---BREAKAWAY CIVILIZATION ---ALTERNATIVE HISTORY---NEW BUSINESS MODELS--- ROCK & ROLL 'S STRANGE BEGINNINGS---SERIAL KILLERS---YEA AND THAT BAD WORD "CONSPIRACY"--- AMERICANS DON'T EXPLORE ANYTHING ANYMORE.WE JUST CONSUME AND DIE.---
AUCKLAND, NEW ZEALAND—“A year ago we were in a cell with only
toilet paper and a blanket,” says Bram van der Kolk as midnight
approaches at the Mega launch party.
But, oh, how times have changed. Now during its first 14 hours of
operation, the new file sharing service has gained a claimed 500,000
sign-ups. Tonight, Vander der Kolk and fellow Megaupload coaccused
Mathias Ortmann are running on adrenalin. Mega's programmer and chief
technology officer say they have been awake for 40 hours straight.
Ortmann confides things might have been easier if Kim Dotcom had
taken a low key approach to publicity, allowing for a soft launch. Well,
Kim is Kim. And so the new service has been inaccessible at
times. “We’ve had to reboot the storage servers every hour,” Ortmann
says. The pair work with Cogent’s German operation (where the site is
hosted during its launch phase) on a solution.
But the man of the moment has disappeared into his mansion for a
smaller celebration. “It’s his birthday in a few minutes,” Ortmann
says. It was Kim’s birthday party a year ago that provided the FBI and
NZ Police with the convenient opportunity to arrest Dotcom, fellow NZ
resident Ortmann, van der Kolk, and Finn Batato in one place. This year,
the preparations proceed without unforeseen interruption.
There’s lots of razzmatazz at the Mega launch party, with many
flourishes of Dotcom-style goofiness and showmanship. During prelaunch
drinks, guests are buzzed by a remote controlled drone helicopter.
During the presentation, they are buzzed by the real-thing as a
helicopter lands and mock FBI agents rappel down the sides of Dotcom
mansion.
The guest list
Everyone was in good cheer—except for head body guard Wayne Tempero.
Chris Keall
Even members of Dotcom’s security detail are in good cheer, bar the intense Wayne Tempero.
While others mug for the camera during rehearsals, the head bodyguard
stomps back to work. Tempero did not resist FBI agents or NZ Police
during the January 20, 2012 raid, but he faces two firearms charges related to a gun found on property.
Mega CEO Tony Lentino (left) certainly enjoying his evening (pictured here with social media consultant Vaughn Davis.
Chris Keall
Guests included Tony Lentino, the hitherto-unknown
tech entrepreneur who has been named Mega’s CEO and revealed as its
largest outside investor. (The $NZ20 million annual revenue company he
owns, Instra, is also contracted to supply billing and other technical
services for Mega). The earthy, dressed down Lentino drinks beer
straight from the bottle. On Friday, Dotcom described him as a close
friend long before the raid. He even revealed Lentino paid the rent on
Dotcom Mansion— plus living expenses for Kim’s family—to the tune of
around $250,000 before the German’s accounts were partially unfrozen.
Despite both being Web entrepreneurs, "We actually met offline, when
Kim dragged one of his cars at my airstrip,” Lentino says. (Lentino's
1000-acre property in Wellsford, nor far from Dotcom Mansion, includes
an airfield). Evidently, the pair bonded over their enthusiasm for fast
cars.
Through interviews, and the event itself, there’s no doubt that Mega
is an expression of Kim Dotcom’s vision of where the content industry is
heading. The laid back Lentino has no problem with that. He says he’s
the “administrative guy” and is happy with Dotcom being the ideas guy,
plus the lightning rod for world attention.
Lentino poses with EuroDNS founder Xavier Buck.
Chris Keall
Although he’s had almost zero public profile, Lentino seems to be a
prolific networker in the domain industry—he's the one who introduced
Dotcom to EuroDNS founder Xavier Buck. Luxembourg-based
EuroDNS has since become a technology partner to Mega, though Dotcom
would not comment on whether EuroDNS was also the mystery Luxembourg
investor in Mega. Buck said he felt immediate empathy with Dotcom having
tangled with law enforcement authorities himself in cyber-squatting
cases brought by L'Oreal and Air France.
Prime
seats were available to Robert Amsterdam, the newest addition to the
Dotcom legal team by way of the Washington, DC and London-based
Amsterdam & Partners (far right, pink shirt).
Chris Keall
Also circling is the latest addition to Dotcom’s ever-expanding legal team: Robert Amsterdam
of Washington, DC and London-based Amsterdam & Partners. The human
rights lawyer says his key work has been in Venezuela, Russia, and
Nigeria. Now he's contracted by Kim Dotcom to investigate a possible
human rights angle on the Megaupload case—in particular whether one
human, former Senator and current MPAA head Christopher Dodd, breached Dotcom’s rights by going out of his way to engineer what Amsterdam said could be seen as a “contract prosecution.”
