Anti-Piracy By Prostitution – Golden Eye International Prematurely Acts For Friendly Producers

Avast ye, let me Hornswaggle yer!

Golden Eye International Limited (“GEIL”) has finally sent out their letters of claim (“LoC”) for the other producers involved in GEILs “Anti-Piracy” campaign.

What has been considered controversial by the High Court Judge Justice Arnold at GEILs Norwich Pharmacal (“NPO”) Order application, GEIL were given the green light in their appeal to Justice Arnolds original decision to act on behalf of the other producers.

For those who have recently received your first LoC, these links will give you an idea of what to expect:

Link1, Link2, Link3 

Further bad news is Julian Becker, Director of GEIL and manager to the other GEIL Director Simon Honey (a.k.a. Ben Dover), has gloated on forums of his exploits from his visits to US adult trade shows:

Through my work in anti piracy, I am now representing a number of studio’s in the USA.

If any female models are interested in 2-3 weeks of work probably in LA, please email me direct for further details.

Regards

Julian
julian@ben-dover.biz

So what can you make of that?  What do you call someone who arranges a certain type of work for female models and get paid?  And what has that got to do with anti-piracy?  Is that implying that such work isn’t for selling but to be made available for people to download, and then you send a settlement letter?  Is that what you call anti-piracy?

And on to GEIL.  How can you describe GEIL and what they do?

Well, let us see an extract from GEILs NPO.

2. GRANT OF RIGHTS

2.1 Licensor is the owner of the Copyright and/or related ancillary rights in the Works under international copyright law.

2.2 Licensor grants Licensee the exclusive right to act for it in relation to any alleged breaches of copyright arising out of ‘peer to peer’ copying of material across the Internet. The parties agree that additional movies can be added to Schedule 1 with a written supplemental Agreement.

2.3 In case of any infringement of suspected or past infringement by any third party of copyright subsisting in the Works:

(a) the Licensee shall, in its sole discretion, decide what action if any to take; and

(b) the Licensee shall have sole control over, and conduct of, all claims and proceedings;

(c) the Licensee may require the Licensor to lend its name to such proceedings and provide reasonable assistance, subject to the Licensee giving the Licensor an indemnity in respect of all costs damages and expenses that it may incur including an award of costs against it, directly resulting from Licensor’s involvement in such proceedings.

This is very much technical, and can be confusing to those who have been accused by GEIL.  I will try to explain to the best of my understanding by using an analogy of prostitution.  In no way am I trying to associate what GEIL are doing as being prostitution.  It is simply a means to explain.

So effectively the “Licensor” (Prostitute) gives the “Licensee” (Pimp) (“Producer” gives “GEIL”) the right to conduct a campaign of speculative invoicing.

We all know how speculative invoicing works, so how can such an agreement work between the “Licensor” (Prostitute) and “Licensee” (Pimp)?  Again from GEILs NPO:

In consideration of the rights hereby granted under this Agreement, the Licensee agrees to pay to the Licensor 25% of any Revenue. These monies shall be payable by the Licensee in a manner and at intervals agreed between the parties

In the case of the agreements with Orchid MG Ltd, Kudeta BVBA and RP Films Ltd, the figure specified in clause 2.5 is 27.5%, 37.5% and 27.5% respectively, rather than 25%.

Hmmm…..the general agreement is 25%, but three producers want more!  Why?

Having given the prostitute / pimp analogy, let’s start with Justice Arnolds opinion from the NPO:

I consider that would be tantamount to the court sanctioning the sale of the Intended Defendants’ privacy and data protection rights to the highest bidder

So some producers needs are more important than the others (So it seems).

So who are these producers?  Some detail is more obtainable than others which doesn’t really fit well with the idea that their revenue is decimated through torrent piracy.

One of the producers who I will not name made the following quote about GEIL:

If someone gives me a call and says they will fight my corner free of charge, all you have to do is sign up and we’ll do the rest. I signed up!

Interestingly it makes me wonder what “free of charge” actually means.  The Grant Of Rights (Earlier) section 2.3(c) states:

the Licensee may require the Licensor to lend its name to such proceedings and provide reasonable assistance, subject to the Licensee giving the Licensor an indemnity in respect of all costs damages and expenses that it may incur including an award of costs against it, directly resulting from Licensor’s involvement in such proceedings

So GEIL give the producer an indemnity (Or compensation) if things don’t go well in Court.  But what happens if GEIL go bankrupt?

Anyway, back to the producers.

The following is an introduction to the various producers with some detail as best as I could find.  I do have much more information on the companies and people involved, but such is the nature of the material and media I have tried to make it as decent as possible.  It is unfortunate though that some of the links do contain adult content, and it is also possible again from the people involved that the material could change.  Please be aware of such possibilities when clicking on any link.

