On the Nature of Things | Forum

Yukon Cornelius wrote:

Zack Morris wrote: What's illogical is the way you've distorted the argument. It's not about copyright infringement being "right" or excusable, it's about the punishment being excessive. It's not the right way to deal with what is clearly an unprecedented technology. What is your argument for why existing law enforcement is insufficient?

No, there are rouge websites that need spanking, and becuase of the attitude I'm reading on this page, those supposedly exist to, as de Sade put it: "backup the sewers and flood the palaces". Grist for the mill, sticking it to the man, fighting back the inhumanity of having to pay and wait for new episodes of True Blood.

The legislation in question is "wrong" because our "rights" trump the any curtailing of our "Internet freedoms". Like I said at the beginning: "Free" to do "What", exactly?

Yukon Cornelius wrote:

Enki wrote:Yukon: The problem is third parties being punished for the behavior of others, even if they work in full compliance to make sure their service isn't being used for piracy.

No again, people like Google, etc. should have been policing themselves a long time ago. They're doing it now, they do it for China, but they wink at places like the pirate bay because of the reigning ideas about "sharing".


You see, what you really want to do is be complicitous in pissing off/scaring a billion(s) dollar industry, then when they bring that lobbying horsepower to Congress....

Zack Morris wrote:

Yukon Cornelius wrote:

Zack Morris wrote: What's illogical is the way you've distorted the argument. It's not about copyright infringement being "right" or excusable, it's about the punishment being excessive. It's not the right way to deal with what is clearly an unprecedented technology. What is your argument for why existing law enforcement is insufficient?

No, there are rouge websites that need spanking, and becuase of the attitude I'm reading on this page, those supposedly exist to, as de Sade put it: "backup the sewers and flood the palaces". Grist for the mill, sticking it to the man, fighting back the inhumanity of having to pay and wait for new episodes of True Blood.

The legislation in question is "wrong" because our "rights" trump the any curtailing of our "Internet freedoms". Like I said at the beginning: "Free" to do "What", exactly?

That's nonsense. Web sites should be allowed to offer storage space without having to be liable for what is stored there. If a user is violating the law, a court can order the web site to remove the offending material without forcing the entire site down each time a copyright holder claims there is infringement. This is akin to shutting down a storage facility because they don't comb through customers' belongings every day or seizing an apartment building from an owner because a tenant is breaking the law.

This is akin to shutting down a storage facility because they don't comb through customers' belongings every day or seizing an apartment building from an owner because a tenant is breaking the law.

Assume there's a corner store in your neighborhood that rents movies. But the movie industry believes that some or even all of the videos in that store are unauthorized copies, so that they're not being paid when people watch their movies. What should be done?
SOPA/PIPA do not aim at the people trying to get to the store, or even the store itself. The solution under the proposed bills is to make it as difficult as possible to find or interact with the store:

Maps showing the location of the store must be changed to hide it.
The road to the store must be blocked off so that it is difficult to physically get to there.
Directory services must delist the store’s phone number and address.
Credit card companies would have to cease providing services to the store.
Local newspapers would no longer be allowed to place ads for the video store.
To make sure it all happens, any person or organization who doesn’t do this is subject to penalties. Even publishing a newsletter that tells people where the store is would be prohibited by this legislation.

File-sharers are content industry's "largest customers"
By Nate Anderson | Published May 3, 2010 1:40 PM

Drawing on a major study of Dutch file-sharers, Prof. Nico van Eijk of the University of Amsterdam concludes, "These figures show that there is no sharp divide between file sharers and others in their buying behaviour. On the contrary, when it comes to attending concerts, and expenses on DVDs and games, file sharers are the industry's largest customers... There does not appear to be a clear relationship between the decline in sales and file sharing."

In fact, the study found that file-sharers often buy more content, especially when it comes to films and games.

[...]

Beyond ACTA: next secret copyright agreement negotiated this week—in Hollywood
By Nate Anderson | Published February 1, 2012 6:30 PM

One of the worst parts of the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) was its ridiculous secrecy, under which it was easy for negotiators and industry reps to see draft text, but impossible for the public to do so except through leaks. Thankfully, those leaks showed just how bad ACTA was going to be for the Internet, and public pressure helped remove the worst provisions.

But the basic approach to doing deals didn't die, and it's back again this week as negotiators meet in Hollywood to discuss a new, totally secret intellectual property chapter for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a regional trade agreement.

Civil society and digital rights groups would dearly love to be part of the process; barring that, they'd like to know simply what the process is so that they can at least mount press conferences of their own. But even that is difficult.

