Got this off a blog
After posting about Albumbase, a kluged-together P2P service that is currently offline, I received an email from a reader claiming that the service is ripe for an FBI raid:
Attempting to confirm this, I found a SiteMedia forum discussion showing that Albumbase's creator Jack Cator tried to sell the service for a minimum bid of $5,000 in early 2005. I also confirmed that Albumbase is now owned by the Seattle/Massachusetts-based Tatto, Inc., as anyone can see by reading the service's user agreement (now offline; cached version here).
Jonathan Lamy, communications director for the RIAA, would neither confirm nor deny the Listening Post reader's account. Tatto didn't respond to an email, and the phone number listed on its website leads to a bogus destination at the Boston University Medical Center. Jack Cator wouldn't respond either, and his website says he's on "infinite vacation."
Update: I still haven't heard back from anyone at Albumbase, but the site's back up!
Tatto was recently named one of BusinessWeek's Best Enterpreneurs Under 25. If US agents are really raiding their offices, BusinessWeek might want to revise its selection of finalists.
Then again, it seems unlikely that the FBI would raid an award-winning company; the labels will probably sue Tatto instead, through the RIAA, or otherwise force them to shut down, assuming the authorities really are circling in. But the FBI has raided locations associated with file sharing before. In 2004, federal agents raided the homes of five people who each ran hubs on of the Neomodus Direct Connect file sharing network.
I just emailed Tatto co-founder Lin Miao at his "Chairman Maio" address, and will post an update if I hear anything further about this. For now, the site is down [back up -- see update above] and nobody associated with it is talking.
After posting about Albumbase, a kluged-together P2P service that is currently offline, I received an email from a reader claiming that the service is ripe for an FBI raid:
Attempting to confirm this, I found a SiteMedia forum discussion showing that Albumbase's creator Jack Cator tried to sell the service for a minimum bid of $5,000 in early 2005. I also confirmed that Albumbase is now owned by the Seattle/Massachusetts-based Tatto, Inc., as anyone can see by reading the service's user agreement (now offline; cached version here).
Jonathan Lamy, communications director for the RIAA, would neither confirm nor deny the Listening Post reader's account. Tatto didn't respond to an email, and the phone number listed on its website leads to a bogus destination at the Boston University Medical Center. Jack Cator wouldn't respond either, and his website says he's on "infinite vacation."
Update: I still haven't heard back from anyone at Albumbase, but the site's back up!
Tatto was recently named one of BusinessWeek's Best Enterpreneurs Under 25. If US agents are really raiding their offices, BusinessWeek might want to revise its selection of finalists.
Then again, it seems unlikely that the FBI would raid an award-winning company; the labels will probably sue Tatto instead, through the RIAA, or otherwise force them to shut down, assuming the authorities really are circling in. But the FBI has raided locations associated with file sharing before. In 2004, federal agents raided the homes of five people who each ran hubs on of the Neomodus Direct Connect file sharing network.
I just emailed Tatto co-founder Lin Miao at his "Chairman Maio" address, and will post an update if I hear anything further about this. For now, the site is down [back up -- see update above] and nobody associated with it is talking.
