Bad news?

Not sure if everybody knows but there’s a current RIAA-ish crackdown on hi res images on the net right now. So hi res pics might probably be a little harder to come by.

See, one of the best sources for hi res pics (dainews.nu) was hit with a copyright infringement notice from lawyers.

Apparently this all started when some eBay user was selling some Jessica Alba photos with the Dai watermark removed in an auction. A member on Dai’s site decided to bid on a pic and then back out at the last minute – questioning the legitimacy of the work. Whoever the seller was is also a member at Dai’s site because the guy that bid on the pic outed the seller in an e-mail by their screen name. The seller then had all his auctions terminated when the good samaritan reported him. The seller then reported Dainews to the company that legally owns these hi res pic so as to kill source material from getting on Dainews.

It was MediaVast that issued out the cease and desist letter. Mediavast is also affiliated with WireImage, FilmMagic, Contour Photos and WireImageSTOCK. All sources of hi res pictures on the net.

MediaVast is also slowly going after other sites that are distributing these hi res pics. See, they don’t want people sharing these hi res pics anymore. At least not for free. And definitely not for a price on any other site besides their own.

WireImage, for example, charges something like $79.95/month for access to their entire archive of pics. By having other people share those hi res pics outside of their site, they’re pretty much losing money that way.

Take a look at the message Desperado put on his site:

“As of today, this site will no longer offer HQ type pictures. There are too many potential problems going on these days, and we do not need them. This site is free; let’s keep it that way. From this point on only caps, collages, scans, etc. will fill these pages.

Remember, unless it is a vidcap or some other non HQ image, it will no longer appear on this site.”

So what does this all mean? Well, as you all probably know, i LOVE posting hi res pics on fubar. I don’t know if i’ll still be posting them up as much, seeing as to how they *might* be harder to find, but i also wouldn’t want any trouble from lawyers and crap. Not that they would ever come for me but hey, you never know.

Anyhow, it’s still too early to tell what’s gonna happen. Maybe things’ll change, maybe they won’t. We’ll just have to see. After all, people are still sharing MP3’s like crazy aren’t they?

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