Author: BWild

The Justice Department has now filed charges, to which the two accused men have pled guilty.

In a historical case in technology news, two men who have been accused of owning a mobile app piracy site for Android devices have now pled guilty to the charges that had been filed against them by the Department of Justice.

This is the first time that the Department of Justice has landed counterfeit application distribution convictions.

This week, Nicholas Anthony Narbone gave his plea of “guilty” to a single count of conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement. The second man, Thomas Allen Dye, the “co-conspirator” to Narbone, according to the Department of Justice, also entered his guilty plea, though his was made for the same charge earlier on in March.

Both Narbone and Dye were both overseeing a pirate mobile app distribution site.

Through Appbucket.net, which was labeled an “alternative online market”, authorities have alleged that the two men managed to illegally distribute over 1 million copies of the apps that were each copyrighted. Those illegal downloads would have totaled over $700,000 in value, according to federal prosecutors. Moreover, they were distributed without having received any consent from the developers of those applications.

In 2012, American law enforcement agencies seized two different android piracy websites, one of which was Appbucket. Similar charges have been laid with regards to the SnappzMarket.com website. In that caise Kody Peterson, a 22 year old, is suspected of being the individual behind that market and has had government charges filed against him. That site, which was targeted by federal authorities, is believed to have robbed mobile app development companies of an even larger sum of money.

According to prosecutors, the pirated app distribution that ran from May 2011 to August 2012 led to approximately 1 million downloads which would have been worth an estimated $1.7 million. As Peterson did not receive any mention in the press release that was issued on the subject by the Department of Justice, it can be assumed that the case is likely ongoing.

In the mobile app piracy case involving Narbone (who is 26 years old) and Dye (who is 21 years old), the sentencing will occur on July 8th and June 12th, respectively. Both of those individuals could spend up to 5 years in jail.

Retailer finds success by engaging with mobile consumers in non-metropolitan areas

Maimaibao, a Chinese online retail firm, has announced that it has received funding from several large organizations within China, including Tencent. The amount of funding the firm has received has not yet been revealed, but speculation suggests that it is somewhere around the $100 million mark. Maimmaibao has attracted attention for not being a typical online retailer. Instead of targeting consumers in large cities, it focuses on non-metropolitan areas where Internet access is not necessarily reliable. Notably, the firm has seen a great deal of mobile activity in these parts of China.

Feature phones can also participate in mobile shopping, even without access to a fast Internet network

The retailer manages to engage consumers where Internet access is lacking through its mobile website. This website is particularly accommodating to feature phones that only have access to 2G wireless networks. Many Chinese consumers that have these types of mobile devices live and work in places where they do not have access to a PC, making their phones a valuable shopping tool. Maimaibao has managed to find significant success in making itself open to these consumers, and this has attracted the attention of Tencent.

Tencent continues to fight for dominance in the mobile commerce space

Tencent is one of China’s largest Internet organizations and it has begun to focus quite heavily on mobile commerce. Tencent is working to establish a dominant presence in the mobile commerce space through its WeChat application and various other ventures. The company is currently clashing with Alibaba, which has also begun working to engage mobile consumers more aggressively in recent months. Tencent may be able to achieve its goals of mobile dominance by aligning itself with Maimaibao.

Maimaibao aims to develop new smartphone for its primary demographic in China

Maimaibao will use the funding it has received to develop a new smartphone under its Big Q brand name. This mobile device is meant to provide the company’s chief demographic — those living in non-metropolitan areas of China — with a mobile device that has more capabilities than typical feature phones.