Film Studios Lose Bid To Unmask Reddit Users Who Wrote Comments on Piracy (arstechnica.com) 39
Reddit doesn't have to identify eight anonymous users who wrote comments in piracy-related threads, a judge in the US District Court for the Northern District of California ruled on Friday. From a report: US Magistrate Judge Laurel Beeler quashed a subpoena issued by film studios in an order that agrees with Reddit that the First Amendment protects the users' right to speak anonymously online. The First Amendment right to anonymous speech is not absolute, but the precedent followed by US district courts only forces disclosure of anonymous users' identities "in the exceptional case where the compelling need for the discovery sought outweighs the First Amendment rights of the anonymous speaker," Beeler noted. After reviewing the facts and arguments, she found that the Reddit users' comments were irrelevant to the film studios' underlying case and that the studios could obtain relevant information from other sources.
Reddit has no involvement in the underlying case, which is a copyright lawsuit in a different federal court against cable Internet service provider RCN. Bodyguard Productions, Millennium Media, and other film companies sued RCN in the US District Court in New Jersey over RCN customers' alleged downloads of 34 movies such as Hellboy, Rambo: Last Blood, Tesla, and The Hitman's Bodyguard. In an attempt to prove that RCN (now known as Astound Broadband) turned a blind eye to customers illegally downloading copyrighted movies, the studios subpoenaed Reddit seeking identifying information for specific users who commented in piracy-related threads. While some of the comments were posted in 2022, other comments were made in 2009 and 2014.
Reddit has no involvement in the underlying case, which is a copyright lawsuit in a different federal court against cable Internet service provider RCN. Bodyguard Productions, Millennium Media, and other film companies sued RCN in the US District Court in New Jersey over RCN customers' alleged downloads of 34 movies such as Hellboy, Rambo: Last Blood, Tesla, and The Hitman's Bodyguard. In an attempt to prove that RCN (now known as Astound Broadband) turned a blind eye to customers illegally downloading copyrighted movies, the studios subpoenaed Reddit seeking identifying information for specific users who commented in piracy-related threads. While some of the comments were posted in 2022, other comments were made in 2009 and 2014.
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so that they could follow Nazi guidelines like Netflix's about what cameras they're allowed to use and such? How about finally using the word "movie" or something instead of "film", then? Also, good that they lost on this despite the fact that freedom of speech in the U S of A is nowadays reserved only to people who don't write dangerous words about dangerous and wrong thoughts, who would be willing to build their own competing internet service if they did, because hey it's a company they can do what they want hey.
You forgot the big "free speech all I want" category. Multimillionaires.
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was this written by an AI?
Can't have been -- the 'I' stands for 'Intelligence'
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I'm confused here. How does Netflix's approved cine cameras have anything to do with piracy? There is a reason why they want cameras which can handle 4k, at a high amount of bandwidth... and that is having decent film quality on a video screen, as well as other, smaller screens. It only makes sense for them to do this.
Just buy a Panasonic model off their approved list and call it done. They are not cheap, but surprisingly inexpensive for having that certification. Or, perhaps go and support Black Magic
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You know, conveying a message works a lot better if you actually tell people what you want to tell them instead of dropping hints, bits and pieces and hope that people piece them together themselves. People don't do that. They are not as interested in what you have to say as you're in saying it.
Unless you tell people what you want to tell them, they'll just dismiss it as random rambling and move on to the next posting.
Sounds Like The Judge (Score:2)
...made the right decision in this case.
Just because someone comments on the case does not mean they can be "revealed" since that would SEVERELY CHILL the concept of free speech in the USA.
Imagine a movie that gets great reviews from noted public reviewers, but then that same movie get dumped on by anonymous online commenters and box office earning suffer.
Should the studios, MPAA, and so on have the right to "reveal" the authors of those anonymous online comments?
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No way will the MPAA let this ruling go.
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Yep. Don't use your real name or other info on Reddit accounts, peeps. And connect via VPN and browser in incog mode. Don't let them know who you actually are.
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>incognito mode
Well, at least he's got the right spirit.
Even "avoid real name" would matter more. And that barely matters, because they simply need to know userid "U" had ip address "X" during timestamp "T" for comment "Y" written by U. All they need to have over is X, which turns up an ISP who are always glad to hand over the name of the account with X during Y.
Did you mean not giving your real name to ISPs? If so, I once again like your spirit.
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Sounds like a good reason to use a vpn. I don't think a vpn will protect you from certain 3 letter government agency but it will put a dent in such fishing expeditions like this. Even if the judge had forced redit to cough up the ip address it becomes a IP address used by hundreds if not thousands of users.
I'm sure one of you is about to say they can just get the logs from the VPN company. Well, that isn't that simple. First if you use a VPN provider based in a more "enlighten" country, a US based
Re:Sounds Like The Judge (Score:5, Funny)
There's no problem in using a real name.
It should be the one of someone else, though.
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No way will the MPAA let this ruling go.
IDK, after looking through the list of downloaded movies, I'd say some of these people have suffered enough. :-)
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No way will the MPAA let this ruling go.
Well.. Although they can always add additional info about Why their subpoena should be allowed and petition for reconsideration - It is kind of tough noodles for them if the judge they filed a motion to compel with says No; since it's very unlikely they could do anything, unless they wish to uhm move their whole case to another court and start the process all over again.
Re:Sounds Like The Judge (Score:4, Informative)
Just because someone comments on the case does not mean they can be "revealed" since that would SEVERELY CHILL the concept of free speech in the USA.
That's not the "at issue here". From the order. [courtlistener.com]
It is implausible that this one (First Amendment protected) user is an irreplaceable source
The point is that this failed test four for compelling need.
