FTD sleept Stichting Brein voor de rechter. De usenet-community wil dat Brein door de rechtbank wordt gedwongen een rectificatie te plaatsen. Daarin zou het uitspraken dat FTD’s activiteiten strafbaar zouden zijn, moeten herroepen.

via FTD sleept Brein voor de rechter | Pro | Tweakers.net Nieuws[NL].

The small piece of text above is the first part of a Dutch article that announces an interesting change in the (anti-)’piracy’ world. The Dutch Usenet user group FTD charged the Dutch RIAA-light, Stichting Brein — Foundation Brein or Brain, website at http://www.anti-piracy.nl/home/home.asp — because they finally had enough of their Director Tim Kuik — yes, the same one who said that downloading software is always illegal — constantly telling the press and the rest of the world that the group of Usenet users was doing illegal things, without providing much funding.

Earlier the FTD already gave in to pressure[NL] adapted their client to meet Stichting Brein‘s demands a bit, one of the things the removed was the NZB search engine. According to advices from a legal counsellor they were operating within the law at least afterwards. Brein continued with spreading messages saying that the FTD was doing illegal things. Moreover, they said legal action wasn’t ruled out.

FTD also has commercial interests in their client, because they sell ad space. Because of continuing, and like said before, unfounded, claims by Brein they were afraid they might lose people willing to pay them for placing their ads. Furthermore they were getting fed up with constantly being threatened.

Now, for the first time in the Netherlands, and probably also in Europe — correct me if I’m wrong — someone has charged the anti-’piracy’ organisation instead of vice-versa. What’s more, they don’t only want to get Stichting Brein to place a rectification at their website for three months, they also want the judge to tell if downloading via Usenet and providing links to Usenet downloads on forums is either legal or illegal. For that they’ve used the form of a bodemprocedure — German: Hauptsacheverfahren, Google Translate English: substantive issues.

I’m curious about the results of this very interesting trial. I’m sure other parties like Google and The Pirate Bay will also keep an eye on this to see if it’s going to have any consequences for them. I hope the judge will manage to stop Stichting Brein from spreading it’s FUD — they’re very good at it, they once spread a anti-’piracy’ tool that removed all music from your computer, regardless of its legal status.