Slashdot Mirror
Congress May Outlaw 'Attempted Piracy'
cnet-declan writes "Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is asking Congress to make 'attempted' copyright infringement a federal crime. The text of the legislation as well as the official press-release is available online. Rep. Lamar Smith, a key House Republican, said he 'applauds' the idea, and his Democratic counterpart is probably on board too. In addition, the so-called Intellectual Property Protection Act of 2007 would create a new crime of life imprisonment for using pirated software in some circumstances, expand the DMCA with civil asset forfeiture, and authorize wiretaps in investigations of Americans who are 'attempting' to infringe copyrights. Does this go too far?"
Attempted Murder?
Yet murderers and rapist get out in less than 5-10. WTF is wrong with our society.
Once life imprisonment for piracy is passed, the only safe software to use will be Free/Open Source.
All considerations about copyright infringement aside (legal, illegal, etc), this just makes my blood boil:
" Require Homeland Security to alert the Recording Industry Association of America. That would happen when compact discs with "unauthorized fixations of the sounds or sounds and images of a live musical performance" are attempted to be imported. Neither the Motion Picture Association of America nor the Business Software Alliance (nor any other copyright holder such as photographers, playwrights, or news organizations, for that matter) would qualify for this kind of special treatment."
Since when did Copyright Infringement become an issue for Homeland Security to work directly with a specific corporation?
Why give only the RIAA this treatment? Do they notify Tropicana when off-brand OJ is smuggled in from Mexico?
You give Congress too much credit.
If this is to pass, what immoral act would next be prosecuted? Being gay? Being obese? Being lazy?
This is clearly an admission by those who support it that they are UNABLE to enforce current laws, and even that they are trying to enforce laws that are thought to be bad laws by enough people that they can't possibly get 100% compliance.
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
I assume that's a rhetorical question? This sounds remarkably like thought crime. What needs to happen here: immediately laugh this law out of congress, start a massive movement to make certain that no politician who has even spoken well of this bill is ever elected to any public office again, and immediately begin investigations for bribery into those politicians who voted for it or promoted it. Even suggesting life imprisonment for copyright infringement is simply ludicrous.
Deja Moo: The distinct feeling that you've heard this bull before.
Generally attempting to do something is nearly as bad as doing it- for instance, if I tried to murder you I don't think you'd want me to get away scott-free. Likewise, someone attempting to steal my car and getting busted by the police should be punished almost as badly (if not as badly) as someone who actually stole my car. The only saving grace an attempted criminal had is that they were too stupid to get away with it.
You are reading a copy of my copyrighted post.
An attempt doesn't mean that the act was unsuccessful, it simply means that it was tried. Success or failure are not part of the word (although legally, failure is usually implied).
And as one person said, attempted crimes are often persecuted, with murder as a clear example. Robbery is another.
I'd laugh if I saw this plea in court:
"Yeah I tried to rob the store, but the cop stopped me! Let me go free, I didn't actually do that"
34486853790
Connection too slow for X forwarding? Try "ssh -CX user@host"
You do not understand. The purpose, and goal, of laws like these and others, is to make everyone a criminal, therefore turning the entire country into a prison.
This is the type of thing that makes me wish we had a strong third party with different views on copyright. Right now, it's like the insanity of the war on drugs. You have one side that tough on drugs because it's politically smart and the other side is fucking frothing at the mouth because they're fascists. Where's the sanity?
Electric Monkey Pants
Need I remind you the DMCA itself started out as one of those "bullshit bills"...
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Not even 250 years ago, the founders of this country willingly committed treason and went to war over laws such as this. Life imprisonment sounds a lot worse than taxation without representation to me. The general population of the United States are not served by this law. We are not being represented. Now, we can't even get the offenders voted out of office. Never mind trying to incite a revolution.
The only good politician is tortured and dead.
Except that Microsoft and other companies are trying to create the presumption that any and all open source software violates someone's copyrights or patents.
Microsoft is almost certainly already lobbying for laws that will place strong legal burdens and liabilities on open source software, with the intent of making it impossible for any serious business to run open source software.
