popular viewer of them all. However, it has been subject to heavy criticism by computer power users for being a ‘piece of bloatware’. This was true to some extent – one example would be the Adobe updater which came bundled with Adobe Reader. Getting...
10 Tips and Tricks to Make Your Computer Faster
Posted on: January 27, 2010
Slow Start Up
There can be a number of reasons to Windows loading very slowly when starting up. What you want to do is to go to Run, type "msconfig" and hit enter. A new window should appear and under the ‘Start Up’ tab, you need to uncheck the unwanted programs and press OK. Once you've rebooted Windows you should notice things will run a bit smoother.
Oh yeah, another program I thought will be very useful to speed up your computer is StartUp Delayer which will help in setting after how much time programs should be loaded after Windows boots. For example, you could set your instant messenger program to load 50 seconds after Windows starts up so that not all the programs try to start at the same time.
Slow Loading Start Menu
If the Start Menu items are loading slowly, which it normally is when everything else it slow, you can open the Registry Editor by typing in the Run menu ‘regedit.exe’ and pressing Enter. Next, go to HKEY_CURRENT_USERControl PanelDesktop. Find "MenuShowDelay", and double click to edit the value. The lower the number specified, the faster the Start Menu will load - the faster your computer will perform.
Slow Right Click Context Menu
Your Right Click menu on your computer is probably loading slow because too many programs have added unwanted entries there. What you need to do is just download this program called Mmm, install it and then modify your context menu to remove unwanted items which will speed it up.
Slow Send To Menu
When the Send To menu loads slowly, you can type ’sendto’ in the Run Dialog, and remove any unwanted items in the Explorer Window that appears. This should add some speed to it and speed up your computer.
Slow loading My Computer Window
If the My Computer Window loads slowly, in the Explorer Window, go to Tools > Folder Options > View. A new window should appear and you want to uncheck ‘Automatically search for network folders and printers” This should speed it up.
Slow loading Add or Remove Programs Applet
This really is one of the most ANNOYING piece of programs present in Windows, it takes ages to load when you have a considerable number of programs installed on your computer. You can either use the all-in-one CCleaner for this purpose, or get MyUninstaller that comes as a speedy replacement for Add or Remove Programs. If you download any of those two programs, you won't really need to go to Add or Remove Programs as it can all be done with CCleaner and MyUninstaller. This should speed up the process.
Slow Defragmentation
The Windows Defragmenter can’t get any slower, can it? You want to have an alternative to the Windows Defragmenter, and Defraggler is just one of the best ones available in the market. It’s free, and works like a charm which can speed up defragmentation manifold.
Slow Ending of Unresponsive Programs
If you’ve clicked on ‘End Task’ if any program is running unresponsive, you might have noticed that the program is not shut down straightaway, rather it takes time. You can change this by going to Run > regedit.exe > HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESystemCurrentControlSetControl and change this value to 1000 which means it will shut it down faster, thus speeding your computer up.
Disable Animations and Appearance Overhauls to maximize performance
If you don't really mind that your Windows isn't very eye catching then this is great for you. Go to System Properties in the Control Panel. Click on ‘Advanced’, then ‘Performance’ and click ‘Adjust for best performance’. This will boost your PC’s performance up a bit - depending on your current settings of course.
Tips:
- Don’t keep installing software. Install a program only if it really serves you a purpose.
- Keep as less programs as possible running on the System Tray. This essentially means reducing the number of programs that start during Windows start up.
- If your computer boots slow, i suggest using Bootvis to speed it up.
[ Source ]
Comcast's BitTorrent Settlement Excludes Pirates
Posted on: January 26, 2010 |
Comcast has finally agreed to compensate its customers for actively preventing them from sharing files using BitTorrent. Everyone that is willing to swear that he or she is not a pirate will receive a total of 16 dollars. Analysts are not impressed. |
Configure Gmail Account on Your N95/N73....
