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Web Sheriff was directly responsible for the removal of the [[Ken Bigley]] execution videos and has closed down terrorist related sites and monitored trading sites.<ref name="Esquire Magazine">''[[Esquire Magazine]]'', UK edition, "Meet the Web Sheriff", August 2009</ref> as well as the extreme pornographic [[erotic asphyxiation|strangulation]] sites at the center of the notorious [[Graham Coutts|Jane Longhurst]] 2003 murder trial at the [[Old Bailey]] in [[London]], England.<ref name="bbc Longhurst">{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/3504926.stm|publisher=[[BBC]]|title=BBC: Two years to close porn site|date=2004-03-12|accessdate=2010-03-12}}</ref><ref name="mailonsunday2005">{{cite news|last=Giacobbi|first=John|title =How we can clean up the internet|work =[[The Mail on Sunday]]|date =2005-09-11}}</ref>
Web Sheriff was directly responsible for the removal of the [[Ken Bigley]] execution videos and has closed down terrorist related sites and monitored trading sites.<ref name="Esquire Magazine">''[[Esquire Magazine]]'', UK edition, "Meet the Web Sheriff", August 2009</ref> as well as the extreme pornographic [[erotic asphyxiation|strangulation]] sites at the center of the notorious [[Graham Coutts|Jane Longhurst]] 2003 murder trial at the [[Old Bailey]] in [[London]], England.<ref name="bbc Longhurst">{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/3504926.stm|publisher=[[BBC]]|title=BBC: Two years to close porn site|date=2004-03-12|accessdate=2010-03-12}}</ref><ref name="mailonsunday2005">{{cite news|last=Giacobbi|first=John|title =How we can clean up the internet|work =[[The Mail on Sunday]]|date =2005-09-11}}</ref>

In May 2011, when a Web Sheriff protected album, ''[[Born This Way]]'', by [[Lady Gaga]], leaked a week before release, fans were offered official material such as tracks and videos in return for not posting copies of it on sites. Web Sheriff reported that when a mailbox was set up for reporting leaks, tens of thousands of fans responded and sent in links to copies due to the fans' loyalty and bond to the artist.<ref name="BBCstars"/>


==Reception==
==Reception==

Revision as of 02:19, 27 October 2011

Web Sheriff
IndustryIntellectual property rights
Founded2000
FounderJohn Giacobbi
Headquarters
London
,
United Kingdom
Area served
International
Key people
John Giacobbi
ServicesCopyright enforcement, digital rights management, website building, hosting and management, video editing
OwnerWeb Sheriff Corporation
Number of employees
20
Websitewebsheriff.com

Web Sheriff is an anti-piracy company based in the United Kingdom that provides intellectual property, copyright and privacy rights protection services for a range of clients that include record labels, musical artists, media organizations, and celebrities.[1] The company monitors various websites that host links to unauthorized downloads of copyrighted music and film. The company has been in operation since 2000, with two offices in the UK.[2][3]

The company was founded by attorney John Giacobbi, who acts as its managing director.[4] While Web Sheriff will send an immediate "take-down" notice to BitTorrent and other file-sharing sites or threaten lawsuits on behalf of its clients,[1][5] the company reports that over half of its activities involve sending an initial polite request to blogs and fansites for copyrighted music to be removed, engaging with fans and offering free official promotional tracks and clips from the artist as replacement for the leaked material.[5][6]

Description

Web Sheriff performs online rights management services including copyright infringement and libel.[4][7] It monitors blogs, BitTorrent trackers, file-sharing sites, YouTube, eBay, film-sharing sites and websites that host links to downloads of copyrighted music and film.[1][8] The most predominate work it performs is copyright protection services for record labels, music artists and film companies when releasing new material.[7] Major corporate record labels, independent record labels and American film production companies use the company's services.[14]

The company uses proprietary software and web-crawler programmers to search the Internet.[7][15] It relies heavily on phone calls and relationship building instead of only on technology.[1] It does not illegally interfere or add bogus files but targets the persons running the sites.[16] When approaching fans on blogs, a polite request is made for the copyrighted material to be removed, while providing the fans with free official tracks and clips from the artist and record label. When it detects pirated content on BitTorrent and other file-sharing sites, the offending party is given an initial warning before further action is taken.[7][17] According to Web Sheriff, some Torrent sites and file sharing sites such as Mediafire and Rapidshare provide access and allow them to remove infringing content.[1][3][18][19]

