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BitTorrent User Guilty Of Piracy
DIY News writes "A Hong Kong man has been convicted of movie internet piracy in what is believed to be the first case involving BitTorrent file-sharing software. The man was found guilty of copyright infringement for distributing three Hollywood blockbusters using BitTorrent."
Wow so they are taking down the person who took part in the copyright infringement and not the software used... Oh wait its still early in the day, I'm sure BitTorrent will be blamed once again for its ability to be used for evil purposes...
News Reporters Make Tasty Polar Bear Treats!
These threads are quickly becoming a rehash of all the previous file sharing threads. Queue the people saying he was breaking the law, the people talking how sharing information isn't stealing, and finally all the people claiming that information wants to be free.
How is this lawsuit different than all the others?
I use BitTorrent to get the updates for World of Warcraft. I'm not guilty of 'piracy' for that.
Headline should read: "People who share copyrighted movies guilty of copyright infringement."
But I guess that wouldn't get as much of a reaction, what with it being obvious and all...
is competition good, or is duplication of effort bad?
In other news, a man in Delaware has been found guilty of beating another man to death with a toaster. The toaster industry declined to comment.
"Because Science" is one step from "Because old book". Try "Because of my experiment testing my falsifiable assertion".
Bittorrent gives a grey area... you are not just 'getting' the file, but also 'hosting' pieces of it (or the entire thing if its still in the sharing network when you have the complete file). It isn't as open-shut as you imply.
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
This is hilarious because if the guy had simply left his apartment and walked to the nearest corner, he could have bought the DVD for next to nothing.
It's amazing to me that real piracy, where huge profits are made, is ignored while file sharing between friends is hammered.
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
All it will take to totally bust systems like that is a small change to the law, to make it so that if you operate a system participating in such a p2p network, you are liable for infringement using your system.
Since these systems have no advantage whatsoever over non-anonymous systems like Bittorrent except when being used to distribute material illegally, it will be easy to get such a change to the law made.
Such court cases only happen because the movie industry pressures courts and law enforcement, presumably with some support from U.S. trade or diplomatic channels. Now, the clever thing about such court cases is that they focus on the black/white legality of an action, and ignore the wider ramifications. Very typical of the divide and rule approach. You are either for the movie industry, or you are for thr pirates. This is what Fox TV calls a "wedge issue" and it's a clever way of keeping people divided while avoiding useful debate.
It is a false issue, and anyone discussing whether "piracy is right or wrong" is falling into the trap.
What most people actually are for is a better way of getting content. We don't like thieves. We don't like stealing. But we find paying $50-$100 to take the family to the movies unjustly expensive.
The movie, music and TV industry has to give its customers what they want, or they will - court cases or not - lose those customers.
And the simple solution, by the way, is to boycott Holywood, and boycott the record labels that sponsor the RIAA. Consumers do not have much power, but - as Rosa Parks demonstrated - even the most humble of us can refuse to give our money to those that would mistreat us.
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Yes you can. You just can't threaten to do it. Just like you can't threaten to do it with anyone else. The only difference is that he's got his own security force actively looking for threats and running them down while most everyone else won't even know they've been threatened unless you do it to them directly and they have to go to the police and courts themselves.
Only in the same way that going for a walk steals a sale of petrol from the garage. Or that going for a drive steals a sale from the bicycle shop. Or that going for a bicycle ride steals a sale from a shoe shop. Just about anything you do could be considered as stealing a sale from something else, so this is not a helpful way of looking at things. Eating chicken tonight? You've just stolen a sale from a beef farmer. Eating beef? Ditto for chicken farmers. Going veggie? You've just stolen loads of sales from all meat-based industries.
So stop with the "stealing a sale" stuff please; it's pure bollocks.
'I don't have to waste bandwidth downloading it'
Bandwidth is very cheap and getting cheaper and faster. It won't be long before it is faster to download a film than it is to walk to the video store and back. In some places it already is that fast. Besides, most people have unlimited bandwidth deals where if you *aren't* using it, you are wasting more money than if you use it to it's full potential. Most programs can download in the background so that they do not disturb your browsing etc.
'the time to burn it to DVD'
You can do this in the background. If you use a modern OS like Ubuntu with built in support for burning to DVD, burning to disc is such a trivial exercise that it's hard to understand how Windows makes it so hard to do this simple task quickly. Even if you don't want to burn it, you can watch the film directly from your hard disk and then delete it when you are done.
'my drive space'
Because drive space is a scarce commodity? All you need is a gigabyte or two free for the twenty minutes it takes to burn.
It's not that I condone copyright infringement, but you will have a hard time convincing other people that they should go out in the rain/snow, etc. to buy a film rather than download it from the comfort of their own home.
Wouldn't it be simpler if the music industry just decided that downloading films via the internet was a viable business strategy?
I'll probably be modded down for this...
Now define an anonymous peer-to-peer network. One that uses some different routing rules to try to disguise which hosts are requesting what? Hey, doesn't that sound familiar? The use spoofing and zombies and whatnot to disguise where an attacker is coming from? Oh yes, that's the Internet, too.
They can try to pass such laws, but the fact remains that these networks will continue to exist because 1) they will become to widespread to stop, and 2) such a law could easily be eaten for lunch by an enterprising barrister.
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Since these systems have no advantage whatsoever over non-anonymous systems like Bittorrent except when being used to distribute material illegally, it will be easy to get such a change to the law made.
