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US Offered To Draft NZ 3-Strikes Law, Fund Copyright Initiative
An anonymous reader writes "Wikileaks has just posted
hundreds of cables from US personnel in New Zealand that reveal
regular government lobbying on copyright, offers to draft New Zealand
three-strikes-and-you're-out legislation, and a recommendation to spend
over NZ$500,000 to fund a recording industry-backed IP enforcement
initiative. The funding raises the question of whether New Zealand is
aware that
local enforcement initiatives, including raids and court cases, have
been funded by the US government."
I told before that, if you allow private interests take helm in one country, they spread their filth EVERYwhere. see there's the proof.
Read radical news here
How about 3 strikes until a new wireless mesh network spawns?
If I'd heard anyone claim that the US is literally (offering to) writing other countries' IP laws, I'd tell them to remove their tinfoil hats. If these leaked memos are accurate, I guess I was being very naive thinking that.
If we're going to be imperialists, let's go all the way and at least get some land out of it so we can all benefit; not just the corporations!
Yes, but corporations are people, too. And, therefore, are also the people.
The industry mafia will stop at absolutely nothing in its march to take over the Internet and have all of the world's laws turned in their favor. Given that this will lead to unprecedented tyranny over all of us, and that there is absolutely no legal recourse because laws have already been bought and paid for by them, it is absolutely clear that any person working for them and any office or agency tied to them is a legitimate military target. Lay down your useless keyboards and take arms NOW.
Geeks are so full of shit that "beating the crap out of them" takes a whole new meaning.
The first way of course being sending in military and bombing the place.
The second way is of course this, spreading their greedy imperialism to all countries - or as the Borg would say ASSIMILATE
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
Glad I am not a kiwi...
Oh wait, this kind of crap is probably going on here in Australia just as much as it is across the pond.
The real trick is to vote for people who DON'T support the ever increasing power of big content companies. And unlike the USA, here in Australia such people actually stand a chance of getting elected (and in fact a number of such people are currently in parliament, including the Australian Greens)
No idea whether such parties or politicians exist in New Zealand but if they do, vote for someone that isn't going to bow down before SONY or Warner or News Corp or Disney.
We recently had a 3-strikes law rushed through parliment by the current government (which is a gross mis-use of power).
I'd like to share this video which demonstrates the level of understanding our MP's have
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJdPkrpFXBM
Divide a cake by zero. Is it still a cake?
This might be interpreted as a serious attempt to undermine New Zealand's democratic processes by a foreign power. While I think people should be expected to pay for what they use, my feelings are that it is a broken business model that encourages most people to download and that this incessant criminisation of mostly young internet users can only lead to alienation and profound long-term problems. The creative minds that produce the output should be perhaps given more room to develop novel ways to distribute output rather than leaving everything to a bunch of accountants and lawyers who are just nasty.
Corporations are NOT people.Corporations may be made up of people acting in concert but are a legal construct and should be treated that way with legal rights limitations. Corporate bullshit seems may be running the country only because the nobody pays attention to this stuff which is broadcast here but mostly ignored by TV (corporate sponsored) news outlets. Our ignorance is gonna kill us.
bob@Osprey:~>
There are citizens suffering here in the states from unemployment and inept government that hasn't been able to turn the country around. The ineptness is both democrat and republican alike. The government is under a budget crunch and we are spending money in New Zealand over something so stupid as copyright law when research to show that major media companies were losing money over piracy. This whole thing makes me sick. Perhaps, the U.S. is now going to meet the same fate as Rome. Be ready for the dark ages.
I'm a New Zealander and the lobbying from the US isn't a recent issue, in fact it has been regularly reported in the mainstream press for as long as I can remember and not only for copyright reasons. I think the worst part is that the US diplomats have at times threatened us with economically damaging measures for not playing ball (NZ does export a lot to the US and being a small country makes us vulnerable to change). I feel that we've actually done an OK job of pushing back in the past, but the US is both patient and happy to keep trying until it finds an administration that gives it favour, as has happened here.