The company also provides design, website build and maintenance services as well as online security for the live broadcasts of concerts.[2][20] It provides video editing services and manufactures watermarked CDs and DVDs and provides individually watermarked digital streams of audio and video for journalists.[2][4] The company also recovers fraudulently registered domain names.[3][21]

History

Web Sheriff was founded in 2000 by attorney John Giacobbi, who acts as company spokesman and managing director.[4][22] Prior to forming Web Sheriff, Giacobbi had been an independent consultant to record labels and artists including Village People. The formation of the company evolved from a desire by Giacobbi to help Village People retain their rights on the internet, as copyright infringements had become a major problem for the band at that time.[4]

The company first came to note when it was hired by Prince in 2007 to "disappear entirely from the internet."[3] The star's spokesman related that "Prince believes strongly that as an artist the music rights must remain with the artist and thus copyrights should be protected across the board." "Very few artists have ever taken this kind of action over their rights."[23] Some of the Prince fans fought back, formed their own organization called "Prince Fans United" and hired an attorney.[3][24] In September 2007, Web Sheriff announced it would launch lawsuits against YouTube, eBay and The Pirate Bay on behalf of Prince if they refused compliance.[5][23][25][26] These sites were described by the company's spokesman as in the "vanguard of online piracy".[27] Peter Sunde, co-founder of The Pirate Bay, dismissed the threats, stating that American law was not applicable in Sweden.[28] YouTube complied by removing over 2,000 videos from their site and eBay removed more than 300 auctions.[27][29] Numerous unauthorized overseas online sites selling merchandise featuring Prince were shut down.[30]

Nick Bracegirdle with Chicane hired Web Sheriff in 2007 to prevent leaks from his album Somersault after selling his Ferrari and mortgaging his home to finance it. (Chicane's 2003 album, Easy to Assemble was so widely pirated by a Russian counterfeiter alone, selling thousands of copies with a sleeve from a previous album with the title digitally removed, that it was never officially released.)[31][8]

In 2007, when Bloc Party's album A Weekend in the City leaked three months previous to release, their record label, V2 Records hired Web Sheriff to stop the leakage.[32] Web Sheriff at first appealed to fan sites to not post links to the album out of respect for the band. When this approach did not work, widespread uploaders were tracked down and sent letters that referred to possible prosecution. Said to face a possible one million illegal MP3 files downloaded, the leakage was reduced to an insignificant amount.[12]

In 2008, Van Morrison hired the company to contact fan sites and demand that photos, lyrics and other copyrighted material be removed immediately.[33] His manager stated that posting the photos were an invasion of Morrison's privacy. The two most popular sites closed down soon after they were notified. Through the wishes of the artist all related videos on YouTube and elsewhere promptly disappeared from the Internet.[3]

Bryan Adams employed the company in 2008 to remove thousands of low quality bootleg video clips from YouTube and replace them with official videos on his own channel. The new channel was a success and had 187 million views one and one-half years later.[20]

When Qtrax introduced their new file-sharing site In January 2008, Web Sheriff notified the site on behalf of Prince, Van Morrison and The Black Crowes that regardless of whether the music companies supported the service, individual artists would have to give their approval.[34][35]

When "Brother Sport", the first song from Animal Collective's album Merriweather Post Pavilion leaked in November 2008, Web Sheriff posted to Grizzly Bear's blog that they were the "global-leak-source of the track" and asked for an apology to be posted on the blog for a week to Domino Records, Animal Collective and Web Sheriff.[2][11] Grizzly Bear band member Ed Droste complied and apologized stating "The Web Sheriff is just doing his job, and we're all aware of the damage internet file sharing is doing to album sales."[36] The album leaked a month early and while Web Sheriff said it was "virtually impossible to completely put an album back in the box after a leak", the company was able to remove 90% or 10,000 of the links.[3]

RLSLOG, called one of the world's most popular release news sites, was taken offline in January 2009 through efforts by Web Sheriff. The site was shut down by complaints by Web Sheriff to its web site host and band width provider.[37][38]

Bob Dylan used the company's services pro bono to protect his charity Christmas album, Christmas in the Heart following its leak in October 2009. By removing unauthorized downloads, more money was generated for World food programs for hunger relief. Web Sheriff also removed unauthorized videos from the internet, replacing them with official ones on Dylan's YouTube channel.[4][39][40]

