After watching the situation play out during last week, this past weekend TF published an article detailing a disastrous copyright notice.

Working on behalf of Columbia Pictures, UK-based anti-piracy outfit Entura International sent an unfortunate DMCA notice to Vimeo demanding that the video hosting site take down several works that allegedly infringed their client’s copyrights. Trouble was, none of them did. In fact, their only crime was to have the word ‘Pixels’ in their titles.

Quite remarkably, among the videos taken down was an award-winning movie by Patrick Jean. Published in 2010 and also titled Pixels, this was the work that actually inspired Columbia’s movie. In fact, Jean even has a credit in Pixels 2015.

Behind the scenes TorrentFreak was in discussion with one of the affected parties. Concerned about a legal process they had little experience of, they asked to remain off the record. But what became clear is that while Entura were permitted to issue a complaint and take down content immediately, the counter-notice procedure was much more drawn out. In fact, several days later no videos had been restored.

Yesterday, however, all that changed. Vimeo informs TorrentFreak that after becoming aware of serious issues with Entura’s DMCA notice, the video hosting company decided to intervene.

“Late last week, Vimeo removed certain videos pursuant to a DMCA takedown notice filed by Entura International claiming that the videos contained copyrighted content from the film Pixels,” Vimeo told TF.

“After users informed us that their videos did not contain any Pixels content, we reached out to Entura. Entura has since withdrawn its takedown notice. As a result, we have now restored the affected videos.”

A check of all ten affected videos reveals that they have indeed been restored to their former glory, which is obviously very good news for the parties involved. However, Vimeo’s response to the problem – i.e getting directly involved – is somewhat unique.

Mostly users are left to fend for themselves when a wrongful complaint is filed against their account. Does this interaction with Entura signal a new approach by Vimeo and can we expect similar action in future?

“We handle DMCA notices on a case-by-case basis,” Vimeo told us.

“It’s our policy to inform users of their rights and give them the ability to file a counter-notice or reach out to the complaining party to request that a notice be withdrawn. In this case, it appeared that the complaining party had made a mistake, so we reached out.”

But while Vimeo is to be commended for taking action, the system remains flawed.

Without providing any evidence, Entura was not only able to have ten entirely non-infringing videos removed from the service, but in response Vimeo issued each of its affected customers with a ‘strike’ against their account. If the users were to receive a couple more of these they could be classified as serial offenders and find themselves banned from Vimeo altogether.

While acknowledging that a repeat infringer policy is considered important for U.S.-based services, we put it to Vimeo that there might be a better way to deal with ‘strikes’. Perhaps delaying the issuing of a strike against a customer account until they’ve been given a chance to appeal (thereby giving them the benefit of the doubt) might be an option?

“To answer your other question, when a video is restored — whether due to a counter-notice or the withdrawal of a DMCA notice — the associated strike on the member’s account is removed,” Vimeo said.

So, in summary, anti-piracy companies issuing wrongful takedowns can easily have a strike placed against a user’s account, but the onus remains on the user to fight his corner in order to have the strike removed. That’s not always straightforward.

While things ended well in this case, there can be little doubt that less publicized cases on Vimeo, YouTube and dozens of other services will end badly, with users picking up strikes they don’t deserve. Thanks to ChillingEffects, however, many of the problems are made public and can be tackled. Expect more in the future – many more.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and the best VPN services.

In recent months there have been several lawsuits in the U.S. in which copyright holders were granted broad injunctions, allowing them to seize domain names of alleged pirate sites.

In addition, these injunctions were sometimes directed at hosting providers, search engines and social networks, preventing these companies from doing business with these sites.

Most recently, such a request came from Hollywood’s major movie studios, who previously sued several MovieTube websites. The companies asked for a preliminary injunction ordering several third-party companies to stop linking or providing services to the pirate sites.

This proposal reminded some opponents of the blocking provisions that were listed in the controversial SOPA bill. Among the opposition are some of the largest tech firms in the world.

A few hours ago Google, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and Yahoo submitted an amicus brief (pdf) asking the New York federal court not to include neutral service providers in the injunction.

According to the tech giants the proposed language goes too far. An injunction should not target companies that are not in “active participation” with MovieTube, nor should it circumvent the rules that are outlined in the DMCA, they argue.

The tech companies suggest that the MPAA is trying to resurrect SOPA-powers through this lawsuit and ask the court to halt their efforts.

“Plaintiffs now appear to be repackaging the excesses of SOPA into the All Writs Act. Indeed, the injunction proposed here would require the same online intermediaries targeted by SOPA to engage in the same kind of content and domain blocking that would have been required under SOPA had it been enacted,” the tech companies argue.

“The Court should not allow intellectual property rightsholders to obtain through the existing statutes the very sort of third-party blocking orders that failed to gain legislative approval.”

Instead, Google, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and Yahoo ask the court to rule that online services can’t be targeted by broad injunctions against websites they are not actively involved in.

“Such a ruling would be all the more appropriate in light of the fact that Congress recently rejected a push to change the law to authorize exactly these kinds of broadbased online blocking orders,” they note, referring to SOPA.

While the requested injunctions are not new, this is the first time that a broad coalition of tech companies has voiced its opposition. As a result, the MovieTube case may set a crucial precedent for the future of website blocking in the U.S.

Last week the EFF also warned against the potential danger of the MPAA’s proposed injunction. This didn’t fare well with several entertainment industry insiders, who told the group to shut up. However, with the tech giants getting involved there will only be more talk about it now.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and the best VPN services.

Last month Jan and Ed Lengyel decided to launch a Kickstarter campaign for the Hobbit house they’re building at their Suffolk countryside campsite.

The married couple are running a successful holiday ‘glamping‘ (glamorous camping) business and thought the idyllic location would be very suitable for small house inspired by the popular movie.

