UK Police and PRS Shut Down Karaoke Torrent Site 75
An anonymous reader writes with this news from Torrent Freak, from which he quotes: The City of London's Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit and copyright and royalty group PRS for Music have teamed up for what appears to be a first-of-its-kind action. Arresting a 46-year-old man, this week police shut down one of the Internet's few karaoke-focused BitTorrent trackers. While at some stages wildly popular in the East, to most in the West a night at a karaoke bar is probably more closely associated with too many beers and individuals belting out classics wearing the aural equivalent of beer goggles. The pastime is considered by some as a bit of a joke but karaoke is big business. According to the people behind the web-based Playstation software SingOn, the global karaoke market could be worth as much as $10 billion.
Thank God Scotland yard (Score:4, Insightful)
takes agents off of less important subjects like preventing the next bus bombing to arrest despicable criminals who share unlicensed lyrics!
Re:Thank God Scotland yard (Score:5, Informative)
Two, some forms of IP crime are used to fund terrorism.
Do you really believe that there is a single person who reads this site who is dumb enough to believe that? Even one?
Re: Thank God Scotland yard (Score:4, Interesting)
Since you stupid nerds believe your laughable "skills" may avail you against government/corporate surveillance, I'd say yes.
Funny how that same government is busy trying to hire those nerds and their "laughable" skills.
You know, because we apparently suck so bad, and government of course must have the most skilled and elite at their disposal. After all, their security rating year after year is A-plus. Top notch work indeed, keeping all those surveillance tactics a secret too. Oh, and so impressive how they've managed to keep our Rights intact as well while doing all of this. I mean, nothing they do would be considered illegal, now would it? Because that would be wrong, and we nerds might get the idea that breaking the law is somehow the right thing to do.
It doesn't take skills to fight government/corporate surveillance. It merely takes someone in charge with a fucking backbone to call out the lawbreakers, and do something about it to enforce the laws we have today.
Re: Thank God Scotland yard (Score:1)
His name is "anonymous coward". And he posts here a lot.
Re:Thank God Scotland yard (Score:5, Funny)
Two, some forms of IP crime are used to fund terrorism.
Do you really believe that there is a single person who reads this site who is dumb enough to believe that? Even one?
Don't be so grumpy, he has a point. You have clearly never heard a drunk Japanes tourist singing Elvis Presley songs at the top of his voice. If you had you'd know that for all intents and purposes Karaoke is indeed a form of terrorism.
Re: (Score:2)
"some forms of IP crime are used to fund terrorism" is actually so loosely stated that it may well be true. Think about it for over a half-second. (Mind you saying that "some forms" *are* used that way would require proof.) Note that "some forms" includes running an illegal gambling operation...and the quesiton arises "illegal for who and in which country".
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
NO IP crime is not used to fund terrorism. That is just complete BS that the MPAA came up with to have politicians say to help get attention. It was also quickly dropped once someone asked for real numbers. There are no huge operations even in china or india where no IP is safe. In some countries like Russia, it is organized but only in the sense everyone pays for protection there. In general it is just some guy making some quick bucks and that is IF he is selling copies on the street. And he likely t
Re:Thank God Scotland yard (Score:4, Funny)
I paid for the suicide bomb with "Rocky Mountain High" and "My way!"
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:1)
Poser [youtube.com]!
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That's so much worse than a rickroll
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v... [youtube.com]
Re: (Score:1)
Two, some forms of IP crime are used to fund terrorism.
Well, most forms of money are used to fund terrorism. We should ban money!
Rte:Thank God Scotland yard (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Rte:Thank God Scotland yard (Score:5, Insightful)
City of London Police are basically a private, corporate police unit. The City of London is strange place, where corporations have the majority of votes in elections. The police basically work for corporate interests, but have all the powers of a normal police force. They abuse this by putting pressure on people to stop doing perfectly legal, lawful activities that the corporations dislike.
It's disgusting and an affront to democracy and justice.
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The submissive, obedient public is much more disgusting.
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--- can multi-task.
The geek shares at least one thing with the white-collar criminal, the unshakable belief that the world revolves around him, and that it would take the entire police force to bring him down.
There is money in Karaoke.
Karaoke Bar in Trafalgar Square [britain123.co.uk]
What? (Score:3)
$10B?! I find this utterly staggering. Mostly because I cannot imagine karaoke being that popular. Second, because most of this, as far as I know, happens in bars. Who would buy/download karaoke for personal use? What is more, why is this a target for the police when there are plenty of other, and larger, trackers out there? Nothing in this story makes any sense.
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They're no doubt counting every drink and whore paid for in every karaoke providing bar or restaurant in Asia...
Of course those bars probably don't do Karaoke all day, but they sell drinks or food all day. In other words the number is bullshit.
You know, that's how you always excuse draconian laws, by lying.
Re: (Score:2)
The numbers don't seem all that unrealistic considering karaoke's incredibly popularity in Asian countries [youtube.com] (if nothing else, watch the little Japanese girls singing [youtube.com] in the video, as it's really adorable).. The typical commercial establishments called "karaoke boxes" feature many tiny rooms suitable for small numbers of guests [wordpress.com] to sing and eat drinks and snacks in private. These aren't normal bars that do karaoke part-time like western establishments - they're exclusively designed for karaoke, and are suita
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You have to understand that the licensing for these kind of performances is big because they hit you twice. First, if you were to purchase an officially licensed karaoke track or a normal song track for DJing between singers, you will be paying between $3 and $4 US for each new song. But then you also need a public performance license on top of that. So when they figure the 10 billion value, they are probably thinking the licensing costs and increased unit costs. Technically, you aren't supposed to be abl
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In the West, I would think that most of karaoke happens at home or private parties.
