"i really do suggest people to BUY this game if they can, it's well worth it like he says.
I just want to see it cracked for shits and giggles"

Ha, how did that turn out, uh?

Some people have offered a very strange defense for this supposed $1.6mil AU fine (which, like ameratsu said, I don't even buy into). I'm going to have to call you people out on this.

So far, it seems as if the reasoning is that 50,000 people downloaded this game that this man uploaded, so his punishment should be proportional to this. There are a few reasons why this is unfair:

1. There's no proof that each of these 50,000 downloads were a lost sale. If I made a Facebook group with its sole purpose to download the game 100,000 more times and did so (and delete it subsequently after), the guy's fine would end up tripling? That makes absolutely no sense.
2. I don't believe this man uploaded the game directly to all these 50,000 downloads. It was off a torrent, correct? If so, that makes everyone who uploaded data using the torrent responsible, which is likely to be a very large number. Just because we could only catch one guy, does not mean he should hold the responsibility of all the (supposed) 50,000.
3. Finally, he's credited as being the first who uploaded the game. This is because the game would have been uploaded/downloaded 50,000 times, regardless of whether he uploaded it or not. Give me an example of a game that doesn't have a torrent if you argue against this. This is relevant because it makes it pretty damn clear that he's not solely responsible for 50,000 * (game price) of revenue, as that revenue is always "lost", whether this man is in the picture or not.

The man's real crime is that he uploaded the game first, not that he uploaded it 50,000 times (the torrent supporters carried it on for the vast majority, track them down as well if justice must be served). The fine should be proportional to the former, and $1.6mil obviously does not sound reasonable.

You can better rape someone and be free in a few years.... than upload a game on the internet.

Just pointing out that I think this is not fair.

Every time read the title of this thread, I can't help but think it's the title of a new Super Mario game. >_>

ha. i read that too.

So, rather than punishing this man in relation to the severity of his crime, they're punishing him in relation to Nintendo's projected losses?

You can quanitfy monetary bereavement. Can you quantify a lifetime of suffering? Because that's essentially what's being handed out here.

Justice based on assumtions. A comforting thought.

But then again he settled on this amount with Nintendo, so people wonder if he's actually gonna pay anything or if it's just for the headlines.

Never thought Nintendo would pull a microsoft.

You know what's better than suing people for piracy in attempt to stop.
Is to actually attempt to stop it by making hard to pirtate machines...

Seece is right, the punishment doesn't fit the crime. He should be paying back the entire amount he took from Nintendo rather than a portion.

Despite that misleading intro, I think he should have to pay Nintendo back everything they loss. Considering he only has to pay $1.5 million of that $5 million, he's getting a pretty good deal. But his attempt to try and slant his story pretty much shows what kind of person this guy is. At least man up to what ya did.