‘Hurt Locker’ studio to file lawsuits against record-breaking 24,583 BitTorrent users

• OneBuckeye

  

  http://www.bgr.com/2011/05/24/hurt-locker-studio-to-file-lawsuits-against-record-breaking-24583-bittorrent-users/
  

  The production studio behind the movie Hurt Locker, Voltage Pictures, is attempting to go after a record 24,583 illegal BitTorrent users. The studio has already filed lawsuits against 5,000 BitTorrent users who illegally downloaded Hurt Locker and, in an effort to make up losses due to piracy, it’s now going after more with the help of law firm Dunlap, Grubb and Weaver. According to TorrentFreak, the lion’s share of subscribers — provided on a list to the U.S. District Court of Columbia — are Comcast customers (10,532). 5,239 are Verizon subscribers, 2,699 are Charter customers, and 1,750 are Time Warner users. The lawsuits will likely be tried over the next several years, however, as Verizon and Charter only offer up 100 and 150 customer IP-addresses per month. TorrentFreak suggested that Voltage Pictures would prefer to reach cash settlements with customers as opposed to taking each case to court individually.
  

• sleeper

  

  I hope Hurt Locker studios goes bankrupt.
• SportsAndLady

  

  Yeah, fuck off Hurt Locker studio
• hoops23

  

  Pretty fucking stupid IMO...
  
  
  Great movie though LOL
• queencitybuckeye

  Yeah, what in the hell are you thinking, trying to recoup the millions it cost to make the movie. Greedy bastards.
• hoops23

  

  queencitybuckeye;780424 wrote:Yeah, what in the hell are you thinking, trying to recoup the millions it cost to make the movie. Greedy bastards.

  
  You honestly think a lawsuit this big is going to work out? I'm guessing the money the studio will spend on trying to create a lawsuit this big will far outweigh what they gain back.
  
  Besides, the movie did very well, I think they've already made the back the cost of the film and then some.
• queencitybuckeye

  hoops23;780429 wrote:You honestly think a lawsuit this big is going to work out? I'm guessing the money the studio will spend on trying to create a lawsuit this big will far outweigh what they gain back.

  No idea, not my field.
  

  Besides, the movie did very well, I think they've already made the back the cost of the film and then some.

  By that logic, retailers that are doing well should tone down their emphasis on stopping shoplifting?
• hoops23

  

  queencitybuckeye;780436 wrote:No idea, not my field.
  
  
  
  By that logic, retailers that are doing well should tone down their emphasis on stopping shoplifting?

  
  Not many retailers do well. They're usually split even until xmas season, hence the name "black Friday"..
  
  But I wasn't trying to give logic, you just said they're trying to recoup the millions it cost to make the film, I rebutted that by saying I believe that money was already recouped. I wasn't saying it makes stealing right.
• queencitybuckeye

  Fair enough, I misunderstood your reasoning as to why you think their actions are stupid. Yours frankly make more sense than the usual arguments on this topic.
• thavoice

  They may not make money but it definantly could hinder people going forward for doing such things.
  
  There is a segment of the population who will do whatever no matter what, but also a segment who will not do illegal acts like this when they see peoplpe do get busted. I know some poeplewho used to be big into downloading and sharing music illegally but stopped doing so when read of people getting fines for it.
  
  
  They gotta do what they gotta do. Piracy is illegal...are they supposed to just keep letting it happen?
• Mulva

  

  I read that wrong. Because I'm dumb.
  
  But anyways, wouldn't they need some sort of proof about who downloaded the movie? What if there are 5 people living in a house/apartment? Are you just going to sue the "subscriber" (whoever the accounts name is under)?
• dlazz

  Mulva;780499 wrote:Are you just going to sue the "subscriber" (whoever the accounts name is under)?

  
  yup. they own the connection so they're responsible for it. I've read that people have gotten cases tossed because they had their wifi unsecured, so it could have been anyone who downloaded it.
  
  Most people just pony up a few grand and they drop the case.
• I Wear Pants

  So are they going to sue all of them in the proper jurisdiction? There was a similar case last year that was thrown out very quickly because the firm tried to file all of them in the same court.
  
  And the parallel to shoplifting isn't good because nothing is actually lost. In shoplifting you count it as a lost sale not because we think the thief would otherwise have paid for the item but because we can no longer sell that item to paying customers. That is not the case with online file sharing. That's not to say it should be allowed but there are certainly better methods of dealing with it than suing a bunch of people.
• tk421

  

  I understand illegal downloading is bad, but I don't get how any judge could award a multi-thousand dollar judgment for downloading a movie that costs at most 25 dollars. It just seems way to excessive and unnecessary. You don't get fined 10,000 dollars for stealing a movie from a store, why should the companies be allowed to get these excessive fines for downloading?
• queencitybuckeye

  tk421;780616 wrote:I understand illegal downloading is bad, but I don't get how any judge could award a multi-thousand dollar judgment for downloading a movie that costs at most 25 dollars.