According to Sean Flynn, an American University professor who has worked on these issues for several years, the cloud of secrecy is again in force. "Although there has been no official announcement about the planned meeting, public interest advocacy organizations have determined that intellectual property negotiations will be held January 31-Feb 4th at a hotel in West Hollywood," he wrote last night in an e-mail.

Flynn helped to organize a "public interest briefing" that would take place at the hotel and be open to any TPP negotiators interested in hearing a different perspective. It was not to be:

The public interest briefing was booked last week and advertised to all delegations, including the host USTR [US Trade Representative]. An hour after the invitation was sent, we received a cancellation of our venue by the hotel. The cancelation by by Sophie Jones, Event Sales Manager, Sofitel Los Angeles stated:

“I am sorry to be the bearer of bad news but unfortunately we will not be able to move forward with your luncheon for Tuesday January 31st. It was brought to my attention that we have a confidential group in house and we will not be allowing any other groups in the meeting space that day. Again, my apologies for the late notice. Hopefully we can work together in the near future.”

After receiving the cancellation, members of an advocacy organization called the hotel and were able to book a room for a claimed private event not related to the TPP. Apparently only TPP-related events were banned from the hotel at the request of an unidentified party. USTR is serving as the host of this meeting.

The meeting did take place... at a restaurant across the street from the hotel. A later, two-hour conference was held at the USC Law School and is available for streaming. The whole episode sounds both petty and farcical on USTR's part, but the issues are deadly serious.

Last year, versions of the TPP's US-written IP chapter leaked; its provisions went well beyond even ACTA, which was already the new high-water mark for IP enforcement. Where do things stand now? Are the other TPP countries on board with the US approach? Who knows! It's all secret.

While ACTA at least claimed not to exceed US law, Flynn and other professors allege that the leaked TPP IP chapter does go beyond what's in US law, doing things like extending copyright protection even to temporary "buffer" copies so crucial to digital devices.

As for USTR, it claims to be conducting "an unprecedented fifty-state domestic outreach strategy for TPP," and it's even hosting a largely worthless TPP blog. People can send comments to USTR through a special Web form, and negotiators do take in presentations from civil society groups on some occasions.

But negotiators still insist of shielding their work from the public, even on matters of increasing public concern, such as digital copyrights. And each agreement they negotiate mysteriously ends up just a bit tougher than the one before it. The time for "trust us" is over, and unlike ACTA, people want meaningful access to TPP documents before the draft text has been so worked over that no substantive change is possible. But without significant public pressure, that's not going to happen. Again.

YMix wrote:

File-sharers are content industry's "largest customers"
By Nate Anderson | Published May 3, 2010 1:40 PM

Drawing on a major study of Dutch file-sharers, Prof. Nico van Eijk of the University of Amsterdam concludes, "These figures show that there is no sharp divide between file sharers and others in their buying behaviour. On the contrary, when it comes to attending concerts, and expenses on DVDs and games, file sharers are the industry's largest customers... There does not appear to be a clear relationship between the decline in sales and file sharing."

In fact, the study found that file-sharers often buy more content, especially when it comes to films and games.

[...]

BTJunkie Shuts Down Voluntarily

BTJunkie, a popular BitTorrent search engine, has voluntarily shut down after seven years in existence. The recent seizures of MegaUpload and several hundred sports broadcasting websites likely had an significant impact over the move to voluntarily shut down. It’s yet to be seen if BTJunkie will go completely inactive or whether they will follow in the footsteps of The Pirate Bay, which ended its search service in 2009 but still allows for the trading of content through decentralized methods such as magnet link sharing.

All that is left of BTJunkie is a four-sentence statement, which reads:

This is the end of the line my friends. The decision does not come easy, but we’ve decided to voluntarily shut down. We’ve been fighting for years for your right to communicate, but it’s time to move on. It’s been an experience of a lifetime, we wish you all the best!

According to the website ranking service Alexa, as of February 2012 BTJunkie ranked as the 392nd most popular website in the world. For comparison, The Pirate Bay reached as high as 75.

Enki wrote:

YMix wrote:

File-sharers are content industry's "largest customers"
By Nate Anderson | Published May 3, 2010 1:40 PM

Drawing on a major study of Dutch file-sharers, Prof. Nico van Eijk of the University of Amsterdam concludes, "These figures show that there is no sharp divide between file sharers and others in their buying behaviour. On the contrary, when it comes to attending concerts, and expenses on DVDs and games, file sharers are the industry's largest customers... There does not appear to be a clear relationship between the decline in sales and file sharing."

In fact, the study found that file-sharers often buy more content, especially when it comes to films and games.

[...]

That's true. Most people don't look at the overall aggregate of entertainment sales. Hollywood and the RIAA see their sales declining, but Video Games have risen much further than the amount of decline in those other industries.