O2/BE There Send More Pre-Warning Letters In Anticipation Of Further Golden Eye International Claims
Golden Eyes more Pounds – Lacks Proof
In a repeat of last Decembers warning letters in anticipation of Golden Eye International Limited (“GEIL”) Letter Of Claim (“LoC”) of copyright infringement on behalf of Ben Dover Productions (“BDP”), O2/BE There have started to send out the same warning letter to their customers in what can only be in anticipation of further LoCs from GEIL on behalf of the other 12 producers.
GEIL successfully gained disclosure of O2/BE There subscriber details (Which was un-opposed by O2) from their Norwich Pharmacal Order (“NPO”) application in March 2012 for BDP, but were unsuccessful with the other 12 producers. They subsequently won their appeal for the 12 producers in December 2012.
The 12 producers (Listed in the NPO Court case) in question are: Celtic Broadcasting Ltd, Easy On The Eye, DMS Telecoms Limited, Gary Baker, Harmony Films Limited, Justin Ribeiro Dos Santos t/a Joybear Pictures, Orchid MG Limited, Kudetta bvba, RP Films Limited, Sweetmeats Productions t/a S.M.P, SLL Films Limited & Terence Stephens t/a One Eyed Jack Productions.
For the new recipients of these imminent LoCs, many will be completely unaware of what is effectively a “phishing” campaign by GEIL. This is because GEIL have only the evidence of a “monitored” IP address and with this they “bought” the subscriber details from O2/BE There. The letter under “Infringing acts” starts:
This letter assumes that you, as the internet account holder at your address, were the user of the relevant computer on the day and time in question
After making such a statement, the letter goes on to say:
In the event that you were not responsible for the infringing acts outlined above because, for example, another member of your household was the user of the computer, you should make full disclosure to us of the other parties at your residence using your internet connection to make the Work available for download
So they assume the subscriber is the infringer then say they may not be responsible, to which they say:
A failure to make such disclosure may lead to a claim being made against you with the court being asked to conclude, on the balance of probabilities, that you were the user of the computer
A completely innocent subscriber who has not committed the infringement, and not authorised anyone else to commit the infringement may receive a follow up letter demanding a disproportionate settlement simply because they respond with details of who also lives at their address.
The subscribers who will receive the latest letters GEIL are sending out can see from the NPO judgement that Judge Arnold said:
Furthermore, it will expose them to receiving letters of claim and may expose them to proceedings for infringement in circumstances where they may not be guilty of infringement, where the subject matter of the claim may cause them embarrassment, where a proper defence to the claim would require specialised legal advice that they may not be able to afford and where they may not consider it cost-effective for them to defend the claim even if they are innocent
This is the Judge who presided over GEILs NPO application, and this Judge knows innocent people will be targeted.
The Judge goes on to say:
What the Claimants ought to do is to proceed in the conventional manner, that is to say, to require the Intended Defendants who do not dispute liability to disclose such information as they are able to provide as to the extent to which they have engaged in P2P filesharing of the relevant Claimants’ copyright works
So from the words of the Judge, those “who do not dispute liability” are “to disclose such information as they are able to provide”. The Judge does not say that those who do dispute liability should disclose such information.
The man who has perpetrated this phishing campaign is Mr Julian Becker who is a director of GEIL along with Ben Dover (a.k.a. Mr Simon Lindsay James Honey). Mr Becker has been known to make rather odd quotes to the Adult Media Press, such as:
Fundamentally we are pursuing those that are uploading not downloading, they are potentially uploading to millions of others who are also using these networks. How many they upload to is impossible to calculate, but in effect these violations are unauthorized distribution, we are not pursuing those who have simply downloaded one film.
Now the words there are totally misleading and could lead a subscriber who is innocent or guilty in to a false sense of assurance. “pursuing those that are uploading not downloading” is completely irrelevant because the nature of BitTorrent software IS downloading and uploading. And as I have found out, GEILs response to those who admitted one infringement is a demand of £350.00 which contradicts his statement of “we are not pursuing those who have simply downloaded one film”.
For those who have received the warning letter from O2/BE There and may receive an LoC from GEIL, what can you do?