RP Films
Revenue agreement: 27.5%
Company details: Link
Company status: Dissolved 15/05/2012

What is interesting is their first notice of strike off was 31/01/2012 which was two months before GEILs NPO application in March 2012.

Principle director at time of NPO:
Gavin Erlam: Link
Some notable links to RP Films:
Nothing really available.

Orchid MG Ltd
Revenue agreement: 27.5%
Company details: Link
Company status: Dissolved 09/07/2013
Principle director at time of NPO:
Jason Maskell: Link
Some notable links to Orchid MG Ltd and Jason Maskell:
Twitter: @Orchid_Films
Twitter: @Jason_Maskell
Twitter: @Yoursdotxxx
Twitter: @TrulyFlyMag
Twitter: @AdultXfund
Facebook: Link
Facebook: Link

Kudata BVBA
Revenue agreement: 37.5%
Company status: Link – Bankrupt: 21/03/2013, Bankrupt withdrawn: 13/06/2013

Obviously there was an incentive to keep the company alive after the bankruptcy.

Some notable links to Kudeta BVBA:
Nothing really available apart from this link: Link

Celtic Broadcasting
Revenue agreement: 25%
Company details: Link
Principle director at time of NPO:
Garry Stuart Grant: Link
Some notable links to Celtic Broadcasting and Garry Grant:
Link1
Link2

Celtic Broadcasting was founded by Gary ten years ago after he graduated as an editor from Aberdeen College.

Easy On The Eye
Revenue agreement: 25%
Company details: Link
Principle director at time of NPO:
Anna Imogen Arrowsmith: Link – Anna Imogen Arrowsmith has an alias of Anna Span.
Some notable links to Easy On The Eye and Anna Imogen Arrowsmith:
Twitter: @annaarrowsmith
LinkedIn: Link
Link1
Link2

DMS Telecoms Limited
Revenue agreement: 25%
Company details: Link
Principle director at time of NPO:
Darren Paul Barker: Link
Some notable links to DMS Telecoms:
Twitter: @stockingsluts
Link1

Nylon Stocking Sluts is owned and administered by Fricova 1102, Dobris, 26301, Czech Republic. Email: info@nylonstockingsluts.com

Gary Baker
Revenue agreement: 25%
Company details:
No real information available.
Principle director at time of NPO:
No real information available.
Some notable links to Gary Baker:
Link1

Harmony Films Limited
Revenue agreement: 25%
Company details: Link1
Principle director at time of NPO:
Daniel Richard O’Sullivan: Link
Steven Thomas Elvins: Link
Some notable links to Harmony Films and Directors:
Twitter: @harmonystoreuk
Facebook: Link
Link1
Link2
Link3

Justin Ribeiro Dos Santos, Trading As Joybear Pictures
Revenue agreement: 25%
Company details: Link
Principle director at time of NPO:
Oliver Justin Ribeiro Dos Santos: Link
Some notable links to Joybear and Oliver Santos:
Twitter: @Joybearbaby
Twitter: @joybear_lady
FaceBook: Link
YouTube: Link
Link1

Having concluded that the Service is an ODPS, ATVOD has determined that a contravention of section 368BA (Requirement to notify an ODPS) and section 368D(3)(za) (Requirement to pay a fee) has occurred because on the basis of the information available (a) the Service is an ODPS; (b) Joybear Pictures is the provider of the service; (c) Joybear Pictures withdrew its previous notifcation of the service; and (d) Joybear Pictures has not paid the regulatory fee for the year ending 31 March 2013, as required by ATVOD under section 368NA of the Act.

So effectively Joybear should have paid a fee to operate an On Demand Programme Service (ODPS) and JoyBear tried to weed out of it by claiming that the domain had transferred to another company outside the UK.

More information:

Service providers must pay a fee to ATVOD in relation to each On Demand Programme Service they provide and will receive invoices with respect to each notified service.

Sweetmeats Productions t/a S.M.P.
Revenue agreement: 25%
Company details:
Address: 27 OLD GLOUCESTER STREET, LONDON, WC1N 3XX
Principle director at time of NPO: Joe Black (Not a Director as such)
Some notable links to Sweetmeats / SMP:
Twitter: @SweetmeatsPress
FaceBook: Link
Domian Info: Link
Domian Info: Link

Interesting though that the above domains are registered to a Joe Black and this link has the address of Sweetmeats above and Joe Black is a Director of a company called Blackhart Media Ltd, which this link shows a title that Sweetmeats are the production company.

SLL Films Limited
Revenue agreement: 25%
Company details: Link
Principle director at time of NPO:
Michael Lister Newcombe: Link
John Martin Coates: Link
Director After NPO:
Michael Newcombe: Link
Some notable links to SLL Films and Directors:
Link1

Down as the “Owner” of SLL Films Ltd.

