NZ Illegal Downloading Crackdown Law In Effect

First time accepted submitter sfranklin writes "As of Sept 1 at midnight, 'anyone caught downloading copyrighted content illegally could face fines of up to $15,000 and have their internet cut off' in New Zealand. You don't even have to do the deed yourself. The 'account holder needs to know what's going on even if they themselves don't do anything online ...' Scary stuff, although I wonder how much actual enforcement is likely to happen."

Comments

Not all bad

[atomicbutterfly]

If I were a Kiwi (slang for New Zealander in case you didn't know), this law would give me an additional impetus to begin searching for free/open-source/creative commons software and media for all my computing and entertainment needs. Sure, I'd buy stuff occasionally as well, but if I had to buy every single thing I was using which was pirated I'd be broke and seriously in debt. Much better to hunt out legally free software and media.

Having said that, I'm an Aussie (the bigger brother of the Kiwis) and it's a hobby for me to do this anyway even though we don't have such a draconian law. I suppose some others in NZ might find ways to get around it, but I don't see the point of risking it myself.

Re:Not all bad

[nospam007]

I'd invest a couple of bucks a month to rent a seedbox in Burkina Faso or Tonga.

Re:Not all bad

[ivi]

Aussie might not have laws like NZ's [yet], but sometimes they don't NEED such laws...

One person - from Overseas - was sharing his I'net feed with a house mate UNTIL he received a "We see you've been downloading someone else's IP." eMail from his ISP. So afraid that a prosecution (eg, for IP theft, or whatever the crime is in AU) would adversely affect an upcoming decision on Permanent Residence, that they STOPPED sharing their I'net feed.

I HAPPEN TO KNOW that the Overseas guy kept the router set to use only WAP security... Why, they never told us... :-/

Re:Not all bad

[Chuck Chunder]

Said so from the land of 3 strikes-your-out.. seriously besides France, I thought Australia was the worst place to be if you're a pirate

Whatever you think are talking about, it isn't reality.

Re:Not all bad

[aaaaaaargh!]

The parent has a point.

If measures like this are really successful, they will reveal that the alleged losses that software makers suffer from due to piracy are completely imaginary. Nobody except well-running, larger companies can or will afford to buy the tons of commercial software available and certainly no school kid can afford to buy 10 games at 60 $ every month. The industry's expectations are ridiculous.

To give an example, when I used to be a very poor student that could barely afford to pay his electricity bill, I pirated all games, because there was simply no way I could have afforded them. Now I get a decent salary as a researcher and -- surprise! -- buy all games. (And no longer have the time to play them...)

So yes, one way to deal with it is to switch to open and free software for everything you do (and ignore commercial games, how mouth-watering they might look...most of them suck anyway) But there also needs to be a big initiative to get rid of all proprietary file formats or even just minor incompatibilities that force you to use proprietary software. That needs to be prohibited. For example, journal publishers must be prohibited by law to only accept Microsoft Word format.

Re:Not all bad

[igreaterthanu]

In addition, this law reduces the maximum penalty for copyright infringement from $50,000 to $15,000.

If you are in the right, you can still challenge this in court. An IP address isn't proof, but it is very strong evidence that someone did something.

...and I'm from New Zealand btw.

Re:Not all bad

[dbIII]

The NSW police in Australia are being taken to court this month for pirating a few thousand copies of some terminal emulation software that really should have been replaced a decade and a half ago and is licenced at an insane price per seat for what is effectively abandonware. So there you go, even the police force does it.

Re:Not all bad

[Stormthirst]

Thing is, this is more likely targetting TV episode/movie/music downloads. Unless Netflix or similar service is in place, people will continue to download.

Anyone know how easy it is in NZ to get a different ISP?
What's the ISP market like?

Re:Not all bad

[Internetuser1248]

You wouldn't have to stop pirating. The law only covers peer to peer and torrent protocols, so as I recommended to my sister who lives in NZ, you just need to rely on streaming, file hosting sites and the sneakernet. The sneakernet is where most of her piracy happens anyway.

Re:Not all bad

[TapeCutter]

Said so from the land of 3 strikes-your-out.. seriously besides France, I thought Australia was the worst place to be if you're a pirate

Don't believe anything AFACT tells you. There are no baseball inspired laws in Oz against downloading, rumours of such were just another AFACT wet dream. The MO of these parasites is simple and obvious, make exaggerated claims in country A about what is done to "battle piracy" in country B, if country A is dumb/corrupt enough to actually implement it in law, reverse A with B and repeat.

Also it is not a crime to download copyrighted material in Oz since everything on the internet is copyright by default, sure AFACT can try and sue you in civil court for damages but it's never been done because the only damage they can claim is the real cost of the material, as such most cases would not even make the $50 minimum damages bar to get the case heard in the small claims court. If AFACT conducted themselves like their brethren do in the US (pay $X,000 or we will sue), I'm pretty sure they would be investigated by the authorities for racketeering and/or extortion (admittedly I may be giving them too much credit).