I don't understand why Slashdot has to report on every bullshit bill that comes before congress.
Because this stuff matters. Big companies are spending billions to influence politicians. The only power that we, the people, have against that is to make our wishes clear to our elected representatives. If you don't, these companies will get their way by default.
And in order to do something about these laws, you need to know about them. So get off your lazy behind and let your representatives know where you stand on these issues.
"The only difference this time is that the Attorney General is attempting to submit the law himself to give it more credibility."
Like Gonzales has any credibility left.
110100 1101000 1101000 1100110 0 1101111 1101000 1100011 1
This is going to sound like a screed, but now you figured it out. The implications of the last 6 years of legislative and executive action are damn obvious to academic economists (like me). The "ownership society" the Decider spoke so much about in 1999 and 2000 leads directly to this. Not long ago, Republicans would be very angry and resentful that the government would try and allow monopolies on our collective culture. Now, all politicians are content that well over half this country will be at the mercy of the "Owners." Being an "Owner" won't be easy though, because many, many employers are making employees sign away all rights to inventions, patents, and copyrights devised while at the company (we don't know how enforcable this is now, but will be within 50 years at the current pace). Any worker will never be able to own their own work, and will never be able to enter the "Ownership" class easily.
We will enter feudalism all over again, but this time over access to information. Instead of paying a 60% title to your lord, or paying 35% in tax, you'll be paying 1000s of micropayments to let you do things like sing "Happy Birthday" at your child's birthday, or to load that CD into your computer. Your right to know if there is melamine in your flour will just be more commoditized information, and well beyond your ability to afford. You'll have to buy all your human and property rights back from the barons that own them, if you have the cash.
Democrats stopped being "liberal" about 70 years ago. About 30 years ago, Republicans stopped being "conservative." We are left with two right-wing Authoritarian parties. As disclosure here, I voted for Bush in 2000, thinking he'd be less authoritarian than Al "My wife invented the Tipper Sticker" Gore and Joe "We need to censor video games" Lieberman. I may have been wrong.
See what it has become - something that is exploitable to the extent that people can propose LIFETIME imprisonment.
if anything, any concept or practice comes to this point, it becomes evident that it is wrong and harmful.
lets see what intellectual property has become :
nth generation inheritors still living lavishly on a single book their ancestors had produced 100 years ago, without giving anything to society.
big publishers enjoying a practical monopoly of the creative market, sign on promising talents, and thereby force (or try to force) entire population of earth to go through them to reach mankind's fruits of creativity.
same big publishers are utilizing connections and bribing statesmen so that their monopoly wont be broken, but furthered, in the expense of modern democratic rights and values.
A scoundrel's collection of lawyers, posing as RIAA, extorting and intimidating people arbitrarily, without even feeling the need to provide valid proof before accusing someone and demanding surrender.
combined, all these have reached a point that the intellectual property exploit parties are now insolently demanding that their hold on society be ratified and furthered with LIFETIME imprisonment. get a load of that. This is no less than INDENTURED servitude of 17th century. make one mistake, sign one paper and you are goner.
this is not what free countries of the earth were founded for. in every country every citizen has the right to take up arms against a state that compromises the principles of democracy and unjust. United states was founded in this fashion, and has open statements to that effect.
It is evident that intellectual property concept has to be revised fundamentally, to prevent such abuses and insolence. its current state is a one that it has started actually hampering free trade, freedom of choice, competition and civil rights.
Read radical news here
The GP didn't equate piracy with murder. He merely demonstrated that an 'attempt' can often be, and often is, something we should consider criminal.
And it is still ridiculous. Why do we need a federal copyright law on the books that covers anyone who recklessly causes or attempts to cause death with pirated software? Don't we already have crimes that cover recklessly causing or attempts to cause death? What makes doing so with pirated software so special? I would think accomplishing these tasks with a dull rusty hatchet is more deserving of an increased sentence than doing so with pirated software, but that's just me.
This is just a ludicrous attempt to tie piracy with more heinous crimes. It's like saying we should give life in prison for littering... with the intent to cause death by forest fire.
