U.S. charges man in camcorder-piracy crackdown

A Missouri man is the first to be indicted under a new federal law that prohibits people from secretly videotaping movies when they are shown in theaters, the U.S. Justice Department said Thursday.

Curtis Salisbury, 19, used a camcorder to make copies of recent releases "The Perfect Man" and "Bewitched" and then distributed them through illicit computer networks that specialize in piracy, the Justice Department said.

A law that took effect in April prohibits such behavior.

Salisbury also downloaded several movies and software programs from the computer network, the Justice Department said.

Salisbury, who faces up to 17 years in prison, could not be reached for comment.

Entertainment industry insiders and tech-savvy hackers use "warez" networks, as they're commonly known, to distribute movies, music and software for free, often before they're released to the public.

The files then end up on peer-to-peer networks like Kazaa, where they can be downloaded by millions of people, or burned onto discs and sold on street corners.

Law enforcement officials say most participants in warez networks are generally not motivated by profit. In this instance, Salisbury sought payment for the movies he uploaded, the Justice Department said.

The Justice Department has targeted warez networks before, most recently in a June 30 raid that involved more than a dozen countries.

Salisbury, of St. Charles, Mo., was arrested as part of that effort. He has been charged with conspiracy and copyright infringement, along with two violations of the camcorder law.

Camcorder piracy accounts for over 90 percent of movies that turn up on the Internet while they're still in theaters, said the head of a movie industry trade group.

"The creative works of the entertainment industry belong to the millions of people who make them and are not for others to steal or unlawfully distribute," said Dan Glickman, head of the Motion Picture Association of America.

Story Copyright © 2008 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.

[brian o'blivion]

U.S. law has lost all perspective.

A potential 17 years of a person's life for petty entertainment piracy!? The very idea makes me sick to my stomach. Salisbury might be better off with a first degree murder charge. The American lawmakers have lost their grip on reality and the entertainment industry should be ashamed of itself.

petty entertainment piracy?

If you put millions of dollars into creating a movie and it was distributed without compensation, you would want the person(s) responsible for it to be punished too.

I'd like to see ANYONE work long hours to get a project done and never be compensated for it, even you demand raises and a paycheck. And don't bring volunteer work into the equation, its not a valid argument.

U.S. Law Is So Wrong...

So selling drugs on the street corners, murders, homicides, drunk driving, racism etc is not important anymore and software piracy puts a person in jail? The movie industry isnt LOOSING money to piracy, THEIR LOOSING MONEY BECAUSE OF CRAPPY MOVIES!

Plan and simple, make a good flick, it will sell, make a crappy one, who cares.

Death penalty to all criminals

Just give the death penalty to every criminal out there. You'd have to execute this young man for piracy. You'd also have to execute the executives of the MPAA for antitrust.

[R. U. Sirius]

The Real Crime Here

The real crime here is that someone would even bother to watch these two crappy movies to begin with. What Hollywood movie this year, other than maybe the latest Batman, has really been quality.
And please don't say "Star Wars III", because it was an overhyped Saturday morning matinee.

By the way Cnet, P2P networks aren't "illicit." I recommend you fix that sentence. It's the act of pirating that is illicit, not the network itself.

gizmodo.com

thats right giz... well said! I will have to find
myself a new bumper sticker.... if the false
terrorists.. cough cough I mean.. civil liberties
protectors of freedom, peace keepers... dont
remove it.. jesus! they let out all the air in my
car tire... the right front.. just like they let
out all the air from my bike tires when i lived
on Oahu.

Friendly Fire... geeze, I cant even choose my own
computer names anymore... or actually, my own
router names... ;0