(1) the subpoena seeking the information was issued in good faith and not for any improper purpose,
(2) the information sought relates to a core claim or defense,
(3) the identifying information is directly and materially relevant to that claim or defense, and
(4) information sufficient to establish or to disprove that claim or defense is unavailable from any other source.
People who could provide evidence to a criminal act can be compelled to be discovered so that they may appear in court. The Plaintiff wasn't seeking to include them as part of the defense for their case. They were seeking their information from Reddit to identify the people so that they may be called to bring testimony in the RCN Telecom Servs. of Mass., LLC case that is ongoing.
this case, the plaintiffs [movie studios] subpoenaed non-party Reddit for identifying information for eight Reddit users’ accounts and then moved to compel Reddit’s compliance after Reddit objected
Continuing on. . .
The users at issue posted comments over the years that, according to the plaintiffs, support the plaintiffs’ claims
Which are some users who posted on Reddit that the ISP RCN could turn on and off modems if RCN detected that someone was pirating something. A claim that RCN denies that they can do. The motion picture studios want to obtain testimony from these users to enter into the record. Reddit indicated that, if these users were indeed knowledgeable about RCN then RCN more than likely knows who they are and thus it should be RCN who unmasks them and not Reddit and the court agrees with this take.
These users are only protect because they can be unmasked elsewhere, not because they have an absolute right to free speech.
The First Amendment protects the right to anonymous speech . . . That right is not absolute, though . . . In “evaluating the First Amendment rights of anonymous Internet users in the context of a third-party civil subpoena,” district courts have followed the approach taken in Doe v. 2TheMart.com
The court acknowledges that a criminal case is on-going and does not weigh on that case, but instead is solely weighing in if Reddit is the correct route by which this information ought to be obtained. The court finds no reason to compel Reddit to release the names. It is now up to the Plaintiff [the movie studios] to seek a different route to obtain testimony from those users.
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The court acknowledges that a criminal case is on-going
It's a civil case.
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Should the studios, MPAA, and so on have the right to "reveal" the authors of those anonymous online comments?
Only if those authors have become parties to a court case beyond simply sharing opinions about the subject matter.
For example if the commentators stated something factual that was false, and the MPAA were filing a defamation case against the reviewer, then obviously they can subpoena the identities of respondents who were involved in causing the alleged libel to be posted -- when a lawsuit is being
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The MPAA may also have legitimate reason for subpoena in event a commentator makes it clear or known that they would be potentially a material witness to facts of the case
This is exactly what this order pertains to. The court found that the information could be obtained elsewhere and thus unmasking the names of the witnesses from Reddit did not present a compelling need for the discovery sought to outweigh the First Amendment right of Reddit.
The "war on piracy" is the "war on drugs 2.0" (Score:5, Insightful)
Nobody really wants to deal with malware & sketchy websites, but it is still better than the alternative of paying like $50 for a movie on Bluray or "rent" it for $10 and then they tell you that the 4K only works on full moon nights or some other random restriction. My entire year of Spotify costs less 2 Blurays and I might as well go see it in a theater at that price
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All this is because of how music and movies were traditionally sold.
Up to the 1980s a new song would go on the radio for a few weeks to build up demand, and then go on sale on vinyl. Pent up demand would push it up the charts. Then home tape recording got really cheap and suddenly the music industry had a big problem. People were taping not just because they were cheap, but because they literally couldn't buy the song if they wanted to. Starting sales early was the obvious solution, but then there would be
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We just want the old shit. I just want to be able to stream my Seinfeld, Simpsons, Family Guy & older movies at one place, for a nominal fee, without having to jump through hoops. Like how Netflix used to be.
For new releases, I think the theater works great. Launching them on streaming sites, doesn't make too much sense. Then we are back to the same shit of competing platforms
Film studios issue subpoenas? (Score:2)
"US Magistrate Judge Laurel Beeler quashed a subpoena issued by film studios"
I admit I'm not familiar with the judicial system of the USA, but if film studios can issue subpoenas, then what stops Al "Scarface" Capone from issuing a subpoena compelling you to pay him some protection money?
Or do film studios have some exclusive rights granted by the Congress?
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"US Magistrate Judge Laurel Beeler quashed a subpoena issued by film studios"
I admit I'm not familiar with the judicial system of the USA, but if film studios can issue subpoenas, then what stops Al "Scarface" Capone from issuing a subpoena compelling you to pay him some protection money?
Or do film studios have some exclusive rights granted by the Congress?
The film Studios don't issue the subpoenas, the lawyers working for them have them issued.
In this case, the lawyers believed that the reddit commenters had written something so germane to whatever court action they were working with or planning to work with that they believed they should be witnesses, or possibly defendants.
But lawyers overstep their bounds fairly often, Reddit's lawyers fought against that - after all it's kind of a chilling effect on commenting if you know that any criticism you mak
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> compelling you to pay him some protection money?
That would be a misuse of the word subpoena. A subpoena is an order to appear before the court, to provide testimony or other information. A legal court order to pay money is a thing that can happen, but it is not a subpoena.
With that said, I think they've also misused the word "issuing". The subpoena was presumably initiated or requested by the film studios (more specifically, by their legal
For me it's bittersweet (Score:1)
If you try to dox the accounts, the rabbit hole just ends with an 8K wallpaper of Goatse excreting Metallica albums in Andy Warhol pop art style.
I also have written a spec script for City Slickers 3 based on this.
luck (Score:2)
Lucky that Reddit stood up for its users. Why should that even be necessary? 90% of the time, the scurrilous companies will just hand you over to the mob.
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