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EU Passes Nasty IP Law
FireBreathingDog writes "This BBC report details a new European Union law that 'allows companies to raid homes, seize property and ask courts to freeze bank accounts to protect trademarks or intellectual property they believe are being abused or stolen.'" Like any bit of controversial legislation, it can change massively just before being voted upon. This legislation, which originally had DMCA-like provisions (protections for technical protection measures on copyrighted works), seems to have lost them prior to passage. (I'm sure they'll be back in some new piece of legislation.) However, it does make "regular" copyright enforcement much more aggressive in the EU, with companies able to raid, confiscate and freeze the bank accounts of those accused of copyright infringement. More information: IP Justice, FFII, FFII background.
from the article: But late amendments added to the law limited who intellectual property owners could take action against and what penalties they could apply.
This would be just great if companies like SCO get to have this power. The average politition may not realise what their new 'core business' consists of, and give them the keys to the IP city. In 16 months time will it be a common sight to see 'SCOrm Troopers' busting through windows of offices and razing them?
It's bad enough with the government departments doing this, but profit based companies? Shit, this is scary stuff
You can't expect to wield supreme executive power, just because some watery tart threw a sword at you
The US of A were at least original, we're just lagging behind but not at all wiser.
with companies able to raid, confiscate and freeze the bank accounts of those accused of copyright infringement.
Maybe one can use this against GPL violations. What does the legislation say about when, oh, Phillips or Vivendi might be violating GPL terms? Can we have their assets frozen?
["The European law was shepherded through the European Parliament by MEP Janelly Fourtou, wife of Jean-Rene Fourtou who is boss of media giant Vivendi Universal. "]
And there you have it.
Nice to see politicians (are MEPs even elected?) have *our* best interests at heart.
Forget thrust, drag, lift and weight. Airplanes fly because of money.
So exactly *why* are private parties given these rights? Shouldn't they be reserved for the "authorities" after a claim has been acertained as legitimate? What would this mean for a company like SCO that seems to have no real evidence for a claim of IP violation? Could they just use this bill against anyone they *claim* violated IP?
Looks to me like there's no escaping the soul-crushing, draconian corporate police state that's almost (if not already) here in everything but name.
Isn't there any country out there with the balls to refuse to give in to shit like this that isn't already a police state of some kind??
Use 'slashdot stuff' in the subject line in any email you send me if you want to get past the spam filter.
The article states:
The directive allows companies to raid homes, seize property and ask courts to freeze bank accounts to protect trademarks or intellectual property they believe are being abused or stolen.
Is this correct? Are companies going to be granted powers that had been restricted to law-enforcement (for good reasons) up until now?
Will Kodak be able to raid Sony to protect it's intellectual property?
There should be one penalty for both the little guy and the big guy - the law should not be a respecter of persons.
I have not read the full suggestion yet, but all these laws that allows a company to take police actions makes me begin wondering... What would happen if I created a recording company, published a single song and began raiding political offices and homes as we have "Proof" of them sharing our intellectual property? And raiding ISP to take their servers? This seems to me like they are writing away an important part of the legal security and this is something to be very very affraid of when it begins happening. Giving a company the power of the police (intrusion etc) is never a good thing.
This also made my stomach turn. When i was younger, i believed that corporations had an invisible influence over the workings of certain governments. The older i became, the more i realized that there was nothing covert about it.
I've spent a lot of time wondering where the blame should go.
Is it apathetic voters that simply dont have time to research what potential canidates have done?
Is it an abusing lobbying system that wont change because the people that receive the money are also the ones that make the laws?
Is it what ive heard Noam Chomsky refer to as "Institutional Control"? IE, your more than welcome to discuss the US involvement with Uzbekistan in your political science class, but expect your govt funding to be terminated shortly...
At any rate, I agree with your sentiment.
I wonder if local authorities will allow non-official parties to enter your house without official government permission. The EU can decide this, but local authorities can still overrule it, AFAIK. But, IANAL.
"Honey, I feel a certain distance between us..." "Really? A 31ms ping ain't that bad..."
It's not because you're insular (which you are) or xenophobic (which you aren't) -- it's because most UK cits realize that what they think and do matters not at all to European politicians.
In other words, they (the apathetic sheep) have a reasonable and correct worldview whereas you are kind of cute but sad, like a little mouse that says it will protect its parent mice from the evil cat.
Now hush up and give us all your fishing rights -- oh, you already have.
Whence? Hence. Whither? Thither.
Policemen act according to the legal standards. Your article is a flamebait.
"The people who once sent other people to gulag and confiscated their "bourgeois property" will be the lawmakers in Strasbourg and Brussels. Along with the people who sent other people to "gaskammers" and confiscated their "Jewish property"."
Sounds a little bit paranoid. These are crimes of the past and the persons who did it are dead. Crimes against humanity in the past were a good lesson to change the system. Legal standards in Europe are known to be high.
However, the executive branch does not make the laws. It's the lack of lobbying and citizen's representation on the EU level.
Support organisations who are in the debate by donations, give them attantion, forward their news. It is a a power case. the Music industry lost a lot of money, so they invested into lobbying. Don't hate the lobby, be the lobby.
If they freeze my bank account, how can I afford a lawyer? They would be taking my ability to defend myself.
Remember, licking doorknobs is illegal on other planets.
but its open to abuse. Large corporations don't seem to be above that kind of thing. And shouldn't it be left up to the police to sort this type of thing out?
Silly rabbit
Too bad though, most EU civilians now are forbidden to own weapons.
