Slashdot Mirror
Usenet Group Sues Dutch RIAA
eldavojohn writes "With the Pirate Bay trial, it's been easy to overlook similar struggles in other nations. A Dutch Usenet community named FTD is going on the offensive and suing BREIN (Bescherming Rechten Entertainment Industrie Nederland). You may remember BREIN (along with the IFPI & BPI) as the people who raided and cut out the heart of eDonkey. This is turning into a pretty familiar scenario; the FTD group makes software that allows its 450k members to easily find copyrighted content for free on Usenet. The shocking part is that FTD isn't waiting for BREIN to sue them. FTD is refusing to take down their file location reports, and is actually suing BREIN. Why the preemptive attack? FTD wants the courts to show that the act of downloading is not illegal in the Netherlands. (Both articles have the five points in English that FTD wants the courts to settle.) OSNews has a few more details on the story."
Actually it does. If more groups start doing this, it will tie up all the RIAA legal resources defending themselves.
I seem to recall MDY Industries taking pre-emptive legal action against Blizzard. It doesn't work as well as you might think.
Um, I'm not a lawyer and the only information I have on this topic are these two issues but I would wager that FTD is suing the BREIN over ideas right now, not money.
... not to say their ideals aren't sound but I am saying that the common populace and judge may not agree with them. So we have this sort of testing the waters lawsuit over some simple take down demands and if it turns out the court agrees then let BREIN try to sue them; the five golden points (or 2/5 or whatever the court agreed with) have been upheld by the court and everyone's hand is being shown. No risk of money involved.
What's the difference? Well, if they wait for BREIN to sue them for one hundred million billion gajillion Euros, they have to now put their ideals up against that
My work here is dung.
..have broken the first rule of Usenet.
For all intensive porpoises your a bunch of rediculous loosers
It's in the mind of the people.
When someone is tried, he's at least "sorta" guilty, right? Else, hey, nobody gets arrested without some reason, right? At least there's suspicion that he MIGHT have done it. When he is tried, there's a reason, right? Hey, they wouldn't go to court if what the defendent does isn't at least "sorta" illegal...
This isn't how the justice system works, but this is how people think. Nobody is dragged to court without at least some kinda reason. So suing instead of waiting to be sued is, from the PR point of view, quite sensible.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
But whenever you have a place where real democracy can happen and not one thats locked down into two parties, you start to have politicizations who answer to the people. Might I remind you about the Pirate Bay and how Sweden is heading towards some pirate party representation? Sure, this won't happen overnight, but whenever you get a few members in the EU parliament that listen to the people, well, a revolution is sure to happen.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
No one side can overwhelm the RIAA. However when you have hundreds of lawsuits from various people and organizations, that takes a strain on the RIAA's budget. If they lose a few cases then they lose money, that loss compounded with the crap they call music being promoted, and with them having to bribe lawmakers in order to be able to keep passing laws like the DMCA, it will hurt the RIAA.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
There are two sides to the story. The criminal aspect, and the civil aspect.
I'm not sure about dutch law, however, a lot of the recent UK law (which I am more familiar with) has been enshrined here via EU directives aimed at legal harmonisation. So don't take what I say too seriously...
The civil aspect covers the violation of the copyright license associated with the works. You are not criminally liable for merely breaking a license. The criminal aspect only comes into play when you break something enacted in statue.
Consider, The Copyright, Designs and Patents Act (1998) here in the UK -
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts1988/ukpga_19880048_en_5#pt1-ch6-pb5-l1g107
s.107 covers the criminal offense (Criminal liability for making or dealing with infringing articles). It limits criminal acts to those performed in the course of a business, in terms of sale, and those performed other than for "his private and domestic use".
The civil issue is different. Merely obtaining something does not mean you agree to a license. But common law has long established that using something, in a certain manner - often in accordance to normal use - can imply a factual agreement to contract.
Therefore, one should assume that aquiring a copyrighted work does not mean you have to assume the terms of its license, but once you decide to use the product in a non-domestic, public or commerical manner, it is implied you accept the incorporated restrictions (which will prohibit such use). You will then be liable.
So there is this big grey area that needs testing!
But most Americans, even many /.ers have no clue about the rest of the world. The main lobby group for music and copyright in the USA is the RIAA. In the Netherlands they have BREIN. They both have the same essential functions. Its like calling the English Parliament the congress of England, sure, its not correct, but its something that most Americans can identify with.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
Win or lose, its another story in the news about how flawed the music, movie, and print industry is and how unwilling the players are to modify their business model. They do seem to have a decent legal base, so lets hope for a win!