Posted on: January 26, 2010Here is the short tutorial which allows your to configure Gmail Account on N95: (IMP: You must enable POP3 access of Gmail Account. Hint:Look inside Setting and POP forwarding Options on gmail web site)
- Open Messaging Application
- Goto Mail box. It asks you No mailbox defined. Define now? Choose Yes
- Mailbox setup wizard will start. Press start to continue
- Mailbox Type choose POP3, Press Next
- On next screen type your email address xxx@gmail.com (IMP: press the Pencil Key and highlight your email address then press Copy. This will save you typing)
- Press Next
- Enter pop.gmail.com as Incoming mail server, Press Next
- Enter smtp.gmail.com as Outgoing mail server, Press Next
- Access Point, choose Always ask or your preferred one. press next
- In Mailbox name keep gmail press next
- Click Finish
- Click Option and then Settings
- Choose E-mail
- Press on Mailboxes and then on Gmail
- Press on Connection settings
- Press on Incoming e-mail
- Enter Username as xxx@gmail.com (You may Press Pencil and then paste)
- In Password type your password
- Scroll down to security port and choose SSL/TLS
- Press Back Button
- Select Outgoing e-mail, Enter your username and password as described above
- Scroll down to security port and choose SSL/TLS
- Hit Back Button twice
- Press on User settings
- Enter your Name as you want to display and then go back
- Goto Retrieval Settings
- Click on E-mail to retrieve and change it to size limit and then enter 100KB or whatever you like in next screen. Press OK
- Click on Back
- If you have unlimited GPRS connection then goto Automatic retrieval and change it otherwise leave as it is.
- Click back button multiple times so that you are back to main screen.
- Now when you start Messaging Application you will see Gmail Account goto it and retrieve your email.
- You can also send email attach images with it etc. Have fun
Any Question? post them in comments.
Private Tracker Invites On IRC – BitTorrent Sites With IRC Recruitment (Part 1)
Posted on: January 26, 2010It wouldn’t be wrong to say that the easiest way of getting into private BitTorrent trackers is via open signups. However, there’s a growing trend in the BT community which is proving to be increasingly popular – IRC recruitment & invite applications. It works like this: private trackers set up their own official invites channels on IRC (Internet Relay Chat) servers or make invite applications available to the public. Usually after a short interview process ort a questionnaire (in some...
EuReKa Joins HD-Torrents - Signups Open, Awesome-HD Domain Changed
Posted on: January 25, 2010There’s been a lot happening in the BitTorrent community today – EuReka, an internal encoder and a founder of the high definition torrent tracker Awesome-HD, has left AHD to join HD-Torrents, another popular HD tracker. It was a move filled with drama as EuRekA took the Awesome-HD domain along with him, leaving close to 9000 AHD members stranded and not being able to use the tracker. While this definitely is a blow to AHD, we learn that this definitely will not be the end of the tracker. At the...
MobiReader – Best EBook Reader For Symbian S60, Windows Mobile, Java & Others?
Posted on: January 25, 2010I’ve tried using many 3rd party applications for reading PDF, TXT and HTML Ebooks on my Symbian mobile device (trying to view a PDF file with the built in Adobe Reader LE proved to be too painful). However, most of these apps had some feature missing that ruined the whole experience. Luckily, i stumbled across MobiReader (by MobiePocket) which IMHO is the best eBook reader currently available for Symbian powered smartphones (and possibly for other mobile platforms as well). MobiReader...
How To Fix Mass Effect 2 Crashes, Import Savegames, Avoid Freezes & More
Posted on: January 25, 2010Back when Mass Effect 1 was released, it was a busy time for us. The game was filled with bugs (most of these were triggered by the game’s copy protection mechanism, on pirated copies) and we had to post several troubleshooting articles to answer all the questions that were directed by our readers. Thankfully, Mass Effect 2 (ME2) release has been a lot ‘cleaner’. It does not seem to carry an insanely paranoid DRM system and at the same time seems to be very well optimized. I’ve played a few...
Zeroday.Scene.Rules.v2010.1-RULES – Download NFO
Posted on: January 24, 2010It seems a lot of readers around here are interested about the warez scene. Articles in our Scene section have been getting a lot of hits lately and the post we published yesterday was no exception. We quoted the SceneNotice about updated zero day release rules and as some of you had commented, there is already a revised version of the same rule set been released. And another reader had requested for a download link to original NFO file instead of us pasting the entire content (without ASCII...
BzEe.TV – A New Ratio Free TV Tracker
Posted on: January 24, 2010BitTorrent community has many specialized TV torrent trackers including veteran sites such as BitMeTV as well as promising new trackers such as ShareTheRemote. There are however not many ratio free TV trackers around - BzEe.TV is a site that aims to fill this gap. BzEe is a brand new ratioless tracker which indexes international Television series (mostly from United States) and tracks both individual weekly episodes as well as complete season packs. You may have not heard about this site before...
