I have to agree with the MPAA’s conclusion that the shutdown of Megaupload had huge (positive) repercussions for online piracy.  This according to a September filing with the U.S. Trade Representative, written by the  MPAA’s Michael O’Leary, excerpts of which were published on the TorrentFreak website:

“When these two websites were taken down, many linking websites, custom search engines, and custom streaming scripts that relied on the sites for content became inoperable. Some websites were abandoned by their operators, others lost traffic, while still others shifted their business model.”

Having spent many hours researching online piracy and cyberlockers during these past couple of years I must say that I concur.  From what I’ve seen, although new cyberlockers pop up every day, none match the scale or reach of Megaupload.  Some of the other major pirate cyberlockers like Fileserve and Filesonic went offline while others stopped offering affiliate awards or anonymous file sharing.

There’s been a domino effect.   As cyberlocker cash rewards programs have dried up, so too has activity on various file-sharing forums where those (monetized) links were spread.  I suppose one could compare it to a vaccine.  The disease of piracy hasn’t been eliminated, but the number of vectors that nourish and spread it has been reduced.  Nearly a year out, it seems clear, to me,  that the fed’s take down of Megaupload was a major turning point in the battle against content theft online.

Read the full piece on TorrentFreak, here.