Mininova limits its activities to Content Distribution service

Hi all, Today is an important day in the history of Mininova. From now on, we are limiting Mininova.org to our Content Distribution service. By doing so, we comply with the ruling of the Court of Utrecht of last August. Unfortunately the court ruling leaves us no other option than to take our platform offline, except for the Content Distribution service. According to the verdict (Dutch link) we have to prevent uploads of torrents to Mininova that refer to certain titles or to similar-looking titles. We've been testing some filtering systems the last couple of months, but we found that it's neither technically nor operationally possible to implement a 100% working filter system. Therefore, we decided that the only option is to limit Mininova to Content Distribution torrents from now on. We are still considering an appeal at this moment. We launched our Content Distribution service in 2007. This service allows producers and artists to easily publish and distribute their content for free through Mininova. The launch of Content Distribution has proven to be a success. Countless content owners have used Content Distribution to distribute their content (e.g. albums and documentaries) for free to millions of users. For example, the Dutch band Silence is Sexy released their complete album on Mininova and received the Interactive Award 2009 for doing so. The Dutch television broadcaster VPRO decided to start using Content Distribution in 2009 in order to distribute documentaries. We would like to thank you for your support. Especially everyone that contributed to Mininova receives a big "thank you!" for the effort! We hope to keep welcoming you on Mininova and our other projects (e.g. Snotr, Dispostable). Thanks! The Mininova staff

Mininova considers appealing in Brein case

Utrecht, August 26th 2009 - Today the Dutch Court of Utrecht ruled that BitTorrent platform Mininova acts unlawful. Mininova considers to appeal this judgment. The court did not agree with Brein on all demands. Specifically, it ruled that Mininova does not infringe copyright and neighboring rights. The court also found Mininova can not be expected to remove files that are "reasonably likely" refer to infringing material. Remarkably, the verdict does not give any consideration to the fact that Mininova has developed a content filter for Brein, nor to the cooperation between Mininova and other organizations of rights holders. This surprises Mininova, because it has always stressed the importance of cooperation. Erik Dubbelboer, co-founder of Mininova: "We are obviously not satisfied with this ruling. The result of this ruling for Mininova is that we have to reevaluate our business operations. At this time, we cannot determine what this will actually entail or imply. We will have to examine the verdict thoroughly first. We are considering to appeal this judgment."

Special HDD deal for Mininova users

Hi everyone, Most people will probably experience similar problems with storage like us: you never have enough space. You just bought a new hard-drive and within a few weeks you filled it up again. All this storage -- even though it is getting cheaper -- is still quite expensive. So we were immediately interested when the guys at Freecom contacted us with a cool offer for our users: 20% discount on the "Freecom Hard Drive XS" series. We think this is a great opportunity for you to get a good hard-drive for little money. The prices listed below are less than in any other place we could find and the drives are shipped worldwide.
Media_httpwwwmininova_fbdbr
The drive itself received very good reviews. It is housed in a special rubber casing which makes it both very quiet (no fan) and provides optimal grip. Since it's the smallest type of external hard-drive (3.5") and because of the anti-shock rubber, it's perfect to carry around or to take to friends to exchange files. In order to get the 20% off all you need to do is enter the following promo code on the Freecom checkout page:

mininovaxs

  • 500 GB / 1 TB / 1.5 TB
  • Smallest 3.5" external hard drive
  • Quiet, thanks to fan-less design
  • Rubberized enclosure, reducing vibration and providing optimal grip
  • Turbo USB 2.0 driver for faster data transfer speeds (Windows only)
  • High quality, sleek design (18.2 x 11.4 x 3.1 cm)
  • One year manufacturers warranty, free help-desk support
You can choose between 3 sizes: 500 GB -
Media_httpwwwmininova_atbvb
buy now
€79.00 / $99.00 / £74.99 €63.20 / $79.20 / £59.99 1 TB -
Media_httpwwwmininova_atbvb
buy now
€109.00 / $139.00 / £99.98 €87.20 / $111.20 / £79.98 1.5 TB -
Media_httpwwwmininova_atbvb
buy now
€139.00 / $179.00 / £124.99 €111.20 / $143.20 / £99.99 The code will only be active for 2 weeks (till 09-08-2009) or until the drives go out of stock, so make sure you order quickly! You can order the harddisks by clicking on the product link above. Cheers, The Mininova staff

Mininova demands rectification report from working group

Hi all, In January 2008, a working group was installed with the goal to evaluate copyright laws. The working group consists of four members of the Dutch parliament. Two weeks ago, the working group published a report with the name Auteursrechten. Een rapport ('Copyright - a report'). The report includes several recommendations related to reforming copyright laws. Unfortunately the report includes several factually incorrect assumptions related to Mininova, among which:
  • That Mininova refuses to remove torrent files after a complaint has been filed
  • That Mininova adds 'reviews' to torrent files uploaded by users
  • That Mininova pro-actively removes torrents that refer to 'incorrect content (e.g. porn)'
Besides these factual errors, the report also implies that all torrents on Mininova refer to copyrighted material, that Mininova hosts the content itself, and that Mininova profits from distributing these torrents. We are very displeased with the fact that the working group didn't contact us prior to releasing this report, or even took a look at mininova.org. If they had done so, they would've seen that we offer a copyright policy service for content owners for years and that we work closely with the content industry. We demand that the spreading of false information related to Mininova will be stopped. In addition, we demand that the working group removes the name Mininova from the report and places a rectification on the website of the Dutch parliament and in several national newspapers. If these demands are not met, we'll consider legal steps. To our surprise and nuisance the working group refuses to respond to the essence of the claim, being the factual errors about us and our services. That's it for now, stay tuned for updates! - The Mininova staff

Bruno interview (update)

Hi all, On July 10, 2009 the movie Brüno will be released in cinemas worldwide. Actor Sacha Baron Cohen (of Ali G and Borat fame) will play yet another funny character - if you liked his previous appearances, you'll love this one! Digg Dialogg is doing an interview with Brüno next week, and we will post the interview on June 30 here on Mininova. That's not all: you can submit your questions to Bruno, and the top rated questions will be asked! That's it for now - keep watching Mininova on June 30! --update-- The interview with Brüno has been published. Cheers, The Mininova staff

Court trial with BREIN postponed until June 2nd

Hi all, The upcoming court trial with BREIN, which was planned on Wednesday May 20th, has been postponed until Tuesday June 2nd, at 13:00 hours. The reason for this postponement is solely due to personal circumstances of our attorney and has explicitly nothing to do with the content of the case. We would like to thank the parties involved for their cooperation in this postponement. Regards, The Mininova staff

Torrent removal trial

Hi all, Here at Mininova we are working continuously on ways to improve our platform. One example is our content distribution service, where we offer producers and artists a way to expose and share their work with BitTorrent users. Today, we decided to extend our platform and run a trial with content recognition. This basically means that likely infringing video files referred to by torrents are checked by a third party content recognition system. If the system finds that the file corresponds to unauthorized content, we remove and block the torrent that refers to this file on Mininova. We hope that this system will make it easier for copyright owners to remove torrents that refer to infringing content from Mininova, while still offering the best platform to our users. Cheers! The Mininova staff