To be honest I think that Australia is worse off from this sort of lobbying though. They haven't had an anti-nuclear past and this has led them to 'enjoy' a closer relationship with the US than we have(!)
Corporations ARE people. They are deemed artificial persons with all the Constitutional protections and rights of 'real' people (and the added benefits of a corporation, to boot). The SCOTUS has upheld this in their previous decisions. Therefore, if a corporation is a person and you are a person, and this is a country of "we the people", then representing the interests of a Fortune 100 that happens to line the coffers of political campaigns and legislative actions becomes just as viable and just as much a duty of office as the interest of you and me.Well, more-so, I suppose -- since I'm certainly not donating any finances to their campaigns.
You and I may not agree with the concept of Corporate Personhood, but that doesn't change the reality of it.
You spelled 'liberation' wrong. :P
Words on paper do not have the power to redefine reality. Corporations are *not* people. SCOTUS is corrupt and their rulings mean nothing IRL. The fact that so many people tolerate this kind of silly word juggling doesn't help, either.
***glare***
Caveat Utilitor
Where in the U.S. Constitution does it say that the government has the power to deem that corporations should have these protections and rights?
Too bad corporations aren't burdened with any of the personal/social responsibilities of people. Sure, they can't literally vote, but their money serves as a good proxy. They can't easily be jailed or otherwise punished - in a manner that would directly affect those actually running the corporation. They aren't subject to the same tax rules, or in many cases, laws, as people. SCOTUS is wrong; corporations are not people. But, perhaps, that's just my thinking.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
The population of New Zealand is 4.5 million - half that of New York City.
Isn't the media industries worry over this much ado over, seriously, nothing?
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
corporations do not have a right to privacy like people do, so at least they arent 'totally people'
According to sources I've read, the notion of corporate "personhood" only became viable when a court reporter took a judge's comment made during a case (Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Company), and elevated it to the status of a ruling by including it within the case's headnotes. No such ruling per se, ever took place. This "ruling" was clearly the result of a coincidental set of events that, under ordinary circumstances, may well have never happened.
The Supreme Court decision could be overturned with a single law. The Supreme Court rules on what the laws currently say. And the laws (not the Constitution) give corporations personhood. A law clarifying this would "trump" the rulings. But Congress likes treating decisions as laws because it helps another branch write bad laws and have the parties blame the courts. Blaming the Supreme Court for bad decisions is another way the two major parties work really hard to keep our system a two-party system.
The real solution is a multi-party system. But that would never happen. The entrenched parties agree on nothing, unless you start talking about systems that would hand any power to 3rd parties.
Learn to love Alaska
I'm a Kiwi. In spain they were made aware by Wikileaks, of the equivelent diplomatic cables BEFORE the legislation was passed, naturally the 3-strikes law was thrown out.
Could have let us known sooner, thank you. It would have been terrifically useful in getting this thing stopped.
No surprises the 3-strikes law seems to be popping up in many countries with open diplomatic channels to the US. In some cases (ie the British equivelent) the language in the law is word-for-word identical.
This makes me very concerned.
After logging in slashdot still does not take you back to the page you were on. It's been that way for 20 years.
I would believe that if the laws as they are written for US are the same as applied to THEM. There is no attempt at justice or equality. Corporations are treated as a protected class under the law in comparison to the population at large. When they tax corporations at the same real rate, allow them to vote and require the same responsibilities of corporations as they do people I will believe you.
I will also leave for Europe and not return because then the wackos have won and the rest of us are totally screwed. Treating this fiction as reality under the law means that there is no chance or intent towards either justice or fairness under the law. They can call the law anything they want but there needs to be one or the other to continue to call the system of laws in the US "Justice".
bob@Osprey:~>
reality IS defined by the words on the paper that SCOTUS says is the law. SCOTUS upholds a shitty law, you violate that law, in reality, you are punished for that violation. In our current reality, corporations are considered people and thereby gain the rights of a person to influence the system as they see fit.