Isn't this a bit like having the hospital administrator imprisoned for life because somebody died due to fact that the faulty infusion pump that killed the patient wasn't paid for on time? The fact that software is pirated or not has no effect on the outcome.
Most likely, the truth is that it's just too expensive for them to prosecute little things like that, particularly when there were no actual damages that your credit card company was trying to recoup (which would be necessary anyway for a civil suit).
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
Actually, what do you think is running the machine pumping blood through your veins during surgery? Software. In a hospital today there are any number of machines that run on software that keep people alive. However, I doubt very much any of them are using pirated software since the software is written specifically for each machine and the machine won't work without it. Buy the machine, get the software free.
The whole thing seems a bit lame to me. That part, anyway. Criminalizing attempted crimes is already common. Attempted murder is a crime, as is attemted terrorism or whatever. The reasoning is that your incompetence as a criminal shouldn't allow you to try again until you succeed.
So logically speaking it's actually hard to argue against such a law when there already are a number of similar laws except on one very important point: severity. Attempting to do something should only be criminalized in severe crimes. Copyright infringement is a petty crime. Unless done on an industrial scale. And the people doing that on an industrial scale won't be attempting it, they'll be doing it.
Badgers, we don't need no stinking badgers! - UHF
This bill may not pass, but who is to say the next bill like this will not pass. The buttholes in congress introduce bills like these to see how much they can get away with. There's a good chance this bill will pass, in some shape. Congress likes to "negotiate" and pass diluted bills through the system.
It's quite possible that Gonzales proposed all these items just so they could "negotiate" the wiretap clause into being passed. Gonzales likely doesn't care about the majority of the items in the proposed bill, he probably is only cares about one or two items. The rest of the bill is likely bait.
I can't help thinking that if the wiretap clause were to be passed, it could be then be used as a defense of all the illegal wiretapping currently going on. On a technical level, anyone using a internet browser could arguably be accused of "attempted" copyright infringement, as your browser downloads the content in order to display it. As such any person with a computer connected to the internet could be wiretapped.
The bottom line is that our congressmen and women need to be smarter than they currently are in order to do their job. Their inability to spot potential exploits like these are going to be our undoing.
Why don't we just reorganize the RIAA as another extension of the federal government? They're practically there anyway, and they'd be able to add an RIAA Piracy tax to our paychecks.
Because then they'd have to pay lip service to things like Due Process and the Freedom of Information Act. They're much happier as a private organization that simply gets the government to do its bidding for it.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
I don't know why Congress doesn't just stop fucking around and ban thoughtcrime.
Let's stop dilly-dallying and just change "-1: Overrated" to "-1: Disagree" or "-1: Doesn't Subscribe to Groupthink".
Randall, old Buddy!
Maybe you haven't been paying attention to the news, but nobody in Congress has any interest in listening to what Bush is promoting, and certainly not what Gonzales is selling.
I'm just surprised Gonzales choose copyright to try to change the subject. I'd have thought he'd be promoting a bill to protect children from porn, or something like that. Maybe he's afraid of pulling a Mark Foley?
They put in a bunch of totally extreme proposals, that can then be negotiated out, so that the "less extreme" version can be sold as a compromise. It's a standard political tactic to sweeten a bitter pill.
It's a shame both the mainstream parties sold their souls decades ago, so long ago that most citizens do not realise what was lost. Both parties serve the interests of the corporations who bankroll their election, and rely on bamboozling the voters for their support instead of representing them.
need a free COBOL editor for Windows?
Actually it isn't. Courts discern between intentional and accidental or reckless death. First degree murder is planned and deliberate, accidental/reckless death is considered manslaughter and the penalty is accordingly less.
I don't see this particular comparison as "specious at best." That such a comparison can be made is inherent in the law of nearly every country in the world.
I'm a nature photographer.
I don't know why Congress doesn't just stop fucking around and ban thought crime.
very true. It would speed up the creation of the new slave class also known as ex-cons. After all, why punish poor drug users when you can just make them slaves. They have to be poor already because we can see that rich drug users can make it all the way to the white house.
on another note, here in Houston a few years ago I remember Geraldo Rivera had a special about ex-cons driving our metro buses....and how we should be worried about it. What the heck? I want ex-cons to have jobs. If they don't have jobs, I am pretty sure they are going to resort to crime...