Re:Not all bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Your solution is too anti-Microsoft. You must phrase your law to be LESS restrictive.
So instead of making a law which prohibits "only accepting Microsoft Word", make a law stating that a other (open) format MUST be accepted.
This format must be chosen based on being a worthwhile format (ie: it wouldn't help if the required format was .txt because it's not REALLY usable for many submissions).

The movement has to start lower though. Don't use the law to pry open "journal publishers". Instead, use the law to make primary school teachers (and their secondary/finishing/whatever school associates!) accept an open format.
ALL of my college classes in the past two years have required a specific Microsoft Office proprietary format for submissions.
Anything with writing was Microsoft Word.
Anything with spreadsheets was Microsoft Excel.
They wouldn't even take the older formats (that I could sortof export from OO).
F U ".xlsx" F U in the A!

Re:Not all bad

[GigaplexNZ]

Anyone know how easy it is in NZ to get a different ISP?

Very easy.

What's the ISP market like?

Fairly competitive but still overpriced for the small data allowances you get. There's essentially one big backbone ISP (Telecom) and most of the smaller ISPs wholesale connections from them, and regulations prohibit Telecom from blocking competition.

Re:Not all bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you guys on the "innocent until proven guilty" standard over there?
Or are you with the "cases presented and Magistrate calls it as he sees it" method?

I question this due to the whole "You are responsible for what other people do with your node" part. It seems geared towards plugging the hole where the user knows how to scrub his equipment so well that you really can't get past the "Someone was hijacking my AP!" defense on the basis of other evidence.

Related example question:
Assume you leave your keys in your car, your car unlocked, and park it on the street outside your house.
Assume someone who is looking for such an opportunity sees your stupidity and steals your car.
Assume that car thief drives your car to an unoccupied home, robs the place, drops off the stolen goods and then brings your car back.
Assume the police are only able to trace the robbery back to your car (a picture, tires, whatever... they 100% identified your car at the scene and used in the robbery).
If your defense is "I always leave my car open like that"; are you by default responsible for the robbery? (Under current NZ law)

Re:Not all bad

[TapeCutter]

IP theft, or whatever the crime is in AU

Downloading is not a crime in Oz and nobody has ever been sued for it in an Australian civil court, but somehow the Australian government is responsible for Overseas_guy's rampant paranoia? He was never in any danger and should have done what most Aussie's do in that situation, ie: tell his current ISP to go fuck themselves and switch to one of the many ISP's that do not forward AFACT's idle threats to their customers.

Re:Not all bad

[cheekyjohnson]

but it is very strong evidence that someone did something.

And unless they have very strong evidence that that someone was you, I think they should lose instantly.

Re:Not all bad

[nzac]

I'd invest a couple of bucks a month to rent a seedbox in Burkina Faso or Tonga.

The funniest thing about that I think you avoid the law completely (yes its still covered by the general copywrite one) as well as the added bonus of being anonymous to all but the governments.

IANAL but since you are not torrenting outside the country you can be easily prosecuted for the torrenting from the seedbox/vps. Then since the law only covers p2p at the application level the ftps or ssh downloading to your desktop is fine (yes again there is the general copywrite law).

I would think that this law will also imply to police/judges that no one should be prosecuted for downloading something not covered by the law.

Re:Not all bad

[QuasiSteve]

It is sadly telling that your comment - advocating going completely legit by such means as finding alternative media - currently sits at +4 Insightful, with the very first reply - advocating continuing illegal behavior but in a way that would make it difficult for you to be caught - sits at +5 Interesting.

As hopeful as I am that people would follow your example - which in the end 'hurts' big media more - I rather suspect they'll go with the alternative.. can't very well miss that latest episode of Game of Thrones just because there's 3 minutes of Where are the Joneses available for free-as-in-beerspeech.

Re:Not all bad

[TheDarkMaster]

But you still have one problem: The patent war/trolls. In the current situation you can not even take a step without "violating" the "imaginary property" of someone

Re:Not all bad

[igreaterthanu]

Are you guys on the "innocent until proven guilty" standard over there?

Not at all. However in my opinion this is much more like a speeding ticket in which they take a picture of your number plate (or IP Address) and you can pay a fine, or challenge it; rather than being like a robbery.

Re:Not all bad

[igreaterthanu]

It is? How? Because they claim it is?

Computers don't lie. They can get a list of IPs from a torrent tracker and connect to them. If they upload the content, that is proof that the connection is being used to break the law.

Is it meant to give your argument some weight? In either case, it's totally irrelevant.

