JLooney.com

Three years ago, a bit-torrent website was shut down. It happens every day, but this one was different.

You see, OiNK.cd was an example of what online music could be, and the recording industry hated them for it.

OiNK was an online community of 180,000 users, audiophiles and music lovers to varying degrees, and it was invitation only. There was a very strict set of user guidelines, and if you so much as strayed into the gray area even once, your account was at risk. Cross the line and you were done, banned, no questions asked, no chance for appeal.

But there were amazing benefits, if you had been lucky enough to receive an invite. Users described OiNK as one of the world’s largest and most meticulously maintained online music repositories, and they were right. At it’s peak, OiNK hosted over 200,000 torrent files of exceptional quality and range. Users were required to maintain a respectable upload-to-download ration, which ensured that there were no freeloaders, but that everyone actively participated in the shareage. And because it was a community of music lovers, only the highest standards in music encoding were acceptable. If you uploaded a sub-par CD rip to try and up your ratio, rest assured that it would be reported and removed faster than it took you to upload it. Duplicates were strictly forbidden as well. And the music, oh the music – there was anything you could ever want!

I loved OiNK, and for the few years that I was privileged to enjoy the community and the music there, I was in heaven.

But all good things must come to an end.

On October 23, 2007, in the culmination of Operation Ark Royal, a joint operation between Interpol, the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), the British Phonographic Industry(BPI), and some other organizations, the site was shut down, the creator, Allan Ellis arrested, and the site’s hosting servers at nForce confiscated.

The days that followed held fear for all OiNK users. Would the authorities be able to identify them? Would the ISPs give up usernames and real-world identites? Would the joint task force start seeking out the 180,00+ users and begin prosecuting them? And what about Trent Reznor, who was a vocal member and fan of the site? Would he be prosecuted as well?

As it turned out, they were only interested in a few individuals besides Ellis, and most were promptly released from police custody and charges dropped.

On January 15, 2010, Allan Ellis was unanimously declared not guilty. He’s provided just a little bit of information over at OiNK.cd:

If you would like to get in touch with me, you can do so here: contact@alanellis.co.uk.

The solicitors representing me in the case were Morgan Rose with Alex Stein as the barrister.

I’d like to express my thanks to all those who have been in touch offering their support over the years, and the huge amount of congratulations I’ve received over the past few days.
There were three main questions arising from the emails:

1. Will the site be returning? Absolutely not.

2. Will I be available for interview? No, sorry, I would like to get on with my life in peace now.

3. Where did I buy my coat? Wait, what!? Well, I’m almost ashamed to say, but it’s from New Look, and judging by the fact that when I checked yesterday my local shop had more than 10 of them in stock for £30, it’s not very popular!

Finally, a huge thank you to my excellent legal team, without which I wouldn’t be here writing this right now.

It was a sad day when OiNK was shut down, and except for an exclusive few, the rest of the world may never know what a music-sharing site has the potential to be. For anyone that thinks iTunes is a neat idea or the next generation in music distribution: with all due respect, that’s like saying digital watches are the next generation of home computing.