"Only one thing, is impossible for god: to find any sense in any copyright law on the planet." Mark Twain
Absolutely. Which is whenever anyone tells me that they want to run for president or congress, I suggest they just get rich and buy themselves a Congress critters. It's like having your own Congressional seat, but without pesky things like term limits, conflict of interest investigations, elections or ethics commitees!
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
So what is an appropriate penalty for using someone else's work without paying for it?
2 x List Price. Not jail. You haven't deprived anyone of anything (as your use does not stop someone else's use). Copyright violation is wrong, it doesn't mean that jail is just punishment.
At some point, somewhere, the entire internet will be found to be illegal.
Now we can put even more non violent criminals in an already overly bloated prison system for crimes that the general public doesn't even care about. It's so great when special interest groups dominate the American people into submission, dominate the media into ignoring it, and then dominate actual people into prison.
Expect this law to:
A) Not be enforced ever, or the fabric of American society will fall apart as too many prisoners ruin the economy.
B) Be enforced only on occasion, and in ways that are specifically beneficial to the power abusers who will wield this power.
C) Ensure that what was left of our civil liberties is gone, America really is a police state, and expect a massive, massive brain drain.
This guy should so obviously be in prison for crimes against the constitution. Our whole system, and every member in it is so corrupt that Jefferson is totally right: We need a revolution every 25 years, and right now we are 205 years over due.
rhY
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
I don't think there will be anyone left to vote for.
If you build it, nerds will come. Soylentnews.org
I would guess they have decided this is the best way to use that power. Not for the terrorists. Oh, wait.....terrorists harm the value of society. Our US society is determined by the value of the bank account. Money is god here. So I guess this goes hand in hand with the Patriot Act, Wiretaps, Tracking and No Fly lists. "You will be labeled a terrorist for THINKING bad thoughts." I would say that the US is turning into a "Police State" but I am pretty sure it is way too late for that simple assessment.
You keep going until you die..."Me".
Civil asset forfeiture is certainly effective, but the last thing we need to do is expand the prison industry. Look at what this has done for the "war on drugs" since Reagan signed it into law in the mid 80's - prison population has quadrupled, but drugs are just as easy to get now as they were then.
Copyright and patent violations should not be criminal penalties, period.
Yeah, and they'll charge you with that after one of the SWAT guys stubs his toe after breaking into your house to arrest you for . To me, it sounds like a ridiculous new law that serves no good purpose. We already have laws against assaulting an officer. This is just dumb.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
With something like copyright infringement, you have a lot to prove, one of which is intent. The only way to really prove intent is to show that Joe Bob made 4000 copies of whatever. Otherwise, you're just making a backup copy for yourself which you are legally entitled to do. Attempted murder is allowed because you actually went out and tried to kill someone. You actually did something that was illegal - like shooting at someone and missing. That means that you had the gun, loaded it, climbed up on the roof top, took aim, and pulled the trigger.
What they're talking about doing is something like revoking your driver's license because you might be involved in accident.
2 cents,
Queen B.
HDGary secures my bank
They have a right to make money on people obtaining their products.
That's negotiable. Currently law does not reflect this. If a friend of mine decides he doesn't like his Rolling Stones cd, and subsequently gives it to me, the producers/artists have no right (legal or otherwise) to collect money from me.
The only rights the producers/artists have are (i) the right to attempt to sell the items, and (ii) the exclusive right to make copies --- for a limited time. Let's not forget that last part like the corporations and the government have. It's hard for me to sympathize with the artists'/producers' plight when they don't uphold their end of the agreement.
And hate crimes are bullshit, too. If I beat the shit out of someone, it doesn't matter if they're white, black, aquamarine, it doesn't matter; I'd say some form of "hate" was involved. If a white man beats up a black person, that's a hate crime, but if a black person beats up a white man, that's a rap video. Very hypocritical.
Let's stop dilly-dallying and just change "-1: Overrated" to "-1: Disagree" or "-1: Doesn't Subscribe to Groupthink".
