"We just link to videos!" won't stave off MPAA lawyers: Via arstechnica

Now, camcorded films like Twilight are offered up in Flash by sites that splay advertisements across the screen and pop them up repeatedly along the bottom of the video in question. Even those who don't see anything wrong with "noncommercial" sharing between a couple of thousand friends can't see such solutions as anything other than piracy.

But the key question is whether sites like Campusist are engaged in that piracy, or whether the fact that they simply link to other sites grants them immunity. This latter argument is the one routinely advanced by The Pirate Bay and other torrent trackers. But, when every link on a site leads to an infringing copy of a film, does the "Hey, I'm just linking to some stuff!" argument still carry weight?

The MPAA doesn't think so, and yesterday it filed suits against three websites: Campusist, Movies-on-demand.tv, and Sswarez.com. The move is part of MPAA's continuing legal campaign to target distribution sites, and the film business has yet to engage in the sort of widespread suing of individuals that has characterized the music industry's approach.

Read Original Article ( Via arstechnica. )