Mininova Traffic Plummets After Going 'Legal'
Posted on: January 24, 2010 |
For two years now Mininova has been the most visited BitTorrent site in the world. After Mininova lost an important court trial, they were forced to remove all user submitted torrents. The result is a huge traffic drop. |
tpsBB – HD Direct Download Forum For NhaNc3 & Other P2P Group Releases
Posted on: January 23, 2010It seems a lot of P2P release groups like to maintain their own online forums these days. This isn’t exactly a new trend though – we’ve seen quite a few similar sites of this caliber which have become successful (two good examples would be HD-UNiT3D and DarkSide_RG). Anyways this post is about tpsBB, another DDL forum run and maintained by non scene encoder group NHanC3. NHanC3 are known for their high definition movie encodes and they seem to be quite a capable bunch. tpsBB indexes download...
ACiD (A-L) Invite Giveaway 02 – Private Tracker With A Great Community
Posted on: January 23, 2010This should be good news for those who are looking forward to get into ACiD (or A-L) - it’s been over 6 months since our last invite giveaway for this tracker and it’s time for another. You may not have heard about A-L before as it does not prefer much publicity – it’s rules prohibit disclosing full tracker name or URL in public. However is not a new tracker by any means – it’s a veteran in the BitTorrent scene and has been online for over 4 years. AL staff have yet again agreed to offer...
Dragon Age Origins Return To Ostagar DLC Leaked Online
Posted on: January 23, 2010Anyone who played Dragon Age : Origins would agree with me that the game is pretty addictive. BioWare created a masterpiece and I don’t say this often (not do I buy a lot of games), it is well worth the money. Anyway DAO was supported by many downloadable content (DLC) packs that included bonus items, additional missions, playable characters and so on. Most of the DLC were free for those who purchased the game. By releasing so many DLC packs for the legitimate game, BioWare definitely wanted to...
Free Calling Softwares For Mobile
Posted on: January 22, 2010Gizmo5
Gizmo5 is ideal for small business voip. They are a very reliable VoIP service provider and provides a reasonably cheap voip rates among the competitors.
Fring – Community Based VoIP
fring is the industry first Symbian S60 mobile VoIP software, unlike others, fring is more of a community based mobile internet service that enables you to access & interact with your social networks on-the-go, make free calls and live chat with all your fring, Skype, MSN Messenger, Google Talk, ICQ, SIP, Twitter, Yahoo! and AIM friends using your handset’s internet connection.
Beyond fring’s social appeal, it also saves money letting you make affordable local and international calls to landline and regular cellular numbers using your SkypeOut/SkypeIn account or almost any internet voice service (SIP) such as SIPNET, EuteliaVoIP, VoIPVoIP and VoIPTalk, even from non-SIP enabled handsets. What’s more, fring does all the work for you, automatically logging you into your favorite WiFi hotspots so you save time and hassle without having to configure your WiFi access points each time.
The only drawback on fring’s VoIP software is it does not have its own network to do VoIP call. It uses other network, such as Skype, Gizmo, thus making it uncompetitive in term of VoIP rates.
[Source]
Vibes.CC – Large Greek BitTorrent Tracker With English Releases
Posted on: January 22, 2010After 850+ posts dedicated to private torrent trackers, on would imagine we have covered most of the torrent sites out there. However, this is far from the truth; new sites are launched every day and we stumble across large, lesser known torrent trackers ever so often. Vibes.CC is another private tracker that has a relatively large user base and a rich torrent index filled with lots of releases. It’s a General/0Day torrent site with movies, music, games, TV shows, application and over 500...
Demonoid Forums Back Online After Downtime
Posted on: January 22, 2010One of the many reasons why Demonoid is considered one of the best BitTorrent trackers is the helpful community of members who use it. And in keeping this community together, Demonoid’s forums (fora.demonoid.com) played a huge role. Although both the site and the BitTorrent tracker came back online after an extended downtime in December 2009, it’s forums continued to remain offline. If you were waiting for fora to return, here’s some really great news. Demonoid’s forums are back up and are...
