In the wake of last week’s Megaupload shutdown, some of the biggest names in the market are taking drastic action. During the last 48 hours many sites have completely withdrawn their systems for paying uploaders when their files are shared with others, but one of the most

dramatic moves came first from Filesonic and today Fileserve. Both services now forbid people from downloading any files they didn’t upload themselves.

While the shutdown last week of Megaupload and the arrest of its founder and management team was certainly dramatic, a situation of perhaps even greater gravity is beginning to emerge.

Over the past 48 to 72 hours, the operators of many prominent cyberlocker services have been taking unprecedented actions that can not simply be explained away by mere coincidence. The details in the Megaupload indictment clearly have some players in the file-hosting world spooked.

One of the key allegations is that between 2005 and mid 2011, Megaupload ran a program that rewarded users for uploading infringing material. A cited internal email allegedly shows staff members discussing cash payments going to people uploading “full popular DVD rips” and “software with keygenerators (Warez)”.

Although Megaupload stopped paying out rewards in July 2011, that didn’t stop the site from getting raided. Other cyberlocker services are clearly hoping they will be more lucky.

Last evening Filesonic, a top 10 player in the file-sharing world with a billion pageviews a month, not only withdrew its affiliate rewards program, but also banned any third parties downloading files. Simply put, users can now only download files from the service that they uploaded themselves.

But according to reports, there’s no guarantee of that. Account owners report that their files are being mass deleted, that’s if their entire account has been banned already.

Fileserve, another leading player, also ended its affiliate program this weekend. Additionally, this morning TorrentFreak received news that Fileserve has now joined Filesonic in banning all 3rd party downloads.

“I just paid for a premium account and can now only download my own files an unlimited number of times,” said one angry user. “What use is that?”

Other users of Fileserve are experiencing an even further degraded level of service. Reports describe mass deletion of their uploads and the banning of accounts on apparent ‘Terms of Service’ violations.

But the changes at these two services appears to be just the tip of a very big and very complex iceberg. Developments at other file-hosting services are widespread.

As previously reported, Uploaded.to banned all US IP addresses in what appears to be an effort to distance itself from US jurisdiction. Its affiliate program is still listed as operational but the same cannot be said about those run by some of its competitors.

VideoBB and VideoZer have both reportedly closed their rewards program and according to reports have also been mass deleting accounts and huge numbers of files. Other sites closing their affiliate programs and/or deleting accounts/files include FileJungle, UploadStation and FilePost.

Another interesting development involves so-called ‘release blogs’, sites that report on leaked material but either provide links to the material on cyberlockers or allow their users to do the same. The number of overall releases hasn’t changed much but the links currently being posted on some of these sites show less variety and volume than they did this time last week.

Source: TorrentFreak

The first new single from Autonomous i’s forthcoming début album ‘Attack the Mattress’.

Since forming years and years ago in a dark damp community hall in Tipperary, Autonomous i have been honing their songwriting and performance skills to the point where their music is influenced as much from within the group as it is externally. These five lads fuse sounds together from a breathtakingly broad sonic palette and have produced a range of original tracks over the years that a well stocked duke box would give it’s last dime for!

Autonomous i’s live shows are varied in the extreme and the band seamlessly navigates through rock, funk and dance inspired grooves with infectious confidence and a cheeky grin. Fronted by one of the most powerful set of lungs on the Irish indie rock scene today, Frah Butler, the band have gigged throughout the country in venues such as Whelans and the Sugar Club in Dublin and The Crane Lane in Cork and are being overwhelmed with positive criticism from the likes of Duke Special who described their music as being ‘intriguing and wonderful’.

Mail on Sunday music critic Danny McElhinney has described Autonomous i as being ‘the best undiscovered band in Ireland’ and that ‘it defies logic why Autonomous i is not top of the charts’, it is about time for Autonomous i to be discovered.

Autonomous i are:
Frah Butler – Vocals, Guitar
Daragh Kennedy – Guitar, Vocals
Jamie Kelly – Bass, Vocals
Eddie Dwan – Violin, synth
Adrian Creaney – Drums

1902-1999

Lyons Tea is one of Ireland’s biggest and best-loved brands. Anyone on the island of Ireland over the last few decades knows the jingle ‘Extra quality, Extra flavour, Lyons the Quality Tea’ unless you were hiding under a rock.

Our other claim to fame is introducing Ireland to the first ever pyramid-shaped tea bag! Generations of Irish families have grown up with Lyons Tea. For them it will always be entwined with their memories of home and homecoming

How it all began:

In 1902 the Lyons family started their little tea business at High Street in Dublin, near Christchurch Cathedral.

In 1932, Lyons moved to Marlborough Street, behind the Gresham hotel.

1963 saw Lyons move up in the world, to a state-of-the-art factory in Goldenbridge, Dublin 8.

The very first on-pack promotion by Lyons Tea was in 1963. When people bought a pack of Lyons Tea, they could hope to find a voucher for between 10 shillings and £10 inside.

Iconic campaigns, such as the Minstrels and the very popular car giveaway would become a vital part of the Lyons Tea brand over the next 25 years.