While it is irrelevant as to whether or not my argument is valid, it shows that I am arguing for myself to be under the same laws that I am arguing for.

This law that has generated protests against because of the lack of oversight, the lack of public input, no legal standard of evidence, no firm way to prove innocence

You mean it has generated protests because people want to complain that they can't get a free ride anymore?

Have you actually read the bill before making statements about it? Specifically section 122MA

An account holder may submit evidence, or give reasons, that show that any 1 or more of the presumptions in subsection (1) do not apply with respect to any particular infringement identified in an infringement notice. “(3) If an account holder submits evidence or gives reasons as referred to in subsection (2), the rights owner must satisfy the Tribunal that the particular presumption or presumptions are correct.

Just for the record, I am also from New Zealand.

So what? Is that meant to impress upon us how seriously you take IP infringement? Is it meant to give your argument some weight? In either case, it's totally irrelevant.

Re:Not all bad

[cheekyjohnson]

It would come down to what the reasonable person would do in that situation.

Now all we have to do is define "reasonable."

Re:Not all bad

[cheekyjohnson]

You mean it has generated protests because people want to complain that they can't get a free ride anymore?

Yes. Anyone who complains about this law must be a copyright infringer.

Re:Not all bad

[igreaterthanu]

But why are they protesting now and not before? The new law reduces the penalties and makes nothing that was previously legal now illegal.

The new law streamlines infringement cases, and contrary to the FUD many people speak of, innocent people do not have to pay up.

Re:Not all bad

[trum4n]

Exactly how i see it. It has nothing to do with theft, they just want more money. Speed limits are calculated for large box trucks. Small nimble cars like my Honda Fit(jazz over seas) can noodle around traffic and turns faster than most eurosport cars. 35mph in the middle of no where? Yea, right. I'm using 5th gear so i can get my 40mpg. Hugging turns is FUN, not dangerous. Downloading an MP3/game hurts no one. If i couldn't download BioShock, i wouldn't have played it. But after i did, and LOVED it, i bought it. Way to go guys, The Pirate Bay just sold a copy of your game for you.

Re:Not all bad

[cheekyjohnson]

But why are they protesting now and not before?

I don't know. And unless you can read everyone's mind, I don't think you do, either.

innocent people do not have to pay up.

It's possible that innocent people can be found guilty.

Re:Not all bad

[BigBuckHunter]

I would be interested to know why people would pay money to change the geography of their Internet servers when they could simply switch to a darknet. I'd recommend trying Freenet for a while and see if you have any complaints besides it being slower than the observable Internet.

I'm genuinely interested in why more people do not take this approach.

Re:Not all bad

[GameboyRMH]

Is that even necessary? If they're not monitoring torrent swarms, just force encrypted torrent traffic. Are they gonna cut you off for passing a lot of random-looking garbage back and forth?

Re:Not all bad

[GameboyRMH]

"something might happen somewhere at some time so LOOK SHARP!" - Stan Smith

Re:Not all bad

[Anonymous Coward]

There's also a human-rights aspect to Free Software - my dad was in the hospital, and it bothered me to see all of the computers running medical software, potentially keeping him alive, running proprietary software. Dammit, if it's affecting my health or the health of my family I deserve to see the source code. It's no different from requiring ingredients and nutrition information on food packaging.

Re:Not all bad

[wwphx]

If I were a Kiwi I'd locate all the government officials that I could and download some really horrible music off their WiFi, stuff that'd cause a lot of laughs if the list were released in public. How can they expect average people to actively monitor their internet connection?

Re:Not all bad

[hawkinspeter]

I wish everyone who received any kind of threatening letter from their ISP would change providers - that would create a very strong market pressure for ISPs to not bother dealing with organisations like AFACT/MAFIAA etc.

Re:Not all bad

[hawkinspeter]

I can't see a problem with private organisations only allowing a certain format - you aren't forced to deal with them.

There's a very strong case for ensuring that all government offices/systems have to accept the relevant open standard for documents/spreadsheets etc. If they choose to accept Microsoft docx files as well as odf/pdf, then that's down to them.

Re:Not all bad

[MacDork]

Sure, I'd buy stuff occasionally as well, but if I had to buy every single thing I was using which was pirated I'd be broke and seriously in debt. Much better to hunt out legally free software and media.

Downloading and using "cracked" software from internet? You might as well open every SEX.EXE file you get in your inbox. Running executables you can't trust is not smart.

This law will really benefit the cable/dsl companies who stand to gain quite a lot if everyone is afraid to run open wi-fi. (Queue the random slashbot to tell me MY network is unsafe because it's open)

Re:Not all bad

[Grishnakh]

I don't know about Australia, but here in the USA we don't really have ability to change providers. In most urban places, there's only two choices for broadband ISPs, and frequently there's only one (we have DSL and cable, and in many locations DSL isn't viable, or cable isn't available). The DSL telcos and the cablecos are each monopolies.

