ST, Aug 14th 2007
By Chua Hian Hou
THE Singapore distributor of popular Japanese animated cartoons called anime has won the right to track down fans who download the programmes illegally using their Starhub Internet accounts.
A Subordinate Court has ordered the telco to disclose the identity of about 1,000 of its subscribers accused of illegally downloading anime.
It is believed to be one of the largest crackdowns on illegal Internet downloading by home users in Singapore.
The recent hearing was held in a closed chamber session, so few details of the case are available publicly. The action was taken by local anime distributor Odex.
StarHub had initially resisted the company's efforts to get its customer data, said a spokesman for the telco, as it had 'an obligation to protect our customers' information'.
But it now has no choice but to comply with the court order, as Odex had 'satisfied the court of its need for the information'.
Once Odex obtains the identities of these Internet users from StarHub, it is expected to write to them demanding a settlement of up to $5,000 and a promise to stop further illegal downloading.
In May, Odex went after 17 SingNet subscribers after obtaining a similar court order. It then sent more letters to an undisclosed number of other SingNet subscribers also accused of illegally downloading anime.
Odex director Peter Go said a few infringers with financial difficulties were allowed to settle for about $1,000. He added that a number of those who had received the letter had engaged lawyers, but did not contest Odex's case.
Having succeeded in getting SingNet and StarHub customer lists, Odex will now go after customers of another Internet service provider, Pacific Internet (PacNet), in the Subordinate Courts later this week. It is understood Odex has accused about 1,000 PacNet users of illegal downloading.
PacNet spokesman Bernard Ho said the firm was 'resisting the application' made by Odex in court.
However, lawyers familiar with such applications say they have a strong track record of success. But information obtained this way is not always useful to the plaintiff. For instance, the user may no longer be in the country.
Popular with both children and adults, the anime industry was worth as much as US$5 billion ($7.5 billion) worldwide, according to a 2004 BusinessWeek report. However, illegal downloads, available online since the late 1990s, have cut deeply into the profits of producers and distributors.
Mr Go said the South Korean anime market, once the world's second largest after Japan, collapsed several years ago due to piracy problems.
This prompted Japanese studios making anime to band together to mount the crackdown here as they were worried Singapore, although not as big a market, would end up the same way.
A 23-year-old anime fan acknowledged that there was some truth to Mr Go's words.
'At my peak a while ago, I used to download five to 10 gigabytes of anime a week,' said the undergraduate, who declined to be named.
Now, he is resigned that his past will catch up with him.
'It's just a matter of time before I get the dreaded Odex letter.'
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Court forces ISP to reveal culprits
Netizens cry foul- How did company track downloaders?
New Paper, Aug 9 2007
By Liew Hanqing
THE white school shoes lined up neatly at the reception area were telling.
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| Popular series Inuyasha is one of the anime series distributed by Odex here. |
Inside were several frowning parents with their teenage children in tow.
That was the scene at Odex's office at International Plaza on Monday.
Odex is the local distributor of Japanese anime cartoons which made news recently when it cracked down on illegal downloaders here.
Most of those caught were students - one, a 9-year-old child.
The episode has caused a huge uproar among Netizens, who are worried that their online privacy has been compromised.
How did Odex, which distributes popular Japanese anime series such as Bleach, Inuyasha and D.Gray-man here, find out who had been downloading illegally?
TROUBLING
Said Mr David Lee, 23, who collects anime box sets: 'What's troubling is how it seems like the ISPs are prepared to divulge user information so readily.'
After some persuasion, Mr Peter Go, managing director of Odex, revealed how the company had done it.
He told The New Paper that a US company had been hired to track down the illegal downloaders.
'All the information we obtained was through the proper channels,' he said.
Mr Go declined to reveal the name of the company Odex hired, saying only that it was also involved in several high-profile copyright infringement cases in the US.
He said that the data collected was then used to obtain a court order.
The court order required Internet service providers (ISPs) to provide the account information of users whose internet protocol (IP) addresses had been linked to illegal downloading.
On disclosing users' identities, a SingTel spokesman said: 'SingTel has a strict policy of not disclosing customer information to external parties.