When cops enter your home by "dynamic entry", that's one thing, but when CIVILIANS (which is what those private raiding parties are over there) break into your home by force, then they should be SHOT DEAD ON THE SPOT.
Maybe they can get some sharp sticks and skewer a few of them. When some of them get killed pulling these bullshit raids they'll back off..
Note to those thinging of this here: This is the USA, we are ARMED. Don't try it. You've been warned.
MEPs are elected, and by the way a new European general election is due this year. Hope that french people won't forget "Ms. Vivendi", but I must say I'm sceptic. Not because they are French, but because I am Italian (we have the worst politicians you can find east of Haiti, and we quietly keep electing them for 60 years running...)
-- Let's go Viridian.
It would have been nice to stop this proposal, since there is no reason awarding special favors to plaintiffs in intellectual property cases as opposed to everyone else.
On the other hand, there is a bright side even to this unfortunate development. The Directive says nothing about penal sanctions. Contrary to the original Commission proposal, there is nothing left of Article 21 on the circumvention of technical measures. The article on damages has also been reduced, there are no damages at the amount of double license fees.
Since this is a Directive, the fight is far from over. It will now move on to the 25 stages of national legislation.
Lenz Blog
Actually, I'm looking towards South America, specifically Brazil.
Brazil seems to be improving rapidly, still, Lula seems to keep his eyes open and doesn't take in whatever comes from the large nations and corporations like most do. Brazil also seems to have quite a few good hackers allready, so it has a good start.
He's probably being told from the large ones that he has to enact draconian laws to encourage economic growth, and he is probably to some extent forced to do it through international treaties and bilateral "trade agreements".
If we could convince a nation's leader that, to the contrary, to encourage growth, you have to let go of stringent laws and foster creativity, then we could have a free country. Furthermore, if geeks would move there en masse and create the greatest brainpool anywhere, encouraging the whole society to become creative, then it would lead the way for the rest of the world. Right now, I think Lula seems to be the leader most likely to be convinced this can be the case.
With a free country getting some real mindshare, it could easily take the lead...
I'd really like to hear what the brazilians here have to say about it.
Employee of Inrupt, Project Release Manager and Community Manager for Solid
Think of it the other way around:
... and casting your vote accordingly would be worth it!??
Imagine that the turn-out for the next European Parliament elections was 10%
And you were one of the ones did vote
Did you notice that your vote would count for you plus 9 of the people that didn't vote?
Maybe checking out which of UK's EU parliament members voted for this law and which voted against
I think a right to kill for protecting property is absolutely disgusting.
There is no absolute right to kill. People who shoot intruders under anything less then clear circumstances of a serious threat are often put on trial and have a tough time.
Price of a human life in USA is WAY too low.
The ignorance about what life is really like in the USA is WAY too high.
Look, in the middle of the night, you don't know the intruder's intent, and he's not going to have a little sit down to discuss it. Mere robbers will generally case a house (insert RFID comment here) and wait until it is unoccupied.
I will defend myself and my family to the fullest extent to which I am capable, and use whatever tools I am legally allowed to have (and a few I am not, but that's a different thread). I will take my chances with the legal system rather than the judgement of someone who has broken into my house.
--- Ban humanity.
Still, it would have to be a copyright infringement to start with. Trading cassette tapes (or CDs) with friends is not nessecarilly copyright infringement in some countries. Even with the new proposed copyright laws here in Sweden, you can copy for example music for close friends and family.
... which puts us right back where we started, with assets seized and frozen for downloading a song via a P2P protocol) is enough to have your assets frozen and seized, and your physical self imprisoned.
... our forefathers, spinning in their graves at what we've done, certainly are not.
No. There need only be the accusation of copyright infringement. The DMCA is used at least as often to silence criticism as it is to take down actual, infringing material. It, like this law, has no requirement for due process: the accusation is sufficient to have a web site silenced and an account revoked. The same is true of this law: the accusation is enough to have your door broken down, and the accusation of organized copyright infringement (what defines "organized" I wonder? Participating in a p2p network with thousands of other users might qualify as "organized" to many
This law is a trajedy for Europe. I do not think most Europeans realize just how many of their basic freedoms and rights they have lost with this one piece of ill-considered legislation.
This gets back to the argument I made years ago. Capitalism doesn't work in a world of plenty. It doesn't work with ideas, it doesn't work with expression, and it most assuredly doesn't work with digital information. To make it work, you have to enact and enforce profoundly draconian laws: laws that run counter to every human impulse with respect to sharing (information, knowledge, expression, you name it) in order to create an artificial scarcity where in reality none exists. This will work no better than communism's attempt to impose a communist economic system on a domain where it wasn't applicable (a domain of scarcity), and the result will be the same draconian government, the same lack of freedoms, the same invasive government that will make no one safe, even in their own homes.
Farewell enlightened democracy in the west. We've chosen an outmoded economic system over the ideals of our forefathers. I hope we're proud of ourselves
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
...if this law were passed in America? Corporate troopers breaking down the doors, and if you resist they can just shoot your ass. Speak ill of any corporation and all of a sudden 'evidence' will be manufactured, er, provided to 'competent law enforcement agencies' that you're a copyright evil-doer.
Perhaps you'll eventually be exonerated - that is, if said 'evidence' doesn't mysteriously appear on your computer *AFTER* it's seized and hauled off to corporate headquarters - but you'll have to wait years to get back your property, your money, and recover what's left of your life.
If shit like this comes anywhere close to passing in the U.S. I'm moving to Canada.
Max
My god carries a hammer. Your god died nailed to a tree. Any questions?