People need to think about that -- if someone attempts to pirate, is convicted, and serves a prison term of one year, that just cost us taxpayers well over $50,000.
For what? $3000 worth of pirated media?
As a country, we'd be better off just paying the *AA companies directly from the general treasury and allowing people to copy media freely -- of course, that would decrease the expansion of the prison industry, but I have no qualms about that.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
Why don't we make "attempted torture" a crime first? And then when Gonzalez is in prison for it, then we can start listening to his bill about copying a few files and losing a billionaire another $4 latte.
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
When done for financial gain, infringement has always been a crime.
And fortunately for people who can buy legislation, in 1997 'financial gain' was extended to include the simple act of copyright infringement personally saving you $15 for a single CD. (See: the No Electronic Theft Act of 1997)
What you want to argue, is: what does attempted copyright infringement look like?
Because in every case I can think of, an 'attempt' to infringe copyright looks exactly like Fair Use.
Say I have an ISO image of Toy Story on my computer and a box of DVD+Rs on a shelf.
Am I attempting to infringe copyright, ready to churn out bootlegs for sale at the local flea market?
Or am I exercising my right to a legal back-up, for when my kids inevitably mangle the original?
I haven't actually infringed anything, so there's really no way to tell the two situations apart.
(Which is where the 'attempted robbery' analogy completely breaks down. attempted robbery and attempted homicide are cleanly distinguishable from legal activity.)
This all sounds to me like an end-run around Fair Use.
// "Can't clowns and pirates just -try- to get along?"
That limited time is what, 99 years?
No. It's unlimited as long as Disney has any say in the matter. Every time poor ol Mickey is about to dive into the public domain, it's time for another round of copyright extension. Perpetually renewable != limited.
Copyright is horribly broken. The terms need to be completely re-negotiated. It was never intended to exclusively benefit artists/corporations and guarantee them a living --- it was intended to benefit the public. In that, it is failing.
Both of your analogies are god damn awful and show that you seriously don't understand what's going on.
First of all, the original content maker is typically unaware of every single user pirating their content. So the lawn analogy would only work if:
A- The pirate was invisible
B- You were not told of his presence
As for the photo analogy, not everyone makes money from copyright infringement. In fact, most people don't. What if he printed out a giant copy of your Winter scene, framed it, and hung it in his living room. It's not as high quality as it might've been if, say, he ordered a print from you based on the master; in the same way a DVDRip, for example, isn't as high quality as a DVD. He did not profit off of you, and for the most part, you're likely unaware of the transgression even occurring. Is this a crime worthy of such harsh punishment, when even rape and murder often aren't given life sentences?
>>when even rape and murder often aren't given life sentences?
Nail, meet head.
There is a perfect example of what's fucked up in the US.
Rape? Murder? You'll be out in a few years. Armed Robbery? Still be out in a few years.
Punch somebody in the nose while distributing Warez0rs? You're going to Rape Me in The Ass Prison for Life!
I'm surprised there is any need for a law to cover specifically that instance. It sounds like somebody's playing a game so that they can claim that copyright infringement could land you in jail for life, mostly as a way to scare kids away from downloading pirated software, music and movies.
I'm pretty sure that if a hospital used pirated software that caused someone's death they'd already be liable for negligance causing death. It hardly seems like new laws are needed for that.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
And so, how do you divide the compensation? If I start cranking out drivel for the purpose of becoming a copyright holder, does that mean I'm magically entitled to some cash, even though no one cares enough to buy my "art?" If I can't find patronage, then I should be doing something else to make money. I shouldn't expect someone to foot the bill for me.
This is the same problem I have with state sponsored art of any kind. Why should any penny of my taxes go to floating the career of some guy whose creations I wouldn't even dignify with the title of art, whether it be a painting, music or whatever?
I don't claim to have any definite solution to this problem, but more taxes is not it.
All that is necessary for the triumph of good is that evil men do nothing.
If you think that only IP publishers push for such legislation, think again.
Criminology studies pointed out, that since the USA privatized the prison system, the number of jailed prisoners have gone up sharply.
