Australia May Adopt DMCA-Style Copyright Regime

beaver1024 writes "Australia, desperate to garner more U.S. trade, has indicated that it is willing to follow a more stringent regime for protecting copyright. This follows attempts by MediaForce to force Australian ISPs to comply with U.S. DMCA provisions. I fear that due to the current Australian government's weak spineless nature, the harsh provisions of the DMCA will soon arrive in the land down under."

Comments

Can countries hold out?

[Mdog]

One thing that has always given me some hope with all this DMCA stuff is that it only takes one sensible country to not accept it, and development can go on (albeit hampered.) This story makes me wonder if it's only a matter of time until only lawless countries can host such things. Troublesome.

Re:Can countries hold out?

[smasherbob]

There's a problem with your statement there.

Think of it this way - the DMCA is a worm. It's going to try to propogate itself by spreading to as many countries as possible. The ones that choose to keep it away can, but the more countries that adopt the laws, the more at risk these non-DMCA countries will be. Trade embargos and the like from different countries can spark a nation's government into shaping up surprisingly fast.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I really believe that every (developed enough) country will have a DMCA equivilant of some kind within the next 5 years. It's only sensible to cover these new actions under law. I'm not saying that every country will adopt a code as strict as America's, of course. Not every country is run by their entertainment industry. ZING!

There goes another safe haven.

[Anonymous Coward]

Just the other day I was wondering where I'd go next if the US got too oppressive.

The UK's already too surveillance happy.
The US is getting there, and has too many stupid laws to boot.

I guess it's time to look at NZ.

Re:There goes another safe haven.

[hdparm]

As a New Zealander, I can tell you - look elsewhere.

NZ is too small and too dependent on Australia's and US economies that it will have to obey probable requests of this kind.

It's sad but that's how it is. Let me know if you find a place - we can go together.

Even ARIA admits piracy isn't the problem!

[decefett]

Check out this article from the Sydney Morning Herald, Piracy not the burning issue in CD sales slide: ARIA

I amazes me the lengths the Howard government will go to in order to suck up to the US.

I'm sick of this.

[harikiri]

I'm a longtime Australian resident, and have been saddened to see more kowtowing to our 'big brother', the United States, instead of seeking out our own identity and place in the global marketplace.

This possible DMCA "adoption" is another example of us bending over backwards to please our economic partners.

I had high hopes for us when our Australian Competition & Consumer Commission (ACCC) started defending our rights against DVD region encoding. Looks like we need to do more campaigning to wake the public up before this new movement gets too far.

Economists don't believe in this agreement

[decefett]

An opinon peice from Ross Gittens (a noteable economic commentator) titled Free-trade agreement is Howard's ticking bomb does not look kindly apon this agreement.

A choice quote: Contrary to appearances, bilateral FTAs don't rate as micro reform because, as any textbook will tell you, they're more likely to be "trade diverting" than "trade enhancing".

Where is safe haven?

[josh crawley]

Where's the safe haven for "hackers", "reverse engineers", and decrypters? There must be some place that has:
1: 1'st world type living
2: Somewhat bustling computer community/advancement
3: Decent economy
4: None of these "DMCA" laws

And dont answer Sealand. It's way overcrowded (for a cement pole in the ocean).

China to the rescue?

[lingqi]

Not trolling, but this point in the game it might really take a country that doesn't give a shit about US bs-laws, and who is a huge market, to avert this kind of crap.

I know the knee-jerking is that "oh it's a terrible regime" and "human rights" and "think of the children" and so forth, but really though - China didn't think so much of DVDs, so they went ahead and defined SVCDs - not as nice and versatile, but pretty good standard, useful.

I mean with all the trade agreements in place, US can pretty much enforce DMCA on everybody through trade embargos and get away with it... No hope for these guys standing up to the US in these areas.

Who will rule the world?

[teamhasnoi]

The U.S. no longer knows how to make shovels, but they know how to buy them from 3rd world countries. They then use these shovels to overwhelm these same countries with the one thing that makes America 'great' - culture.