The project received a lot of positive press and thousands of pounds were raised in the days that followed. However, lawyers at Warner Bros. and the Tolkien estate were less enthusiastic.

Following a complaint from Warner Bros. the Kickstarter campaign was pulled offline without warning. The movie studio didn’t want the couple to use Hobbit references arguing that they infringe on their copyrights and trademarks.

Faced with the sudden removal the Suffolk couple saw no other option than to give in to the demands and started editing the page.

“Due to Copyright issues with Warner Bros. & Tolkien Estate, all references to Tolkien & The Hobbit have been removed,” a message on Kickstarter now reads.

As a result the “Poddit Hole” house now resides in ‘Centre-Earth’ instead of ‘Middle-Earth,’ and several other references were removed as well. However, that didn’t end the trouble.

Lawyers from the Tolkien Estate claim that ‘Centre Earth’ is too similar and want ‘Poddit Hole’ gone too. In fact, the lawyers ask the couple to remove all words that rhyme with Hobbit.

“The Tolkien Estate has asked us not to use ‘Poddit Hole’, which is absolutely ridiculous. We have got to call the project something, what would they like us to call it?” Ed Lengyel tells Daily Mail.

“Even though we have bent over backwards to meet their demands they are still wanting more,” she adds.

The campsite owners say they don’t want to damage the brand. On the contrary, they want to give visitors the option to enjoy the Hobbit experience.

“We are not trying to damage their brand or do anything offensive and there’s a lot of local and national interest in the project,” Lengyel says.

That’s exactly what the problem is. Warner Bros. and the Tolkien Estate don’t want others to use their intellectual property to entertain people. Unless it’s properly licensed of course.

This isn’t the first time that the Hobbit trademark and copyrights have caused trouble in Britain. Previously Hollywood lawyers went after a little pub in Southampton which had been using the Hobbit name for the past 20 years.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and the best VPN services.

While movies often appear online during their theatrical windows and TV shows shortly after their network debut, leaks in advance of these events are rather more uncommon.

On the movie front so-called ‘DVD screeners’ appear in waves each year after leaking from the Oscar nomination process but TV show leaks are much less regular. Nevertheless, downloaders are celebrating this morning after the pilot episodes to several big upcoming TV shows unexpectedly appeared online a few hours ago.

The first (and thus far the most popular with downloaders) is upcoming sci-fi crime drama Minority Report. Scheduled to premiere on September 21, 2015, the Steven Spielberg sanctioned series (which sees the man himself as executive producer) is set in Washington, D.C. in 2065, fifteen years after the events of the 2002 film of the same name.

The leak, which comes courtesy of Scene group LOL/DIMENSION, is available via a sub 400mb download or, for those craving quality, a 5GB 1080p release. As can be seen by the screenshots, presentation is good with no visible watermarks.

Second up is the pilot to upcoming crime-horror ‘Lucifer‘. Based on a comic book character created by Neil Gaiman for the comic book series The Sandman (and spin-off series ‘Lucifer’), Fox and Warner Bros. completed a deal for the show in February.

Tom Ellis takes the lead who “bored and unhappy as the Lord of Hell, resigns his throne and abandons his kingdom for the gorgeous, shimmering insanity of Los Angeles, where he opens an exclusive piano bar called Lux.”

Releasing two versions of the pilot up to 1080p, Scene group LOL/DIMENSION are again behind the leak, which comes way ahead of Lucifer’s planned 2016 premiere. As can be seen from the screenshots from the leak itself, the quality is very high indeed with no visible watermarks.

The source of the leak is currently unknown but the pilot was screened exactly a month ago at the 2015 San Diego Comic-Con where according to Fox it was well received.

Despite the brewing controversy, Lucifer character co-creator Neil Gaiman is unlikely to shout too loudly about the leak. In 2011 he admitted that in some instances piracy had boosted his book sales by 300%.

“I started to realize, that actually, you’re not losing sales by having stuff out there,” he said.

Also leaked in the past few hours was upcoming U.S. drama Blindspot. Starring Jaimie Alexander and Sullivan Stapleton, the series was ordered by NBC on May 1 and was due to premiere September 21. While download numbers are currently brisk, Blindspot is nowhere near as popular with pirates as Minority Report and Lucifer.

Again, the leak comes courtesy of Scene group LOL/DIMENSION. A pair of releases are available, SD at around 300MB and 1080p closer to 5GB.

Also getting an unofficial Internet airing today is the upcoming NBC sitcom The Carmichael Show. Starring Jerrod Carmichael, the show features a fictional version of his family.

The leaks, which happened just a few hours ago, follow in the footsteps of the Supergirl and Crowded pilot leaks of May 2015 and are destined to reignite the piracy vs promotion debate.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and the best VPN services.

This week we have three newcomers in our chart.

Terminator Genisys is the most downloaded movie.

The data for our weekly download chart is estimated by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only. All the movies in the list are BD/DVDrips unless stated otherwise.

RSS feed for the weekly movie download chart.

Ranking	(last week)	Movie	IMDb Rating / Trailer
torrentfreak.com
1	(6)	Terminator Genisys (Subbed HDrip)	7.0 / trailer
2	(…)	Pitch Perfect 2	6.8 / trailer
3	(1)	Hot Pursuit	4.9 / trailer
4	(7)	Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (HDTS)	8.0 / trailer
5	(2)	Furious 7	7.6 / trailer
6	(3)	Insurgent	6.6 / trailer
7	(…)	Ant Man (HDTS)	7.8 / trailer
8	(…)	Aloha	5.3 / trailer
9	(4)	Minions (HDTS)	6.7 / trailer
10	(5)	Jurassic World (TS/Subbed HDrip)	7.7 / trailer

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and the best VPN services.