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Music-Swapping Sites To Be Blocked By Irish ISPs
An anonymous reader writes "Irish internet users are to be blocked from accessing music swapping websites, as internet service providers bow to pressure from the music industry. Eircom, the country's biggest internet provider, is to start blocking its internet customers from accessing music swapping."
The fucking article mentions Pirate Bay as one of these "music swapping" sites. So basically, they're after torrent trackers.
I won't go into explaining the difference between a hypothetical "music swapping" site and a tracker. Insert here gun, car and other analogies.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
For a related discussion on free (and non-RIAA) music, see:
I've just downloaded one artist's Creative Commons songs, and it's not half bad. I'd imagine he might earn cash on freelance composition.
Or, if they implement this how I think they will, a quick DNS server switch should do the trick.
Here in NZ we have been about to suffer one of the most draconian media industry walkovers that made the DMCA look like a wet bus ticket ...
But then something entirely unexpected happened - the government actually after some shiny grassroot protests like the blackout thing that shut down many public sites here in NZ for the day.
I might actually have some hope for democracy after all.
http://creativefreedom.org.nz/
come to the dark side, we have penguins.
All ISPs in the Irish Republic report reduced revenues and profits.
If the ISPs really do see a drop in profits then they may try to fight the decision, even if it's for the wrong reasons.
That's it, really. How sad.
Freedom isn't defined by the ability to download music for free.
This does amuse me. All these measures do is bring about new technology for sharing files. Well, that and win the people who came up with the idea promotions/votes.
Anyone who thinks of things like this should be sat down and made to watch a film about prohibition. Then they might just realise how stupid they're being. Just arguing that they're doing the wrong thing won't work, because they don't think they are, and anyone who says they are is 'uninformed'.
A learning experience is one of those things that say, 'You know that thing you just did? Don't do that.' - D. Adams
I live here. They're my ISP, for about another ten minutes.
Ireland is notoriously corrupt. Eircom didn't even fight the court case. I smell brown envelopes.
i don't know about ireland but in germany there is a debate as to the legality of having an unsecured wifi net.
You must be to describe IRMA so prefectly.
It must be noted, however, that IRMA is fighting to protect the meagre incomes of people like U2 and Enya - who are all just managing to survive with one castle each.
Sarcasm aside, due to the fact that musicians have a tax exemption (cos lord knows U2 need it) - there are unfortunately a lot of them here, and they also have great wadges of cash. This in turn makes IRMA far more powerful than it should be.
I still don't think the other ISPs are just going to rollover - Eircom is a joke. They are largest because they were originally a monopoly - and there is a large number of users that are slow to change.
Genesis 1:32 And God typed
lolcode is worse than yelling. By quite a bit.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Oh God !!! Why did you have dig him up ???
Never liked Churchill but why destroy such a great speech?
heres a decent quote that fits the situation
"Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to all its citizens and creates a country where everyone lives in fear." --Harry S. Truman, message to Congress, August 8, 1950
...Ireland is one of the most conservative countries of western Europe. Remember that access to information about abortion thing? Apparently abortion isn't just still banned in Ireland, a situation which is by the way fairly representative of the general state of Irish law, but Ireland even tried (from 1983 to 1993) to ban access to information on abortion. Fortunately, it couldn't possibly work, not unless they would pull a China on us.