UK "Creative Industries" Call For File-Sharers Ban

siloko writes "An alliance of so-called 'Creative Industries,' including the UK Film Council, have signed a joint statement asking the UK government to force ISPs into banning users caught sharing illegally. In an 'unprecedented joint statement,' the alliance predicted a 'lawless free-for-all' unless the government ensured the 'safe and secure delivery of legal content.' The previous tactic of pursuing individual file-sharers in the courts appear to have been abandoned. 'Instead, [the government] should provide enabling legislation, for the specific measures to be identified and implemented in an Industry Code of Practice,' it recommends. One wonders how they remain 'creative' in their vocation when they keep on trotting out the same old story backed up by imaginary statistics (they claim 50% of net traffic in the UK is illegal content but provide no evidence for this figure). The BBC also has a blog entry dissecting their statement."

Comments

Re:Um

[Cajun Hell]

Medical marijuana is legal where legalized. The fed is just trying to posture and assert illegal authority.

Posture?! Federal agents arrested marijuana growers in California. Those federal agents were not, in turn, arrested by California cops or ever charged in a California court with kidnapping.

They got away with it. Posturing is saying you're going to do something illegal. When you actually do it, and it is accepted by all your rivals, and there are no negative consequences to you, it isn't called "posturing"; it's called "winning."

You can make all the legal arguments you want about the feds not having this power, cite John Locke and Thomas Jefferson for hours on end, but the feds have (as in "possess") this power. They not only assert it, but they exercise it whenever they want to, and every single one of their opponents always submits.

Unless someone points out more often that "the king wears no clothes"

The king does have clothes. The real problem is that the king is a total asshole, and our enemy. His clothes, though, are very real. Those federal agents are armed and go into a raid with the sincere attitude "I'm willing to kill anyone who defies me" and there's no state trooper or city cop who ever shows up with his own gun and the attitude "I'm willing to kill any fed who defies the law and threatens the safety of the citizens I'm supposed to protect." The people are the ones who have no clothes.

Get your clothes on before you backtalk the king.