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Australian ISP Argues For BitTorrent Users

taucross writes "Australian ISP iiNet is making a very bold move. They are asking the court to accept that essentially, BitTorrent cannot be used to distribute pirated content because a packet does not represent a substantial portion of the infringing material. They are also hedging their bets purely on the strength of the movie studios' 'forensic' evidence. This ruling will go straight to the heart of Australia's copyright law. At last, an ISP willing to stand up for its customers! Let's hope we have a technically-informed judge."

4 of 207 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Shut Down All Possible Ways To Break Laws... by mrsquid0 · · Score: 4, Informative

    The first guns were made for military use. The earliest recorded military use of a firearm (that I know of) is 1327. Hunting came much later when firearms became small enough, and reliable enough, that they did not need several people to use them, and to protect the shooter while he was using the gun.

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    Just because you are paranoid does not mean that no-one is out to get you.
  2. Re:SO if I by Kjella · · Score: 4, Informative

    I'm not aware that this is actually against (U.S.) law.

    According to the grokster case, the uploader is violating the distribution right and the downloader the reproduction right by fixing the transitory data stream to a medium on his computer. Otherwise it wouldn't be illegal to film in a cinema, it could be against the cinema's rules but if filming it didn't involve any of the copyright holder's exclusive rights it couldn't be copyright infringement either.

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    Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
  3. Re:Wow by erikina · · Score: 4, Informative

    Nope. It's just good business sense. Here (in Australia) we pay for our usage. I'm on a 20GB/month plan, while someone like my mum is on a 500MB/month plan.

    The "heavier" the user, the better the customer. In other parts of world, you have the opposite problem when the "light" users are the most profitable customers.

  4. Re:Wow by grim-one · · Score: 5, Informative

    In Australia we have quotas on our internet plans, users who download large volumes of data pay a premium for it (up to AU$140 for 140GB per month). iiNet is defending its interests and revenue stream - they don't want to see quota downgrades en-masse from people abandoning file-sharing.