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US To Push Criminalization of IP Violations
Dr.Hair writes "
Soon to be ex-Secretary of Commerce Don Evans speaks out on 'piracy' just prior to his last trip to China for negotiations. 'That means criminalizing the laws as opposed to (having) just civil laws...You've got to start putting people in jail.'
The article points out that this lust for prosecutions extends from Evans to his successor, the American Chamber of Commerce, and the US Senate. "
Now we can fill up our jails with even more people who are as dangerous as marijuana smokers...
You can't talk about Wikipedia's flaws on Wikipedia
Well, as long as they're consistent. Looks like maybe Bill Gates will be doing some hard time for the Burst patent violations, right?
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
We lead the way in crypto-facism this time!
China has "got to start putting people in jail" to show it is serious about cracking down on widespread counterfeiting and piracy that costs U.S. companies billions of dollars in lost sales every year, a top Bush administration official said.
Why should China want to stifle it's own economy just to please Bush?
That's just great. Put me in with the rapists, murderers, high level drug dealers... do what you've done to low level potheads for years. Throw me in with the rest. Though I'm not a criminal now, when I come out, I will be. "and I say to myself... what a wonderful world" (I was going to rant about this. I restrained myself)
Tim says: "please mod me up so my karma won't be terrible. Please?"
I for one agree with the largely European stance of no IP/software patents. I agree with RMS on the values of sharing. Before long, and at this rate, companies will literally own the government. The srtong lobby for software and IP in general serves only to line people's pockets.
The socialists are right on this one.
And don't even give me that crap about the poor programmer who is trying to earn a living. I, too, work in IT and have a family to support. In the end, IP serves to hurt the people rather than help them. The only people it helps are the shareholders and lawyers who prosecute and defend.
Sadly, as long as politicians are getting big contributions from the entertainment industry, the outlook for this kind of law is not so good because the real motivations are hidden and corrupt.
For all the people who haven't thought this through yet:
When they come to lock you up, no one is going to stand up for you. Maybe the EFF will send you a Christmas card in prison.
The propaganda has worked. No one in the public at large has any notion of the rights and freedoms they are in the process of losing, let alone what they mean.
Society is 100% ready to accept zero-privacy, expensive, addled DRM solutions. They will have no sympathy for anyone doing a 4-8 stretch for "downloading." With one deft push from Comrade Gonzales, they will all line up to throw tomatoes at "developers of illegal software."
My advice for you all is to read early accounts of the rise of the Soviet state, and/or especially the transition years in Eastern Europe. Totalitarianism has a very recognizable feel, even in the very beginning, before you can barely feel its grip, you can smell it's breath long before it starts to squeeze.
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this title and /. article is highly misleading. did the poster rtfa?
this is about the usa pushing for china to start putting people in jail for counterfeiting. that IS widely acknowledged as "piracy."
sum.zero
For a change, I RTFA. They're pushing for the Chinese to start putting Chinese counterfeiters in jail under the rules of Chinese law.
While it might be a short leap for the same people to start calling for the criminalization of copyright infringement in the US, that's not what we're talking about here.
Jail doesn't work.
They call it the Department of Corrections, which is pure political bullshit. They've never corrected anything.
It's necessary to remove violent offenders from society for societies safety, but repeat offenses are high. Being in prison doesn't "teach" or "fix" or correct the problem.
Yet in America, we've set the system up so that virtually every last citizen belongs behind bars under the law.
We can start jailing kids for running kazaa, and it won't solve the problem.
It'll just increase the tax burden for the handful of people who manage to not get caught.
Everyone has done one of the following: tried drugs, infringed a copyright, exceeded the speed limit, drank alcohol underage, bought a violent video game for someone under 18, etc...
Why don't we just run razor wire along the coasts and borders, and declare everyone incarcerated?
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Imagine the reaction if senior Chinese officials started calling for the internal laws of the US to be altered to suit Chinese business interests.