As is always the advice:
BE CALM, DO NOT PANIC and DO NOT IGNORE.
The Citizens Advice Bureau (“CAB”) would be one of the first ports of call, they can be contacted on 08454 04 05 06, their website at adviceguide.org.uk or you can attend your local Citizens Advice Bureau.
The Open Rights Group (“ORG”) are there to give guidance and advice also.
The Speculative Invoicing Handbook Second Edition provides valuable information and a recommended read.
Read up about these people and this Copyright Trolling / Speculative Invoicing on this Blog, Torrent Freak, and also the Forums at Slyck with a goldmine of information.
Read here for testimonies of those who received letters similar in the past, and realise YOU ARE NOT ALONE.
Golden Eye Respond To Those Who Admit Infringement
Without doubt the whole “Speculative Invoicing” operation employed by various participants with various roles has proven to be flawed and has targeted innocent people. That is proof alone that there has been no justification in operating such a scheme, even if infringers are caught.
Sadly, I know of certain people involved in the GEIL operation who have stated that “Collateral Damage” is acceptable if it catches the infringers. I take this to mean that no matter how many innocent people are targeted and pay up through fear, this “Justifies” their actions if they catch infringers.
As regards GEILs Letter Of Claim (“LoC”), the one small problem in what happened to be an excellent outcome of their original LoC being neutered is there is no initial settlement figure, and thus the real threat of the LoC is dumbed down. That could be a problem because an infringer (Or an infringer who seeks legal guidance) may see a figure of compensation far differently than GEIL.
It now transpires that unsuspecting subscribers who admitted the infringement have immediately received another letter from GEIL demanding a settlement figure which is more close to their original LoC and completely ignores everything that was decided by the Judge in GEILs original Norwich Pharmacal Order (“NPO”) back in March 2012. I suppose GEIL are not going to let a decision from an “unimportant” High Court Judge dissuade them from carrying on their absurd claims!
So what can a subscriber who has been led in to admission of guilt take from it? And what can they do when they receive the unjustified claim of compensation from GEIL?
If the alleged infringer admits GEILs claim then I believe clarification must be given to what extent. Admission could be:
1. An actual download took place by accident and cancelled quickly.
2. An actual download took place by accident and cancelled eventually.
3. An actual download took place in completion in anything from X hours to X days and removed by the infringer from the p2p software.
4. An actual download took place in completion in anything from X hours to X days and not removed by the infringer from the p2p software.
What about the infringement? It may be accepted that “Two acts” of infringements occurred:
1. The alleged infringer has admitted to downloading the copyright material.
2. The alleged infringer has made the copyright material available for GEIL to download a small part.
What is in dispute is GEILs value of compensation of a demand for £350.00 per infringement or £700.00 for four infringements.
Let us start by looking at GEILs letter of claim under the section “Our claim for damages”:
The act of file sharing the Work without the consent of GEIL or BDP has caused damage to our business. We contend that every copy of the Work that is downloaded represents a potential lost sale. Whenever the Work is made available for download to other parties there is the opportunity for multiple downloads to take place resulting in lost revenue. In addition to GEIL selling direct, we also enter into licensing agreements for third party organisations to distribute our content. File sharing also results in lost royalty revenue and weakening of the Ben Dover brand. The court has power in such circumstances to award GEIL and BDP damages for our loss and, in appropriate circumstances, additional damages where the unlawful file sharing has been flagrant
The level of damages we claim will depend on the extent to which you have downloaded the Work and/or made it available for the download by others.
Now the decision from the Judge Mr Justice Arnold in the Court case:
134. Secondly, in the case of those Intended Defendants who are infringers, the Claimants have no idea about the scale of the infringements committed by each infringer. Some might have infringed on a very substantial scale indeed, while others might only have infringed to a minor extent.
Now I will look at particular aspects of GEILs evidence, claim, proposed settlement and their claim of legal consequences.
Evidence
The single most important fact is GEILs evidence has a small part of an upload from an IP address. This is very evident from GEILs claim of “Whenever the Work is made available for download to other parties there is the opportunity for multiple downloads to take place resulting in lost revenue”. This is backed up by the Judge when he states “the Claimants have no idea about the scale of the infringements committed by each infringer”.
