Bitcoin Forum

Apparently, the US Justice Department has arrested four founders of a website popular with Anonymous, and charged them with conspiricy to commit copyright infringment.  Anonymous has responded with the largest DOS attack in years, if not ever. 

Never disturb a sleeping dragon.

FBI.gov just went down recently it looks like.

I enjoyed this quote.

"We are having website problems, but we're not sure what it's from," a DOJ spokeswoman told CNNMoney.
http://money.cnn.com/2012/01/19/technology/megaupload_shutdown/

When the site comes back online, check out www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/n-dex

http://torrentfreak.com/images/megagun.jpg

Goddamn, Kim Dotcom is awesome...

They should start ddosing and never stop

This will be a typical mafia-type prosecution under RICO. When they are eventually extradited, they will pound the smallest fish to give testimony against the other 3 to put the final nail in the coffin. Not that they need it really. The evidence is pretty substancial inclusive of in-house emails between management basically allowing, suggesting, and advocating piracy, intentional mechanisms to keep pirated content while masking their deletion by multiple file identifiers going to the same files which were specifically designed to make content owners think they were being deleted when they were not, and a complex financial system for ill-gotten gain from it all.

For being so smart, these individuals were very stupid and lacked any common sense. They knew what they were doing was illegal and to remain in any country that had extradition treaties was simply idiotic.

They deserve the decades of prison time they will get and the loss of eveything they hold dear for their stupidity.

whatever, sharing culture is not and will not ever be an illegal activity, regarding all the efforts put to make us think otherwise. Culture is not an industry, the artists will have to cut the middle-man to be able to live off their work. Bitcoin is here...

You seem to be confused. Do you drive a Rolls Phantom?

It's about property rights. Specifically, theft of someone elses property they made investments in creating - we call that a business enterprise for profit - makes no nevermind if its wood chairs, music, cell phones, movies, computers, software, or widgets. Pretty simple really. The "culture sharing" comment is an inept justification of simple theft to deprive the owner thereof. They were middle persons knowingly facilitating and enabling it. The only thing that makes it "cultural" is a consumers interest in using and enjoying it. Its still someone elses protected property. Many consider their clothing and cars as cultural, so they should be free... right?

Be careful what you wish for, else I might consider your watch, ring, house, and wallet as cultural.



Please explain. I have no idea what you mean. Confused about what ?

I am saying that you are some broke chump criticizing a fucking baller who rose to the top by providing a service that people want and stealing nothing.

Let me pose a question for you: If I take a Montsanto sunflower seed, grow it, harvest the seeds and plant ten of them the next year, am I stealing from Montsanto?

meh, patents on seeds, this is going overboard

Information isn't property.  Even the framers of the US Constitution recognized this, by refusing to enshrine copyright as a eternal right.  If it was a property, they wouldn't have been opposed to perpetual copyrights; for that matter, they probably wouldn't have felt a need to mention copyrights as all in the US Constitution, if they regarded it as a form of personal property.

Along these lines. Does anyone think that legislators who pass bills allowing a creators copyright to eventually expire are endorsing theft? Does it become right to steal the creators work just because it loses legal protection? Would stealing a car become right if 300 old men said so? Does anyone here actively avoid using public domain works without compensating the creator?

I've got me a huge collection of patented GM seeds in my freezer. Sometimes, you gotta pilfer from the botany lab. Hopefully I don't grow any extra limbs...

I am criticizing their lack of common sense compared to their business acumen... not their financial "success" compared to my own. If you can really call it success. I am quite happy being a middle class businessman, husband, father, and friend to those around me. If it would mean the rest of my life in prison away from my wife, my kids, and my family and friends, I certainly would decline participation in activities that do not promote the causes of true freedom and liberty... even those with possibilities of wealth beyond comprehension to be taken away by those prosecuting me. Simply put, there is no jealousy as your post insinuates. As to the "success" term you used... many would disagree with that label for: sitting in a prison cell awaiting extradition to a country that most likely will force you to forfeit all your locatable money and property, and imprisoning you for the rest of your life when convicted.

They knew they were breaking laws, but did little to realistically protect themselves. They were not ballers flagrantly and publicly thumbing their noses at an unjust opressive system out of some altruistic need to spread awareness for change. They did it for the money. Got greedy. Were actually scared of the authorities. And got caught because of their greed. They went to great lengths to hide and protect their true natures as pirates and thieves within the platform they created, but the technology they used came back to bite them. If you read the email evidence (their own words) you would realise this. Then they stayed in countries with extradition treaties. Would prudence not require they relocate to countries with a more favorable extradition process, or none at all. I mean really, there are approx 84 countries with either no treaties or treaties specifically exempt from extradition with the United States and other western industrialized nations.