Amsterdam agrees his work could help Dotcom seek redress from the US
government down the track. But his immediate aim is to publicize Dodd’s
role. “This prosecution should not be afforded the presumption of
regularity," he says. "The way this was done—the helicopters; the
rappelling down the buildings [of Dotcom mansion]; the over-reaction—all
of these are signs of a classic political prosecution.”
Amsterdam will spend the next two days interviewing the Megaupload
team as part of his preparations for a “white paper” he will publish in
around two months’ time.
Auckland
software developer Ben Gracewood was invited after helping Dotcom gain
even more viral notoriety (in green, pictured with tech blogger Paul
Spain to his right).
Chris Keall
Fittingly, Auckland software developer Ben Gracewood
was among the guests. Gracewood played an unwitting role in Dotcom’s
rise as a cult hero in New Zealand and further afield, when he tweeted
to the Megaupload team: “You guys just drive around in modified
electric vehicles and pose for photos. I could live like that.” At the
time, Kim replied he should come on over and bring friends. Gracewood
did, and the resulting “Swim at Kim’s” became a surprise viral hit with world media, including love from The New York Times
on July 3. It was the first time since his January 20 arrest that
Dotcom engaged with the public. He's been on the front-foot in PR terms
ever since.
Doctom's US lawyer Ira Rothken and his New Zealand lead, Paul Davison.
Chris Keall
Dotcom’s US lawyer Ira Rothken spent a long time chatting with his New Zealand lead, Paul Davison
QC. Rothken says it is inevitable Hollywood, music labels, and the DOJ
(which has hinted at fresh charges if the Mega launch goes ahead) will
come after the new service. He does, however, stop short of predicting a
fresh wave of legal action.
“We fully expect them to say and do things that we believe at the end
of the day will be inaccurate, and designed to embarrass, and designed
to harass,” he says.
Doctom's
wife Mona was also in attendance—it is the Dotcom mansion, after all
(Emily Lentino, Tony's wife, pictured in the blue dress).
Chris Keall
Kim Dotcom’s wife Mona also took in the affair. As usual, she kept a
low profile. But in commercial terms, she is the power behind the
throne. Mona Dotcom owns 89.31 percent of Mega Ltd,
according to NZ Companies Office records (the balance is owned by a
company controlled by Lentino).
InternetNZ policy lead Susan Chalmers.
Chris Keall
The global Mega.co.nz gained its “.co.nz” domain (which usually
designates a New Zealand company) after Gabon suspended the previous
“Me.ga”, allegedly under US government pressure. If any such pressure
exists, InternetNZ (which administers the .co.nz domain on behalf of
ICAAN) is not showing it. Outgoing InternetNZ CEO Vikram Kumar has been
an outspoken supporter of Dotcom, and InternetNZ policy lead Susan Chalmers attended the Mega launch party.
If you lived in New Zealand, you'd recognize musician Tiki Taane.
Chris Keall
Mainstream record labels have been hostile to Dotcom, even pressuring a local media company to take Mega ads off air. But the party included a number of music personalities, including DJ Tim Phin and singer Tiki Taane. Still, overall, music industry figures were conspicuously absent.
Perhaps the next RSVP events?
Sure, a lot of interesting people attended. But the man we all came to see eventually took the stage.
Chris Keall
Onstage, Dotcom talked up two new services that will follow Mega in around six months time. First is Megabox,
which will offer music, cutting in artists on profits. The second is
Megakey, which will allow people to access that content for free if they
earn credits by installing a plugin that substitutes ads served up by
websites with those fed from the Mega network. (A service called
"Megamovie" is also in the works, and will offer a similar setup for
films.)
Offstage, Kim offered further details. All Megabox users will be
given a dollop of free Megakey credit to hook people into the service.
And for those who don’t want the ad-serving Megakey plug in “You can
choose to just straight out buy the music that is on the [Megabox] site,
just like you would on iTunes.”
But wait, won’t media sites, and most of any description, be hostile
to their own ads being blocked and replaced by those served by the
Megakey browser plugin as a visitor seeks to build ad-viewing credits to
‘buy’ music from Dotcom?
“No.” No?
“No. Here’s how we’ll do it at first,” Dotcom explains. “Only 10
percent of the ads you see will be ‘adjusted’. This is not a general
removal of ads. We’re not going to replace ads off small publishers, for
example, or sites that have an Alexa
rating below 100,” he pledges. “That is not our goal. We’ll be taking
it [ad revenue] from the big guys, and giving it to the smaller
artists.”
A beverage, sir?
As they arrived, partygoers were offered champagne and Moa (a trendy craft beer), but also super-size cans of energy drinks.
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