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Free P2P In France?

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the viva-la-parliament dept.

cyberbian writes to tell us that earlier in the week the French Parliament voted to allow free sharing of music and movies on the Internet. This ruling puts them in direct conflict with both the Media companies and the rest of the French government. From the article: " If the amendment survives, France would be the first country to legalize so called peer-to-peer downloading, said Jean-Baptiste Soufron, legal counsel to the Association of Audionautes, a French group that defends people accused of improperly sharing music files. The law would be a blow to media companies that increasingly use the courts worldwide to sue people for downloading or sharing music and movie files. Entertainment companies such as Walt Disney Co., Viacom Inc. and News Corp.'s Fox say free downloading of unauthorized copies of TV shows and movies before they are released on DVD will cost them $5 billion in revenue this year."

12 of 190 comments (clear)

  1. Duplicate article by Antony-Kyre · · Score: 4, Informative

    It's a duplicate, same URL as before. I know because I saved the page from a few days ago.

    1. Re:Duplicate article by DrHanser · · Score: 4, Informative
      The funny thing is that the ruling is largely symbolic anyway, and still has to pass the French Senate. From this article:
      But despite reports, this does not mean that P2P is legal in France. The vote would still need to pass in the French Senate, and even before then, it will probably need a second reading in the lower house, because the first one was a sham. To put it bluntly, this is a publicity stunt. The bill, which passed last night by a vote of 30 to 28, saw the remaining 519 deputies absent from the vote. They weren't there.
      --
      What is humor if not pain tempered by time?
  2. What about Canada? by eMartin · · Score: 5, Informative

    "If the amendment survives, France would be the first country to legalize so called peer-to-peer downloading"

    I was under the impression that it's already legal in Canada.

    Or does Canada not count?

    1. Re:What about Canada? by k00110 · · Score: 4, Informative

      In the initial ruling they say "But the judge denied that request. In a far-ranging decision, the court further found that both downloading music and putting it in a shared folder available to other people online appeared to be legal in Canada. "

      Makes it available to other people imply uploading so it must be legal. I think some recording associations are trying to mess with the judgement.

    2. Re:What about Canada? by wfberg · · Score: 3, Informative

      The distinction made between uploading and merely making it available for download is who's pushing the buttons. So, sending music to your mate on msn messenger would be Bad, since you're pushing the upload button. Having an FTP server would be legal. Etc.

      --
      SCO employee? Check out the bounty
  3. Already Legal in Canada by Oniros · · Score: 3, Informative

    No, it would not be the first country to make P2P downloading legal. P2P downloading for personal usage is perfectly legal in Canada; which is just an extension of the right to private copy which let you borrow a CD from a friend and make a copy for your own private usage. What is not legal is uploading / distributing unauthorized copies of copyrighted material; likewise it's an extension of the existing laws, you can't make copies and give/sell them to others.

  4. It's more about global licence by Pierre+Carrey · · Score: 4, Informative

    Just to be precise : the 2 amendments voted are first steps towards the introduction of a global licence for download of video and musical content. People will be able to download content legally if they pay somehow for it. The next step should be to introduce a tax in the internet access fees in order to make the download fully legal.
    BUT, that is if the amendements are really fully accepted. The government is trying to reverse the movement and cancel the amendments (the bill intended at first was supposed to forbid P2P and be a real pain in the a**). The debates should start over in mid january.
    (Sorry, no english links to provide, everything I wrote is from french sites (ratiatum.com, liberation.fr))

    --
    ... or not.
  5. Re:Why this is WRONG by elzurawka · · Score: 0, Informative

    Céline Dion, is canadian, from quebec.
    Not every that speaks french is from France.

    --
    -EL
  6. Re:Why this is WRONG by Rosco+P.+Coltrane · · Score: 2, Informative

    Céline Dion, is canadian, from quebec. Not every that speaks french is from France.

    Any person from France can tell you the Quebec lingo can hardly be called french. It's just about impossible to understand outside of Montreal...

    --
    "A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
  7. Re:Actual Cost?-A steep pitch. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    Except the latter is irrelevant. The reasons for criminalizing P2P were demonstrable harm coupled to an industry lobby created perversion of copyright from limited monopoly for commercial distribution into intellectual "property". The latter's a lie, if the former is as well then banning P2P is obviously unjust. And simple-fun-fact, an activity doesn't need to be proven beneficial to be legal. Stop thinking in dualisms, which are convenient but rarely represent reality.

  8. Re:This is going down by jon1012 · · Score: 2, Informative

    Mhh.. UMP is the majority party in France (they are right-wing), but they do this to actually gain popularity and remove this amendment later.

  9. Re:How very ironic! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    We already have a "tax" on every single (well, almost) internet connection. It's called the FCC Subscriber Line Tax (or something like that) and our cable and phone companies have been collecting it from us for years.