That's like saying only criminals have things to hide, therefore good citizens will not mind a compulsory search and seizure. "You want a warrant? What are you, a terrorist?" We have a right not to show the government everything we do. That doesn't make it illegal.
Hey, at least we got buttsex back from the Republicans.
The movies were crap and it might help illustrate at least one reason why people pirate. I mean really, who is going to pay for those movies?
I'm always a little perplexed by this line of reasoning. If it's not good enough to enjoy... why bother obtaining and watching it? If it's good enough to enjoy, and you're glad that the person who made the film (and his/her hundreds of co-workers and investors) spent the money and went to the trouble of producing it, why deliberately rip off the people making the stuff you do like?
So... if it's quality material worth watching, then it's worth paying the people who produce it (and encouraging them to make more). If it's not worth watching it, why tarnish the name/concept of P2P technologies by squandering it on pirating something copyrighted that, in the same breath, people say is not worth the trouble? I can never understand the people who think they're somehow "punishing" the studios into making better movies by ripping off the (at best) mediocre stuff while piously saying that they'll pay for the quality stuff (assuming, ahem, that they actually do). You indicate that you buy movies you like, but your first sentence (which you say is illustrative) just gives moral comfort to the twits.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
Look. I am guilty of speeding... hell I even let my insurance lapse a few times. I've shoplifted before (when I was a kid) and YES I admit to having downloaded music and movies from across the internet using a variety of means. (I also buy music and movies when I think they are worthy... haven't bought music in a VERY long time but you might find that I own DVD versions of some TV shows and movies that are also on my hard drive.) I make only weak attempts to justify my actions in that I know what I do "isn't right" but at the same time, I don't feel so wrong about it either. Whenever three conditions meet, I am inclined to buy! Those conditions are Availability==TRUE, Affordability==TRUE and Appreciation==TRUE. I think it's generally true of just about anyone out there.
I don't think it's good that the current market is essentially a "buyer assumes the risk" market. After all, will sellers accept a return of a CD or DVD based on the "I didn't like it" argument? I think they should but they don't. This practice, when done maturely, essentially helps to balance this problem in the market. Is it "wrong"? Yeah... it's wrong by a variety of standards, but it's also a market demand otherwise so many people wouldn't be doing it.
I don't think we should feel any worse than we feel for our neighbor when he gets a speeding ticket. (And I don't think he should get much more punishment than a speeding ticket either.) Just like anyone else, he knew the risks and he took the chance... gambled and lost.
I guess what I'm saying here is that we don't need to call an end to "copyright" and all that. But we do need to bring sanity into play when all of this is going on. I think we can all pretty much agree that it's insane now. If the motive is profit, throw the book at them. If it's the kind of (ab)use that we see on a regular basis, give them a [reasonable] fine and move on. I think it would be fair enough.
I'm way off topic here...
that the people at Guantanamo were all captured on the battlefield against US soldiers, operating under the control of no nation, not signatories to any of the Geneva conventions, are not US citizens, and in many cases have been shown to have attended training events on terrorism tactics.
While your points may be correct, it's difficult to substantiate. The administration says this is the case, but we have no way of verifying it.
But, let's assume that all your points are correct. Given that, while it may be legal to do whatever we want with them, is that really what America stands for? Indefinite detention? No legal representation? Harsh conditions and treatment? Alleged torture?
We have other places too, like Diego Garcia, and probably many more.
These places and ways of treating people are not what I think of when I think of the grand ideals my country was founded on. These are not the things I joined the military to defend. These things are what we accused the Soviets and other communist countries of doing - and held them out as reprehensible. It's disgusting and shameful that our country would act in such a way, and then be brazenly proud of it.
I'm ashamed of what my country does and I'm angry that there seems so little that Americans with a conscience and sense of true patriotism can do about it. And I'm saddened that so many Americans think it's okay that our country does these deplorable things.
Doesn't it bother you that just because the administration has declared someone to be an "enemy combattant" that such a person has no rights and no protections, and that our government feels it has free-reign to abuse and detain them indefinitely?
I think people are quick to dismiss the rights of those held in Cuba; if our places were reversed and it was a Middle Eastern country invading the US to spread Shariah Islamic Law, would you be so quick to condemn your countrymen--fellow citizens--caught fighting that force? Because they're disorganized and haven't been through boot camp?
The fact is those people were defending against invaders, ideological differences aside, and were not wealthy enough to have a highly-organized and well-trained militia like much of the rest of the world. Just like many Americans don't feel the government adequately represents their interests abroad, it's certainly within the realm of reason that some of those individuals did not feel Osama bin Laden represented their interests in attacking the US, but when a counter-attack was launched it was a matter of defending their home and way of life.
Being poor requires fighting face-to-face and with short-range mortar and explosives, not invisibly from the skies like Americans, and these people resorted to whatever tactics were necessary to muster a defense against invaders. In my opinion (whose weight is questionable), it is much more a terrorist act to strike at an enemy from the sky without fear of retribution than to fight him on level-ground, face-to-face. At least when you can see your enemy you know who you've killed, instead of accidentally exploding a wedding party.
The reasons you're giving for giving the OK for locking up these prisoners of war sound an awful lot like the reasons given for rounding up and imprisoning or killing Native Americans (and I have therefore a hard time accepting that). My point behind replying is to say that the quickness with which you determine guilt and innocence can easily be turned on you and the ones about whom you care. Justification of the treatment is justification of your own treatment.
I am not speaking regarding the rest of your post (which may or may not have merit).