Internet entrepreneur and Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom is planning to launch two new business ventures, even as he appeals to the United States Supreme Court to get back US$75 million of seized assets.
A video posted on Twitter shows that the venture, called BitContent, is set to help file and video streaming content owners make money. It allows them to sell uploaded files and sell them directly to users at a price of their choosing.
All transactions will be through another new venture, BitCache, although there’s little detail on how it would be different from existing virtual currency transactional services.
He explains in the video, "You can create a payment for any content that you put on the internet...you can share that with your customers, with the interest community and, boom, you are basically in business and can sell your content.”
No launch date has been announced for either.
German-born, New Zealand-based Dotcom has petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court for the return of $75 million of assets seized by US authorities when they raided his property in Auckland.
The assets are made up of cash, Hong Kong and New Zealand bank accounts, artwork and luxury cars.
Reporting from inside the Australian music business since '94.
The petition – on behalf of two other Megaupload executives – argues that authorities illegally seized his assets by wrongly labelling him “a fugitive” even though he has never been to the United States.
This is his third attempt at getting his assets back: it was turned down most recently by the Fourth Circuit last August.
Dotcom has long claimed that the file-sharing Megaupload was a legal business, and that seizing his assets was just a way to freezing funds to fight his charges.
In that instance he tweeted, “Did they think they can separate me from my kids without a fight? I fight corrupt US empire clowns all day, every day. Not even tired.”
The new petition stated, "If left undisturbed, the Fourth Circuit’s decision enables the Government to obtain civil forfeiture of every penny of a foreign citizen’s foreign assets based on unproven allegations of the most novel, dubious United States crimes.”
The full petition can be read here.
The Supreme Court now must decide whether to hear the case.
Dotcom is also challenging in the Court of Appeal of New Zealand a New Zealand appeals court decision in February that he can be extradited to the U.S., where he faces copyright infringement and money laundering charges related to Megaupload which authorities closed in early 2012.
The judge agreed that “online communication of copyright protected works to the public is not a criminal offence in New Zealand". But he added that other elements in the case made them eligible to be moved to America.
Dotcom has also long insisted that New Zealand’s PM John Key was part of a conspiracy to give him New Zealand residency so it would make it easier to get him extradited to the US.
The claim is based on an email purporting to be from Warner Bros CEO Kevin Tsujihara to the Motion Picture Association of America’s Asia-Pacific President Michael Ellis.
It allegedly said he had met the PM that day and "John Key told me in private that they are granting Dotcom residency despite pushback from officials about his criminal past. His AG will do everything in his power to assist us with our case. VIP treatment and then a one-way ticket to Virginia.”
All parties involved vehemently denied being involved in the email.
In March, the Serious Fraud Office of the US said it had investigated the claims and found the email was “a forgery”.
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Reporting from inside the Australian music business since '94.
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