FOX FILMS: We Should Disconnect File-Sharers Like France
Posted on: January 21, 2010 |
Fox Filmed Entertainment CEO Jim Gianopulos wants a three-strike law, like the one in France, implemented in the US. Independent film makers are hit hard, a three-strike law where repeat-offenders are disconnected from the internet is the only solution. |
Piracy Surcharge Set To Force 40,000 Households Offline
Posted on: January 21, 2010 |
The music industry claims each illegal download constitutes a lost sale. This logic suggests an enormous loss of revenue. In the UK proposed measures to compensate this loss will force ISPs to charge customers 25 pounds or almost 40 dollars extra. |
Zero Day (0Day) Scene Rules For 2010
Posted on: January 21, 2010I’ve seen on several online forums folks talking about how the modern 0day scene is dying. While the current 0day scene may not be as powerful as what it was about 10 years back, it is far from dead. There are plenty of quality groups out there such as CORE (Challenge Of Reverse Engineering), ZWT (Zero Waiting Time), CRD (Crude), etc who still pwn supposedly un-breakable software protection schemes within minutes. However, scene groups follow a strict set of rules and regulations when...
Nokia To Close N-Gage By The End Of Next Year!
Posted on: January 20, 2010
Nokia Oyj will close its battered gaming service N-Gage next year, acknowledging failure in its first major services offering.
Nokia is looking for new revenue from online services as its traditional handset market matures, with games and music being the first focus areas.
Yet the handset maker's mobile gaming push has encountered major challenges, with consumers first shunning its dedicated gaming phones which went on sale in October 2003, accompanied by a major global advertising campaign.
The online gaming service, which opened last year, took over the N-Gage brand and also never moved beyond a niche audience of hard-core gamers.
"We will no longer publish new games for the N-Gage platform," Nokia said on its N-Gage blog, to which a user calling himself Jon replied: "It's a sad day for N-Gage fans."
It said the games from its first major services offering could be purchased until the end of September 2010 and the community site would remain in operation throughout 2010.
"It's a sign of a more realistic approach. It's time to bury the dead and focus on the future," said Tero Kuittinen, analyst at MKM Partners, adding Nokia had great opportunities in other areas, such as location-based services, micro-financing and mobile email.
Nokia's leading position in the cellphone market had attracted all the top mobile game makers -- including Electronic Arts, Gameloft, Glu Mobile and Digital Chocolate -- to create special games for N-Gage.
After closing the N-Gage service, Nokia will continue to sell mobile games at its Ovi Store, a smaller rival to Apple's popular App Store.
[Source]
ShareTheRemote TV Tracker Open Again – Now With More Torrents And New Features
Posted on: January 20, 2010While everyone was chasing after BitMeTV and TVTorrents.Com, ShareTheRemote (STR) grew. This great new TV tracker backed by the crew behind Pass The Popcorn has recorded an impressive growth during its first month since launch. With thousands of new members recruited and hundreds of TV shows indexed, this new entrant to the BitTorrent community is indeed showing some real promise. Thankfully, STR’s admins have not become obsessed with recruiting new members and expanding their torrent index –...
Jambands.fm – Private Tracker For Live Music And Concerts
Posted on: January 20, 2010Over the years two types of private torrent trackers have been reviewed here on FILEnetworks; large general trackers that appeal to a broader audience and smaller niche sites that focus on a specific category if torrents. Jambands.fm is a new private tracker that falls into the latter category. It’s a niche music tracker that specializes in live shows and concerts by bands such as Phish, Greatedul Dead, Furthur, etc. This Gazelle based tracker was open for registration only for a brief period...
MusicThe.Net – Another Ratio Free Music Tracker With Open Signups
Posted on: January 19, 2010Private torrent tracker community seem to have this strange affiliation with names ending with ‘The.Net’. FTN probably started the trend and soon a ton of other sites such as EliteThe.Net, InspireThe.Net, StoreThe.Net and even invitations forums like InviteThe.Net followed course (we’re not saying it’s a bad thing at all – just an interesting observation). Latest tracker to join this club is MusicThe.Net or MTN. MTN is a music torrent tracker specializing in English music albums. It appears the...