So making a claim of “the opportunity for multiple downloads” when the Judge quite rightly says that they have no idea how much, is where GEIL have the major problem of lack of evidence. GEIL have the evidence of one upload.
Lost Revenue
What about GEILs claim of lost revenue? Surely lost revenue must be taken in to account after all relevant costs are taken out for sending a DVD to a consumer. Compiling a DVD and packaging costs need to be considered, then the sale value to a distributor and finally the postage costs to post it to a distributor.
After all this is taken in to consideration, even a 30% gross profit on the £30.00 sale of a DVD to a distributor is £9.00 profit.
This is also on the basis that you can actually buy the film if it is at all available through Distribution. It cannot be deemed lost revenue if the film is not available to purchase.
Disproportionate
Although it is the case the Judge declared GEIL have the right to protect their copyright, it is certainly not right for GEIL to claim disproportionate compensation. If GEILs claim to an alleged infringer is lost revenue through sharing and uploading, making the same claim against other alleged infringers is double-counting.
If 10 alleged infringers were asked to pay compensation, each alleged infringer would be asked to pay for the infringement of the others. This would in the case of the 10 alleged infringers make them pay for a total of 90 infringements.
Legal Consequences
From the Judgment, Mr Becker makes reference to “the reasonable royalty should be assessed on the basis of a ‘time limited license [sic] to exploit a work by providing copies of it on an unlimited worldwide basis’ “, whilst the LoC claims “In addition to GEIL selling direct, we also enter into licensing agreements for third party organisations to distribute our content. File sharing also results in lost royalty revenue and weakening of the Ben Dover brand”.
It now transpires that GEIL are making the claim that the Court will grant their claim for a “One year” standard licence agreement for one film which they would typically grant for Distributors. This could be as much (If not more) as £1,500.00. Exactly how they can equate sharing one film to a one year licence is baffling! It can only be considered the basis of a licence for as long as the download took place. If it took two days to download the film by the infringer, it can only be a licence for that amount of time, which would be no more than £10.00.
It may be argued by GEIL that they would only ever negotiate the minimum term of a licence to be one year, but negotiation is precisely the point when it comes to an agreement for a licence. It cannot be one way. A Distributor can make the decision if they wish to agree to those terms or not.
It also has to be taken in to consideration that you have the disproportionate situation (Above) of infringers having to pay for all other infringements resulting in double-counting again.
Flagrancy
The particular claim of flagrancy in GEILs LoC relates to their claim that an infringement has damaged the Ben Dover Productions (“BDP”) brand. I will set aside the notion that this is a possibility as it could be argued that is what GEIL are doing. This claim fails again through the evidence situation (Above). To what level can GEIL claim an infringer has damaged the BDP brand? Again no evidence to back up such claim.
Summary
My summary of GEIL and their latest claim against those who admitted the infringement are:
1. To what level of infringement has GEIL established from the infringer?
2. What evidence does GEIL have to prove an infringers level of infringement?
3. Why do GEIL quite directly ignore the Judges opinion?
4. Do GEIL consider the profit only aspect of lost revenue?
5. How can GEIL consider the idea of multiple uploads, licencing and flagrancy when it results in double-counting?
6. How can GEIL impose the one year licence on an infringer without negotiation when a download may take up to two days?
Special thanks to Hickster
ADDITION
Mr Becker was quoted here:
Disregarding the fact that our films when purchased sell for far in excess of £10, he totally missed the fact that file sharing occurs not in a closed user group of those circa 9,000 Telefonica customers, but in a far larger community of millions of users. Fundamentally we are pursuing those that are uploading not downloading, they are potentially uploading to millions of others who are also using these networks. How many they upload to is impossible to calculate, but in effect these violations are unauthorized distribution, we are not pursuing those who have simply downloaded one film.
“millions of users”………Oh dear God.
“potentially uploading to millions of others”……..Oh dear God, please!!!
“How many they upload to is impossible to calculate”………..No evidence?