Technically speaking, the court's job is to interpret the laws created by congress. Therefor, the interpretation of a law is the law since decisions trickle down from SCOTUS to the lower courts and cannot be overturned by lower courts.
If the Supreme Court makes a ruling, it's generally binding on the lower courts. However, if the finding is about a specific law, and that law is changed, then the lower courts are not held to the Supreme Court ruling anymore. That's the point. The Supreme Court may interpret the law, but it is no "higher" than the law itself, and Congress could change that any time they feel like it.
Learn to love Alaska
yes, IF the law is changed. Any ruling on a law that predates the modification of that law is then no longer binding IF the ruling pertained to the specific portion of the law that was changed.
Yes, that's what I said in my first post in this thread. But I'm glad you finally caught up. Now, did you have anything to add to the conversation, other than your obvious lack of reading comprehension?
Learn to love Alaska
The real solution is a multi-party system. But that would never happen. The entrenched parties agree on nothing, unless you start talking about systems that would hand any power to 3rd parties.
If you want more parties, convince more people to vote other than Democrat/Republican, it's the only way it's going to really happen.
If you want to debate whether "overturned" is an inappropriate word for that sentence, that's a completely different argument than whether the decision in question would be moot. And you argued about whether the decision would be rendered moot.
If you want more parties, convince more people to vote other than Democrat/Republican, it's the only way it's going to really happen.
The Republicrats spend billions to convince people that there can be only two. I can't compete with that, even if I'm right. It's actually cheaper and easier to just move to another country to improve my quality of life. If enough instant runoff systems can be instituted on a local scale, then we'd be free of the two-party hold, but even that gets massive push-back from the Republicrats because they know it could lead to 3rd parties as well.
Learn to love Alaska
This is what you're looking at should the Conservatives manage to win a majority today.
thanks
The Republicrats spend billions to convince people that there can be only two. I can't compete with that, even if I'm right. It's actually cheaper and easier to just move to another country to improve my quality of life. If enough instant runoff systems can be instituted on a local scale, then we'd be free of the two-party hold, but even that gets massive push-back from the Republicrats because they know it could lead to 3rd parties as well.
I had the very same thoughts. Leaving and taking up residence elsewhere. However, truthfully, it would just be running away from a problem and not facing it head on as it should be. Yes, the parties have millions and millions of dollars to throw around to fight against additional parties being added to the system, but you have the power of word, you have facebook, you have petitions, you have the ability to work to change the system. That is the defining beauty of the US system. Instant runoffs could definitely help, but only a few places use the system and it needs to become more widespread, but as it does so, it will meet opposition by the parties just as strongly as any movement to add n number of new parties. I despise the party system.
and again, it's not a matter of congress changing a law, as the preceding decision would still be binding.
The preceding decision would not be binding on lower courts. If the Supreme Court decides that, under the Title IX law, that funding for male and female sports should be substantially similar, then a change to the law in question will free all the lower court from following the Supreme Court ruling. The case in question may still be held to be settled as per the previous law, but often the law changes such that the previous case will have the outcome change as well. Without more details as to what changed and how, the previous case decision may simply be invalid, and thus binding on no one. But since this is a hypothetical situation, there is no way to tell and an example could be crafted either way.
Leaving and taking up residence elsewhere. However, truthfully, it would just be running away from a problem and not facing it head on as it should be.
I disagree 100%. Your ancestors "gave up" on their life elsewhere to move where you are now. Are you descended from a bunch of quitters, with quitter in your blood? Or are you descended from opportunists who saw the chance for a better life in America and moved. Now that America is in decline, it would make sense for those that moved here for the same reasons to look to moving elsewhere. But for whatever reason, a country based on mass immigration hates immigrants and even more so hates emigrants. I can't explain it, but I think it has to do with irrational nationalism, which is another reason to leave, not stay. When nationalism is strongest is when the blinders are put on and people will choose the wrong path because the right one would require admitting some previous error/weakness by their country.
Learn to love Alaska