In the end, Kim was hiding like a scared rat in a panic room in his mansion, crying and sniveling, with a shotgun at his side he was to much of a coward to use to either; go out like a Baller/Gansta taking as many of "the man" with him on his way, or to kill himself ... unlike the Gansta or Baller many thought him to be.

As to monsanto, you certainly would be breaking the law because they have patented their own "roundup-ready" seed products. They created them and they own them. To get them you must contract with monsanto to get them and the roundup fertilizer, or steal them. It's a system. Why anyone would want a monsanto seed without the fertilizer in unknown. Its kind of a rediculous proposition really.  What would not be illegal is for you to buy your own non-monsanto seeds and live a full happy life farming with them. You can certainly obtain sunflower seeds that are not patented and genetically altered by monsanto, so I find the parallel you are trying to draw irrelevent. Now, if there ever comes a day when Monsanto, Cargill, Archer Daniels Midland, or any other agricultural conglomerate tried to patent a complete naturally-occurring plant species, then we have problems (like all sunflowers, etc). That said, agricultural conglomerates abuse the legal system in ways I do not think is right. They have taken to court farmers near customers of theirs whos plants have been cross polinated/contaminated by Monsanto products, genetically altering the next generation which they claim ownership of, subsiquently claiming basically theft. This has put many out of business because of the financial costs of lawsuits. This needs to stop and the agricultural conglomerates need to compensate them. Polination can not be controlled. Its part of the natural process and the cost of doing business if you are an agri-business selling modified patented seeds.



To say "information isnt property", means you think there should be absolutely no copyrights, trademarks, or patents at all on anything.

All products and services, from the beginning of time, are information... knowledge.

It's saying all the stuff we enjoy has always existed in some form, thus it should be free to everyone regardless of the considerable research and development time, learning, and costs associated with them. To me this is no different than the socialists who want to throw everyones shit in a pile, by force, to share.

Its saying someone elses hard work means nothing because its all iinformation and knowledge based, because its derived from one basic principle. The increased awareness and knowledge of the world around us leading to our ability to manipulate the world around us into products and services we find useful.

To me, its as basic as fruit from the tree. If someone creates something society finds useful by manipulating the earths resources through discovered and applied knowledge, they and all their heirs should forever be compensated and remembered for what they have provided society, unless they choose to give it freely and agree to no compensation. Anything less than that means they, and their heirs, are providing it against their will, by force, which is tyrannical and oppressive slavery.

That's exactly his position.  We discussed it in a thread about intellectual property.  They really do feel entitled to take the product of your work without your consent.

I feel entitled to remain free from coercion.  To advocate the position that information is property, is to engage the collective forces of governments & society to compel those who do not agree with you to comply with your ideology.  I advocate only for the natural default conditions whenever force isn't used against the peaceful.

Me too.  The difference is you feel entitled to my property. 

Anyway, its off topic to this thread so I let you have the last word.

any news on this?

I am not talking about roundup-ready crops, and the fertilizers and soil conditioners to be used in conjunction with RR have nothing to do with it. They hold thousands upon thousands of patents on plants that have never been cultivated outside a lab. Maybe I just want one that produces a higher concentration of oil per kernel than the regular old Burpee seed packets. I am talking about patented genetics...genetics that some may know as merely a store of information. You say that there are other sunflowers...yeah, there are over 10,000 Asteracea species, but I am not talking about them. I am talking about one.

Say I never take the seed...say I drop a cutting into my tissue culture hood and form my own plants from a small scraping. I do it regularly as a hobby. If I culture it, flower it, and harvest the fruit, how in the fuck can they still own it? Stealing involves something being taken, and not being available to the original owner anymore. Culturing, breeding, or copying, if you please, are not theft and cause no monetary loss.

If I build the exact same car as Ford, spending billions of dollars to manufacture my parts to their specs, did I commit grand theft auto? Cause I am pretty sure that is an implication of your stance...

 

I believe it would boil down to where you got the original cutting.. if you stole it form someone elses property, if it were given to you or yyou were allowed to take it, and if they had the right to give it to you or let you take it to begin with. If someone changes the genetic code of a naturally occurring plant, then patent that, its theirs. They did the work. They invested in the research and development. Its no different than someone taking the earths naturally occurring resources and manipulating them into the latest bleeding-edge "widget". If you use their patented method or product, you pay a royalty fee or invest in research and development and make your own. Making your own does not include stealing off someone else who invested time, money, and resources in my opinion.

