This has to be the sadest copyright lawsuit I have ever seen! These lawyers (Dunlap, Grubbs and Weaver) are absolute idiots!
Just when you think lawyers couldn’t get any stupider or more moronic along comes Dunlap, Grubb and Weaver along with their client Voltage Pictures and their pathetic lawsuit against thousands or even millions of supposedly illegal internet downloaders.
Voltage Pictures which is the company that made the B rated movie Hurtlocker, is under the impression (more like a misconception) that the poor showing in the box office (only $16 million versus the usual several hundred million for Oscar-winning films) was due to massive Internet downloading and sharing of the movie. The reality is that the movie sucked and that is why the earnings were pathetic.
As anyone with half a brain knows, the Internet downloaders they are talking about have been proven time and time again to instead of costing them money to make them money. How is this you might ask? It’s because of the virality of the Internet. A movie that is downloaded a lot or a video or even a book or documents on how to do something (like an ebook) tends to gain traction if it is good.
If it is excellent it can go viral and get millions and millions of page views. This is why movie makers that make decent or great movies actually try to work with Internet downloaders and others because it actually benefits them. And not only do they make money off of their movies in the movie theaters, but they make money off of DVD sales, related product sales, etc…
Now, this lawsuit of theirs could easily be a case of David and Goliath but it will be more like Pearl Harbor when the Japanese comander commented that they may have woken up a sleeping giant in America. Well, voltage pictures and their moronic, dumbass attorneys at Dunlap, Grubb and Weaver have numerous problems here.
One, is that you’re talking about millions of people, most of which are under aged, armed forces veterans, single mothers and others that by themselves cannot afford to fight off a lawsuit (even one as trivial and easy to have dismissed as this one). The reality here is that this is going to give Voltage pictures, their idiot attorneys and their at best B rated movie horrible press to say the least.
Now out of this massive defendant group that they’re trying to sue there is also a small, but notable and important fraction that include some of the world’s most notorious hackers and similar Internet junkies. The last thing anyone in their right or left mind would ever want to do is to piss off everyone in that whole entire group. Even if they aren’t all in this lawsuit as defendents, their friends are and they are definitely not people you want to mess with on any level – especially all of them at once!
The most immediate problem out of this is that in retaliation you know that your movies are going to be immediately given to every place in the world for free and you can’t possibly stop that. On top of that any websites associated with Voltage Pictures, Dunlap, Grubb and Weaver, Hurtlocker and anything remotely similar will get hacked on a daily basis. These are people that when they hack sites go through 40 different countries and they’re pretty good about not getting caught.
And, even more worrisome, there is even a smaller group of these that consist of the 1000 top hackers in the world. They are routinely used or tapped by such government agencies as the CIA (Central Intelligence Agency – even though everyone knows what this stands for I have to do this for the benefit of slow dimwitted attorneys like those at dunlap, grovel and weave – did I misspell that?), the NSA, the Mossad, etc…
There’s a reason why these agencies hire and tap this group of people – they are the best in the world at what they do. You do not want to mess with them. They can make your life a living hell and will. If you’ve seen the movie Enemy of the State you can see a little bit of what could truly happen here. This group of hackers could literally erace or eradicate Voltage Pictures, the CEO of Voltage Pictures, the idiot attorneys at Dunlap, Grubb and Weaver and more.
Now aside from the horrible backlash that apparently neither Voltage Pictures nor their attorneys took into consideration, you next have to take a look into their complaint, lawsuit and its claims. When you read it you have to ask yourself if it was actually written by a competent attorney? And if so they must’ve gone to the complete dipshit school of Law. Where in the hell is there a school of law that teaches you to write a lawsuit complaint at a third grade level that is basically complete bull crap?
Maybe they went to the University of Phoenix school of Law or some other online school that is completely worthless. If not, whatever school of Law they graduated from needs to be disciplined for graduating complete idiots that have no understanding of the law, horrible writing skills and complete ineptitude. You have to actually read the lawsuit complaint to see what I mean.
I read it and laughed for hours. In it they are trying to explain why they think that Washington DC holds jurisdiction over the thousands of John Doe defendants from all over the country and possibly even outside of the country. Their argument is that because these defendants used Internet services that might be used in Washington DC that they should be held liable there. That is preposterous.
The law is you can only sue an individual in there county that they reside in unless they caused an auto accident out of state or similar. You cannot sue someone because the service they use is located near you or convenient to you. If any of these defendants wish to put forth a motion to have this pathetic (and yes I do mean pathetic) lawsuit quashed due to wrong venue it will easily be found for and the suit dropped.
The only defendants this might stand for is those that actually live in and around Washington DC in its immediate vicinity. Everyone else must be sued in their own state and county. Sorry Voltage Pictures and the dumbass attorneys at Dunlap, Grubb and Weaver. Now, a second issue is the fact that they have not released how they have exactly gotten these ISP numbers for the defendants and how accurate this data really is. It is a well known fact that the best programs for doing this out there will not be 100% correct. So what is the error rate?
How many people that did not illegally download terrible movies like Hurtlocker will they try to bully and make them pay $1500 or so? The other problem is that even if they have the correct ISP number, how can you possibly prove that the individual that it is assigned to was the one that downloaded the movie? What if they have a wireless router and a neighbor was using it? Can you sue someone because someone that wasn’t supposed to be using it did it?
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This is kind of like if a drug dealer decided to send a pound of marijuana to President Obama at the White House. Would Obama get arrested? No because he didn’t order of the pot to the White House – he has better means of getting it that wouldn’t be that obvious and stupid. Now this may sound ridiculous, but the point is that can one be held responsible if they didn’t do something and you can’t prove that they did it?
