Archive notice: This article was originally published on July 31, 2007. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
The hunt for the so-called First Seeder has since begun. Only a few hours later, on Saturday at the open day at Frankfurt Police Headquarters, the GVU informed numerous visitors about intellectual property and theft through illegal copies. In doing so, the organization also continued this weekend to disrupt the business of pirates in a targeted way at both ends of the distribution chain: Criminal prosecution of those responsible for a mass distribution of stolen film versions on the one hand, sensitization of end consumers to the value of originals on the other.
In its first days, the original version of “The Simpsons Movie” drew almost as many paying visitors to cinemas as the recently launched film “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix”. To protect such blockbusters from pirates, distributors, cinema operators and the GVU work closely together, as Vincent de La Tour, board member of the GVU and Managing Director of Twentieth Fox Century of Germany – the distributor of “The Simpsons Movie” in Germany – explains. Thus, for example, observation of selected cinema auditoriums with night-vision devices is intended to prevent the procurement of illegal copies. “Once such a film is in cinemas, sooner or later it will also appear on the Internet as a pirated copy” de La Tour describes the situation. “This often happens even before the official cinema release. That the film was not Online until two days afterward this time is therefore something we rate as a success; the security measures are beginning to take effect.” In the future too, action will continue with all determination against those responsible for the appearance of pirated copies on the Internet and the GVU will be supported in its measures against the first uploaders, de La Tour continued. During Monday, the GVU filed criminal complaints against the “First Seeder” file.
At the GVU stand on Frankfurt’s Adickesallee too, the topics “first uploader”, “file-sharing networks” and “download” formed the center of interest. From 10:00 until early evening, employees of this organization were available to several thousand visitors at Police Headquarters for information. While children and young people mainly asked questions about the permitted number of reproductions, copy protection and copies for shared film evenings with friends, the parents and guardians were primarily concerned with recognizing legal and illegal download possibilities on the Internet.