Drill baby drill - on Mars
I'm honestly not for software piracy but this seems to pinch a nerv a bit.
We're filling up our jails with Pot users and Pirates. When does this start seeming to be a waste of taxpayer's money?
Looks like a way to reduce further tax revinue and increase costs to the (now fewer in number) tax payers.
Great job guys.
The most useful kinds of rules are the ones that everyone violates, and that are therefore unworkable. In other words - rules are made to be broken.
Now we can fill up our jails with even more people who are as dangerous as marijuana smokers...
....
Oh, that's fuckin' great -- IP violaters and pot smokers, cheek to jowl in the showers.
God only knows what kind of criminal masterminds are breeding in those prisons
-kgj
-kgj
You can hardly make this into a vast right-wing conspiracy by mentioning Bush when practically everyone in Hollywood is a Bush-hating left-winger.
Remember, kids, it's all about being tough on crime. If, for some inexplicable reason, crime continues to exist--you're simply not being tough enough. Throw more people in prison; make the sentences longer to keep 'em there. To hell with reform; make sentences punitive and harsh for the sake of scaring people straight. It'll work eventually, right?
1 out of 37 Americans have served time in prison. Our incarceration rates continue to skyrocket. How much more will it take for people to throw their hands in the air and say "Enough!"?
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
Bush was up here in Canada last month (i think) twisting the arms of the Canadian Government to stop the sale of drugs online. Our gov't agreed and shut down a bunch of retailers losing about 4500 jobs in the process. So much for being an autonomous nation.
Coincidentally, the very next day, our beef was now allowed back over the border into the U.S. Even when they found ANOTHER case of BSE the very next day. hmmm. One was enough to kill our industry last year.. but this one's ok? I smell a rat.
As our now dead ex-Prime Minister Trudeau used to say, "Living next to America is like sleeping with an elephant."
I'm not anti-social, I'm anti-idiot.
The IFPI/RIAA/MPAA and it's current USA puppet the bush-government (and a lot of senators and other so-called representatives of the people) is fighting a lost cause. And I think they know it. If they would act specifically against mass-counterfeiting for commercial purposes then, certainly when health issues are at stake, it might have some validity, but everyone knows such laws will be used against all others as well, before you can blink your eye. And yet, it will go as with the war on drugs: something you can never beat, and something that is sustained with unvalid reasonings and making a lot of FUD.
/ freenet/website/pages/fairshare.php?rev=1.1).
First off all, I have difficulties with their acclaimed 'stealing' of music/movies. As far as I know, stealing implies that the one that has been stolen has been derived of something. When you take a copy, you do not take the original away, thus they have not 'lost' anything. They might claim that they loose money when ppl d/l music, but even that is far from certain.
Not only is it not shown statistically to have had that effect (they didn't even show a correlation thusfar - see aussie music-news - let alone a causality). Furthermore, in an individual case, they would have to show they actually lost revenue. Which is far from said, because I sure know some guys who d/l music, but would NEVER have bought that music if they were unable to d/l it. So, how did the RIAA/IFPI loose revenue, exactly? And if they didn't lose anything, how can the term 'stealing' apply?
It would still be copyright-infringement, ofcourse, but that's another matter. I think maybe it's time we went beyond our current system of copyrights and walk into the era of cyberspace. With the industrial revolution, patents and copyrights knew a high flight, maybe it's time to let it leave and try something new? Maybe something in the lines of this: fairshare (http://cvs.sourceforge.net/viewcvs.py/*checkout*
And don't worry, contrary to what the RIAA claims, musicians will not starve to death, and music-making will not stop. We had music long before we had copyrights, and we will have music long after copyrights have vanished from the scene.
And lastly, it's something that *can not* be stopped. P2P progs and their development act as organisms that follow the darwinian rules of survival. When Napster was 'killed' by the RIAA, immediately others (like kazaa) took over, being more resistent to attacks from the RIAA&co. Whenever kazaa will be shut down, others again will take over. When endusers are targeted, systems that protect the user will become dominant (like FreeNet).
