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Landmark Ruling Gives Australian ISPs Safe Harbor
omnibit writes "Today, the Federal Court of Australia handed down its ruling in favor of the country's third largest ISP, iiNet. The case was backed by some of the largest media companies, including 20th Century Fox and Warner Bros. They accused iiNet of approving piracy by ignoring thousands of infringement notices. Justice Cowdroy said that the 'mere provision of access to internet is not the means to infringement' and 'copyright infringement occurred as result of use of BitTorrent, not the Internet... iiNet has no control over BitTorrent system and [is] not responsible for BitTorrent system.' Many Internet providers had been concerned that an adverse ruling would have forced themselves to police Internet traffic and comply with the demands of copyright owners without any legislative or judicial oversight."
Suck it long and hard.
Landmark Legal Decision - Law and Common Sense Align
This case is probably not over yet.
What I liked about this ruling was just how much they won it.
The judge said that Safe Harbour provisions did apply to the ISP... but they weren't needed because they only applied if the ISP explicit approved that user activity (which they do not)... and any infringement notices from the studios didn't need to be sent to consumers due to the Privacy Act (iiNet sends all infringement notices to the police instead)... and in any case the sending of infringement notices and subsequent banning etc was not considered a valid copyright prevention mechanism.
So yeah, they wiped the floor with them.
we still have a proposed Internet Filter, no R18+ rating for video games, and a South Australian government that passed a law saying that every person commenting about the election online must provide their real name and postcode. We have a long way to go yet.
...common sense? But it's Austfailia! This can't be true! Somehow they'll find a way to overturn this I know it.
The important part is what isn't said. The ruling didn't say that there was no obligation to police a certain part of the net for copyright violations, just that the ISP wasn't responsible for BitTorrent and thus wasn't obligated to police that part of the net.
so, "the law recognises no positive obligation on any person to protect the copyright of another" doesn't meet your definition of that?
Advanced users are users too!
Translation:
1. Dey tuk er jeb! Won't someone think of the jeb?
2. Never should have allowed testimony about how the Internet works.
3. OK, fuck the courts, we'll just buy a few politicians. We'll tell 'em it's about protecting Australian jobs and about protecting de widdle chiwdwen.
4. Need to work out which politicians to buy.
Thirty-four film companies representing the Australian and US film industries today expressed their disappointment that the Federal Court found that iiNet was not using orbital mind control lasers to encourage copyright infringements by its customers on its network.
Despite findings of copyright infringement by iiNet customers, pirate flags in their front yards and downloaded cars in their driveways, iiNet did not authorise the acts of its customers, merely sitting back and watching the tens of dollars rolling in to feather their own nests at the expense of the poor beleaguered major record companies and film studios.
Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft executive director, Neil Gane, said he was disappointed by the Court’s decision. "Today’s decision is a setback for the 50,000 Australians employed in the film industry, who work hard to send money to America as fast as possible. But we believe there's something not quoite roight about this ruling — it was based on a mere technical loophole centred on the court's interpretation of what the law technically says in actual words and original intention, rather than what it should say.
"We are confident that the government does not intend a policy outcome where zombie hordes of drooling open source copyright terrorists led by the evil genius Michael Malone are allowed to continue feasting upon the flesh of the living via the iiNet network.
"We will now take the time to review the decision before seeing if we can bribe enough federal politicians to get a law more to our liking."
http://rocknerd.co.uk
Here's a timeline of the case. Also the full ruling has been posted online.
"the law recognises no positive obligation on any person to protect the copyright of another," - Justice Cowdroy
Ah, reasonable, rational, and direct. Love it.
The Issue was decided by a single judge, which means the likelihood of appeal to the full bench of the Federal court and the high court after that is 100%. I think this is a good day for Australian ISPs. And despite the whinging from AFACT it does not protect pirates since the copyright holders have had the mechanism of going to the court for a court order to name an ISP subscriber for years. They just elected not to use it and tried to bully subscribers with infringement notices. And any ISP that didnt pass on these notices were run over the coals by AFACT as this case has demonstrated. But what this case demonstrates is that AFACT is not above the law. However I can see the Government tightening the legislation at the end of this case making any decision by the high court moot when it gets reversed by the incompetent Conroy and his band of merry men
And additional important ruling (taken from the summary):
This appears to be saying that when someone torrents, they only infringe copyright once. Which would make it economically unviable to go after people for casual copyright infringement via the internet, since damages would be severly limited.
http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/cth/FCA/2010/24.html
iNet has no control over BitTorrent system and [is] not responsible for BitTorrent system.
To define it as a system is interesting, when it's really a "society". Bittorrent is simply the protocol of the society of people who wish to acquire media on the internet in a free (not as in beer) manner. If the media companies could provide a way to allow people to pay a reasonable licensing fee by choice for the content they provide then people would use it. Unfortunately the vast majority of people don't feel the content is worth what they charge. But the same individuals are also motivated by social pressure to watch the content, pressure that is created by the media advertising. So they make us want the content, but then don't provide it at a reasonable cost. This causes humans to naturally seek the path of least resistance, even if it means bending a few "laws" that are out of date and not really even relevant any more. Media would love to be drug pushers and they really are to a certain extent. Where it breaks down is that they create demand and are unable to provide supply therefore the free market takes over and makes it available. There is only one solution, to stop making the content, or to form a police state that regulates the content for the companies. Neither are a viable solution for anyone. Their profits will plummet in either situation. So what will happen is that there will be more consolidation in the industry, less competition, and only the company that can make content people want for as cheaply as possible will succeed. It looks like iTunes was a pretty good first guess. People will pay $1 for things if it's convenient. I don't see the industry going out of it's way to increase the convenience of acquiring their content so likely they will fold and the people who actually make the content will have to find a new way make it cheaply and get it to the customer.
Cool! Amazing Toys.