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What the Pirate Bay Verdict Could Mean For Google
explosivejared writes "Forbes is running a story discussing the verdict in the Pirate Bay case and its implications on file sharing, specifically with regard to Google. The article points out what most people on Slashdot already realize: Google provides essentially the same service that the Pirate Bay does. The Pirate Bay case may be far from over, accounting for appeals, but the Pirate Bay's assumption of being unchallengeable was shattered. The article raises the question of whether or not Google is untouchable in the matter. The story is quick to point out how the situation resembles a futile game of cat-and-mouse, but given how the Pirate Bay's confidence was ultimately broken, is Google beyond reproach?"
The pirate bay case means google may have to pay when people use google to download copyrighted material.
Almost sounds like the internet will be treated like a broadcaster on radio stations where money is payed to musicians when a song is played.
Isn't the key difference between them simply, "intent"?
What does The Pirate Bay intend to do, versus Google's intent?
and how justice is under the paid service of the corporations, not to mention legislators, and the charade of a fair and free society is being maintained despite corporations and wealthy do not have any problems ignoring and bypassing laws through the power of money if they feel the need. and all is rationalized behind a twisted interpretation of 'freedom' coupled with capitalism.
no. im not socialist. but im this close to being one from what i saw in the recent years.
Read radical news here
..both TPB and Google will eventually be able to rely on the same protection as ISPs. They are neutral carriers of information and therefore should, in law, be held harmless. The Pirate Bays difficulties are that publically they try to deliberately convey an air of behaving unlawfully and dangerously to attract attention. I think the Swedish court bit on this too much, rather than the actual evidence and law. From what I can tell, the legal abilities of the primary Swedish courts don't appear to be too good; previous judgements against Pirate Bay have routinely been overturned on appeal, and I suspect this one will be no different.
Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
Karma: Chameleon
The verdict explicitly addresses this point and states that due to TPB running the tracker and thus being intimately involved in the sharing of copyrighted material any comparison with Google is false. They were not convicted because TPB is hosting a bunch of torrent files, they were convicted because they were running a tracker.
What TPB did and Google does not, is format the search results in a way that makes it easy to get exactly what you want. If you use the well known filetype:torrent on Google to search something all you get is the standard high page rank hits first. This with no peer or seed numbers, comments or screen captures,so it is a crap shoot as to actually getting a good file. I guess they will hide behind the term vague search results, or, 'we only provide the links and nothing more'. Now if the comments and seed info were decentralized... well that would be...
flinging poop since 1969
Google can afford billion dollar lawyers.
Have they even read the verdict? The reason pirate bay was demed illegal was not because pirated content could be found, rather because almost ALL (well above 90%) was illegal, and the court found that the service was created IN ORDER TO distibute such content.
The similarity with google is about as close as an alligator and a lightbulb.
Since the staff at piratebay have been pretty outspoken about what they do, going as far as to say that yes we have mostly pirated material here, but it is legal in sweeden so you can go fuck yourself - they cannot really argue against the verdict and claim that they did not create the service to facilitate distribution of copyrighted material.
They were simply wrong about the law.
That being said, trackers have crossed into the mainstream. The only way the content-owners can regain control is to give better access to the material than the pirates do. This means streaming services. pay a monthly fee and gain unlimited access to all the music you want.
It is just a matter of time. 10 years from now, most entertainment can probably be legally streamed for a monthly fee. When this happens, trackers will loose most of their hold on the content. Most people wont be bothered to go through all the hoops and annoyance and delays of places like piratebay when they can have instant access for a small fee.
Google should "cooperate" with all authorities in this matter. In fact, what Google should do is to say:
"We'll remove *all* references to pirated content from search results in order to guarantee that no such content can be obtained with the help of our infrastructure." (Bold mine).
Google would go further and say:
"What we expect from content providers is a list of all content they feel breaks copyright and we will timely respond as noted above. Google is a responsible company which values the "rule" of law."
Now, it would be interesting to see how those companies respond.
Simply close the internet to all free content. What are we Commies?, why should anything be free?
The internet is here as a vehicle to provide paid content from the RIAA, MPAA BSA ans other for profit businesses.