  
  If it isn't excessive, it won't be effective.
• SportsAndLady

  

  queencitybuckeye;780679 wrote:If it isn't excessive, it won't be effective.

  
  With that logic, why don't they put kids in prison for 10 years for underage drinking?
• I Wear Pants

  queencitybuckeye;780679 wrote:If it isn't excessive, it won't be effective.

  How has suing people for large damages been in any way, shape or form effective in discouraging p2p file sharing of copyrighted material like movies, music, and software?
• Mulva

  

  queencitybuckeye;780679 wrote:If it isn't excessive, it won't be effective.

  
  That philosophy didn't work out so well for the music industry.
• like_that

  

  queencitybuckeye;780679 wrote:If it isn't excessive, it won't be effective.

  
  Still doesn't give them a right to make it excessive.
• tk421

  

  Media companies should be no different than any other area of our society. Like mentioned, we don't put kids in prison for shoplifting, underage drinking, etc. etc. Giving them special privileges just so they can scare people should not be allowed.
• Sykotyk

  

  queencitybuckeye;780436 wrote:No idea, not my field.
  
  
  
  By that logic, retailers that are doing well should tone down their emphasis on stopping shoplifting?

  
  If I steal something, I have it and now you don't. If you copy a long string of ones and zeroes, I have a copy and you have a copy. The whole intent of laws against theft are due to the fact the injured party is no longer in possession of their things.
  
  IP rights are bogus, put in place to exponentially increase the wealth of the companies pawning their wares. They can still sell DVDs, they can still market their movies in theatres, etc.
  
  You can't 'own' thoughts (the original intent of IP rights).
  
  Sykotyk
• kayo

  I Wear Pants;780586 wrote:That is not the case with online file sharing. That's not to say it should be allowed but there are certainly better methods of dealing with it than suing a bunch of people.

  
  I agree and would recommend a mass scolding as a better alternative. Seriously, what is a better method than going after someone's money if they stole from you?
• I Wear Pants

  kayo;781183 wrote:I agree and would recommend a mass scolding as a better alternative. Seriously, what is a better method than going after someone's money if they stole from you?

  If suing people with massive damages far beyond the scope of what they "stole", and it isn't stealing it's copyright infringement, is such a good method why has it never worked for the music, movie, game, or software industries? Why do you think continuing to do the same thing over and over is going to yield different results?
• kayo

  I Wear Pants;781192 wrote:If suing people with massive damages far beyond the scope of what they "stole", and it isn't stealing it's copyright infringement, is such a good method why has it never worked for the music, movie, game, or software industries? Why do you think continuing to do the same thing over and over is going to yield different results?

  
  Look, I'm not expert here, but I'll make a short list of reasons why I like this lawsuit:
  
  1) I don't download media without paying for it, and when other people do it drives up the cost for me to legally view such media.
  
  Well, I guess that was shorter than I expected it to be, but I think it's sufficient. I have no idea of the history of such lawsuits, but I would imagine the attorneys here are doing something different than what has been tried before. The news article (which was obviously slanted given the use of the word 'scheme' to describe the lawsuit) even admitted that this could work for the plaintiffs:
  
  "The math shows that this scheme could turn out to be extremely profitable for the parties involved. If ‘only’ 10,000 of the alleged infringers eventually pay a $2,000 settlement this would bring in $20 million."
  
  As for the word 'stole', I guess that isn't the correct wording. It sure conveys the right thought, though.
• I Wear Pants

  1: It does not drive up the cost for you. This isn't a cookie or a case of beer someone stole where the company has forever lost those materials and the ability to sell them. They have no lost cost because of this and as such if they use it as a reason to raise prices they are lying to you.
  
  And it is a scheme. What the RIAA/MPAA and these douche law firms do is try to bully and scare people in to settling out of court for a few thousand dollars so that they won't sue them. Thing is many times if they do sue them the cases get thrown out because they have filed in the wrong court and have no standing to bring a case there. And a lot of the cases get thrown out if the defendants are smart enough to get attorneys instead of just paying up they find that the parties found that they were downloading the file through means that were dubiously legal at best.
  
  If they want to make a parallel to theft and physical products then they should be accountable to the same standard. What I mean is, they get the IP addresses of people by seeding or sharing the files and then recording the IPs that connect to their server or machine. This would be akin to them having a "free Hurt Locker" stand and then following the people who take the dvds back to their house and suing them for theft.
  
  It is a racket to make money and it has nothing to do with lost profits from file sharing. The media industries have shown repeatedly that they do not want to change their business models to suit the digital age and that they have a great contempt for their consumers (things like all the DRM debacles, rootkits, etc). Do not make the mistake of thinking they are the victims here. Is copyright infringement a good thing? Not in most cases. But this is not the way to stop or lessen it and I can guarantee that they will not see a lessening of the problem as long as they continue these methods.