Just like there are games where you play the guitar (Guitar Hero) there are karaoke games where you sing as well (Lips, SingStar).and some that include both. Those games alone sold about 50 million units (3 billion dollars), mostly in Europe.
Then there are a lot of people who just get stuff off of youtube and use a normal mic.
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I cannot imagine karaoke being that popular.
Rather than debate this if you have and Android phone or Apple iPhone for that matter go to to the App Store and search for "karaoke", you will find that there are quite a few apps (I counted 250 on Android) dealing with that. Now just for fun why don't you "tap" on an app (don't install unless you want too) and see how many downloads of that app has had.
Basically you are going to see 100's of thousands and even millions of downloads per app so just because you can't see karaoke being that popular I think
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Unhhh..... that comment about "Happy Birthday" is US law, and applies in the US. (And the copyright should be ruled invalid as the song predated the copyright issuance date by considerable, and the putative author of the song had nothing to do with it's creation, though possibly with its orchestration. (It was already being sung to that approximate tune, but I don't know whether it was to the exact same tune...probably, considering the number of singers, but just *try* to prove it.)
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The weasel words here are "could be worth as much as..."
So, by the same token, my cat's old scratching post could be worth as much as 27 trillion dollars on the open market. I mean the probabilities are strongly weighted towards zero, but with the right buyer it could be worth that. I just need to find an insane trillionaire is all :)
Add to that the fact this is all just someone's opinion ("according to the people behind the web-based Playstation software SingOn")
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Who would buy/download karaoke for personal use?
Singstar sold 16million copies.
Really? (Score:4, Insightful)
What's next? Some razzias to throw grannies in jail, who 'illegally' use Disney figures on their embroidering machines for the little ones?
Re:Really? (Score:5, Interesting)
Don't give them ideas.
Fun story, I knew a guy who lived through the great depression. He and his wife made ends meet, by making Disney character windmills and selling them on the street corner. These days, they'd likely be tossed in prison and have a fine.
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Well, yeah, you can't go around building jails and not fill them up.
Justice (Score:3)
The police going after easy targets, while the city police protect criminal banks who have done well documented money laundering for Mexican drug cartels by the city's own banks. If you do crime, do it big, or give police backhanders to look the other way.
Arrested him for WHAT? (Score:1)
“The unlicensed BitTorrent site directed users to a catalogue of tens of thousands of copyrighted music files, in particular the latest chart music and karaoke hits,” PIPCU said in a statement.
Directing users is not the same as infringing copyright.
“The public needs to be aware that by accessing sites like this, they are putting money directly in the hands of criminals, which often then funds other serious organized crime, as well as putting their own financial and personal details at risk
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What would your arguments be from a songmaker perspective?
Time to join the dinosaurs and buggy whip makers.
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You dare challenge us, you'll only be a stain on someone's shoe.
Yay, internet bravery! Looks like the best part of you wound up as a stain on someone's mattress.
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Except that the same type of big pocket media companies have tried this exact tactic on more than one occasion and each time, the companies that dug their heels in and refused to change with the times were crushed no matter how much money or influence they threw at the problem. All they can do is slow their demise in exchange for guaranteeing their demise.
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without the prosecution present
Did you mean without the defense present?
The funny thing is... (Score:2)
The site was really just the same software/format as The Pirate Bay, only it didn't use any text...
"Police"? (Score:4, Informative)
TF keeps calling them "police" so they keep answering their inquiries. We're talking here about "The City of London Corporation, officially and legally the Mayor and Commonalty and Citizens of the City of London, is the municipal governing body of the City of London" (source: Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]). Part of this is PIPCU, which is funded with taxpayer money.
"Since at least 2011 the BPI (= the british branch/version of RIAA, C.) had built close ties with the City of London Police's National Fraud Intelligence Bureau as well as advertising agencies to remove payment channels from pirate sites. The dedicated unit itself was first announced in December 2012 by Vince Cable MP. It was funded by £2.5m over two years of public money via the Intellectual Property Office and became operational in September 2013. In April 2014 Mike Weatherley, the Prime Minister's Intellectual Property Advisor called on the Prime Minister to commit to the permanent funding of the unit to extend its existence beyond 2015. In October 2014 additional funding was revived to operate until 2017."
Don't be as dependent on scraps like TF and stop referring to them as "City of London Police" which might to the ininitiated be the metropolitan police of the British capital, while in fact it's some corporate task force that abuses the old City situation to give themselves public powers. Think of them like a Omni Consumer Products enforcement group, by Big Business, for Big Business, and paid for by the taxpayer. Can it get any better?
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"in fact it's some corporate task force that abuses the old City situation to give themselves public powers."
While the specifics of the City of London Corporation may be unique, the fact that the city government is an incorporated legal body makes it just like any other chartered city government since chartered cities were invented.
ASCAP (Score:2)
However PRS are the worst for throwing their bullshit around. They actually have zero right to be collecting royalty payments - they just assumed this role.
As I understand it, PRS for Music is like BMI or ASCAP in that it has whatever rights are delegated to it by songwriters through the songwriters' respective music publishers.