“we are not pursuing those who have simply downloaded one film.”………Untrue!!!
Demanding £350.00 for one infringement makes what Mr Julian Fraser Becker says as untrue.
Adult Industry Trade Association (AITA) to close – Emails to the Chair RE “Golden Eye International” involvement
It has been announced that the Adult Industry Trade Association (AITA) is to be closed down. The committee it seems feels that it is untenable and has been running at a loss since 2010.
After conducting research and feedback from the “Adult” Industry, that is Porn Industry to you and me, 64% of respondents felt that an adult trade association was needed but only 32% believed that AITA was an effective voice for the industry. These figures seem rather damning. Two Thirds believe their should be an association but that the AITA is rather useless actually acting as that association.
The Official AITA statement reads:
“With the limited resources available to AITA, it did not come as a surprise to learn that the majority of current members felt that AITA is underperforming in its provision of key services when considering their relative importance. It is clear that this cannot be addressed without a significant injection of cash. AITA has significantly reduced its running costs over the last three years, however with corresponding decreasing subscriptions it has been running at a significant loss since at least 2010. Due to the lack of ongoing support for AITA from the general UK adult industry, and after much deliberation, the committee believes that it is no longer tenable for AITA to continue after the end of the membership year (March 31st) and all committee members will resign on that date and the company closed down. The committee would like to thank all members for their support over the years. As individuals they will continue to work to support the UK adult industry where they can, offering ongoing advice in their particular area of expertise and continuing to network at adult industry events.”
This is rather interesting as a statement made by the AITA December 12th reads
Trade body AITA has announced that it has appointed Jason Maskell of JCaz as its interim chairman following the resignation of Jerry Barnett. Maskell’s tenure is scheduled to run until the end of March 2013.
A statement on the AITA website, posted 11th December, read: “The AITA committee would like to thank Jerry for all his time and work he has put in to AITA during his time as a committee member and chairman and wish him well for the future and all his does.”
Now those following the Golden Eye International Legal action may not realise that Jason Maskell is also the head of Orchid MG, one of the litigants in the “Speculative Invoicing” action. Orchid MG were one of the Producers added to the action in Golden Eyes Appeal.
On the suggestion of one of the other Producers, I had written to the AITA before Maskell had taken over, and had received an email from the then head (Barnett), that whilst he did not agree with the action, he could understand why it happened, and that they should make the most of what they could do while they could do it. I thought an interesting response.
After Maskell took over in December 2012, and on realising he was one of the Producers added to the action, I thought, “Hmmm, this sounds like a conflict of interest”, I was however misled into thinking that the AITA was a kind of self regulation group who might actually care for innocent people being targetted by Porn Barons and NOT a pressure group for the Porn Industry, my mistake.
I sent an email to the AITA detailing my concerns with the Golden Eye action and received, what to me was no more than a Golden Eye Press release from the AITA, I then sent a second email and got no response at all.
On Twitter this week Maskell attempted to engage me and offered me an interview on camera, using almost word for word, what Terence Stephens of “One Eyed Jack” had offered, I again politely declined, explaining again why I might not want to break rank, namely the fact I have already been threatened with legal action by Golden Eyes previous legal team. After failing to get me to do the interview, I pointed out to Maskell that he had not replied to my last email, and I would rather he did that, He responded by saying he wouldn’t respond as I was “moaning about a court approved action” in my email, by Maskel of the AITA, I thought how odd (and unprofessional), far from moaning I thought I had laid out my concerns in a fairly cogent manner.
Anyhow, I include our email exchange here, just for the record, and would like to just add, that if the AITA are looking for a big cash injection, why on earth have they not asked Mr Ben Dover? Surely he is interested in the Industry that has made him a multi millionaire? No? Oh….
Was I really merely “moaning”, about a legal action I didn’t like?
Golden Eye Letters starting to arrive (devoid of any real evidence) UPDATE 2
Letters from Copyright Troll collective, Golden Eye International (GEIL) have started to land on the nations doormats, throwing those unaware into a fit of panic. Many bewildered recipients have woken to find a letter stating that they are deemed by GEIL to be responsible for infringing the copyright on some obscure pornography title.
