Filesonic Removes Ability To Share Files 412
Ihmhi writes "In the wake of the Megaupload takedown, Filesonic has elected to take preventative measures against a similar fate. The front page and all files now carry the following message: 'All sharing functionality on FileSonic is now disabled. Our service can only be used to upload and retrieve files that you have uploaded personally.' Whether or not this will actually deter the U.S. government from taking action remains to be seen."
Screw Paying Customers (Score:4, Interesting)
Obvious (Score:1, Interesting)
Why would anyone ever have to "share" backup files with anyone else.
I predict, within a week filestube and the like will be utterly useless and this facade (of legal file sharing)will be completely stopped just like Napster was.
If these sites can be shut down with lawsuits now, why do we need SOPA and PIPA?
Re:Obvious (Score:5, Interesting)
Because the owners of these sites are only punishable under US law so long as they're doing business here and they are in a country that extradites to the US. The moment someone sets up an operation like this in a US-unfriendly country (and makes absolutely sure not to conduct any business in the US), there will be no way for the US to shut them down by going after the owners.
Thus SOPA. You can't shut the site down, but if you can prevent them from engaging in transactions with US residents, you've effectively achieved the same thing.
Re:Obvious (Score:5, Interesting)
We don't need SOPA and PIPA as currently written, but we need something.
Do we? [forbes.com]
Local DC++ hubs, magnet and torrent trackers (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Thigs swinging back to Bittorrent and P2P? (Score:3, Interesting)
I personally try and not even consume that which comes from Hollywood, Television or music I can't get off the radio anymore. The Internet just is so great without main stream media that I don't need it. I actually kinda dislike mainstream media because they try and change policy with government to destroy the Internet.
A message from America... (Score:5, Interesting)
...to the rest of the world: we don't want your business. We don't want any tech companies to set up here. We're going to make this the most hostile nation to internet and technology start ups by bullying anyone who dares defy our notion of imaginary property.
Re:Obvious (Score:5, Interesting)
If this type of service was only meant for personal backups and not illegal file sharing, this would have been the standard in the first place.
Why would anyone ever have to "share" backup files with anyone else.
You're making a strawman argument. No where does it say on that site that it's for making backups.
I assume they're only making the files available to the original uploaders (so that no one can come and later claim that they've lost important files because of them). You know how people are. If gmail were to suddenly shut down tomorrow and allow no one to retrieve anything from their account. 100% of all gmail users would claim that they had lost irreplaceable files and data on it (even if they hadn't).
...and this facade (of legal file sharing) will be completely stopped...
Sure, the facade of illegal file sharing may shut down, but at the cost of the legal file sharing as well. I don't know about you, but for me if everyone of those filesharing sites shuts down, that means I'm relegated to using gmail for sharing files (and that usually means a limit of 5 MB to 25 MB depending on who I'm emailing the attachment to). Either that, or I can use meetup.com site which has a limit of 10 MB (plus I think they manually inspects each upload, even for paid customers, so that means there is a delay there as well before anything actually shows up).
If these sites can be shut down with lawsuits now, why do we need SOPA and PIPA?
Like I said, I hope this doesn't shut down all file-sharing web sites, which would make my life difficult, but I think that was the original point of SOPA and PIPA, and that was to eventually shut down without due process any and all user file-sharing web sites that are easy to use (no matter what collateral damage this would create on the legitimate and legal usage that goes on there).
Re:Not only that... (Score:5, Interesting)
The concept of liberty is so 1790s.
Re:Correction for the title. (Score:5, Interesting)
>Filesonic becomes useless.
Internet within US jurisdiction becomes a little more useless.
FTFY
You know that piracy isn't bothered by what the US does to it's own Internet businesses, right?
Re:next up: pastebin, scribd, youtube, tubestack (Score:4, Interesting)
Youtube also has checks in place to figure out whether the soundtrack matches a copyrighted one. Of course, it's relatively easy to fool (change tone a bit or alter the soundtrack just a tiny fraction), but unaltered songs get automatically silenced. I know because I tried uploading a World of Tanks Clan Parade video I made which had "Diesel Power" by Prodigy as soundtrack. As soon as the upload finished, I received a notification that the soundtrack was copyrighted and bang, movie with no sound.
Interestingly, the same algorythm they use made me stop uploading Audiosurf captures; Audiosurf is a game allowing you to "race" a track uniquely generated from a song you choose. After ending up with a few nice captures which were muted, I said screw it and stopped.
Another correction for the title (Score:2, Interesting)
RIA, MPAA, and related vicious companies have won. They've created fear that they can do whatever they want without any problem WORLDWIDE.
Does anyone know how to kill them?
Re:Thigs swinging back to Bittorrent and P2P? (Score:5, Interesting)
Seems to me that over the last 10yrs or so the MAFIAA have been very successfully in their campaign to convince people (including way too many slashdotters), that downloading is illegal. From a moral POV, I would really like to see the authorities take them to task over what amounts to a seriously fraudulent advertising campaign. A just punishment would be to fine them twice what they spent on the campaign and give it to a court appointed executor to spend on correcting the misinformation....one can dream, right?
Re:Correction for the title. (Score:5, Interesting)
I wanted to also point out that uploaded.to [uploaded.to] pretty much completely blocked the United States. Just my luck, I find out a half-hour after I submit the story.
The reaction of non-Americans (on Reddit [reddit.com], at least) seems to be "Ha, now you have to deal with the same shit we deal with from the BBC, Netflix, etc.".
Man, wouldn't it be just awesome if loads of websites in other countries blocked us? -.-
Re:Thigs swinging back to Bittorrent and P2P? (Score:5, Interesting)
Some time ago I contacted the RIAA to get permission to play music in public in a specific setting. I got sent off on a 6 week long wild goose chase with no-one able to tell me how to get permission and how much it would cost. The bears repeating: no one at RIAA or any of the labels could tell me how to get permission to play music in my setting.
What this means is that in spite of all their noise making, the *IAA is not set up to let people do what they want; they still want to control not only the distribution but also the who, when, and where. They just tell you that if you don't have permission, you can't play. But they don't have a mechanism, at any price, to let you play when and where you want.
Re:Correction for the title. (Score:3, Interesting)
Man, wouldn't it be just awesome if loads of websites in other countries blocked us? -.-
This is actually fairly likely. File hosters, and plenty of other sites targetable by inane legislations like SOPA/PIPA, are likely at some point to figure out that it costs them less to give up the US market entirely than to fight its legal system and possibly risk forced shutdown. I think Uploaded.to is just one of a long series of sites that'll do that.
This could go well, though. For starters, seeing the US shut out of increasingly large parts of the internet could serve as a warning for other countries attempting similar stupidity. And then, as more and more of the Internet is precluded to them, perhaps the US will start seeing the error in their ways and come back to sanity.
And in the meantime, those of us who live in more civilized countries won't have to endure rules that a government entirely owned by megacorps forces upon those that aren't.