Fox threatens site for linking to copyrighted video
Cory Bergman December 10th, 2006
QuickSilverScreen.com says Fox sent it a cease-and-desist letter because it was linking to (not hosting) free, illegal streams of Fox TV shows. “Whether linking to infringing materials can itself create copyright liability is still a somewhat murky question,” says EFF senior attorney Fred von Lohmann. In this case, QuickSilverScreen.com did remove the links, sort of, by posting the URL’s in copy-paste boxes with the line, “Do not copy and paste these address’s into your address bar, as that may or may not infringe Fox’s rights depending on where you live.” And over the weekend, the site announced it has been sold to a new owner “from a country where operating QuicksilverScreen is legal.”
7 Comments Add your own
1. Safran | December 10th, 2006 at 6:00 pm
There, IMHO, Fox crosses the line. Linking to someone who is engaging in copyright infringement is not the same as copyright infringement. Here’s why: you run into a contextual problem.
If I’m writing a piece illustrating the problems of piracy, and I link to the infringing site as one of those engaged in pirating, I am well within my right to do so. I am reporting on a site engaged in this activity. It doesn’t make me a criminal any more than linking to a white supremacist site makes me a racist.
Clearly, Fox understand this and simply lawyered the site to death anyway.
2. Rocker | December 11th, 2006 at 8:55 am
Actually, excellent marketing copy implemented by quicksilver…that particularl wording surely increased the CTRs substantially.
3. Tainted Heir | June 21st, 2007 at 7:06 pm
qss is still alive and will nearly 100,000 members and that does not count the “visitors” apparently dear ol’ Rupert was grasping at straws
4. hitmewitdarock | June 21st, 2007 at 8:27 pm
400 movies pirated so far…
thank you quicksilverscreen…
suck it rupert…
5. jimboy | June 27th, 2007 at 11:00 pm
fuck you rupert you fuckin dickhead, our hero MORBIDPIG is
comeing to get you so be scared very scared hahahaha
6. jimboy | June 27th, 2007 at 11:06 pm
oh and anouther thing rupert, hitmewitdarock & tainted heir
are banging ur wife, while ur at ur shit fox office haha u cunt…..
7. Liey | January 18th, 2008 at 7:25 am
Wow, thanks for the excellent information!
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