When the U.S. is reduced to its last surviving companies, it will be the producers of media that have spent trillions of dollars in the pursuit of an unstoppable monopoly on 'content' and the profit that follows.

Will there be U.S. Steel plants? Refineries? Agriculture? No. Will any durable good be manufactured in the U.S. No.

The only thing that other countries can't compete with the U.S.: the creation(in the loosest sense), distribution, and consumption of U.S. made MassMedia.

The war on terrorism is already a poor excuse for a reality-TV show, the war on drugs is an effort to direct your 'escapes' to more profitable, advertising-rich video and movies; the war on piracy is nothing more than a giant squeezing blood from a stone.

When all that is real has been lost to a soft, dehumanized, videodrone people - that is when the countries who have made the shovels, dug the ditches, grown the food, built the roads and cities in the U.S. - that is when those countries will walk in and quietly pick up the fallen reins of America, and sense may return.

I think I just choked on a pretzel.

Where Will Quantum Computers Be Designed

[Greyfox]

Who will be the first to file charges against IBM for attempted development of a device which will render all existing crytopgraphy useless? The handy side effect that Quantum Computers make factoring trivial should be enough to use legal means to halt all further work on the devices. The lawsuits should be filed now, before the threat of the Quantum Computer is allowed to fall into the hands of hackers and terrorists everywhere!

Why is this a surprise?

[chill]

In all reality, Australia -- as well as New Zealand -- has been the United States' bitches since right after WWII.

Remember Echelon? Back in 1947 the U.S. and the U.K. signed the Ukusa (really creative name) agreement that was soon after signed on by Canada, Australia and New Zealand. This basically cemented the major former U.K. colonies and English-speaking countries as the axis around which the future world would spin.

http://216.239.33.100/search?q=cache:OU6RBkDIMKs C: mondediplo.com/1999/01/04echelon+australia+united+ states+echelon&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

Despite the occasional noise made by various MPs, PMs, Congressman and other politicians, there is a stranglehold of a tie between those 5 countries that will be almost impossible to break.

The U.S. leads because of the simple fact that they are the biggest, baddest and richest. (Usable natural resources, military, population, economy, etc.) The others may not toe the exact line, but everyone moves in the same direction.

Minor dissent is allowed, because it gives the illusion of self determination and national sovereignty. Major dissent never happens -- not over anything important.

The rest of Europe and Russia bitch because they aren't that important anymore. The world no longer spins around France, Germany and Russia. They are being pushed to the sidelines. Hell, they did it and now it is someone else's turn.

Sad, but that is the way it works.

Re:Why is this a surprise?

[Anonymous Coward]

"The world no longer spins around France, Germany and Russia. They are being pushed to the sidelines. Hell, they did it and now it is someone else's turn."

Of course the world no longer revolves around London either, but as you indicated earlier we're humoured into thinking we have a certain significance, so what can I interest you in this year?

- Mercenaries, you need a few good troups here and there? SAS can help on the cutting edge and the rest of the army makes a good occupation force... err I mean "peace keepers", n.b. in original packing only used once recently in Afghanistan, but good as new.

- Various basesd and coastline facilities capable of housing mid range missiles that could reach Moscow, note, some obsolescence has been noted.

- We've some free space on a remote moorland already packed with radar and interception facilities, it would make a good location for future NMD Star Wars bases for tracking weapons from various scumbag uncolonised... err I mean "uncivilised" states. Again, we don't mind becoming a target even if we're not within StarWars, nor is there concern about painting a big fucking target all over the North of England, it's miles away from London.

- Airbases on the North Sea for testing suspiciously new aircraft and frightening the Russians.

- 1 x Permanent member vote on the security council.

Also on offer this week:

1. Nuclear testing groud in the Australian outback, they like to think they have their own government but generally they don't mind us blowing up the occasional nuke here and there, though some Aborigines can get pretty pissed at radiating their land for the next 2000 years, get them.

2. Interception bases in Canada, Australia and New Zealand, Indian Ocean bases and Hong Kong (see previous), the Chinese usually don't like people spying on them.

