An Inside Look at Piracy

[effowe]

I just read this from Slashdot. It's called The Shadow Internet. It's very interesting and offers insights into how software, and mostly movies find their way to the Internet. Check it out for a good read.

effowe

 

[biostud]

Good read :thumbsup:

 

[globalcitizen]

Quite an interesting read. Never quite realised piracy was this organized.

 

[StevenYoo]

very interesting!

 

[HardcoreRobot]

cool

 

[KoolDrew]

Originally posted by: biostud
Good read :thumbsup:

 

[Robor]

A real good read. Thanks effowe!

I didn't catch a number in this story but I believe the alleged money "lost" by the RIAA & MPAA is extremely exagerated. Just because a movie is downloaded once does not mean the person who downloaded it would've purchased it had it not been available for download. I've downloaded music and movies and if they are good I'll pickup the DVD/CD when it's released - if they suck I will not.

A good example is the latest A Perfect Circle CD of covers, eMOTIVe. I'm a Tool/A Perfect Circle fan. I own all of Tool's official CD's and the first 2 APC CD's. My friend gave me a rip of his eMOTIVe CD and I listed through it. IMO it is absolutely awful. Know where it is today? The garbage.

Did I steal? I guess so but had I paid $12 or whatever for that awful CD I would've had no recourse. If I buy a meal out and it sucks I can send it back. If I buy a piece of electronics and it doesn't perform well I can return or exchange it for something else. Where's the protection for the consumer when it comes to bad music or movies? There is none and until that changes I will usually demo a CD, movie, and game before I buy it.

 

[mugs]

I think it's funny how they refer to it as the "piracy scene." It amazes me that people would put so much effort into something like this. They take pride in being the first pirate on the block to offer a title - I don't think the end users really care where it comes from or hold these people in high regard. They're not doing something great and noble like they'd like to believe.

 

[dighn]

it's really interesting how these people are so organized and dedicated to piracy. mixed feelings here.

 

[KLin]

Originally posted by: mugs
I think it's funny how they refer to it as the "piracy scene." It amazes me that people would put so much effort into something like this. They take pride in being the first pirate on the block to offer a title - I don't think the end users really care where it comes from or hold these people in high regard. They're not doing something great and noble like they'd like to believe.

their peers hold each other in high regard though. I doubt they care what downloading users think.

 

[n7]

It's a pretty fascinating scene (not condoning it, just saying it is interesting).

A buddy of mine used to be a courier, & due to that, he still has hookups with those up there, & tends to get stuff the instant it's released.

He's got some pretty interesting stories about his courier days

 

[mugs]

Originally posted by: KLin

their peers hold each other in high regard though. I doubt they care what downloading users think.

Seems like a pretty dumb thing to be proud of is what I'm getting at. But it seems like they're mostly high school kids, so whatever floats their boat.

 

[flawlssdistortn]

They consider themselves modern day digital robin hoods. Pirating movies for some people is comparable to the rush teenage girls get when they shoplift.

 

[RealityTime]

I can remember being 15 years old around the time I my parents bought me my first computer (IBM XT 8Mhz... $3500!!!) At the time the best modem on the market was the USRobotics 16.8 Dual Standard HST.. as in 14.4 v32 and 16.8 HST was their proprietary protocol. It was I think about $800 canadian for the modem. I used to courier for the piracy group called razor 1911, used to use hacked pbxs to make the long distance calls etc. It was exactly that, sort of a rush at being in involved in this network. Basicly rather silly, but when you are young its a blast.

 

[Nothinman]

Quite an interesting read. Never quite realised piracy was this organized.

It's hard to believe it could be any other way, how else would things get released as quickly and with as high quality as they do? Have you ever watched a Centropy movie release? Some of them are close to DVD quality.

They consider themselves modern day digital robin hoods. Pirating movies for some people is comparable to the rush teenage girls get when they shoplift.

It's not about anything like robin hood it's about being able to watch a movie, listen to a CD, etc weeks or even months before it hits stores and to keep their access they need to transfer other media around.

 

[Jassi]

I wonder if they talk like pirates while passing files around.

 

[mugs]

Originally posted by: Jassi
I wonder if they talk like pirates while passing files around.

I think they talk like 1337 h4x0rz

 

[BW86]

good read

 

[EngenZerO]

Originally posted by: mugs

Originally posted by: Jassi
I wonder if they talk like pirates while passing files around.

I think they talk like 1337 h4x0rz

not really

 

[naruto1988]

yep, it's that organized. about 3/4 of the stuff released online is good, but the rest is by a random person or a crappy group. they forgot to mention some groups will clean up after other groups, which i find hilarious. a group will release the another group's bad release w/ 'proper' or 'fixed' in the file name and give a text file stating what the error was.

 

[bamacre]

But the Feds are getting smarter. Last spring, the FBI and US Department of Justice launched a series of raids codenamed Fastlink. Working with cops in Sweden, the Netherlands, and eight other countries, the operation seized more than 200 computers. One confiscated server alone contained 65,000 pirated titles.

65,000? Wow, that's a lot of TB's of hard drive space. Roughly 50 to 70 TB's, I imagine.

 

[mugs]

Originally posted by: EngenZerO

Originally posted by: mugs

Originally posted by: Jassi
I wonder if they talk like pirates while passing files around.

I think they talk like 1337 h4x0rz

not really

I was being sarcastic. :roll: Read the post I was replying to, did you think he was serious too?