From the article,
So, supported by two Dutch copyright lawyers and IT experts, FTD have filed a lawsuit against BREIN in which they request the court clarifies these points;
Government agencies must go through a series of checks before they prosecute a citizen--the whole "innocent first, prove guilty" thing. For some reason these rules no longer apply when the agency is backed by large, private corporations...
But here we are discussing it, hating it, and wishing for change. Eventually the straw will break the camel's back.
A small difference with, say, the USA is that downloading music and films is legal in the Netherlands, but uploading is not. So even if BREIN's assertion that FTD is aiding and abetting downloading is correct, that does not in itself mean that anything illegal is going on. In fact, the reason FTD is suing BREIN is because they are fed up with the slander against them; BREIN has publically accused them of illegal behavior, and now FTD wants to get a legal ruling that tells them to go piss up a rope.
How the hell is BREIN the "Dutch RIAA"? They have no links to each other, no affiliation, no hard relation whatsover.
"Dutch RIAA" doesn't mean they are affiliated with the (US) RIAA or that they have any relationship. All the phrase means is that they are the equivalent of the RIAA, in the Netherlands. In other words, that they have a similar purpose and so forth.
Its like calling the English Parliament the congress of England
It's doubly incorrect as England, unlike its parters in the UK (Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland) has no parliament of any kind.
It does work--at least it works better than the alternatives. Take two assumptions that are pertinent here: (1) You want to keep doing what you are doing; and (2) You are headed for a showdown with the MAFIAA if you proceed.
In this scenario, you are going to court (that's the given). It is often better to file your lawsuit BEFORE you damage your opponent, because that way the trial stakes are not so high for you. It is important to remember that a trial is always a HUGE uncertainty because juries can be wild or stupid. Anything you can do to minimize your financial exposure is a good thing. Remember that you are not (strategically, at least) going after anybody for money in either the preemptive situation or the responsive situation--you want a ruling enabling you to do what you want to do!!
If you have already bet the company and you have already caused your opponent damages, then it probably doesn't matter, because the stakes are high either way. That appears to be the Blizzard situation. Also, the Blizzard situation failed for the developer because he was flamingly, obviously, in the wrong and he was a fool to fuck with the big bear. If you're wrong, who cares whether you're preemptive or responsive--you're doomed anyway.
When you haven't done anything to hurt your opponent yet and you can afford to wait--that's the paradigm optimal situation for a preemptive attack.
and of course, the lawyers always win
Metaphors don't go in quotes. Nor do they usually need explaining.
No, your children are not the special ones. Nor are your pets.
Just to note... BREIN is more like the RIAA (music), MPAA (movies(/TV?)) and whatever software interest group in U.S. exists for entertainment titles (so not the BSA, as that's all business such as Photoshop, AutoCAD, Office, etc.) rolled into one.
Each of those do have their actual equivalents (RIAA = BUMA/STEMRA, MPAA = NVPI, ???? = B.I.G.), but BREIN can be seen as the 'parent' organization, but without many of the legal things tying them together.
So lawyers make money. Big deal. So do doctors, and auto mechanics, and the geeks for chrissakes.
Imagine that, people who have specialized knowledge make money, even when idiots wreck their cars, bring disease upon themselves with their lifestyle choices or use litigation as a business model.
Many also do pro bono work for people who are in need of legal council but can not afford it. Despite this, nearly half of litigants in my country are forced to represent themselves, straining the court system and usually resulting in justice denied for those too poor to pay for an attorney.
But I'm sure organizations like the RIAA would welcome your lawyer bashing, and encourage you to continue spreading the myth that it's the lawyers - not the executives - who are at fault.
I don't care why you're posting AC
FTD is doing horrible things to usenet, they're a plague on any newsgroup they descend upon. FTD makes software so people can use Usenet as a P2P system without ever interacting with the newsgroup. This has not been popular with most newsgroups that have standards for posting. FTD does things their way, and when massive complaints from newsgroup participants are posted, the FTDers never see them. I've seen newsgroups destroyed by floods of FTD posts. The regular participants (the most valuable members of the newsgroup) have their contributions buried by massive floods of off-topic posts. And there's nothing you can do to stop them.
On most usenet groups, FTD is commonly parsed as "Fuck The Dutch." They want to exploit Usenet for their own ends without participating in Usenet culture. Fuck em.