And I think that this is the point where a logical person who is somewhat "internet savvy" can deduce for himself why Megaupload and Grooveshark - while both profiting from IP which they do not own - cannot be, at least morally, judged the same way. The way I see it, Grooveshark is a service that is basically trying to force or at least demonstrate to the music industry what it is exactly that people want in an online music service. I am certain that in a bizzaro worlds where music executives have actual working brains they would see it and would offer "legality" to grooveshark without pricing them out of existence. In a world without piracy grooveshark would thrive.
Megaupload on the other hand is a company whose sole purpose it to assist pirates. Without piracy there is no reason for the existence of such a service (and before anyone yells "dropbox!", I don't think I need to explain why these two services are very different).
"Megaupload on the other hand is a company whose sole purpose it to assist pirates."
This is not true. While pirates may have been a large share of their customers, many people also used the service to transfer files that are too large to be sent through e-mail, or spread their own content which they've created themselves and chosen to distribute for free.
>Megaupload on the other hand is a company whose sole purpose it to assist pirates. Without piracy there is no reason for the existence of such a service...
While you might be able to make that conclusion about Megaupload (based on some of their internal emails), making that conclusion about file locker services as a whole is complete hogwash. You don't think there's a legitimate reason for a person to be able to upload a large file somewhere for download by someone else? Really?
I can conclude nothing else from your stance but the fact you are either a troll or a paid shill. 5 seconds on google would provide numerous accounts of people who were using Megaupload for distributing their own content who were burned by this crap.
>I can conclude nothing else from your stance but the fact you are either a troll or a paid shill.
Typical response from the "everything is a conspiracy" crowd that dominates these discussions so much.
Sure, people also used the service for legitimate purposes. If you think for one second that those people comprised more than 5% of the userbase (and that's being generous) or that Megaupload and similar services were setup to profit from those legitimate users and not from the pirates then you are simply being delusional. And there is no need for internal emails to reach that conclusion some experience and common sense will suffice.
Is it a valid service to provide server space and linking of files for sharing with other people? Yes it is. That's what would be called a significant non-infringing use (and it's the reason that Rapidshare isn't shut down).
The fact that some people use it to break the law (much with guns, or computers, or any other tool) doesn't really change anything.
>If you think for one second that those people comprised more than 5% of the userbase
Prove it. The onus of proof is on you. Presumption of innocence and all that.
Megaupload on the other hand is a company whose sole purpose it to assist pirates. Without piracy there is no reason for the existence of such a service (and before anyone yells "dropbox!", I don't think I need to explain why these two services are very different).