Hey guys: For the first time ever, I am trying to set up a blog. I am typically interested in making it about ebooks of different types. Now, my question is that is it illegal to put links of rapidshare and other file hosts on my blog. I am confused because since no copyrighted "material" like books are uploaded on the blog itself...is it still against the copyright law to make an ebook blog? ------Thank you very much for your feedback!!!---------(I am from US)
YES! You can get in trouble for promoting illegal acitivity in the US - namely providing illegal content that violates copyright laws, especially when you know about it.
Lets get this straight -_- 1) Its not really illegal to link to warez -_- its freedom of speech but that wont get you really off the hook if u do it a lot they will just shut you down (DMCA) Solution: Thats why you get offshore hosting and also display a warning message. 2) Its illegal to host COPYRIGHTED ebooks. Solution: You get rapidshare to host it 3) There is not much money being made Solution: popups and annoying ads can get you something 4) The dead links is the problem Overall: There is no big point into doing it -_- sinces its kinda late and there are loads of other warez sites. Just place some
just make sure that all links to the ebooks arent held on your server, or you use an offshore host, i would suggest hosting the ebooks on sites such as rapidshare as they should be fine there. ben
Warez is an illegal topic in the USA even if masked as a "security topic." As stated above, you need and offshore hosting service and be careful getting your name linked to such questionable content.
As I wrote earlier (and in the PM), I believe you'll be much better off spending the same amount of money, time, and work on a legal and legit site rather than this one.
But...Since I only have links to the warez sites and not the actual content on my server, why is there a problem ?
In the United States linking to copyrighted material like you are is still considered contributory copyright infringement and is illegal.
You can't use rapidshare either. It against their Conditions of use. I strongly suggest that you follow Whatarewewaitingfor? by creating a legal site. P.S. I'm selling my own ebook so I don't like the idea of your blog. But I did price it so that most people in the world could buy it.
Yea...I guess...but, I think that linking is part of free speech, isn't it? I mean, I can say whatever I want - Say if I stand in the streets of New York and shout out links to copyrighted stuff, I don't think the cops are going to stop me...Coz, it's free speech, and I can speak WHATEVER I want.
Free speech won't allow you to yell "fire" in a crowded theater, threaten to kill someone or link to/distribute copyrighted materials illegally. Giving out copyrighted material on the streets of New York would get you arrested, just look at people trying to sell bootlegged DVD's and getting busted. The United States has very strong laws protecting free speech, but some forms are still restricted.
You need offshore hosting in a country such as malaysia and also be sure to protect you domain name from whois.net