GEIL are operating a Speculative Invoicing/Copyright Troll scheme almost identical to that run by notorious Law Firm ACS:LAW, and recently gained an appeal to add a further twelve, also obscure companies to their “Legal” action.
One of the firms RP Films has already folded, although that didn’t seem to affect their seeming victory in Court.
The man responsible for these letters, Julian Becker, has said a few contrasting things when he has made statements to the press, (Not faceless keyboard warriors, you understand as he has described those who oppose him)
I have tried to contact him but had nothing in return, (One of his clients informed me he would be prepared to have a face to face on film in front of an audience picked by him and the filming would be produced by one of his fellow pornographers, I of course declined, not least as I have had issues with Golden Eyes previous Lawfirm) I have taken to posting open letters 2 counteracting his “economy with the truth”
I contacted the Adult Industry Trade Association (AITA) who are now headed by one of the Golden Eye clients, Jason Maskell of “Orchid MG”, I sent him an email detailing my concerns with regard to these letters, and he dismissed it out of hand. I have tried to contact a number of the people behind these companies but none seem to care with regard to what I feel are the dangers with pursuing these claims and the sheer lack of evidence that should never be sent to an innocent person.
This Blog has also been the subject of a DMCA Takedown by GEIL “Forensic Expert” Clem Vogler which resulted in WordPress having to remove a photo (but not the content) of Mr Vogler from one of the posts. I did not oppose this takedown as on reflection I believe it improves the appearance of the page immensely.
The letters look the part but they have no substance, they are in effect “phishing” letters. They rely on the recipient to incriminate themselves. They are of course a diluted compromise that was forced on them by the Courts, but the letters still have the potential to scare people into paying up.
So what are those in receipt of one of these letters to do?
Well first thing is
DO NOT PANIC.
Then
DO NOT IGNORE
Consumer Focus have done a great job in educating the Citizens Advice Bureau, and the CAB would be one of the first ports of call, they can be contacted on 08454 04 05 06 or you can attend your local Citizens Advice Bureau
For more on Consumer Focus see here for some invaluable information
Read up about these people and this Copyright Trolling/Speculative Invoicing on this Blog, or Torrent Freak, also the Forums at Slyck are a goldmine of info.
Read here, for testimonies of those who received letters similar in the past, realise YOU ARE NOT ALONE
UPDATE 2: A letter received by us seems to show GEIL including the filename of the media they allege has been infringed listed on the ISP Report they have received from O2, this seems a VERY dodgy method of making out that O2 are in agreement with GEIL about the file being copied. This is not true, and unless this is a mistake on GEILs part, seems a very desperate attempt to use O2′s name to lend credibility to what is in essence VERY patchy evidence.
Response to Golden Eyes Appeal “Success”
Thanks to Bpaw!
On the 21st of December the Appeals Court found in favour of Golden Eye International (GEIL) and sanctioned what the original Judge had refused saying it “would be tantamount to the court sanctioning the sale of the intended defendants’ privacy and data protection rights to the highest bidder”.
GEIL intend to keep 75% of all monies collected, their Director Julian Becker has now responded to the successful appeal. We think we should respond too!
“I am delighted that the Court of Appeal ruled in favor of Golden Eye, albeit that I am still confused that the initial ruling allowed us to act for Ben Dover but fell short in permitting the right to protect the other producers that I represent”
“The other producers that I represent”? Maybe you should be aware that other Pornography Producers tried this method of “monetizing alternative revenue streams” before, Darker Enterprises, Pure Platinum/Liquid Gold, Mebray, Phoenix, Relish and Load XXX amongst others, and they all fell flat on their faces, when Media C.A.T and ACS:LAW screwed up by taking a case to actual Court where their lack of evidence was exposed , and their methods were derided, and it resulted in their collapse.
“Having now studied the case, I’d like to say that there was more chance of the end of the world occurring on Dec. 21 than Golden Eye losing this appeal.”
So you won an appeal. An appeal that was given by default to other applicants in the past.