Web Sheriff was directly responsible for the removal of the Ken Bigley execution videos and has closed down terrorist related sites and monitored trading sites.[7] as well as the extreme pornographic strangulation sites at the center of the notorious Jane Longhurst 2003 murder trial at the Old Bailey in London, England.[41][42]

In May 2011, when a Web Sheriff protected album, Born This Way, by Lady Gaga, leaked a week before release, fans were offered official material such as tracks and videos in return for not posting copies of it on sites. Web Sheriff reported that when a mailbox was set up for reporting leaks, tens of thousands of fans responded and sent in links to copies due to the fans' loyalty and bond to the artist.[18]

Reception

Web Sheriff is said to also function as a "fan outreach organization"[4] through its unique, "gentle, gradual approach".[43] The company's methods make use of each fan encounter to "turn a negative into a positive by using viral marketing and actively engaging with and including fans and bloggers in their marketing and promotion."[1][7][13][17][36][44] Web Sheriff states their intent is to engage with the protected artist's fans where they congregate most and redirect them to artist approved material with the hope that they will leave the leaked content alone. The company then tries to build a relationship with the fans and promote the artist further by sharing links to their Facebook, YouTube, Myspace page and to the artist's official website.[5]

Music fans and bloggers often initially respond angrily when first requested by Web Sheriff to take down MP3 tracks or to not post them on the music-related site. Web Sheriff's usual approach is an appeal to the fans to respect the wishes of the band with offers of links to approved tracks and samples for the new album. Fans sometimes interpret this as Web Sheriff saying, "I've got my eye on you."[36] The company spokesman says that eventually most of the fans tend to respect the wishes of their favored artists by cooperating.[1] As related by The Guardian, The Prodigy fans on the brainkiller forum engaged with Web Sheriff on a thread that lasted through 18 pages. Some of the fans who had been hostile at the beginning, then asked what they could do to help the band.[17][45]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g Sandoval, Greg (25 September 2007). "Web Sheriff Doing it different than Media Defender". CNET. Retrieved 14 March 2011.
  2. ^ a b c d e f Weiss, Dan (10 December 2008). "Meet the Web Sheriff". The Village Voice. Retrieved 14 March 2011. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h Rolling Stone, "Battle Over Online Piracy Gets a Sheriff", Andy Greene, RS 1077, April 2009
  4. ^ a b c d e f g Goetz, Rick (2010-07-06). "A Kinder, Gentler & More Effective War On Piracy". musiciancoaching.com. Retrieved 2010-10-02-. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help) Cite error: The named reference "JG/MC" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
  5. ^ a b c d "New Sheriff in Town" (PDF). Billboard Upfront. 1 July 2011. Retrieved 22 August 2011.
  6. ^ Daniels, Andrew (12 April 2011). "The Most Hated Man on the Internet". Men's Health. Retrieved 12 April 2011. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  7. ^ a b c d e f g Esquire Magazine, UK edition, "Meet the Web Sheriff", August 2009
  8. ^ a b Sinclair, David (7 August 2007). "Frontier lawmen". independent.ie. Retrieved 28 August 2011.
  9. ^ "The Brown Coach of Leisure". Silent Talkie. 17 January 2010. Retrieved 6 September 2011.
  10. ^ a b Raible, Allan (27 March 2008). "Review: The Raconteurs' "Consolers of the Lonely"". ABC News. Retrieved 6 September 2011.
  11. ^ a b Thompson, Paul (24 November 2008). "Grizzly Bear Apologize to Animal Collective for Leak". Pitchfork Media. Retrieved 6 September 2011. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  12. ^ a b Sherwin, Adam (31 March 2007). "Arctic Monkeys go Bananas Over File Sharing". London: The Times. Retrieved 6 September 2011. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help) Cite error: The named reference "timesonlineArctic" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
  13. ^ a b Smyth, David (11 April 2009). "Caught in the net". The Scotsman. Retrieved 11 April 2011. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  14. ^ Columbia Records,[9] Matador Records,[2] Warner Bros. Records,[10] XL Records,[10] Domino Records,[11] Rough Trade Records,[2] V2 Records,[12] and film distributors such as Magnolia Pictures.[3][7][13]