UK ISP Calls Bono's Anti-P2P Rant "Outrageous"
Posted on: January 19, 2010 |
UK ISPs are not happy with the latest anti-p2p rant by Bono, frontman of U2. According to Bono digital piracy is of the same magnitude as child pornography and he further claims ISPs are cashing in on this. |
Use Mobile As Microphone Or Speaker Of PC, via Bluetooth Or USB
Posted on: January 19, 2010
No one like to use their microphone and speakers when they talk to their family and friend in Yahoo messenger, Msn Messenger, Skype, Google Talks and so many instant messenger software Now you can make use of you mobile as microphone and speakers to talk with you friends and family believe me it's simple and easy, just follow the step by step guide and you will throw you microphone into bin forever.
You don't have to remain in one place to talk with friends an family if you have USB bluetooth or WIFI router you can remain anywhere in your home and enjoy talking with your friends and save your cost forever.
Here is the step by step guide to make your mobile phone as microphone.
- Download the file from This link and read the following steps.
- In this file you will get one folder (I_LOVE_DVT) and two separate file. One is for PC application and another is for mobile application.
- Install the PC software name as "mobiolaheadset2_wl_s60v3" in PC and install the mobile application name as "headset_s60_v_2_0" into mobile.
- Remember if your don't have Blue tooth or WIFI functions, it will not work. Yeah it works for Cable but what is the difference between a cable and normal Microphone.
- Installed the application in PC as well in mobile now open the folder "I_LOVE_DVT" and in it you will find two files, one is "keymaker" and other is "runme". Copy these two files into the install directory such as "C:Program FilesMobiola Headset for S60" and paste it.
- Now run the "runme" and "keymaker" as well. From "runme" copy the Hardware fingerprint something like "373D-BCC0" into "keymaker's" H/W ID and press generate.
- Now copy the keys and the name from "keymaker" into "runme" and press ok. It show valid. Now run the PC application and check it.
- Than go to control Panel, sound and device. Run the sound and devices settings find the microphones one, select your microphone driver to mobiola and select the speaker driver.
- Check your microphone by going to Volume controls and run any song to check your speakers that you can hear the song in your mobile speaker.
- Enjoy talking with your friends and family and save your cost
RARBG Registrations Open – Huge Semi Private BitTorrent Tracker
Posted on: January 18, 2010We’ve mentioned RARBG in the past but there are a couple of reasons why we’re posting about it again. First, it’s one of the closest alternatives to large trackers such as Zamunda which international users currently have trouble accessing. Second, it’s a huge semi-private BitTorrent tracker that has a lot of content and offers relatively good download speeds compared to other sites in the same league. Contrary to popular belief, RARBG is not a private tracker –it’s a semi private BitTorrent...
Pirate Camming Farce Comes To An End
Posted on: January 18, 2010 |
Samantha Tumpach brought a camera inside a movie theater and used it to record her family singing happy birthday along with a few shots of the movie. By the end of the movie she was arrested and was facing three years jail time for being a movie pirate. |
SceneTorrents BitTorrent Tracker Shuts Down
Posted on: January 18, 2010 |
SceneTorrents (ScT), one of the most respected private BitTorrent sites around, has officially closed its site and tracker. Speculation suggests it may be because their main content provider, the topsite LOOP, was recently raided. |
OiNK Admin Found Not Guilty!
Posted on: January 17, 2010 |
The owner of the private BitTorrent tracker OiNK, Alan Ellis, has been declared not guilty by the jury. It took the jury only 90 minutes to reach an unanimously decision. Ellis has been accused of conspiracy to defraud the music industry. |
InviteThe.Net BitTorrent Invite Forum Open Again
Posted on: January 17, 2010InviteThe.Net (ITN – formerly PTiAccess) is open for registration once again. ITN is usually a closed community and potential new members are usually required to go through an IRC interview if they are to successfully register on site. However, the site has opened registrations for a limited time and all new members have to do in order to gain access to the forums is to make a single post on their “Introductions’ section. Like most other similar sites, ITN is a BitTorrent related forum with...
Find And Preview Actual URL In Shortened Links - ExpandMyURL
Posted on: January 17, 2010Over the past couple of months, URL shortener services such as bit.ly, is.gd and tinyurl recorded some impressive growth. Part of the growth was fuelled by services such as Twitter and with Google (goo.gl) and FaceBook (fb.me) set to enter the competition, this space is only going to get more heated up. There are definitely lots of advantages to using shortened links (save space, track trends, etc) but let’s not forget that scammers and other scum can exploit these to their advantage as well....