Such as the following
01 Feb 2007 – Davenport Lyons – Judge Behrens – Topware Interactive
22 Nov 2007 – Davenport Lyons – Chief Master Winegarten – Reality Pump
30 May 2008 – Davenport Lyons – Chief Master Winegarten – Atari
30 Jun 2008 – Davenport Lyons – Chief Master Winegarten – Digiprotect
12 Nov 2008 – Davenport Lyons – Chief Master Winegarten – Digiprotect?
19 Nov 2009 – ACS:Law – Chief Master Winegarten – MediaCAT
19 Nov 2009 – ACS:Law – Chief Master Winegarten – Digiprotect
27 Jan 2010 – Tilly Bailey Irvine – Justice Warren – Media & More GMBH
17 Feb 2010 – ACS:Law – Chief Master Winegarten – MediaCAT
07 Jul 2010 – ACS:Law – Chief Master Winegarten – MediaCAT
“I believe there is always going to be a bias against this genre of film production”
Well no, that is a “non sequitur”, whatever problems that this “genre of film production” has had in the past, has absolutely nothing to do with the material you produce, but the actions you take. When other industries, (games 2 , music 2 etc) took the same actions, they too were derided in the same manner. They had the sense to bail out. It is actions like what you are doing, resurrecting a hated and hurtful legal action that is known to target to many innocent people in its dragnet is what is likely to drag your industry through the mud again.
“So although in legal terms we are actually no further forward than in 2010”
Erm, NO. You are further back than you were in 2010. You have been neutered in Court.
You called the account owner an infringer, the Court said NO!
You wanted a default £700 per letter, the Court said NO!
You wanted the account owners internet to be slowed down, The Court said NO.
You wanted to confuse with reference to the Code of Practice, The court said NO
You wanted to give the recipient only 14 days, the Court made it 28 days
The previous Law firm that represented you, halted their action in 2010, and you then attempted to pursue alleged infringers through the “Money Claim Online system” , when it seems you come up against Judge Birss, the Judge who presided over the ACS:LAW/Media C.A,T cases. You deemed your actions inappropriate and that is what has led us to this ruling.
“Golden Eye has now been successful after the most severe of legal scrutiny, combined with bias and manipulation from some areas of the press and mistruths and lies from faceless keyboard warriors in several Internet forums.”
I would question in light of the restrictions placed on you by the Court how successful you have been, but yes you have been successful in obtaining an NPO in light of what I believed the agreement the ISPs had after the ACS:LAW debacle, in at least challenging these orders. You were greatly helped by O2 NOT challenging you. If they had I don’t think you would have been granted the order.
Your only defence of criticism is to say your critics, be it the press or “faceless keyboard warriors”, are biased or spread “mistruths and lies”. My comment on this is simple. You would say that, wouldn’t you? Is it a shame you use “sound bites” rather than provide actual evidence. This Blog has detailed the number of contradictions you have spoken to different organisations. What are the “lies and Mistruths” that I have spread?
“In some respects Golden Eye finds itself back where it was two years ago, having correctly followed legal procedure after submitting technical evidence that has been accepted by the courts that there is an arguable case that Ben Dover and other rights holders content that we represent has been infringed by Internet users on file sharing networks and obtaining the names and addresses of these alleged infringers,” said Becker, calling Friday’s ruling a “positive judgment [that] is very much a bitter sweet, moment.”
May I provide a quote from your statement in the original Court case (15):
“Originally, the only evidence filed in support of the claim was Mr Becker’s first witness statement. In paragraphs 1-3, headed “Introduction”, he explained that the Claimants sought disclosure by O2 of the names and addresses of the subscribers associated with the IP addresses shown in the CD-ROM attached as Exhibit 1, that the Claimants believed that those IP addresses had been used by the subscribers to make available copyright material for P2P copying and that O2 did not oppose the making of an order in the terms set out in Exhibit 2.”
Hmmm…..“the Claimants believed that those IP addresses had been used by the subscribers to make available copyright material for P2P copying”. Now you say alleged infringer. This is plainly wrong, the subscriber as the Court has said is not necessarily the Infringer, alleged or not.
