<story><title>Megaupload programmer goes to prison for one year</title><url>http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/member-megaupload-conspiracy-pleads-guilty-copyright-infringement-charges-and-sentenced-one</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>jackjeff</author><text>I really dislike the extra-territorial aspect of it.&lt;p&gt;From what I understand the Netherlands copyright law is more lenient than the US law. For instance downloading copyrighted material was legal until very recently. So downloading something from Megaupload was hardly a crime there...
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.zdnet.com/article/downloading-pirate-material-finally-becomes-illegal-in-the-netherlands/&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.zdnet.com&amp;#x2F;article&amp;#x2F;downloading-pirate-material-fin...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;So you could do something which is legal, or illegal but not criminal offense (civil) in the country where you live, but if it displeases the US, then suddenly they can throw you in jail in a foreign country (the US) where you have no ties.&lt;p&gt;I break Chinese laws on a daily basis (Tank Man!). Why should I care about US law, since I do not live there, nor am I a citizen? It&amp;#x27;s not like I can vote for these laws...</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>jepper</author><text>The United States can request an extradition for crimes committed by an individual(as argued under the US law). However this does not mean that the Netherlands has to comply. If a Dutch person committed a crime in the Netherlands  according to the US, but its legal here, he&amp;#x2F;she will NOT be extradited. The same is true if the punishment is unreasonably severe according to Dutch law (death penalty.). For the latter there is a clause in our Dutch-US extradition agreements however you can still argue against this in court. (trias politica). It also stated in the treaty that the Dutch convicted can serve their jail time in the Netherlands. The punishment is then even converted to Dutch punishment standards.&lt;p&gt;There have been cases where it was argued that US electronic law (hacking and piracy cases) is not fair to the accused. This however does not always help.&lt;p&gt;This will however not help if you refuse a hearing on this. The article states: &amp;quot;Nomm agreed to waive his extradition hearing in the Netherlands&amp;quot;</text></comment>
<story><title>Megaupload programmer goes to prison for one year</title><url>http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/member-megaupload-conspiracy-pleads-guilty-copyright-infringement-charges-and-sentenced-one</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>jackjeff</author><text>I really dislike the extra-territorial aspect of it.&lt;p&gt;From what I understand the Netherlands copyright law is more lenient than the US law. For instance downloading copyrighted material was legal until very recently. So downloading something from Megaupload was hardly a crime there...
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.zdnet.com/article/downloading-pirate-material-finally-becomes-illegal-in-the-netherlands/&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.zdnet.com&amp;#x2F;article&amp;#x2F;downloading-pirate-material-fin...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;So you could do something which is legal, or illegal but not criminal offense (civil) in the country where you live, but if it displeases the US, then suddenly they can throw you in jail in a foreign country (the US) where you have no ties.&lt;p&gt;I break Chinese laws on a daily basis (Tank Man!). Why should I care about US law, since I do not live there, nor am I a citizen? It&amp;#x27;s not like I can vote for these laws...</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>gambiting</author><text>Imagine if it worked the other way around.....if one day a US court got a request from Saudi Arabia asking to jail one of US citizens because they broke Saudi law on the internet(even though they have never been to Saudi Arabia). US would politely tell them to fuck off. Yet, when US does this to another country,they comply? It&amp;#x27;s disgusting.</text></comment>