Harvard Prof: Megaupload-Style Cases Will Kill Prosecuted Companies

Jan. 26 (Bloomberg Law) -- Last week was a busy one in digital intellectual
property. In the wake of a day of online protest by technology companies and
individuals opposing the proposed federal Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the PROTECT IP Act (PIPA), the Obama Administration pulled its support for the measures. A day later, federal prosecutors unsealed an indictment against senior officials at Megaupload, one of the Internet's largest file-sharing sites. The officials were arrested in New Zealand and millions of dollars in assets were seized. Bloomberg Law's Lee Pacchia talks with Yochai Benkler, Faculty Co-Director of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University, about copyright law in the wake of the developments.

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• SOPA
• PIPA
• Megaupload
• Yochai Benkler
• Berkman Center
• Harvard
• Bloomberg Law
• Lee Pacchia
• DMCA
• copyright
• Stop Online Piracy Act
• PROTECT IP Act

[thompsoon3]

@endthedisease Only videos with less views look up any songs lyrics and videos that have like 20 odd million views are still up and they weren't uploaded by the recorded companies it's just because the music is almost like it's being advertised on youtube if they took the video down and put up a legal video they would loose money, The companies don't give a shit about the music only the money

[endthedisease]

@thompsoon3 you'd be surprised at how many of those accounts are run through the music industry even though they have normal sounding names.

[Blade025]

I can understand both sides...but megaupload WAS a site used to illegally distribute movies..i mean let's face it..if someone came into our mansion and started robbing our shit..just because we didn't need that certain object and can easily afford another one doesn't mean that it's ok for the robber to do it...the fact that the creators made millions of dollars over this is retarded...but i can see that they are trying to restrict what we can do on the internet..which sucks

[darkblood626]

people like to mail each other pirated DVDS better shoot postman pat size his red van, vivisect his cat and burn his sack full of letters.

[Robsshot]

Piracy isn't something bad - it's our system that makes it bad.

We have to change our system not our piracy. Art should be free and not been done for money. Furthermore there are other businessmodels for distributing free music (I can post an example) and still paying the artists like this one probably was intended to be.

[AlienatedStud]

The importence of how this reflects the justice system means that it will cease to serve the public and raise to those enclosed within the corporate sheild can and will have the last say in ANYTHING. It's been corrupted for a long time but now more than ever are we seeing living prove that our beloved justice system is on life support. It is time to prove what freedom really is because right now, we have lost sight of what that means.

[Bid2Chance]

"If I like you, you stay... if I don't like you, you go away" The rest are just excuses to try avoiding people from admitting it.

[thenypricks]

Lee's cranking some great interviews out! Keep em coming! How about one on ACTA???

[sunnylondon]

@tixmastr LOL

[vRozenSch00n]

I agree that we have to stop Internet piracy, but I oppose SOPA and PIPA as they enable a single indictment to shutdown a competitor's business.

The fact that the FBI had successfully closed MU without SOPA and PIPA, triggered a simple question, is the FBI going to go back to the 60's where many Afro-American got arrested and prosecuted without any trial just because they are protesting and they are black?

Ironically the current US President is an Afro-American.

[nothinisworthit]

Sigh... fking USA, they think they own the fking net wow i'm fking pissed at what they did

[ikills18]

I'll kick the dislike person's ass!