'In this particular case, Odex's solicitors had obtained a court order that required us to release the information to them.'
Then came the tedious process of matching the names obtained from the ISPs to the files they had downloaded, as tracked by the US company.
Additional administrative staff had to be hired to do the matching.
Infringing users were then sent letters, inviting them to enter discussions with Odex to avoid legal action being taken against them.
Users who admitted to the downloads were made to pay between $3,000 and $5,000 in reimbursement fees to Odex, according to Mr Go.
They also had to sign a letter of undertaking promising not to illegally download any anime licensed to Odex.
NO CLAIMS MADE YET
He said: 'At this stage, we have not claimed damages against any of the downloaders.
'The money they've been made to pay is to cover the costs which Odex has incurred.'
Mr Go said besides the usual legal fees, they had to pay the ISPs for identification of users, the US company hired to track illegal downloads, as well as the additional administrative staff.
Mr Go added that the company had no choice, as Odex's business had been severely hurt by illegal downloads.
He said: 'Our sales for 2006 fell more than 50 per cent compared to the year before.'
Statistics show that Odex's declining sales are part of a global trend.
And even though 13-episode anime VCD box sets released by Odex cost just $10, and DVD box sets, $20, consumers were not biting, Mr Go said.
Sales of the box sets have been poor, and got even worse last year.
Odex is still sending letters to users who have been identified as illegal downloaders - one ISP at a time.
Said Mr Go: 'We just haven't finished matching the data obtained from the other ISPs yet. We are not targeting any ISP in particular.'
LEGAL ACTION
He added that Odex would begin taking legal action if the situation does not improve.
He said: 'We would like to avoid getting to the point where we have to raid the homes of those who download illegally. But if this continues, we may soon have to.'
Mr Go said that while there was a 50 per cent drop in the number of illegal downloads a week after Odex sent out the first batch of letters, the number of downloads went back to normal the following week.
Mr Go said he was frustrated that users on anime forums were discussing ways to continue downloading anime illegally, without getting caught.
He said: 'There are so many ways people can get their anime fix.
'And our VCDs and DVDs are already priced about as low as they can go, but people still aren't buying.
'It's very sad.'
Under the Copyright Act, users found guilty of wilful and significant downloads face fines of up to $20,000 and up to six months in jail.
The Act does not specify what constitutes a significant number of downloads......................................................
Business ethics
-Is a specialized study of moral right and wrong.
-It concentrates on moral standards as they apply to business policies, institutions and behaviour and to the systems and organizations through which modern societies produce goods and services and to the people who work within these organizations.
Do you think that there are any ethics involved in business? Nah. Ethics dont get you money or bring you anywhere. Mainland china is an example. In the capitalist world we live in today the key ideal that drives us is the pursuit of monetary gain, be it thru whatever avenue we might choose. In a country where regulation is subservient to those who wield it there is no room for ethics and implications. I can make money through this so what?
No, there is no use spouting profanities and cursing and swearing at how the situation has becomes. We should accept the fact that it is this society that we live in, the grim reality of what life really is. It is not a bed of roses.
In a way one of the very poignant texts which relates closely to the situation would be Aeon Flux. Replace the Goodchilds with a different name and voila. There you have it. As is quoted in the film- "we trade our freedom for a gilded cage". At the same time, we should be thankful for this cage- it is responsible for shaping us into the individuals that we are. Undoubtedly, it is very easily to condemn a system because it does not work the way it does, but then we are all fallible human beings.
But what else can we do but complain? It is what we have been doing, it is what our whole culture is about. We are shaped by this influence into the people that we are today. Perhaps what we can do, is not to lament the fact that everything sucks. (cos it really does) It is just the same old thing being rehashed over and over again, the endless rhetoric about how lousy things are, and how we all yearn for a better life.
Rhetoric stays as rhetoric. Nobody will ever do anything, because they cant, and they wont. We are selfish creatures, merely concerned with the state of our own personal well being.
Like i told a friend one night before, i guess what you can do is, perhaps, choose alternatives to a bad situation. It may suck, but complaining solves nothing. A simple boycott and an import purchase is an action that speaks louder than a million letters and angry online posts.
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