Senator Applauds Pirate Bay Trial, Chides Canada

eldavojohn writes "Republican Senator Orrin Hatch spoke Tuesday at the World Copyright Summit in Washington DC and hailed the Pirate Bay guilty verdict as an important victory. He expressed severe disappointment in Canada for showing up on our watch list for piracy next to China and Russia. Senator Hatch also said, 'In fact, one study reports that each year, copyright piracy from motion pictures, sound recordings, business and entertainment software, and video games costs the US economy $58 billion in total output, costs American workers 373,375 jobs and $16.3 billion in earnings, and costs federal, state, and local governments $2.6 billion in tax revenue. During this time of economic turmoil, we must ensure that all copyrighted works, both here and abroad, are protected from online theft and traditional physical piracy. After all, US copyright-based industries continue to be one of America's largest and fastest-growing economic sectors.' GamePolitics notes that for his 2006 campaign, Hatch was rented for $7,000 by the RIAA and also got on his knees for $12,640 from the MPAA."

Comments

Blame Canada

[oldspewey]

I suppose it would be a waste of time to explain to this genius that the "problem" of file sharing in Canada is largely a myth and has been discredited.

Re:Blame Canada

[Anonymous Coward]

I suppose it would be a waste of time to explain to this genius that the "problem" of file sharing in Canada is largely a myth [canada.com] and has been discredited [www.cbc.ca].

For anyone too lazy to read the helpful link provided by the parent, basically it boils down that they didn't do any actual measurements in Canada, they extrapolated based on what their (flawed) statistical model indicated should be their projected piracy rates.

There is no evidence (real or otherwise) that piracy in Canada happens at anywhere near the rate they pulled out of their backsides.

Re:$58 billion?

[eldavojohn]

Where exactly did he get his numbers? I wonder?

I believe he was citing the Business Software Alliance's annual report on piracy. Although that value I believe is for world-wide losses, not American.

As always follow the money.......

[i_want_you_to_throw_]

Orrin Hatch has taken over $96,000 From the TV/Movies/Music lobby already.

The made up statistics of the BSA

[TropicalCoder]

From Prof. Michael Geist's blog BSA Admits Canadian Software Piracy Rates Estimated; Canada Viewed as Low Piracy Country, the following shows that these statistics are just made up...

This year the BSA reported that Canada declined from 33 to 32 percent. Michael Murphy, chair of the BSA Canada Committee claimed that "despite the slight decline, Canada's software piracy rate is nowhere near where it should be compared to other advanced economy countries. We stand a better chance of reducing it significantly with stronger copyright legislation that strikes the appropriate balance between the rights of consumers and copyright holders."

Yet what the BSA did not disclose is that the 2009 report on Canada were guesses since Canadian firms and users were not surveyed. While the study makes seemingly authoritative claims about the state of Canadian piracy, the reality is that IDC, which conducts the study for BSA, did not bother to survey in Canada.

Re:Some things the Senator needs to understand.

[eldavojohn]

Some things the Senator needs to understand ...

Might I remind you that this is the same Senator Orrin Hatch who

• is a member of the Senate Judiciary Committe
• wanted to destroy file trader's PCs
• headed the Senate panel on copyright and patents
• may be a pirate himself

Combine those first two points and I wager that your comment not only falls upon deaf ears but might instead cause him to laugh. This guy's got a long history and he's been very successful doing it.

Re:Not a Loss

[twidarkling]

So if Terminator 4 was downloaded 1million times in the US, one could say that it cost the $18million ($18 for the DVD) plus the government $1,260,000 in taxes (assuming 7% taxes).

Okay, I *saw* terminator 4 in theatres, and lemme tell you, it was NOT worth the price. If a friend hadn't bought my ticket, I wouldn't have watched it. But to my friend, it was worth the price because we were seeing it together. That's the difference. He was getting a value out of it separate to the value of the movie.

To me, the best pro-piracy argument is it allows people to not reward people for making shit products. If piracy wasn't available, I'd have to pay $60 to find out that new game is absolute ass-nuggets, I'd have to pay at least $10 to see a movie in the theatres to know it was crap, not including travel time, waiting time, concessions, etc. Why should someone benefit from my enforced inability to check the quality of their product before I shell out full price? You can't tell me you've never watched a movie, or played a game, or bought a book, or *something* that made you go, afterwards, "fuck, that was a waste of $X. I wish I had that back."

Re:OK republican shills

[Curtman]

He expressed severe disappointment in Canada for showing up on our watch list for piracy next to China and Russia.

Well we express severe disappointment in the U.S. for showing up on our watch list for nations that are known to use torture along with Israel, China, Iran and Afghanistan.