It really is a lost cause. But then again, they are not truelly battling for the survival of musicians (as I said; they will survive, just as they used to do), it's for their OWN survival they are fighting. There is no way in hell they are going to keep the giant profits that they have been gathering for the last decades.
But ultimately, they will have to do what P2P systems are already doing: adapt to the new circumstances (and forget about the former levels of profit), or whither and die.
--- "To pee or not to pee, that is the question." ---
Is breaking into a person's server or blogsite and messing with the contents any different from breaking in to a person's house/business and messing around? In both cases peoples "space" and privacy have been violated.
Is defacing a website any different from spraying graffiti on someones walls?
Engineering is the art of compromise.
So the Chineese govt. murders 800-2600 peaceful protesters in Tiananmen Square in Peking in 1989. They fobid women from having more than one child and force millions of Chineese women to have abortions. They support various thug leaders around the globe and insist they own Tiawan.
I know! Let's put pressure on them to put people in jail for stealing software.
Piracy is rampant in China and the problem is real, but it isn't killing anyone. Do any of these rotten bastards have any sense of proportion?
--This sig is in beta. Please let us know abut any errors you find.
I have no problem with criminal laws regarding piracy and IP as long as those are only for people who are doing it FOR PROFIT AND (not or) ON A MASS SCALE.
So factories in China silkscreening counterfeit DVDs that are being stamped out and sold apply.BUT, the law needs to be very clear and unambiguous that it can't be used against someone uploading for free on BitTorrent or just selling a couple copies to his buddies. Those violations need to remain solely in the realm of civil litigation. The government should not be in the business of enforcing IP rights.
I think Don Evans was not talking about people downloading music. I think he was speaking about companies in China who pirate software, movies, machine part designs, etc... and then sell them.
It is selling it that makes it different than downloading music.
Setting aside your own personal feelings on the matter, what impact does rampant software piracy in China have on their status as a WTO member? I would think that some level of adherance to copyright/IP laws are a factor in maintaining good standing.
Anyone more informed than I have any thoughts?
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
As far as I know, only copyright infringement for commercial gain is a criminal offence, otherwise its just a civil offence.
Remember folks, MS was convicted of infringing someone's IP..does this mean finally MS will face legal accoutnability for being a monopolist?
Don't Tread on OpenSource
This goes beyond just the US and CDs and DVDs. For example, the Chinese were considering building a maglev train system. So the German companies ThyssenKrupp and Siemens build a prototype. Workers for the German companies videotaped Chinese engineers poking around at 3am. Shortly after, the Chinese said they would use their own newly development maglev technology for the trains instead of the buying the German tains. They may even be able to export maglev trains at half the price of the German or Japanese trains.
I wonder what happens when things like "birth control and break pads" really do become IP. I know it's still science fiction, but I've heard a lot about how nano technology might be able to build objects at the molecular level. What do you think will happen when you can push a button and make anything you want for free? Will companies continue to push for criminalization? And if so how much can our natural movements be constrained before it becomes incredibly oppressive?
The majority of drug users consider alcohol to be a hard drug.
Alcohol is physically addictive.
Withdrawal from alcohol can kill you (unlike heroin withdrawal).
An old study by the British Empire in China regarding the patterns of opium consumption revealed that China's opium use largely paralleled Britain's alcohol use.
RMS doesn't sound so insane/wrong/ now, does he?
It never ceases to amaze me how many people will try to justify or defend a person's "right" to infringe on copyright.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
This is so true.
Someone could go to jail for life without parole for:
1) Getting into a fight in the schoolyard when they're 16...
2) Getting caught with the microscopic resin of cannibus on a pipe that they found on the ground..
3) Listening to music on an iPod or Walkman...