”Two years ago these cases were merely procedural and heard on paper without any formal hearings. This judgment has been debated by leading barristers, funded by government organizations and presided over by some of the most eminent judges in the U.K.”
Two years ago, we didn’t have a case that actually went to Court. ACS LAW tried to take people to Court for a default, but screwed up when those people said they would contest. This had a clued up Judge who completely tore apart the “evidence”. Your latest attempt at obtaining an NPO has been scrutinised because of this. This statement from you is showing that what you took for granted two years ago is now not so straight forward. And remember , the only reason this was debated at all was that O2 acquiesced rather than saying “No”.
This was an NPO hearing, that is all, yes you have gained the rights to exploit other Producers work, however as Rt Hon Judge Birss stated in his Court case with ACS:LAW/Media C.A.T who represented many Porn Producers)
“Media CAT don’t know who did it and know that they don’t know who did it,” said Birss.
Birss said Winegarten granted the (NPO) order based on the facts put before him, adding that the chief master did not have to decide whether Media CAT would succeed in its claims.
“I can’t imagine that the court making the Norwich Pharmacal orders in this case did so with a view to setting in train an exercise that was to be conducted in the manner that has subsequently emerged,” Birss said at the time.
Nothing has changed, it is the same. I will believe you are different when you actively take a contested claim to Court, I for one do not believe you ever will.
Julian Beckers quotes are taking from an article that can be viewed here
Court of appeal permits Copyright Trolls to have their friends join the party
On Friday a Judgement was made by the Appeals Court with regard to Golden Eye International(GEIL)
GEIL the Copyright Trolls, who are resurrecting the ACS:LAW “Speculative Invoicing” had originally been denied their chance of using 12 other Porn Companies in their Legal Action. They appealed and now the Court has awarded them what they had wanted.
This was not unexpected however it is VERY disappointing, O2 Subscribers were represented by Open Rights Group (ORG), and they put up a good show according to the Court record.
Although ORG could not stop the appeal, there are some positive points to be had however, GEIL had depended on a high volume of letters being sent out, that is after all the only way this “Alternative revenue scheme” can work.
After being rejected by the initial Court hearing and only having just under 3000 Ip addresses captured by their Software Monitor, they duly sent them off to O2 to have them matched to actual subscribers who would then receive a letter from them asking them to explain why they had infringed their Copyright. GEIL must have been disturbed to see just under a 1000 actual matches. This is a woeful amount, considering the “Software Monitor” is a “Forensic Expert”.
With the disparity in captured IP addresses and the actual matching of them to subscribers one can apply some logic to see that now GEIL have won their appeal, and have the other Producers on board, they can now send the remaining 6000 IP addresses to O2, but based on the low quality of the Monitoring, one can see that it could lead to less than 2000 retuning as being matched. This of course will leave GEIL with around 3000 actual details they can send their letters to.
GEIL had originally planned to charge £700 per letter, that will not happen as the original Court hearing said no, GEIL also wanted to state that the Subscriber was responsible for the Infringement, regardless of whether they knew or not. The Court has also said no to that reasoning.
Also unlike when ACS:LAW were practising a similar Legal action, no one really knew much about it, now they do, and this will be the greatest threat to GEILs plan.
For further reading
The Speculative Invoicing Handbook – Part 2 :UPDATED
With news reaching us that the “Golden Eye International” launch of their Speculative Invoicing(Copyright Trolling) action is due to start in the New Year, we wanted to bring this latest tome to your attention. This quality guide was written by those fine folks at Being Threatened, in response to the number of innocent people targeted by previous companies, involved with these actions.
Download the PDF file here
Comments are always welcome.
We at ACS:BORE are not affiliated with the production of this book, although we endorse it as the best information to read with regard to receiving a letter from one of these companies. For further reading on this please see the excellent Torrent Freak post
My apologies, as pointed out I wrongfully referred to “Golden Eye International” as “Golden Eye Interactive”, my apologies, it was an inadvertent mistake made in a moment of acute clarity of mind that a shell company based on an industrial estate in the UK with only two employees, and who operate only within the UK is NOT really an international company, my apologies again:-)
