Tuen Mun magistrate Colin Mackintosh sentenced Chan Nai-ming, the uploader of three Hollywood films using BitTorrent peer-to-peer file-sharing software, to three months' jail with a stern warning that the term already included a "reduction" because it was the world's first conviction of its type.

Future perpetrators "might expect greater terms to be imposed" as in cases involving pirated software discs, said Mackintosh.

The judge said uploading media is not just sharing - it causes "extensive" harm to to the copyright holder.

"The message has to be sent out by the courts that the distribution of infringing copies ... will not be treated leniently," he warned.

Senior Superintendent Tam Yiu- keung of the Customs and Excise Department's Intellectual Property Investigation Bureau said the sentence was a step in the right direction.

"The sentence will remind Internet users that illegal activities come with serious consequences," he said.

"Since [Chan's] conviction two weeks ago, we have not found any cases of local BT users uploading illegally distributed works from the forum."

The sentence was also welcomed by industry representatives. Motion Picture Industry Association chief executive Woody Tsung told Agence France- Presse: "I don't care how long the sentence is, as long as [Chan] is going to jail, others will be deterred."

Chan, 38, is not yet behind bars, however. He walked out of court Monday after he indicated he would appeal and Mackintosh granted him bail of HK$3,000. The time to process an appeal takes longer than the three months he would spend in prison.

On January 10 this year, a customs officer became aware of Chan - who called himself "Big Crook" - through his advertising the availability of the Hollywood movie Daredevil on an Internet movie newsgroup.

The officer tracked down "Big Crook" via the films Miss Congeniality and Red Planet. By downloading the films, the officer was able to acquire the IP address, which led the officers to the site "Big Crook" used.

BitTorrent technology allows packets of digital information to be broken down and reassembled to create a large file, like a movie. The process is popular worldwide among file-sharers, who argue that they are simply sharing data for personal use.

Chan was the first to be convicted for being the uploader, or "seeder," of films using an Internet file sharing program.

The magistrate dismissed his notion that he merely "made available" the films on the Internet, and ruled the activity constituted "distribution" as defined in copyright laws.

He began his sentencing Monday by saying: "[Intellectual property rights] are real, they are valuable and they amount to genuine property. And the owners of those rights are entitled to the same level of protection from dishonest appropriation as the owners of ordinary, more tangible property."

Chan, he said, is "not a bad man" but, rather, an "ordinary family man" who used his computer skills for illicit purposes. But no matter how abstract the nature of intellectual property theft, it is nevertheless a very real crime, he ruled.

"An illicit factory or warehouse can be closed. Infringing DVDs can be destroyed. But the Internet cannot be shut down," said Mackintosh.

"Its very essence is the free distribution of material. But that does not mean that it cannot be used for unlawful or criminal purposes. And its use in that regard is difficult to control, save by deterrence."