Thursday, January 26, 2012

An interesting take on that Megaupload business...

Not surprising, just interesting...
However, yesterday, a new theory surfaced that indicates Megaupload’s demise had less to do with piracy than previously thought. This theory stems from a 2011 article detailing Megaupload’s upcoming Megabox music store and DIY artist distribution service that would have completely disrupted the music industry.

TorrentFreak first reported about the service in early December 2011. Megabox was just in beta at that time with listed partners of 7digital, Gracenote, Rovi, and Amazon. Megaupload was in a heated marketing battle with the RIAA and MPAA who featured Kim Dotcom in an anti-piracy movie (5:10 mark). The site had just sued Universal Music Group for wrongly blocking Megaupload’s recent star-studded YouTube campaign. Things were getting vicious in December but the quiet launch of Megabox might have been the straw that broke the millionaire’s back.

Dotcom described Megabox as Megaupload’s iTunes competitor, which would even eventually offer free premium movies via Megamovie, a site set to launch in 2012.
"My politicians are bigger than your politicians" is the very model of fascism in practice. Seriously, look it up: The word has an actual definition, and not all uses of it are hyperbolic.

2 comments:

Don said...

Thanks for the link, Joel. For years I've been trying to find something that accurately defined Fascism as an economic, not political, system.

Because some evil dictators chose to use the system to gain and keep power (much as Lenin and Stalin did with Communism), everyone associates it with military dictatorship.

Tam said...

"When buying and selling are controlled by legislation, the first things to be bought and sold are legislators." -O'Rourke