The problem that Voltage and Dunlap, Grubb and Weaver have here is that they cannot prove that anybody downloaded anything. All they have is a list of ISP numbers. That’s it. Now with these ISP numbers and their lawsuit they’re going after the Internet service providers themselves to get the account information released for each of these ISP numbers. This account information provides names, addresses and phone numbers for each account owner, but in no way does any of this information prove that they were the actual culprit that downloaded this B rated movie Hurtlocker.
Now the problem here compounds very quickly because all it takes is for a few of these defendants to stand up against this legal bullying (which may be illegal and a tort in and of itself as an abuse of the legal system) and countersue. Worse yet, what if a group of them get together and form a class action lawsuit against Voltage Pictures, Dunlap, Grubb and Weaver? With the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union for the attorneys at DGW) and other agencies and organizations out there already on the battlefront this could be a distinct possibility in the very near future and it would actually bankrupt Voltage Pictures, the attorneys Dunlap, Grubb and Weaver and any other parties on the plaintiff’s side.
You also have to question how they got the ISP addresses. Were laws broken in this endeavor? Most likely yes. Privacy laws were flouted and the case could be brought that in so doing they committed wire fraud amongst other things. Can one actually gain access on a users habits without their permission? This is exactly what they did and how they did it!
This to anyone with half a brain is a war that Voltage and its moronic attorneys Dunlap, Grubb and Weaver cannot win. It’s destined to become the Internet Vietnam! If you are unfortunately a defendant from these morons in this lawsuit, understand your rights, definitely file a motion to quash based on the fact you do not live in Washington DC and they have no jurisdiction over you, and do not be bullied into settling with these idiots.
If you want a laugh, be sure to read the actual lawsuit document itself here:
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100528/1044069619.shtml
You will definitely agree with me that it was written by some very moronic attorneys at best. It is my opinion that these dimwitted attorneys could not find their way out of a paperbag let alone a courtroom! Dunlap, Grubb and Weaver are destined to become the laughing stock of attorneys everywhere and the entire legal profession for that matter.
Great writeup. I back you 100%. Their lawsuit has no merit and is just an extortion attempt. It will certainly be interesting to see how this plays out. Besides, you are right, there is a lot of buzz at the various hacker forums on how to handle Voltage and their law firm. It sounds like massive hacking or similar on a scale never seen before may happen sooner then one might think. Good, I want to see Voltage and the lawfirm of Dunlap, Grubbs and Weaver get what they deserve for trying to extort the online community.
Well-loved. Like or Dislike:
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I think this is an actual case of extortion through the legal system. Lawyers in California were doing this until the state legislature had enough of it and they started charging them with rackateering and extortion amongst other things. That is what will probably happen here. I followed the link and read the actual lawsuit and claims. You are right. They have no grounds and are fishing in the dark. Anyone can easily make a motion to have the case dismissed on grounds of jurisdiction.
Also, you made a great point on privacy issues. How did they obtain the original isp addresses and pertinant information? They had to have hacked into the Bittorrent website and similar download torrent sites. That is illegal. Also stealing sensitive information is illegal and just as bad, if not worse than the initial pirating that may or may not have occured.
I see a class action lawsuit on behalf of the defendants they are trying to extort. This will end very bad for the movie producer and their law firm. They must be doing this out of desperation (due to the recession) or shear stupidity.
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yeah, not only do these jackasses need an epic hack campaign waged aginst them, they also need a good old fashioned flamming bag of crap left on the doorstep.. it takes a real souless jackass to extort money from regular everyday people trying to make a living!! since when did seeing a movie for free become such an epic crime? when i was a kid we would sit on my buddy’s roof and watch the drive in movie screen for free, and crappy static sound on the am dial.. should my parents have been bankrupted over that? i can’t count the number of movies i watched that way.. this law needs to be fixed, i could go to Bestbuy and steal the crappy move and the penalty would be way less severe.. you can’t just treat people like they committed some epic crime.. they need to find another way to curb illegal downloading… this is getting ridiculous.
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With randomizers there is no way the Hurtlocker lawyers at Dunlap, Grubb and weaver can prove that they have the correct ISP addresses. With some of these randomizers (which most of the torrent downloaders use) it can insert anyones ISP address. So, how can they prove that someone illegally downloaded their movie? They can’t. Fight them and they will go away. They are trying to extort people for a quick profit. Extortion in any form is illegal and worse than illegal downloading.
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Those attorneys are dumbasses. That is a complete obfuscation of justice. It is extortion no matter how you look at it. Scumbag attorneys!
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I got a letter from my ISP 2 years ago warning me that if I continued to participate in illegal dowloads that they would end my Internet service. Then I found the awsome and totaly secure VPN at TorrentPrivacy.com and I’m downloading lie never before and I have yet o receive any threatening letters or similar from my ISP or elsewhere! Fuck Voltage Pictures and their attorneys! Be 100% anonymous anddowload whatever you want at TorrentPrivacy.com!
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i dont know what you all are reading but DGW seam to be doing just about what they want. the judge seems to allow them to do everything. you cant tell me that sueing all theses does at once can be legal
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I vote for a complete international ban and boycott of everything from Voltage pictures and their scumbag attorneys!
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Dunlap, Grubb and weaver attorneys sent me a letter demanding I send them $3,000 for downloading that pathetic movie Hurt Locker. I had it returned to them and marked does not live here anymore on it. Let’s see what those jackasses do with that. They can suck my left nut and I still won’t give them a dime.
Well-loved. Like or Dislike:
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I got a letter from them demanding $3,000 for something i did not do! I got a virus and i think that some how started to DL the movie. Anyone have any idea on what i should do?
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