Private Tracker Invites For TorrenTiT Members Ahead Of Shut Down
Posted on: January 16, 2010If you haven’t heard, TorrenTiT is shutting down. If it makes things any less painful, it’s not because of legal issues - there were no raids and no one got arrested. However the tracker was hit by internal disputes (which we do not like to discuss in detail here) and it seems TiT will close down for good. While it’s definitely a sad tale for the users of this Gazelle based General/0Day tracker, what’s been amazing is the response to this news by other private trackers - Nearly 15 other private...
IpfilterX – IP Address Blocklist For uTorrent, eMule and PeerGuardian
Posted on: January 16, 2010If you are a file sharer who is worried about security, you probably already use an IPFilter in the hope of blocking prying eyes from seeing your sharing habits. While not 100% effective, IP blocklists can prevent anti p2p companies, government IP ranges, law firms, military organizations and even p2p spammers from getting into your peer list. Perhaps the most popular IP block list that’s around is the one provided by Bluetack internet security solutions. However, there have been complaints of...
MPAA - Yes I'll Take Avatar for $1 Billion
Posted on: January 16, 2010 |
While the MPAA is successfully convincing countries to adopt new copyright laws that restrict consumer rights even more, their revenue is higher than ever. Latest sensation Avatar has generated 1 billion dollars in just 17 days. |
SqN Invites On IRC – Ratio Free Music Tracker
Posted on: January 15, 2010Here’s yet another decent BitTorrent tracker for the music fans among our readers. SqN is an underrated (you may even call it ‘secret’, given their rules against publicity) private tracker that tracks English music albums. Although you don’t see much hype building around this tracker, there’s no denying the fact that SqN has joined the ranks of other successful ratio free music trackers. Not only does it sport a beautiful layout but more importantly it’s torrent index has improved quite a lot...
MPAA Propaganda Hits 60 Minutes
Posted on: January 15, 2010 |
In the CBS News show, 60 minutes, the MPAA is given another chance to spread more lies and propaganda. The only accurate fact in the show is an explanation of how BitTorrent works. |
ScienceHD Is Not Down – Site Moves To A New Domain
Posted on: January 15, 2010Science Fiction and documentary torrent tracker ScienceHD has been having a rocky ride in the past couple of days. Site has been down for the most part due to hosting issues but the good news is that most of these problems appear to be resolved by now. However, Sci-HD’s web interface may still look down for existing members who try to access it from the old URL https://sciencehd.net and its BitTorrent tracker may also appear to be offline. There is no need to panic as the site has moved to a...
GetTheNew – A Release Blog With Google Powered Download Links
Posted on: January 14, 2010Release blogs such as RLSLOG and ZeroSec are popular among online pirates because they announce (via new blog posts) when movies, music, games, applications and other content is leaked online. A regular article on a release blog usually comprises of a brief summary on what the release is about, links to release NFO and most importantly torrent or direct download links so readers may grab a non fake, legit version of the newly announced content. Although many do not know, directly linking to...
What.CD Ratio System Overhauled
Posted on: January 14, 2010Back in last October, the popular music torrent tracker What.CD announced that plans were underway to make some major changes to their ratio system. This was pretty big news for the site’s half a million user base as the announced changes apparently made it easier to maintain a healthy global ratio on this usually ‘difficult to seed’ tracker. However even after a couple of months later, the changes had not been implemented and naturally some users began to feel that the purposed updates were...
TorrentLeech 2010 New Year Invite Giveaway Now On IRC
Posted on: January 14, 2010UPDATE: This giveaway has now concluded. Congrats to those who got in :) If you still aren’t a member of TorrentLeech (TL), here’s a way to kick off 2010 in grand style. TL is right now conducting one of their immensely popular invite giveaways on IRC. If you login to their invites channel, follow instructions on channel topic and pass the very short interview, you will be invited into the tracker by staff themselves. As usual, the giveaway will run only for a limited time so you may want...
