This man is convicted of illegally uploading a movie to the Internet and is ordered not to use Ubuntu Linux on his computer.

Scott McCausland, a former administrator of the EliteTorrents a BitTorrent site which was shut down in 2005, plead guilty last year to ‘conspiracy to commit copyright infringement’ and ‘criminal copyright infringement’ by uploading Star Wars: Episode III illegally. (source)

In an interview published on July 31, Scott told:

Star Wars was uploaded… and then it was game over. I awoke one morning to see the FBI warning on the ET site, and thought to myself “Damn, I think we are screwed.” It didn’t dawn on me at the time that I could be a target. I didn’t upload a lot, just a couple movies. But I did Star Wars, so… Then, at 6AM I am woken up to the sounds of 6 FBI, 6 ICE, and 2 Local Police at my front door. They come in, confiscate everything, and that begins my 2+ years saga. (source)

He served five months in prison and is now on five months probation, but with a couple of restrictions. In is probation period his computer needs to be monitored and the monitoring software doesn’t support Linux. Which means he has to switch to Microsoft Operating Systems. Well, for a hardcore Linux user, this might be worse than the prison sentence itself.

He is currently unemployed and he is asking donation for purchasing Microsoft Windows XP or Vista. I like the way he adds a little sentence “Do not let my problems interfere with your own.”

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