Illegal? Help Me Decide!

Is the content of this MusicLeech article illegal and worth removing?

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trigatch4

trigatch4

BuildAndEarn
Aug 23, 2006
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My brother runs a site for me at Music Leech and recently they had an article that got pretty popular. The article was about an upcoming charity album that is supposed to be off the hook.... my brother's friend listed all the tracks and linked to the raw MP3 files for people to listen to.

I understand that this is a charity but please spare me the morality of "is this right or wrong". They say that the album is still worth buying and I'm more interested in "is this legal or illegal".

We got an email from Home Page - Web Sheriff - Protection of On Line Copyrights, Trademarks & Brands claiming to represent the non-profit org putting out the album. It was basically a DMCA takedown notice asking me to take down the links at risk of being prosecuted.

So I'm eager to know:

  • Is it illegal to link to websites hosting pirated content?
  • What if we merely featured the text of the link where it is available but removed the hyperlink? Freedom of speech... is it not?
It reminds me of the whole digg conspiracy that went down with all the articles featuring that unlock code.

So you tell me... opinions appreciated!

Here is the link to "offending" article: http://musicleech.com/2009/01/27/free-links-to-dark-was-the-night-aids-compilation/
 


Fuck web sheriff, link him to car loan asshole and ask him if he 'wants some'.
 
The car loan asshole was a first class jerk. This group is representing a charity. That being said, I'm willing to be a little more sympathic and I'll probably/might remove the links either way but I thought the issue/question on the legality was an important one. If its hands down legal than I'll keep them up... I just couldn't find a consensus on this issue.
 
They can't do anything bout you linking it, only if you actually hosting and distributing the files. Thats one of the main reasons why Torrent sites can never get shut down until they actually host the files directly (a .torrent in a way is like a link but not a straight download), course some have been shut down but usually because the host they were on had it in the terms to be able to shut them down regardless of legality.

And as wolfe said, they don't even have jurisdiction even if they did have a case. Probably pulling an RIAA (scaring you into compliance or settlement.)

The one thing to watch out for is for them to send the same takedown notice to your hosting provider, which they may or may not comply.
 
trigatch4 said:
My brother runs a site for me at Music Leech and recently they had an article that got pretty popular. The article was about an upcoming charity album that is supposed to be off the hook.... my brother's friend listed all the tracks and linked to the raw MP3 files for people to listen to.
So I'm eager to know:

  • Is it illegal to link to websites hosting pirated content?
  • What if we merely featured the text of the link where it is available but removed the hyperlink? Freedom of speech... is it not?
So you tell me... opinions appreciated!

Here is the link to "offending" article: Free Links to Dark Was The Night AIDS Compilation | Music Leech
Click to expand...


Not sure if I understand this.

You and your brother have a website featuring the article which has links on it to the music on another persons site?

The original owners contacted you to take down the links to the full songs downloads (on your article site)?

You said "opinions" appreciated.

They (the original owners) should (if they haven't already) contact the guy with the music who is hosting the downloads to their property (without having permission)

For you - why not ask the original owners if it is ok that you keep the article (but remove the links to the music), as you like their project and don't mind spreading the word about it.

I'm sure they'd go for that.
 
trigatch4 said:
@ allco

The websites we link to don't have permission. They are essentially hosting pirated music that we are linking to.
Click to expand...

Well then it wouldn't take much for the owners to find that out (just by clicking your links)

If you mention that you are not actually hosting the music - then they'll know for sure (if they can't figure it out).

But they're contacting you because essentially, you are making their product available to your viewers (without their permission)

Do what you feel is right.
 
allco said:
Well then it wouldn't take much for the owners to find that out (just by clicking your links)

If you mention that you are not actually hosting the music - then they'll know for sure (if they can't figure it out).

But they're contacting you because essentially, you are making their product available to your viewers (without their permission)

Do what you feel is right.
Click to expand...

Chances are they tried that already and knew they'd have no ability to take down the songs at the hosted location, and are trying to get the links down at least.

Or... they're idiots and they assume since the content downloads straight thru form the link that it must be on that server.
 
This thread is an epic fail, like all of the Ryan Eagle posts on ppc.bz

When I read, Illegal? Help Me Decide! I was certain this had to be a skittle thread. Massive letdown.
 
If you have a doubt I'd ask a lawyer. It is my understanding that 1 and 2 level deep linking is illegal. Meaning you can't link directly to the file from your site or link to a page on the site hosting the illegal content. Emmanuel Goldstein from 2600 fought a case in 99-2000 He was linking to a site that had the crack for DeCSS (DVD encryption). He was ordered to remove the links to the offending site after losing in District court and 2nd circuit court.
 
shitzu said:
If you have a doubt I'd ask a lawyer. It is my understanding that 1 and 2 level deep linking is illegal. Meaning you can't link directly to the file from your site or link to a page on the site hosting the illegal content. Emmanuel Goldstein from 2600 fought a case in 99-2000 He was linking to a site that had the crack for DeCSS (DVD encryption). He was ordered to remove the links to the offending site after losing in District court and 2nd circuit court.
Click to expand...

Guess he could always link to a .torrent file then :D
 
Linking isn't illegal.
Linking to sites carrying illegal files isn't illegal. At worse, it may potentially be "assistance to a criminal act", which may or may not exist in your local laws... And even if it isn't, jurisdictional issues means they'll have to do it through your local law enforcement agency.

But, if you're feeling bad because it's a charity album, see if you can find the music as streams from somewhere else like lastFM, embed those, and then put a link underneath it to buy it directly from them (or an affiliate program you happen to be hooked up with... it'll probably be on Amazon at the very least)

Shitzu: As I recall, Goldstein got done for assistance to a criminal act, not that the linking was actually illegal.
 
I think it's a grey area. I would think you could be held to some kind of accessory to some crime, but I'm no lawyer. If this escalates to a full fledged lawsuit, well that's another story.

You can always tell them to pound sand and see what happens.
 
It's probably legal, but why would you want to give shit away for free?
I would go with the affiliate links as harveyJ suggests.
 
Links are legal or WF would have been down ages ago. But it's not worth the headache if you have other sites hosted on the same server. Your host might see things in a different point of view and shut all your sites down.

Just transfer the site to a cheap zensix plan and let subigo deal with it
 
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