Upcoming PC Game Releases For January & February 2010
Posted on: January 13, 2010Since several of our readers have requested it, here’s a short post summarizing notable upcoming PC game releases in the next two months. There hasn’t been a lot of PC game releases over the past couple of months but this will soon change in 2010. Some kick ass titles such as Mass Effect 2, and BioShock 2 and Napolean : Total War are slated for release in the first quarter of 2010 and something tells me it’s going to be awesome :p Given below is a brief summary of several upcoming PC games and...
uTorrent Adds Video Streaming Support
Posted on: January 13, 2010 |
We are living in the Youtube age where videos start playing on demand. BitTorrent Inc. has recognized this trend and has brought on-demand video streaming to uTorrent. You can now watch you video torrents while you're still downloading them. |
Private Trackers Open For Signup In 2010 – AppzUniverse & Pro Audio Torrents
Posted on: January 13, 2010Here we go – our first private tracker open signup update in the year 2010. As opposed to the usual 10-15 trackers featured in our regular collective tracker updates, this post only features two torrent sites – AppzUniverse and Pro Audio Torrents. Reason why we decided to post these right now is that both these trackers are known to open signups only at the beginning of every month. They have been featured on this blog before but in case any of you missed out earlier, here’s another chance to...
IsoHunt Asks Court to Legalize Its Operations
Posted on: January 12, 2010 |
isoHunt has filed a statement of claim with the Canadian Supreme Court as part of a pre-emptive strike against the Canadian Recording Industry Association. isoHunt owner, Gary Fung, is seeking confirmation by the court that torrent index sites are legal. |
MaXxeD – Download Full Football Matches, Highlights, TV Shows & More
Posted on: January 11, 2010After a series of posts about private torrent trackers, here’s a Direct Download Link (DDL) forum for a change. MaXXeD is one of the most popular online forums for all things Football. You can find and download full Football matches (both new and classics), match highlights, TV shows and other related videos (some in high definition formats). In addition to the hugely popular downloads section MaXxed is an excellent place to discuss about a number of Football related topics ranging from in game...
More transparency coming to blog reviews
Posted on: January 10, 2010
Bloggers will come under the watchful eyes of the Federal Trade Commission for the first time, as the agency has finalized new rules governing bloggers and the products they write about. "Consumer-generated media" outlets (e.g., bloggers) will now have to disclose if they are being compensated by a manufacturer, advertiser, or service provider when they review an item. So if a blogger gets a laptop from a manufacturer to review and gets to keep it, he or she will have to make that fact public.
The new guidelines don't tell bloggers how they need to make the disclosure, but they do lay out the penalties: up to $11,000 per violation with the possibility of injunctions to boot. The FTC could also order that consumers be reimbursed in cases where a relationship between blogger and advertiser isn't disclosed and they suffer financial harm because of it.
The FTC began studying the issue in January 2007, and the debate since then has been hot and heavy. Some commenters during the rule-making processes said that there was no need for the government to get involved, arguing that industry self-regulation with occasional FTC enforcement under existing laws was sufficient. There were also fears that the commission would wield a broad regulatory axe in the forest of consumer-generated media.
If you're into gadgets and computer hardware and like to blog about your newest purchases, chances are good that you'll never draw the FTC's attention. Those who buy a product "with his or her own money and praise it on a personal blog or on an electronic message board will not be deemed to be providing an endorsement," read the rules. At the other end of the spectrum, anyone who is directly compensated to write about a product by an advertiser is covered by the new rules.
The new rules take effect on December 1, 2009.
[Source]
HDCity – Another HD BitTorrent Tracker From China Now Open
Posted on: January 09, 2010China certainly hides a lot of HD torrent trackers. We’ve already featured on this blog quite a few well known Chinese trackers (with English content of course) such as HDStar, CHDBits, CCFBits and HDRoad. HDCity is yet another private torrent site which has its roots in the very same country. And guess what? HDCity too is a specialized high definition movie and TV tracker. Like most BitTorrent trackers originating from China, it has a Chinese interface. However, beneath the Chinese interface...
HD-Space v2 – Signups Open
Posted on: January 08, 2010Here’s a private torrent tracker you don’t see talked about very often. HD-Space is a specialized HD tracker that’s silently been growing without much publicity or hype. HD-Space indexes high definition movies, TV shows, documentaries, anime and HD Trailers like most other sites catering to this niche. HDS recently released its first major UI overhaul dubbed ‘HD Space v2’ and the new version seems to be well received by the vast majority of site’s users with a 97% approval rating in an ongoing...
