This thesis examines the legal arguments of the U.S. government and Kim Dotcom in the shutdown of MegaUpload, which was the biggest file-hosting site. In January 2012, the U.S. government shut down MegaUpload and alleged its owner, Kim Dotcom, and several executives for criminal copyright infringement. However, Kim Dotcom argued that his business was legal and qualified for The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) safe harbors. Two arguments seem to conflict in the shutdown of MegaUpload. This thesis firstly review legal concepts related to secondary liability for third-party infringement and found that there are two different approaches to interpret third-party infringement. After the creation of the DMCA, the third-party infringement is still evolving. Therefore, some inconsistencies were found between the DMCA and the doctrine of third-party infringement. In Grokster, the Court developed a new doctrine of third-party infringement, inducement. According to this doctrine, online service providers who purposefully encourage and abet infringement should be held liable even though they do not have specific knowledge of infringing activity. In the analysis of the legal arguments in the shutdown of MegaUpload, this thesis found that the U.S. government tended to interpret third-party infringement in a relatively expansive way and contended that a service provider should be held liable for any infringement they are capable of controlling it. In this case, the U.S. government even went further than its precedents and alleged the MegaUpload should be held for criminal copyright infringement rather than civil copyright infringement. However, Kim Dotcom argued that MegaUpload should qualify for the DMCA safe harbors and therefore he and his business should not be held liable. This case pointed out at least three important questions. First of all, what is the priority of applying the DMCA and third-party infringement; second, how to apply criminal copyright infringement and inducement to a service provider; and third, how to find a balance between exclusive rights of copyright holders and the innovation of online services. In conclusion, the thesis suggests that future research can still pay attention to the development of this case. Also, Kim Dotcom has started a new Mega service, which is operated as a cloud service. Future research can also focus on the liability on cloud storage service providers / A Thesis submitted to the School of Communication in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. / Spring Semester, 2013. / March 29, 2013. / MegaUpload, secondary liability, third-party infringement / Includes bibliographical references. / Stephen McDowell, Professor Directing Thesis; Jennifer Proffitt, Committee Member; Andrew Opel, Committee Member.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_183762 |
| Contributors | Huang, Kuo-Ting (authoraut), McDowell, Stephen (professor directing thesis), Proffitt, Jennifer (committee member), Opel, Andrew (committee member), School of Communication (degree granting department), Florida State University (degree granting institution) |
| Publisher | Florida State University, Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Language | English, English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text, text |
| Format | 1 online resource, computer, application/pdf |
| Rights | This Item is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use this Item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s). The copyright in theses and dissertations completed at Florida State University is held by the students who author them. |
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