Of course, it goes without saying that no rich, white, republican kid will ever be bothered by this type of insanity that passes for justice in the USA. Only blacks, latinos, and middle-class whites will be subjected to the guiding light of the American justice system.
It also goes without saying that the legislators who are pushing for these insane laws to be passed are being paid thousands of dollars in bribes ('campaign contributions') from the private prison corporations who will be making $30,000 a year for each new 'dangerous criminal' serving life-in-prison-without-parole in a corporate prison.
If you are a citizen of the European Community or some other stable country with a basic tradition of justice, don't come to the USA. Don't even visit here. It's just too dangerous. The republicans have just gone fucking nuts. Visit Canada (in the summer) or Mexico (in the winter). Avoid the USA. Seriously.
If a U.S. soldier can get six months for ordering some Iraqis pitch off of a bridge, then an offense for IP violation should SURELY be less than that, right???
Now before you inevitably mod me down for the previous comparison, actually consider it... and then consider who our government truly represent based on how it treats it's criminals in relation to their status of wealth and/or power in the system.
"Mistrust those in whom the urge to punish is strong."
The thing about these statements that bothers me is that the industries that are affected by the piracy are doing just fine economically. Movie ticket sales are brisk, CD sales are stellar, and people are flocking to concerts, paying top dollar to see their favorite artists, and yet the industry representatives are acting as though the entire future of American entertainment is in jeopardy. Is it, really? Pop stars and movie stars, as well as the executives of the companies that promote and use them, live lives of luxury that would make the wealthiest, most powerful emperors in the history of human civilization green with envy. They are flown from one 5-star hotel to another in private jets, and are drivin in limosines to the finest restaurants in town, treated like royalty by hordes of fawning, obsequious servitors.
I doubt that the lifestyles of the rich and famous are in any danger of bumping down a notch because a few street vendors in Beijing are hawking copies of their movies and albums.
You are in error. No-one is screaming. Thank you for your cooperation.
When I first read the headline I thought, "Finally some cooperation between the US and China over spamming, phishing and other IP-based dubious activities."
I should have known this was all about protecting the interests of a few large corporations and not having anything to do with making the world safer for everyone.
I respect the right of companies to protect their intellectual property. What disgusts me is the unnaturally high priority these issues have over more important problems which have less to do with corporate profit, but directly affect more people.
When China feels strong enough to tell the US where to go and how to get there. And from the rate things are going, that day is not far off, with the Chinese economy growing by leaps and bounds while the US is bled white in Iraq. Unfortunately, it will also be a sad day for Taiwan.
My rights don't need management.
Well you can murder someone, actually murder them and get 8 years as opposed to waving a laser pointer at a plane and getting 25 years. So it stands to reason that all you fuckwits who elected an administration who believes that a corporation has the same civil and legal rights as a person woyuld also champion laws that turn civil or contract disputes into criminal laws.
Next up; downloading music will land you in Attica.
It really IS time to overthrow the state.
Think of all the piracy here in the US where we have a cultural history which respects IP. You can download music, software, movies, etc, all for free. In cities it's quite common to be able to buy pirated movies and music. In other words, there is a LOT of piracy.
For decades under Communist rule IP was regarded as being owned by the people. In other words, there is no cultural background which required a respect of IP. In China there are no real music stores. Nearly all music sold is pirated. Artists make money from performing on TV and doing advertisements for other products. In fact I recently read an article where no one in China publishes a top 100 sales list for music because it'd be impossible to determine.
Putting Chinese in jail for violating IP simply will not work to change a 100 year old tide. All it would do is piss off a LOT of people and I doubt that the Chinese government would be willing to do that.
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
I was reading the parent's quote that we are telling China to put more people in prison for IP violation. At the same time, the US has been pressuring China over human right issues. I guess the message we are sending them is something akin to, 'Throw more people in jail, but be nice to them, too.'
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
Fact is, it is extremely unlikely that the Chinese would request that the US alter its laws.