Any other use, especially if it is involving providing information of any kind for free and not compensating the content owners needs to be stopped, and stopped now.
* Carthago Delenda Est *
1. TPB exists primarily to facilitate copyright violation. Google is a common carrier.
2. TPB hosts the BitTorrent tracker files. Google does not.
The most rabid believers in American Exceptionalism are the exact same people whose policies are destroying it.
In a world in which a misinterpreted US law applies on Sweden, of course google can be a target as well.
Copyright infringement is "piracy" in the same way DRM is "consumer rape"
This is completely incorrect. Until the appeal has been determined in the case in years, this thing is still in legal limbo. Even new cases will "await the appeal decision".
Thus, this means nothing. The appeal will be everything, as was expected in the first place. All we have is a case of bad reporting/moral panic by forbes.
Well hey guys, you could have gotten away with it if your fucking name wasn't The PIRATE Bay..
And that would have made everything OK? Getting away with it?
Isn't that exactly what RIAA's and their lobbyists are doing? Getting away with it.
To quote another slashdotter, quoting Martin Luther King:
From Letters from a Birmingham Jail, by Martin Luther King, Jr:
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly."
"Now, what is the difference between the two? How does one determine whether a law is just or unjust? A just law is a man made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law. To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law."
" One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty. I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for law."
Stay strong, guys.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
As the article already mentions, the case against TPB is very much a moral victory for the MAFIAA. They need to show you can't "get away" with it.
If Google wants to "co-operate" and avoid this kind of shitstorm, they'd enter into agreements with content owners where they'd agree on what kind of limitations is acceptable, in exchange for giving them a break and not pressuring governments to act.
The bad thing would be that this is all settled privately, and not checked by some kind of "rule of law". You might not even be able to tell how they'd modify their search to support such agreements without studying search results all day...
A crow bar is not illegal. I can buy one for as little as $5-$10. It's very useful in construction and demolitions.
But a crow bar can be a terribly violent weapon. Ever banged your shin with one? It would take just a good swing or two to commit murder.
In many jurisdictions, there are laws having to do with "brandishing a weapon", typically in a threatening manner. I can carry a crow bar all day long at a construction site, and nobody would care. If I carried the same crowbar into a fine restaurant, things would be markedly different. If I sold a crowbar to a kid who wanted to help his dad work on the garage, I'd be a nice guy. If I sold the same crowbar to a kid who wanted to off his ex-girlfriend's boyfriend, I could easily be an accessory to murder.
Intent matters. It's not the tool, it's the act!
I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
I think if Google where to start removing links to copyrighted content other than as required by the law, it would very soon cease being the world favorite search engine.
Can you imagine the outcry on here and Geekdom in general if Google decided to censor results in this way? I'm pretty sure some other search engine would appear without these restrictions and quickly become all computer geeks new baby. I'm also sure the Google is shewed enough to realize this.
N.B. this user is far too lazy to write a witty and intelligent sig.
Nothing, you morons.
Google is a web search engine.
TPB is a torrent search engine.
Google's tools are designed to make is easy to search the web.
TPB's tools make it easy to download copyrighted material.
This is the same BS that came up after the Napster trial, and is BS for the very same reason.
Put simply:
Google is designed to search the Web.
TPB is designed to assist piracy.
I know we're all well aware of the 80/20 rule..but apparently that goes out the window in your efforts to rationalize your overblown sense of entitlement to the creative works of others.
As a thought experiment, what if somebody (such as me) came up with a program that used some of the ideas behind torrents and distributed processing, and created a distributed, decentralized search engine? Say that this program became popular enough that it could create an index large enough and fast enough that it could rival google. Say that some people used it to find and download copyright infringing content.
How would this work, legally, if somebody decided to send a DMCA take down notice? Also, if this distributed search engine were in the position that TPB is in right now, what would be the result? Who would be sued, et cetera?
My guess is that it would be in the same position as programs such as BitTorrent and Transmission: no legal action can be taken against the program because it is just a dumb set of instructions and requires the use of a person to intentionally infringe on copyright.
By the way, I actually plan to implement something similar to this eventually in the future, but if somebody else wishes to run away with the idea, be my guest. Also, try to tell me about it, if you get a chance...I'd be interested to see where the idea goes.