Tiziana

Kator: This would make a really intersting novel or short story or something…maybe you can document and sell your experience with this matter.

The problem with bittorrent is the same as with tutorial links - the original sites fade away and die unexpectedly and frequently. After a few years, the BMR would be half-way bad links, and people would stop even trying.

All of this means that there will be an enormous overhead in running the respository. For example, indemnification iinsurance to hold a reveiwerr harmless if they fail to spot a copyrighted infraction - i mean, who would volunteer for that job description: "Look at a model and determine if it conflicts with any other copyrighted concept in any other nation in the world over the last 50 years. If you are right, you might make $1 for every download. If you miss one, you will be sued for a million dollars." OMG. Our current litigation mindset is killing entrepreneurship.

"I am simply following what I have been told by my lawyer. As I understand it, the terms of the agreement leave options for the model author to pursue other legal action should we cause "other problems." If the offending model reappears on the web, the model author can find the person responsible and pursue legal action against him. My disclosure of details, including the model in question, would violate the agreement by supposedly preventing the model author from pursuing future legal actions."

It sounds to me as if this model author in question hopes (or knows) the violating model will reappear on another site in order to seek legal action with the pupose of making money out of this. Since the model was uploaded from a wifi-point and the identity of the uploader cannot be determined, who is to say that it wasn't this model author who uploaded the model in the first place?

Andrew might consult his legal advisors to check if it would violate the agreement if the identity of this so-called model author was disclosed. This information is probably within the public domain as it is a matter of public record?

If future (or even passed) legal actions by this or these persons come to light it might indicate that we are dealing with some sort of scam.

And at least don't you think that that repository is sharing and not a commercial thing…so bittorrent will be good place for free licenzed works…and good avoiding from "IF ….then what..?"

Such a site repository needs a Terms of Use and a "limited liability" legal disclaimer were users state they own the whole responsibility for the submitted content copyright.

Of course, there should be a "abuse report" button.

And, of course, all users should register themself: real name, real surname, email, address, country, nick, password and image test code.

Moreover, users should chose a suitable license for the contents they submit, like Creative Commons licenses. If the content were not compatible, for any reason, with this license, it should not be submitted.

Well, best of luck to you. I hope Bart's attention to the matter helps with your financial pickle that someone's gotten you into. It's a shame it took almost a year to get some nice recognition on the situation. I am kind of curious though, you mentioned that all the models from the old repository will be put back into the new one once the $3000 have been raised and paid off from the fines. Why would you want to put the old models back into the new repository when you can't verify the originality of them to begin with? I hope you don't resolve one lawsuit to find yourself in another.

It's also a shame that you're not from the US (or at least I assume you're not). Here's something you should look at if you haven't already: DMCA 512 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OCILLA).