TorrentFreak Email Update |
- Mininova Pays Settlement to BREIN to End BitTorrent Lawsuit
- Anonymous’ Operation Payback IRC Operator Arrested
- uTorrent Adds VLC Media Player and Torrent Broadcast Apps
| Mininova Pays Settlement to BREIN to End BitTorrent Lawsuit Posted: 10 Dec 2010 05:24 AM PST Mininova, once the largest BitTorrent site on the Internet, has paid a settlement fee to Dutch anti-piracy outfit BREIN to end the legal clash between the two parties. In return, BREIN dropped the damages claim they were preparing and Mininova has withdrawn their appeal, making it impossible for the site to return to full swing.
Mininova was left with little choice, having been forced into these drastic measures by a negative verdict in their court battle with local anti-piracy outfit BREIN. The Dutch court told Mininova that it had to remove all infringing torrent files from its index, while threatening the site with huge fines for non-compliance. That selective task, however, proved technically unfeasible. Instead, the site's owners took the decision to remove all torrents uploaded by regular users, many of which were not infringing any copyrights at all. Following this decision Mininova started to lose visitors at a rapid pace. A year after the court decision the site lost most of its traffic, as former users looked for alternative torrent sites with a wider variety of content. Meanwhile, the legal battle between Mininova and BREIN continued in the background. Mininova appealed the verdict at the Court of Amsterdam and BREIN prepared a damages claim on behalf of the entertainment industry. In addition, both parties began negotiating a mutual agreement that would be acceptable to all parties involved, and they succeeded in finalizing that today. “Both parties have now reached a settlement. Mininova will abide the verdict of the Court of Utrecht and will withdraw the appeal. In order to settle the matter permanently, Mininova pays Brein an undisclosed amount of money,” the Mininova team announced. Instead of fighting the decision with all means available to them, Mininova decided that it was for the best to pay a settlement fee instead. The agreement announced today puts an end to the ongoing legal battle between Mininova and BREIN. Mininova co-founder Niek told TorrentFreak that he’s happy with the outcome, and relieved that the legal proceedings are finally over. For more than two years Mininova has negotiated with BREIN, both in private and in the court room, and the current outcome was seemingly inevitable. Mininova will continue to operate as a torrent site with authorized uploaders only, as it has been for the past year. Article from: TorrentFreak. |
| Anonymous’ Operation Payback IRC Operator Arrested Posted: 10 Dec 2010 01:49 AM PST A teenager was arrested yesterday on suspicion of being involved with the Anonymous' Operation Payback. The operation orchestrated DDoS attacks on anti-piracy targets in the last months, and more recently against those who obstructed Wikileaks' work. Sources have informed TorrentFreak that the arrestee is one of the IRC-operators of Anonymous, known under the nickname Jeroenz0r.
The operation started initially as ‘payback’ against outfits that tried to stop the BitTorrent site The Pirate Bay, and DDoS attacks were organized to strike back. A few days ago, the operation changed course and instead began to go after organizations that displayed opposition towards Wikileaks. Over the last days several high profile companies and institutions were taken offline temporarily by DDoS attacks including Mastercard, Visa and Paypal. Conversely, Operation Payback’s operation was also obstructed with the deletion of their Twitter and Facebook accounts after the news hit the mainstream media. Yesterday, this was followed by the arrest (Dutch) of an alleged ‘member’ of Operation Payback in The Netherlands. The local police announced that a 16 year old boy was arrested, suspected of being involved in the DDoS attacks on Wikileaks related targets. The boy, whose identity was not released, will be heard in court today and has reportedly confessed to his involvement. According to several sources the arrestee is known online under the nickname Jeroenz0r. The authorities have not yet confirmed this, but the person using this nickname has been ‘missing’ online for the past 24 hours, and has been involved with Operation Payback for quite a while. “Jeroenz0r and his server became delinked Thursday night at around midnight UTC time,” a source told TorrentFreak, confirming that the teenager lives in The Hague, where the arrest was made. “Some of his friends tried calling him yesterday but the phone lead to voicemail. When calling his home number, his dad refused to comment on the situation. Furthermore, his local town newspaper also reported that a local 16 year old boy was arrested.” Another source, who acts as an Operation Payback spokesman, confirmed that Jeroenz0r has been unreachable since the time of the arrest. How the police became aware of Jeroenz0r is unknown, but we were told that he didn’t cover his tracks too well. “Others on the network who know him a bit better knew that he was sloppy and often left traces from his actions online. Also, the Google results on him are quite impressive and indicate that he has been quite active in the torrent scene.” In a possible response to the arrest, the Dutch Prosecution Office now seems to be under a DDoS attack. Previously the Dutch police stated that they will not go after people who ‘make their computers available” for these attacks, but that they will target people who are more heavily involved. Article from: TorrentFreak. |
| uTorrent Adds VLC Media Player and Torrent Broadcast Apps Posted: 09 Dec 2010 10:28 AM PST The BitTorrent Inc. team has just added two of the most interesting apps yet to the popular uTorrent client. The first one allows users to integrate the all-round media player VLC to uTorrent, making it possible for users to play media files from within the client. The second is uCast, an exciting new app which enables users to share a 'live' RSS feed of selected torrents with friends.
The first new app added to the ‘market’ this morning is the VLC player app. VLC is a popular media player among BitTorrent users, and not just because it is free. It also includes a huge number of video codecs so it can play virtually every video file available. With the VLC app, uTorrent users now have a shortcut to play media files in VLC directly, without having to open folders or even extract archives. Users only have to click on the app and it will display a list of recently downloaded torrents which they can play in VLC with just a single click. Admittedly this app is not a technological breakthrough but it does save on time and annoyances, especially for those who have never used VLC before. According to BitTorrent Inc. “..it's a perfect match to the varied file types in the BitTorrent ecosystem,” a description we subscribe to. The second app that was launched today, named uCast, adds a new and interesting feature to uTorrent. With uCast, uTorrent users have the option to create an RSS feed of the (selected) torrents they are downloading, and share this with friends who are also avid BitTorrent users. Wikileaks TorrentCastThis enables users to easily share a selection of torrents without having to lookup the original torrent download links. The RSS feed, which BitTorrent calls a TorrentCast (example), can be easily imported into uTorrent or any other client that supports RSS downloads. One of the best features is that new torrents can be added to the uCast feed later, by simply selecting a recently downloaded torrent from within the app. This makes sharing torrents with friends easier and a lot more convenient than it is now. It’s can be compared to a torrent blog, or a living mixtape as BitTorrent Inc. describes it. “Your TorrentCast is like a living mix tape, because you can add files at any time and your friends will instantly get them. You can also open up your TorrentCast to collaboration, so your friends can also add files to it,” BitTorrent Inc. writes. Managing a TorrentCastIn addition to maintaining these TorrentCasts alone, users can also invite others to collaborate on the feeds. By entering a password others have access to the feed, and the option to add or remove torrents. This added social layer and broadcast functionality is by far the most innovative app we’ve seen from BitTorrent Inc. thus far, It will be interesting to see how the two new apps are received by the public, but they are certainly more useful and promising than some of those previously announced. The TorrentCast app uses the uca.st domain ‘short url service’, and you’re of course free to share yours below. The VLC and uCast apps are available now in the app market and both require the latest stable version of uTorrent. Article from: TorrentFreak. |
After operating for almost five full years, the BitTorrent giant Mininova deleted over a million torrent files from its site during November last year.
Starting mid-September, dozens of anti-piracy groups, copyright lawyers and pro-copyright outfits have been targeted by a group of Anonymous Internet 'vigilantes' under the flag of 
Last month the 
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