That's because US laws are already quite favourable to Chinese business interests. Furthermore, US Corporations generally bend over backwards to accomodate their Chinese hosts. In terms of potential market size, US is a big fish, but China is a whale. Guess who's going to set the rules of the game?
In any case, I think we are beyond telling China to play by our rules or we'll take our marbles home, because they have enough marbles of their own and they play the game here too. "Enforce copyright or face sanctions" would not ever work. Sanctions haven't ousted Castro from Cuba after all these decades (even without Soviet support) and it wouldn't be so much as a flea bite for China.
Odd as it is to say about "Communist" China I'd venture to say an economic carrot would be more effective. If the US made a convincing argument that strict enforcement of copyrights would result in millions/billions more money to the government, then the Chinese government will be all too happy to throw street vendors in gulags and steamroll over their $2 copies of WinXP.
LAND OF THE FREE INDEED.
I otherwise agree with you, but...
I still think "hard" drugs, like crack and heroin, should be illegal.
Alcohol can kill its users with an overdose (or choking on vomit.)
Alcohol can kill its chronic users (cirrhosis, heart disease, etc.)
Users of alcohol can kill others via drunk driving or other acts done while under the influence.
Users of alcohol can have deformed babies (Fetal Alcohol Syndrome.)
What can other drugs do that is in any way worse?
Ooh, a sarcasm detector. Oh, that's a real useful invention.
The whole point is that, to Chinese industry (and Korea, too), every bit of hard intellectual work that the the western world does is simply considered free for the taking. They are building their economy on theft, and figuring that they can build up a culture of actual innovation some other day when they no longer have people smarter than them to steal from.
Oh, the irony.
"Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
their economic system doesn't always impose the costs of raising children onto the parents. That alone would stop population growth--people don't have children if they can't afford them.
This is worth emphasizing.
One of the main reasons why first-world countries tend to have much lower birth rates than third world countries is that children cost money in the former but make money in the latter.
Almost all first world countries heavily subsidize health care and education, but 20+ years of food, clothing, and shelter, not to mention college education and all the little luxuries that are commonplace in our socities, adds up to a heck of a lot of money before our kids are ready to pull their own weight.
In third world countries, especially the ones with the worst population problems, there's not much in the way of college or luxuries for anyone. And in a society where most people are subsistance farmers, it's not very long before the little ones are old enough to help with the weeding, or to go to town and work in the Nike factory.
A legparnasom tele van angolnaval.
Not anymore. The "No Electronic Theft Act" (aka NET Act) of 1997 makes it a felony to reproduce or distribute copies of copyrighted works, even if there is no profit.
Cellmate A: robbery, assault with deadly weapon.
Cellmate B: downloaded Eminem on BitTorrent.
Figure it out.
In compliance with the new American pushed IP laws, China has executed it's first batch of copyright infringers. The trials were short and to the point as the defendants could not afford proper IP lawyers. The RIAA and MPAA were quoted saying, "We are ecstatic that the new laws are working so effectively."
US officials had no official comment but say they are considering similar legislation admid inquiry from concerned citizens in both Hollywood and on Wall St.
Deltron 3030 - Virus (music video)
Get real yourself. You drink, you drive, you kill someone, the charge can still be homicide:
The most important single fact to remember about intoxication is that in most courts, intoxication will not negate the element of recklessness. In other words, if a particular element of a crime can be satisfied by a mental state of recklessness, D's intoxication will be irrelevant. Responsibility
Lots of them, here and here.
The 12% number is off, but the 25% number is correct. The US does have the largest prison population in the world, both as an absolute number and in percentage terms. More than China and Russia, and 5 to 8 times the rates of Canada and Western European countries. And a lot of people are there for nonviolent drug offenses, including this 25-year-old who's going to be in prison until age 81, with no chance of parole.
I wish this insanity would stop, although I don't hold out much hope at the rate things are going.