RedTube

RedTube is a pornographic video sharing site, which in September 2009 held an Alexa ranking within the world's top 100 sites.[3] It is one of several pornographic websites owned by Mindgeek. In June 2010 it had fallen out of the top 100, but it made a return in mid-2012. As of mid September 2020 its Alexa ranking was 520.[4] Its popularity has been ascribed to its non-sexual name, which is a reference to the non-pornographic video sharing website YouTube.[5] The website is based in Houston, Texas and has servers in San Francisco, New Orleans and Montreal.

Not to be confused with YouTube Red.

RedTube
Type of site
Pornographic video sharing
Available inMultilingual
HeadquartersHouston, Texas, United States
OwnerMindGeek[1]
URLwww.redtube.com
RegistrationOptional
LaunchedApril 25, 2007 (2007-04-25)[2]
Current statusOnline
Content license
Free; redtubeplatinum.com is proprietary

History

Wired reported that Redtube.com was one of the 5 fastest growing websites in December 2007.[6]

The site's database was accessed and temporarily shut down by Turkish hackers in October 2008.[7][8]

In 2009, it was one of twelve pornographic sites blocked by the Sri Lankan court because access to the site, which housed images of Sri Lankan women and children, "corrupted society".[9]

In September 2013, one of the videos was blocked in Russia due to the Federal Law On Protection of Children from Information Harmful to Their Health and Development.[10]

In 2018, the Government of India banned RedTube, among other porn websites, after a Uttarakhand High Court court order demanding the same in a rape case where the perpetrators stated they were motivated to do so after watching online pornography.[11]

Viewers

As of 2009, three of the largest porn sites "RedTube, YouPorn and Pornhub — collectively only make up 100 million unique visitors".[12] MindGeek has since acquired all three sites.

Cease and desist case in Germany

In December 2013, the German law firm "Urmann und Collegen (U+C)" sent up to 30,000 cease and desist letters ("Abmahnungen" in German) giving legal warnings to German Internet users who allegedly viewed streams from RedTube containing certain copyrighted videos,[13] demanding them to pay a fine of 250 EUR to the law firm of which 15.50 EUR would be distributed as compensation to the company claiming ownership of copyright for the videos, the Switzerland-based "The Archive AG".[14] By December 13 more than 20,000 people had already received such letters.[15] It is not clear how exactly the law firm was able to collect the IP addresses of RedTube's users.

In documents filed in court in order to obtain the personal data of the individuals involved, the plaintiff claims that he had charged a company called ITGuards, Inc. (allegedly of San Jose, California) who used a proprietary software by the name of "GLADII 1.1.3", allowing them not only to collect the IP addresses of users accessing certain URL's on redtube.com, but also to determine the exact time at which the user started playing or paused the videos embedded on each of those pages.[16]

The BBC reports that the IP addresses were provided to the law firm by the court in Cologne, which began a retrospective review of its decision after receiving complaints.[17] While sending out cease-and-desist letters to Internet users for copyright offenses related to filesharing had been common practice in Germany before, this marks the first time that legal measures are taken against people for merely watching streamed content from a website.[18]

Acquisition

Manwin filed merger notification to acquire RedTube.com from Bright Imperial Ltd on July 31, 2013.[19]

See also

References
  1. O'Connor, Maureen (June 2017). "Pornhub is the Kinsey Report of our Time". New York: 30–39.
  2. "RedTube.com WHOIS, DNS, & Domain Info - DomainTools". WHOIS. 2016. Archived from the original on December 4, 2019. Retrieved February 21, 2016.
  3. "Top Sites". Alexa. Archived from the original on November 13, 2014. Retrieved November 22, 2009.
  4. "Redtube.com Traffic, Demographics and Competitors - Alexa". www.alexa.com. Archived from the original on August 27, 2020. Retrieved September 10, 2020.
  5. Maglinao, Carlo (March 10, 2008). "Why is Redtube popular". Techbays. Archived from the original on December 17, 2008. Retrieved November 22, 2009.
  6. Schiffman, Betsy (January 17, 2008). "Porn Sites Lead Web Growth in December". Wired. Archived from the original on September 1, 2011. Retrieved September 5, 2011.
  7. "Web's Biggest Porn Database Hacked". Radar Online. October 27, 2008. Archived from the original on August 8, 2011. Retrieved September 5, 2011.
  8. "Popular porn site hacked by prudes". V3.co.uk. February 6, 2008. Archived from the original on November 21, 2010. Retrieved September 5, 2011.
  9. "Sri Lanka court blocks porn websites". July 26, 2009. Archived from the original on October 22, 2012. Retrieved September 5, 2011.
  10. "Роскомнадзор заблокировал порносайт Redtube". September 13, 2013. Archived from the original on February 27, 2014. Retrieved October 2, 2013.
  11. "Here is the full list of 827 porn websites blocked by DoT". The Indian Express. October 29, 2018.
  12. Lanxon, Nate (May 22, 2009). "Twitter more popular than free porn: fact! | CNET UK". Crave.cnet.co.uk. Archived from the original on April 24, 2012. Retrieved May 23, 2013.
  13. "RedFaced: Thousands of Germans receive fines for watching copyrighted porn". The Independent. December 16, 2013. Archived from the original on December 25, 2014. Retrieved December 21, 2014.
  14. "Panic as Thousands Receive 'Fines' For Streaming RedTube Videos". TorrentFreak. Archived from the original on December 21, 2014. Retrieved December 21, 2014.
  15. "Porno-Plattform Redtube geißelt die Abmahn-Anwälte". focus.de. December 13, 2013. Archived from the original on December 29, 2014. Retrieved December 13, 2013.
  16. "Redtube: Wurden die Opfer in die Falle gelockt?". chip.de. December 13, 2013. Archived from the original on December 13, 2013. Retrieved December 13, 2013.
  17. "German 'streamed porn' case reviewed". BBC News. December 23, 2013. Archived from the original on October 15, 2014. Retrieved December 21, 2014.
  18. Fuest, Benedikt (December 6, 2013). "Porno-Streaming-Nutzer bekommen Post vom Anwalt". Die Welt. welt.de. Archived from the original on December 7, 2013. Retrieved December 8, 2013.
  19. "Manwin Files Merger Notification to Acquire RedTube.com". business.avn.com. Archived from the original on October 9, 2013. Retrieved July 5, 2016.
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