So by your logic, absolutely ANY plant that I allow to reproduce sexually is a unique creation that I did the work on, and as such is my property and anyone who wants to grow my varietal should pay?

I think you don't understand the nature of genetic manipulation and plant breeding.

No. That is not my logic at all.

You simply growing a plant does not alter the genetic code in any meaningful, intentional, or specific way. Yes, of course it is unique, as is all genetic code of every living plant and animal, however the "alteration" that occurs in your example is by natural mechanisms/processes beyond any control... evolution, if you will.

My logic is that if the genetic code is intentionally altered to create a unique breed/variety that intentionally and materially alters any specific characteristics of that plant, such as yield, product quality, taste/flavor, longevity, enviromental survivability, resistances, etc, would be patentable and property of the developer, if they so choose.

You still don't understand. People could do the same thing in a basement lab. Genetic modification is very easy in plants, not even requiring very expensive or serious lab equipment, and while you need to weed through a lot of phenotypes, you will get that patented Montsanto seed eventually.

PS-Selective breeding is intentional manipulation of specific characteristics of the plant. Gregor Mendel. Google that shit.

Is it wrong that I do think this is theft? Honda definately has the capability to build a Ford, and I certainly think if they do obtain the blueprints and make one that they have stolen.

You are right.  But some people think that they are entitled to take Ford's investment in research and development and profit from it themselves.  Its a small minority - most of us know its theft.

I am not talking about a huge corporation mass-producing an object, I am talking about people and fair use. If I spend vastly more time and effort to build my own version and I am not trying to profit off it, even if it turns out exactly the same, how is that stealing?

In plant genetics especially, there are a lot of different ways to elicit a mutation you are looking for. If I take a different road to the same result, somehow I am stealing from the patent holder. Fuck that noise.

There is no such thing as "Fair Use" for patents. It simply does not exist in the patent system. Mostly because patents deal more with the physical implementation of ideas instead of the expression of ideas. Patents bring thought to reality through a process, all of which is protected by the patent.

Even for copyrights, this would not come under fair use because you would be effectively replicating it in its entirety, basically performing an identical performance as the original, in its entirety, which you have no right to do without permission because the basis for your new plant is the original that is protected.

That said, Utility Patents exist for significant improvement upon an original patent, and you certainly have the right to improve upon the original, so long as your process is unique, novel, not a basic deviation of whats been done before, and most importantly, you arent infringing on the original patent its based on. In other words, its an actual improvement of the original that would be of some substancial benefit the original did not provide.

Huge corporation research lab or musty old basement is not relevent. Bill Gates started in the garage.

So I take it you are ok with those countless patents for processes and machines that current technology cannot achieve?

I am amazed that you don't see a difference between personal use and the manufacturing and sale of an item. You really buy into the current state of patent and copyright law? I am all for allowing those who came up with an idea to profit off it, but I do not think it should be a crime for someone to repeat their experiment for their own use. That's some christianity in the dark ages shit right there.

Indeed, this has gone way off topic.  I'll admit that I've been party to it, but it has to stop.  I'll be forced to split the thread if there is any more of it, and that involves a great deal of work on my part.

I never said I was against personal use. What I said was that fair use does not exist in patent law and what you proposed doing was illegal.

Will Monsanto visit your home ?

Doubtful.

Is it legal ?

No.

Do I care about people breaking statute law that flies directly in the face of common law?

Not if they do not cause someone else harm and honor their commercial agreements, but we dont live in that common law simple world that once existed.

I don't know...anonymous responds to crackdown on piracy, we get into intellectual property law...seems relevant enough for you to shirk that job.

I'm pretty sure anyone can build anything for their own personal use.  Patent laws only apply when you start selling things that utilize patented technologies.

I can cling to that one.

EDIT:  Yes there is such a thing as "fair use" in patent law, although it's not called that.  Anyone or any company can produce another company's patented products for their "own use" (usually market research) so long as they don't actually sell those products or anything substantially similar until the patent expires.  Drug manufactures that produce generics depend upon this to exist, so that they can get the products to market the very same day that the patent expires.  The island nation of Malta has turned this into an artform.

US patent law is a bit more strict than most other regions, in that it forbids anyone from making, using or selling the invention, even when the use is personal. That said, the likelihood of a patent holder bringing suit against singular personal use is rare, if not unheard of, simply for the costs of the suit even if they did find out about the infringement, whch is unlikely. I believe most european countries allow for personal use though. Best to check with your country/region though if you are worried about it.

http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/mpep/consolidated_laws.pdf
http://www.iusmentis.com/patents/crashcourse/rights/