This is the latest of setbacks for the US case against the internet file sharing service and its management. The US and Hollywood has been trying to claim that Megaupload was a haven for piracy and that Dotcom encouraged, hid and profited from it. They threw together a few charges that ended up including the words “conspiracy, fraud and money laundering” this trio gave the US all the power it needed to seize everything from Dotcom and also to close down all operations. The fact that there was no real evidence to support the original charges did not matter to the people involved. They appear to have felt that they would be able to find something (anything) to support their claims after they seized all of the Megaupload servers and Dotcom’s personal computers.

Unfortunately for the US, they appear not to have found anything to support their case, but the New Zealand courts have found that the search warrants were illegal, the removal of evidence to the US was also illegal, that the imprisonment of Dotcom was not warranted and finally that keeping funds from Dotcom and preventing him from presenting a proper defense is also not exactly legal. We are wondering if the courts are resenting the way the US has used them in this operation (we would guess yes).

While things are going well for Dotcom in New Zealand the US is not budging. They know they have nothing, but are choosing to continue the siege in the hopes that they bankrupt Dotcom, Megaupload and everyone that helped in the operation. From the start this was meant to send a message and the Copyright cartels are continuing attempt to do that. They have launched an aggressive campaign that is affecting many levels of the file sharing community with a barrage of DMCA takedown requests (in some cases within hours of the original posts).  

However, Dotcom is not taking this lying down and is maintaining the guard at the battlements in this siege. He has stated that he will launch the Megabox music service this year and also will bring back Megaupload with a new and resilient network infrastructure (including using non-US hosting services). It is a direct slap in the face to the Copyright industry that many feel acted to remove a competitor in the form of the Megabox services and not anything to do with Piracy. After all how did the MPAA and RIAA go from praising the systems used on Megaupload to declaring them a global piracy and criminal ring in the span of a couple of months?

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