Now some will argue that because their services extend to the US and some of the people that used the file locker for piracy are in the US they have the right to go after them (some of these are the same people that argued against imposing foreign laws on US Citizens…). However there is still a flaw in that logic as it assumes the service was provided specifically for the commission of a crime and also that the users here were acting as some sort of agent for the company. Attempting to make a foreign corporation liable for the conduct of their domestic users is ridiculous. It is on par with the same mindset that says the food industry is responsible for making people overweight. The individual end users knew what they were doing and would have used another service if MegaUpload were not available.

As it stands now the US DoJ is on some shaky ground. They have already been ordered by the Judge in New Zealand (where Dotcom and the other managers live) to hand over ALL evidence on the case in less than three weeks. Now they are facing an official motion filed in the US to dismiss the case entirely due to a lack of real jurisdiction.

“In short, a corporation such as Megaupload cannot be brought within the jurisdiction of this court for criminal proceedings absent its consent."

MegaUpload has not given its consent to be tried for a crime that actually does not exist. As we mentioned the US is trying to claim that they encouraged users to pirate movies, but according to MegaUpload’s legal team they complied with every legitimate takedown request sent to them.

“It would have to hold the company criminally responsible for the acts of copyright infringement committed by its users. And there is no such thing as criminal secondary copyright infringement”

Some are speculating that the original takedown was over a deal that MegaUpload was working on with a few recording artists to provide a direct download method for their work. It was already an established outlet for many independent musicians and filmmakers that were not working inside the US MPAA or RIAA cartels. This, if successful would have left both of these organizations out in the cold and had a good chance of breaking their strangle hold on creative efforts in the US at least.

There is sure to be more on this as things heat up in the case. MegaUpload’s lawyers have also asked the money be released to allow for a proper defense. We will keep you up to date on where this one goes.

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