There is lots of money made by operating prisons, to the level, that some cities fight for getting prisons built in their jurisdiction, since it's a great source of municipial income. This is the complete opposite what happens in other parts of the world, where citizens resist to build jails in their neighbourhood.
It's a perfect circle: politicians are getting popular to be "tough on crime", investors and municipalities are profiting directly: the more people in the jails the better, and IP owners can't be happier to fuel the cause.
The suckers are the increasing number of people who are criminalized increasingly easier and of course the public, which pays for all of this elaborate corporate welfare. The federal government has to transfer less money if "smart" municipalities can generate revenues locally, private jail operators and IP owners happily pocket the profit from taxes.
Perfect little heaven for all the smart ones. The suckers? Well... they are just that: suckers.
If the people who scrape together and risk the money to pay the huge staff of creative people, for YEARS, to produce something that can only recoup all of that effort and cost once the work starts to sell find that there's simply no way to make it worth the trouble
Yeah, and there's nobody forcing this industry to spend what they spend, and no reason that our tax dollars should go towards protecting the business based on your premise that "it costs a lot to do it" - seriously, profit protection should be a cost laid to the one making the profits, how do I profit from DHS making special reports to a single industy entity ? Why should WE have to pay to get it done ? What they are describingg is literally the definition of facism (corporate/govt parterning, laws designed to protect the "connected" organizations only).
You first need good solid laws, with solid reasoning, that protect EVERYONE equally. If the DHS discovers that MY copyrighted work is being traded, or even FOSS is being abused, then they should have the SAME OBLIGATION to me to report the data. It's not right that one industry has coopted the use of DHS (tax dollars). As for the extreme penalty, wow, copying CDs is literally worse than murder and rape @! Make the penalty fit the crime, make it enough to discourage the behavior (fine, minimal jailtime - 30 days), and enforce it equally (ie: if a Senator/Judges/Cops daughter is caught, they go to jail).
Oh, and remember when that RIAA guy copied "This Movie Not Yet Rated" for internal review, then distributed and admitted to it... would you propose that he be put in jail ??? I bet not, and that exposes your bias here. Equal protection under the law, without it, you have facism.
"Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing the freeness of speech."--Benjamin Franklin
So if I plant a half-burned CD in your trash and call the cops you can be put away for 1-10 years?
How many cars would I have to steal, how many people would I have to beat up to get the same punishment?
No sig today...
I know about the charter. The problem is that it is ineffective, as evidenced by the "hate speech" laws. I didn't say you don't have constitutional protections, I said there weren't any effective ones.
As to guns, I am aware of the vast difference in philosophy here. You have to remember, I live in a country which owes its existence to an armed populace. In fact, this is true twice over, since my own state, Vermont, obtained its independence from New York by forcibly resisting New York's tax collectors. Many of my own ancestors fought in the revolution against Britain, and some later had to flee Massachusetts, after participating in Daniel Shays' failed rebellion (against unfair taxation), to Vermont (then an independent republic), which gave the fugitives asylum (Col. Allen - who commanded the Vermont militia - went so far as to order his men that anyone trying to collect the bounty or carry out the death sentence on Mr. Shays was to be summarily shot). We are very serious about gun rights, because we know that a time can come when self-defence in the form of armed resistance is the only remaining option, whether against an individual aggressor or a tyrannical government.
So that is why "the right to keep and bear arms," is regarded as a fundamental right in the U.S., while it is not in Canada (or any Commonwealth nation, AFAIK). The more libertarian states have made sure not to have any restrictions on the number or type of weapons which may be owned, either, though the feds have steadily been trying to encroach in those areas. My own state goes so far as to not even have restrictions on concealed weapons, which we regard as a right (other states, except Alaska, require a license if they permit concealed-carry at all).
For what it is worth, I do not, personally, own a pistol (we have several hunting rifles and shotguns, in our house, but no pistols). I probably will in the future, though. Recent events have demonstrated, yet again, that people without guns are at the mercy of of those who have them. All the more reason to have guns in the hands of the "good guys," because the "bad guys" will always have them.