The timeline for Mr Newcombe and Mr Newcombe above as Directors is strange.  Michael Lister Newcombe resigned as Director soon after GEILs successful NPO appeal in Court, then Michael Newcombe became Company Secretary between 16/01/2013 and 03/02/2013.

Now that was an introduction to the other producers.  We have been introduced to the main characters behind GEIL before.

As Julian Becker and Simon Honey are in a certain business that requires a certain character persona, it may be that they could be involved in certain dealings.  This persona may appeal to their audience and consumers, but if something is wrong then it is wrong.

Take for example an article in a London based magazine, Becker recalls Honeys early years including:

Then what happened was a company he was working for got busted. This was in the days when making porn was illegal. In fact porn was only made legal in 93 or 94 in the UK. Before then companies would distribute secretly through private mailing lists. Some of the addresses on the mailing lists were used by undercover CID officers and they were all arrested. It was so funny because when the police raided it – Lindsay was still young, only like 19 or 20 – they asked him who he was and what was he doing there. He said ‘Oh I’m just the office boy’ and they said ‘OK let him go’, which was ridiculous because had they bothered to watch the films they’d realize that he was the guy starring in all of them! And he got away with it and everyone else went to prison.

“so funny” eh? and “everyone else went to prison” eh?

Becker goes on to recall:

I never thought of myself as a pornographer, but I started looking at content and text messaging. I had actresses outside football stadiums giving out cards. They acted really unprofessional, but that was deliberate: ‘My name’s Ella, I’ve just arrived in the UK and I’m looking for new friends’. They would give the cards to these guys, who would then give them a call, but it would actually go to some bureau. It was normally a bunch of gay guys down in Brighton who played the roles. I always found that quite amusing, and it did OK.

Now that must be an admission of a scam.  It may be that it did well and there is a suggestion in the article that some didn’t mind, but never-the-less, it seems it was set up purposefully to con people.

Then Becker recalls how the Ben Dover brand was already registered:

The first thing that I did was look at the copyright side of the brand and realized that Ben Dover’s logo was actually owned by some guy based in Manchester. So I phoned Lindsay up and said ‘Do you know this guy?’, he says ‘No’ and I say ‘Well legally he’s Ben Dover not you’. He says ‘Well don’t be ridiculous you know I’m Ben Dover, everyone knows who I am’. I said ‘I might know who you are but the logo has been registered by someone else and he’s asking for a million pounds to give it up’.

So Honey masqueraded as a character that was already copyrighted.  No problem there then is there?  It is quite OK to not check copyright on a copyright name and use it without compensating the owner.

He goes on to recall:

It eventually got taken to court. This guy had to prove he had been using the Ben Dover brand. He said he’d produced clothing and merchandise. I think just before the court case was about to commence he said ‘I’ll sell it for one hundred grand’.  And we offered him, I think it was five grand – and that was our maximum. It wasn’t that he had any case it was just to stop this – the solicitor was two hundred pounds an hour! On the day of the court case he never turned up and said ‘Oh I’ve had a fire at my warehouse and all the evidence has been destroyed’. So he opted out with nothing

I’m not sure what is being said there, but the outcome proved to be very useful.  I assume the reader is supposed to come up with their own opinion on it, and I’m sure they would.

Anyone who has been a recipient of a letter could raise a complaint to various persons / organisations such as:

Judges Clerks: http://www.justice.gov.uk/courts/rcj-rolls-building/chancery-division/the-chancery-judges

Judge: Arnold J.  (NPO Judge) Clerk: Alison Lee, Tel: 020 7073 1789, email: alison.lee2@hmcts.gsi.gov.uk

Judge: Birss J.  Clerk: John Curtis, Tel: 0207 947 7379, email: john.curtis3@hmcts.gsi.gov.uk

Write to your MP or Lords representative: http://www.writetothem.com/

Find your MP: http://www.parliament.uk/mps-lords-and-offices/mps/

Consumer Complaint – Citizens Advice: https://ssl.datamotion.com/form.aspx?co=3438&frm=citacomplainform&to=flare.fromforms

Open Rights Group: info@openrightsgroup.org

Which? http://www.which.co.uk/about-which/contact-us/email/ or which@which.co.uk

Court of Appeal civil division – Listing Office
For queries about listing cases for hearing, and other queries regarding hearing dates, and should also be used for queries about the settlement of cases
Telephone: 020 7947 6195/6917, Fax: 020 7947 6621, Email: civilappeals.listing@hmcts.gsi.gov.uk

Court of Appeal civil division – Associates
Relates to the Associates or Court Clerks and should be used for queries about Orders of the Court, and any other post judgment matters
Telephone: 020 7947 6879, Fax: 020 7947 6751, Email: civilappeals.associates@hmcts.gsi.gov.uk