In the late 1970s, Lyons reinvented the wheel by going round. The change to round tea bags was so successful that Lyons managed to capture over 65% of the Irish tea market.

The famous “Lyons Tea jingle” played an important role in the Lyons success story, and is still one of the first things people remember today.

Lyons Tea became a part of the Unilever family in 1996.

Another milestone was the development of the tea-caddy style pack. People loved it for its sleek good looks and practicality.

The move from round to pyramid bags in 2004 was another major leap forward for the brand.

2004 also saw the creation of our famous feathered friends, the Lyons Tea birds: Maggie, Niamh, Pete and Tom.

In 2007, Lyons launched a new campaign to celebrate the health benefits of Lyons Tea, as a 100% natural product.

Coca Cola Christmas Hilltop “I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing” TV Commercial.

Coca-Cola is a carbonated soft drink sold in stores, restaurants, and vending machines in more than 200 countries. It is produced by The Coca-Cola Company of Atlanta, Georgia, and is often referred to simply as Coke (a registered trademark of The Coca-Cola Company in the United States since March 27, 1944). Originally intended as a patent medicine when it was invented in the late 19th century by John Pemberton, Coca-Cola was bought out by businessman Asa Griggs Candler, whose marketing tactics led Coke to its dominance of the world soft-drink market throughout the 20th century.

info gleaned from Wikipedia

Retro Budweiser Christmas Commercial with the Clydesdales.

Budweiser is a 5.0% American-style lager introduced in 1876 by Adolphus Busch and one of the highest selling beers in the United States. It is made with up to 30% rice in addition to hops and barley malt.  Budweiser is produced in various breweries located around the world. It is a filtered beer available in draught and packaged forms.

info gleaned from Wikipedia

Woolworths Group plc was a listed British company that owned the high-street retail chain, Woolworths, as well as other brands such as the entertainment distributor Entertainment UK and book and resource distributor Bertram Books. The Woolworths store chain, which had more than 800 stores at its peak, was the main enterprise of the group, selling many goods and having its own LadyBird children’s clothing ranges, Chad Valley toys and the WorthIt! value ranges. The chain was the UK’s leading supplier of Candyking “pick ‘n’ mix” sweets. It was also sometimes referred to as “Woolies” by the UK media and the general public.

On 26 November 2008, the trading of shares in Woolworths Group plc was suspended and the Woolworths and Entertainment UK subsidiaries entered administration. Woolworths Group plc also entered administration on 27 January 2009. The administrators Deloitte & Touche closed all 807 Woolworths stores between 27 December 2008 and 6 January 2009 resulting in 27,000 job losses.

On 2 February 2009 it was announced that the Shop Direct Group had purchased the Woolworths and Ladybird names and these would survive as a brand within the internet based shopping company.

info gleaned from Wikipedia

The Polaroid Land Camera 1000 is a consumer camera line using SX-70 integral film. There were several models:

• Fixed focus – known (in the U.S.) as OneStep
• Zone-focused – known (in the U.S.) as Pronto! ; e.g. Pronto RF
• Sonar Autofocus – Labeled as both Pronto! and OneStep models, usually with an AF or Sonar designation

Playtex Bra advert circa 1980

Playtex is a well-known brand (and trademark). It used to be associated with bras and women’s undergarments. Currently there are two separate companies with the Playtex name.

The women’s undergarment Playtex manufactures feminine hygiene and infant care products. The name comes from “perforated latex” which sandwiched between cloth gave the underwear its elastic and body-shaping character.

A children’s diaper and other baby products company also bears the PlayTex name. This has been and continues to be a source of confusion.

Info gleaned from Wikipedia

1979 Hamlet Cigars commercial from the UK and Ireland

Hamlet is a well known brand of cigar produced by Japan Tobacco. They are available in several varieties, miniatures and also a regular length. They are regularly referred to as the ‘mild cigar’ in their advertising.

Hamlet cigars were first launched in the UK in 1964. More recently, Hamlet cigars have been launched in a number of western European markets.

They are most famous in the UK for their comical advertisements, which present scenes in which a man, having failed dismally at something, is consoled by lighting a Hamlet cigar. Much of the humour came from the fact that the product being advertised was deliberately unclear until the tell-tale cigar appeared, accompanied by the tune of Bach’s Air on a G String, played by French musician Jacques Loussier, and the line ‘Happiness is a cigar called Hamlet’. For example, one advertisement created a diversion by appearing to be advertising beer: a man, dying of thirst in a desert, finds a can of Heineken but accidentally spills it all into the sand; so instead he lights up a Hamlet cigar.

Since the ban on tobacco advertising in the UK and much of Europe was implemented, the adverts are no longer aired.

The closure in September 2009 of the Cardiff-based factory producing Hamlet was announced on 16 October 2007.

Info gleaned from Wikipedia

1979 National Girobank

Girobank was a British public sector financial institution founded in 1968 by the General Post Office. It started life as the National Giro but went through several name changes, becoming National Girobank, then Girobank Plc (latterly trading as Alliance & Leicester Giro), before merging into Alliance & Leicester Commercial Bank (now part of Santander Corporate Banking) in 2003.

info gleaned from Wikipedia