Slashdot Mirror
EU Approves New Stricter Anti-Piracy Directive
A Pirate writes "The European Parliament has voted for the new report submitted by Italian parliament member Nicola Zingaretti that criminalize even attempts to infringe on copyrights. Even if the new directive excludes end-users from the law it will still criminalize sites like YouTube and practically all P2P services, and even the developers of these services. The exceptions beside the end-users' personal use, includes studies and research. While the European Parliament apparently describes the new directive as a an attempt to harmonize the copyright laws of the European Countries others have been describing it as a lobby directive."
Funny how politicians go up for election claiming this, that and the other - usually things like tax, education, health and transport. Then suddenly once they're in, enforcing draconian controls on digital media is what's important - would they get in if that's what they said up front?
The problem then arises that things such as education, parks, police, and anything else that isn't quite so important to the general public goes down hill, or at least that's what would happen here "in the colonies."
The general public has a tendency to not want to spend money on anything that doesn't directly effect them, so they won't care if the police department looses its funding unless they've recently been robbed, they won't care about the money going to schools unless they currently have or plan on having kids in the immediate future, they won't care about the parks unless they live by them. This would only pose more problems in the long run unless the general public suddenly becomes smart, which I don't think can happen.
As the T-shirt reads, "Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.
"Don't meddle in the affairs of a patent dragon, for thou art tasty and good with ketchup." ~ohcrapitssteve
I urge everyone to vote Lib Dem. They're committed to improving the electoral system (check out the 'better governance' consultation paper), which includes implementing a system of proportional representation. This is the foundation for good government. They may well have policies that you disagree with; I don't like their fondness for the EU, nor their support of Labour's road charging idea. However we only need them in office for 1 or 2 terms to fix our godawful electoral system, and then we can actually start voting for parties that are actually GOOD, and our vote will be useful. Vote Lib Dem.
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
I have no problem with the prosecution of these small time crooks, as long as the worst trouble you can get in for copyright infringement does not exceed the punishment for worse laws... which I would say includes just about everything...
The people who whine about this shit don't understand that it just isn't that big of a deal in the grand scheme of things. A very small amount of the population stands to lose, while more of the population stands to gain. But I think that if you get 3 years for copyright infringement and 1 year for beating your wife or six months for aggrivated assault, then there is something seriously wrong with the system. It means that the money being lobbied is more important than the welfare of the people in a country.
Nothing new in our modern civilized societies though. Ick... that sounded bitter.
You take it, I don't want it...