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posted by n1 on Sunday August 24 2014, @02:55AM   Printer-friendly
from the it-doesn't-look-good dept.

BBC reports that computer programmer Philip Danks for has been jailed for 33 months after recording Fast And Furious 6 from the back of a cinema after a judge in Wolverhampton ruled that the defendant uploaded the movie, which was downloaded 700,000 times. As well as putting the film on the internet, Danks offered to sell copies of the film using his Facebook profile.

The judge who sentenced Danks said his behavour was "bold, arrogant and cocksure". Police said that Danks had continued to illegally distribute movies after his arrest in May last year. Fraud investigators quickly traced him after they noticed his online ‘Thecod3r’ tag attached to the video was identical to his profile on dating site Plenty of Fish. Danks was arrested by police after a special ‘webwatch’ team was set up by LA-based Universal Pictures, who raided his home in Bloxwich, Walsall on May 23 – less than a week after the video surfaced online.

The court heard that despite making some money from sales of the film on Facebook and by personal delivery his real motive was ‘street cred’. "The first person with a pirated version attracts much kudos," said Ari Alibhai, prosecuting on behalf of the Federation Against Copyright Theft. "He wanted recognition from the community."

 
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  • (Score: 2) by aristarchus on Monday August 25 2014, @12:47AM

    by aristarchus (2645) on Monday August 25 2014, @12:47AM (#85126) Journal

    If you think it's extortion, make a decision and stand by it and if you want, get your friends to join in.

    But you have absolutely no right to insert yourself into the price or delivery equation, because you did nothing which helped in the production of whatever it is you're buying.

    Capitalist entitlement! What could possibly make you think that the producer gets to set a price? Just because you were stupid enough to produce Fast and Furious 6 or even worse Expendables 3, that does not mean you are entitled to make back whatever you foolishly spent on it. The market sets the price, not the producer, and if you have not noticed, it is purchasers that make a market. And in some cases, that means that products have zero price. In this case I would argue that they should have a negative price. The guy should be jailed for making copies of a movie that never should have been made, in effect spreading cultural pollution and being a nuisance to society.

    So what do you say that we haggle? Ten shekels for that? Are you mad? Its not even worth one! (Monty Python, Life of Brian)

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