  15. ^ Cooper, Duncan (25 April 2011). "Respect Yourself: Interview with the Web Sheriff". The Fader. Retrieved 25 April 2011. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  16. ^ [1]"Facing the Music: There's a New Anti-File-Sharing Sheriff in Town, and He's Getting Results". The Spokesman-Review. 18 February 2008. {{cite news}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help)
  17. ^ a b c Lindvall, Helienne (12 October 2009). "Web Sheriff is Watching You". London: The Guardian. Retrieved 12 March 2010. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  18. ^ a b Youngs, Ian (16 August 2011). "Stars step up wars on music leaks". BBC. Retrieved 17 August 2011.
  19. ^ Emory, Daniel (30 September 2010). "Lawyers to continue piracy fight". BBC. Retrieved 1 October 2010.
  20. ^ a b Reinartz, Joe (10 March 2011). "Meet the Online Police". Pollstar. Retrieved 10 March 2011.
  21. ^ "Web Sheriff Goes To The Mats Against Russian Clone". Encore. 4 July 2011. Retrieved 17 July 2011.
  22. ^ Luft, Oliver (18 June 2009). "CN group sells five radio stations to Quidem". The Guardian. Retrieved 26 January 2011. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  23. ^ a b "Prince takes on YouTube over clips". London: The Times. 13 September 2007. Retrieved 12 March 2010. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  24. ^ "Prince sites face legal threats". BBC. 7 November 2007. Retrieved 1 October 2010.
  25. ^ "Prince get tough on web pirates". BBC News. 13 September 2007. Retrieved 20 March 2010.
  26. ^ "Prince gets tough online". BBC Radio 6. 13 September 2007. Retrieved 2 April 2010.
  27. ^ a b Kiss, Jemima (13 September 2007). "Prince seeks to 'Reclaim the net'". London: The Guardian. Retrieved 12 March 2010. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  28. ^ Söderling, Fredrik (15 February 2008). "Prince stämmer Pirate Bay" (in Swedish). Stockholm, Sweden: Dagens Nyheter. Retrieved 17 February 2008.
  29. ^ "Prince to sue YouTube, eBay over unauthorized content". Billboard. Retrieved 12 March 2010. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  30. ^ Byrne, Ciar (14 September 2007). "Prince sues internet sites for breaching his copyright". The Independent. Retrieved 18 August 2010. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  31. ^ "Chicane Takes Self-Financed Route Back to Stardom". Billboard. Retrieved 28 August 2011.
  32. ^ "V2 and Web Sheriff shield Bloc Party". Music Week. 26 March 2007. Retrieved 24 March 2010. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  33. ^ Q, "Van Morrison fights internet", May 2009
  34. ^ Sowa, Tom (29 January 2008). "Not even out the door and already the Web Sheriff is after Qtrax". The Spokesman-Review. {{cite web}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help); Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help); Missing or empty |url= (help)
  35. ^ Sandoval, Greg (29 January 2008). "After label, Qtrax must satisfy Prince, Van Morrison". cNET.com. Retrieved 31 March 2010.
  36. ^ a b c "Off the Record: Web Sheriff is watching you". Evening Standard. 4 March 2009. Retrieved 12 March 2010. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  37. ^ "Web Sheriff Takes Down RLSLOG". TorrentFreak. 19 January 2009. Retrieved 28 April 2010.
  38. ^ Hefflington, Mark (27 April 2010). "Universal Music complaint gets web leaks news site pulled". DMW. Retrieved 14 March 2011.
  39. ^ Brown, Lane (8 October 2009). "Bob Dylan's Awesome Christmas Album Leaks". nymag. Retrieved 14 March 2011. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  40. ^ "CAFAmerica to distribute royalities [sic] from Bob Dylan's Christmas album to Crisis". UK Fundraising. 14 December 2009. Retrieved 19 December 2009.
  41. ^ "BBC: Two years to close porn site". BBC. 12 March 2004. Retrieved 12 March 2010.
  42. ^ Giacobbi, John (11 September 2005). "How we can clean up the internet". The Mail on Sunday.
  43. ^ Lewis, Randy (9 June 2011). "Piracy watchdog's mild bite". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 6 September 2011.
  44. ^ "John Giacobbi". The Huffington Post. 30 July 2011. Retrieved 17 August 2011. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  45. ^ Lau, Kathleen. "Web Sheriff fights music piracy". itworldcanada.com. Retrieved 28 August 2011.

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