3. Oxford or Harrow education for loyal arab states, have your favourate emirate top brass swear like an Englishman. See Jordan, or King Faisal.

4. Various bases, see Ascension Island, Gibraltar, Cyprus etc.

In return we simply ask for a sense of importance and meaning to distract from the indignity of having lost our preeminence and our descent into a tiny backward 2nd world island where nothing works properly. There's two ways of dealing with this, laughing in sorrow, or getting extremely bitter (see France).

Too close to home

[Anonymous Coward]

I am an Australian citizen, but now call New Zealand my home.

I really really hope this brown-nosing with the U.S. doesent rub-off here, after all NZ has continually told the U.S. to keep it's nuclear-powered warships out of it's harbours, regardless of incentives offered by way of trade agreements.

But now that things like LOTR are so hot, and sponsered so heavily by holywood, I wonder how long NZ will be a DMCA-free zone. Not long I bet.

It'll be interesting to see how long it will take the DRM 'cancer' to spread throughout this part of the world.

Re:DAMN!

[Noodlenose]

Move to New Zealand.

It's just around the corner...

Unlikely to happen

[nich37ways]

I somehow doubt that this will go through the Senate* in Australia as the opposition (Labour Party) and independents/greens/democrats will block it because they dont want to tow the American Line and a lot of the non-Liberal politicians are making their claims to fame by not being pro-American but pro-Australian.

Although I do not doubt that we will get a watered down version there has been too much bad publicity (at least in the circles that care/understand) about the problems with the DMCA that we shouldn't end up with such draconian measures. Also we have the ACCC (Australian Competition and Consumer Commision) who have done a good job looking out for the little guy in the past ( with a fair amount of thanks from the community), and I dont think that the opposition party is willing to risk further destroying our rights and alientating the constituents for the Liberals policy glory.

nich

*Senate - We have a two house sytem, Lower House and Upper House(Senate). The government is whoever holds the majority in the Lower House, currently Liberal Party (mainly look out for big business and John Howard(Prime Minister) is seriously Bush's lap dog.

Not worried about Europe

[Captain Beefheart]

Australia may make concessions to the US to maintain favorable status, especially after that nasty bit of terrorism, but I suspect Europe will smile, nod, and tell the States they can shave their arse cheeks if they like.

The US isn't making any friends right now in the U.N., that's for sure. This is not corporate agenda, by the way, this is political. "You agree to a localized version of the DCMA, and we won't put you on our Suspected Harborer of Terrorists List," or some offer of that nature.

It's just fucking lovely when the government co-opts a corporate campaign for political gain. Hey, that rhymes. I see T-shirts and mugs in my future....

yep, we're fucked

[Anonymous Coward]

I was born in Australia, still live here, and right now am ashamed to admit it... our government has its head up Bush's arse - supporting the latest imperialist initiative and every other boneheaded concept out of the U.S. - and the only thing that mitigates my shame at being Australian right now is the knowledge that I didn't vote for the idiots in power. Europeans built this country - why can't we look to them instead?!

resolving copyright limits

[JThaddeus]

I wonder if Australia will change it's copyright limits to match the US. Currently, the Aussies permit copyrights 50 years after the death of the author while (as we know) the US is now twice that. That's why you can download the works of F. Scott Fitzgerald from Project Guttenberg's Aussie site but not from a US site.

WIPO WCT

[SubtleNuance]

The DMCA is the US embodyment of the The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Copyright Treaty (WCT).

This treaty, (probably) written by the RIAA/MPAA (literally) was approved by appointed trade representatives to WIPO. (see here)

When you see people marching as advocates of Fair Trade (like the opposition to FTAA) they are protesting neo-liberalization of trade by the WTO... so, dont like DMCA? dont want DMCA in *your* country? Join the effort to end Corporate Globalization through the WTO... the DMCA is a *result* of these thieves carving up our future.

Australians, Canadians, and Europeans: Find out who is your WIPO/WTO delegates are, and write a letter condemning neoliberalism (as embodied in the WCT(DMCA treaty)) and send copies to your PM/President and Federal Representative... ill be doing that now.