Search Torrents Easily With TorrentFetcher
Posted on: January 07, 2010If you want to make your Torrents search a little bit easier, just go with TorrentFetcher that is a handy utility program. It contains both torrents search engine and the results lists. You can enter a search phrase and start the search for torrents right away. Moreover, you can configure advanced options like the number of results that you want to have or a specified category. This tool will bring up to 1000 search results. Meanwhile, the categories include the usual games, TV shows, Movies, Software and Music. Moreover, the search results will contain the names, size, seeders, peers and date. As the Torrents are color coded, you can see on the very first glance if a torrent is well seeded or not.
Some Important Features:• Search through multiple pages of torrents at once.
• Automatically move downloaded torrents to a specified output directory (good for bittorrent clients that monitor a specific folder, like uTorrent).
• Automatically launch downloaded torrents.
• Know which torrent files you already have in your downloaded folder through automatic highlighting.
• Results highlighting lets you know if a torrent is well or poorly seeded or if it has negative comments left about it.
• Automatic detection and removal of “denis stalker” trackers using the MonoTorrent library.
• Minimize-to-tray option to keep the utility handy at all times.
• This download is freeware. All features of this program are available for all to use freely.
Download
[Source]
RevolutionTT – Signups Open, Wait Times Off, IRC Bonus On
Posted on: January 06, 2010UPDATE: There was an issue with the signup link. Please use the updated link posted at the end of article. First of all let us wish all our readers, partners and friends a Merry Christmas! Now for the good news – RevolutionTT (aka RevTT) is finally open for signup. We’ve been getting a sh1tload of invite requests for this tracker recently (especially after we posted the article “RevolutionTT – Improvements and Expansions”) and for everyone who wanted to get into this awesome torrent...
uTorrent 2.0 To Elimininate The Need For ISP Throttling
Posted on: January 05, 2010 |
The new and improved BitTorrent protocol developed by uTorrent called uTP, aims to solve the problem of traffic congestion. Traffic congestion has been the main reason why ISPs have been throttling BitTorrent traffic. |
InviteNation (I-N) and BTRealm – BitTorrent Tracker Invite Forums Now Open
Posted on: January 04, 2010There’s been a lot of BitTorrent invite forums popping up lately. In addition to well established sites such as FileSharingTalk, The Pirate Society, TrackeReactor, ETiV, etc, a number of newer sites too have spawned thanks to the ever increasing popularity of BitTorrent. Here’s a little head’s up on two such forums that are currently open for registrations; InviteNation and BTRealm. InviteNation has been around for some time (as a closed registration forum for the most part) and BTRealm is a...
RmvBusterS Tracker – Download 300MB RMVB Movies & TV Shows
Posted on: January 03, 2010Just a quick update on RmvBusters – the site is now open for signup and you do not need an invitation code to create an account. RmvBusters is a very specialized movie and TV tracker with lots of re-encoded Polish and English releases (in fact, all torrents on this site are exclusive releases you probably won’t find anywhere else). They have lots of RMVB (RealMedia Variable Bitrate) and x264 encoded rips that usually have lesser file sizes than the standard of 700MB per CD, etc (usually...
Free anti-virus from Microsoft is now available for download
Posted on: January 02, 2010
I’ve tried out the free anti-virus app and I must say that I’m pretty impressed with Security Essentials. It’s able to tell me whether my computer is safe from any potential threats that might affect the system in just a few clicks. Besides that, it offers a comprehensive malware protection to guard against dangerous malware. Security Essentials runs quietly and efficiently in the background so that users are free to use their Windows-based PC the way you want—without interruptions or long computer wait times.
Even if you already have any anti-virus software on your computer, maybe you can give it a try and see whether it works much better than premium ones which cost a bomb. The software runs on Windows XP, Vista and 7 and requires a minimum of 140 MB of available hard disk space.
Download[Source]
The Game Scene Charts (TGSC) : Issue 37 - November 2009
Posted on: January 01, 2010Finally, we’ve managed to post the latest issue of TGSC without a massive delay. Issue #37 of Game Scene Charts was pre’d on the 27th Of December and this issue covers game ISO/DOX scene group rankings for the month of November 2009. For those of you who are unfamiliar with TGSC, it’s coded magazine that rates and ranks release groups from the warez scene. Rankings are primarily based on the number of cracked PC game releases made available by a group, in a given month. TGSC comes with its own...
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