Movie Piracy is bad. We on the same page here?
Ok, just checking. Because news has come forward today that the MPAA has chucked its most recent spear at the piracy industry laying charges against Pullmylink.com (a link farm for pirated materials) and I think it is a poor target for their message.
The Motion Picture Association of America on Thursday sued Pullmylink.com, a Web site featuring links to free — and allegedly pirated — movies and TV shows, claiming the site promotes and profits from copyright infringement.
What Pullmylink.com does is offer links to these pirate sites letting you know where to find this content. They themselves are not providing the content. This is an ambiguous infringement but not neccessarily a crime. Not that I condone it or say they are “right” but legally speaking this is not actually commiting the act of copyright infringement.
Their claim is that they PROFIT from copyright infringement, which I feel is innacurate. The site isn’t selling the information but rather benefits from the advertisement on its site which is a gray moral issue because this traffic is coming from people seeking to violate copyright.
For example, if I was walking down the street and someone says “Hey have you got any pot?”. I am fully aware of the legallity of trafficking a restricted substance, and though I myself am not selling it, if I say, “No, but that guy over there has some for sale” am I now trafficking? No.
Morally, I am still assisting in the act that individual is pursuing, and I did offer some information. But can I go to jail for selling pot? No. I didn’t sell it. If I say “Give me 20 bucks and I will tell you where” am I now profiting from the information? Is that illegal? Probably. But is that what Pullmylink is doing? No. They are being sued because they benefit from the traffic that views ads, and that traffic is from alleged copyright violators.
The MPAA needs to go after the PROVIDERS to track its source. Hell, Pullmylink is HELPING you find them!! Much like drug busts go (and I know because I was a big fan of 21 Jump Street), they will not waste their time arresting every dealer on the street because they are more interested in the people growing and producing the narcotics. Arresting dealers mean they have to find new dealers. If the dealers have nothing to sell, they are more effective in stopping the crimes. It makes sense.
So why are the MPAA making an example of websites that direct you to illegally provided content? Well some would say they are attempting to curb the ease of access.
Napster was shut down for the same reasons, and it just birthed 50 more providers in its place.
Ironically, in an attempt to close down this provider they simply brought more traffic to their site. News of their action against Pullmylink will only bring more awareness to the existence of this site.
And now by talking about this I have helped them. (And compared movie piracy to pot.. a lot)
Am I in trouble?