There's still some dial-up ISPs out there (I have no idea how they survive), but that requires you to get a landline which is an extra added expense, plus it's kinda irrelevant since it isn't feasible to use BitTorrent over dialup.

Re:Not all bad

[Grishnakh]

Small nimble cars like my Honda Fit

I would never call a car that doesn't have independent rear suspension "nimble". I'd call it a cheaply-made econocar. It's really rather shameful that Honda's been reduced to making such crappy cars these days; back in the late 80s even their cheapest cars all had fully-independent suspension with better handling than their modern econocars.

I used to be a big Honda fan years ago, but the next car I buy is going to be something else. Crappy suspensions, underpowered engines, and lackluster fuel economy do not make for an attractive car.

Re:Not all bad

[trum4n]

Ever drive a Fit? Lane changes faster than a Ferrari 355. Not bad for under 300$ a month to buy. Drives great, awesome feel. Handles corners more stable than the Formula SAE car i drove. Coming from a Lexus SC300 to this was expected to be terrible, but i really like it. Far better car than the "cheaply made, but NOT cheaply PRICED" American junk i'm surrounded by. I feel you don't know what your talking about.

Re:Not all bad

[hawkinspeter]

I'm in the UK and we've got loads of different ISPs (although a lot of them use BT's copper lines).

I thought America was all free-market and capitalism? It sounds more like communism with your lack of choice.

Re:Not all bad

[Grishnakh]

Ever drive a Fit? Lane changes faster than a Ferrari 355. Not bad for under 300$ a month to buy. Drives great, awesome feel. Handles corners more stable than the Formula SAE car i drove.

Where'd you drive it, on a perfectly-smooth track? Try it an a normal road with bumps next time. Cars without independent suspension do NOT handle well.

Re:Not all bad

[Grishnakh]

I thought America was all free-market and capitalism? It sounds more like communism with your lack of choice.

You're kidding, right? You must be new here or something. This subject comes up pretty regularly on Slashdot, with lots of other Americans saying the exact same things as me. I'm a little surprised given your relatively low UID.

No, America is NOT free-market and capitalism. We love oligopolies and monopolies here. In fact, we think that any government action to limit monopolies is bad, because it's "punishing success", and that monopolies should be allowed to do anything they want to their customers or potential competitors. We even think that corporations are people; there's a good chance our next President will be a man who said those very words. Don't forget, we also believe in allowing unlimited abuse of the patent system, so that big corporations can use vague patents on obvious "inventions" to shut out competition from smaller rivals.

However, we don't believe in communism. Communism (in practice) is where the government controls everything, and owns all the corporations. What we believe in here in America is an elite group of people running the corporations, and the government only serving to protect their interests. That's frequently called "fascism".

Re:Not all bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you completely retarded? Of course I'm forced to deal with them. If I don't publish papers in journals I'll simply loose my funding (=job) !

Re:Not all bad

[trum4n]

Mine handles fine. Sounds to me like you just don't have the experience to make that generalization. My 1974 Dodge Charger hugs the road brilliantly, with a solid axle. The only way to transfer real power to the road. Maybe I'm just used to going 160mph, so 40mph is a cute joke to me.

Re:Not all bad

[X0563511]

I got banned from the internet for trying to check my bank statement :(

(that was sillyness, that didn't actually happen)

Re:Not all bad

[hercubus]

i agree with the spirit of what you're saying, what we have, loosely, is fascism

however, Romney does not have a good chance, his chances approach zero. if the economy is rebounding around election time, it'll be Obama. if we're in the middle of the double-dip of recession, it'll be President Rick Perry

unless one happens to be LGBT, or a billionaire, life will get worse at approximately the same rate under either option. not sure if it has any legs, but Perry has been blathering about the "injustice" that half of Americans pay no income tax (due to the fact that their income falls below some minimum, roughly 12K i believe). gotta frakking love that

you see, the problem with poor people is they have it too easy. i see all that blubber walking around and i'm thinking "cheap alternative fuels" on the hoof. our soylent crackers may not come from poor people but soon our electricity will. yee hah!

Re:Not all bad

[Bucky24]

I drive a Fit on a road that hasn't been paved in years. Full of potholes and bumps. It handles amazingly well. Not so great at accelerating over 75 mph, but below that it's very responsive.

Re:Not all bad

[Grishnakh]

however, Romney does not have a good chance, his chances approach zero.

Maybe, but it's still a little early. Regardless, I'm sure Perry would happily say the exact same thing that Romney did; all of today's Republicans believe that corporations are people. And their supporters are dumb enough to believe them.

if the economy is rebounding around election time, it'll be Obama.

I seriously doubt it to be honest, and even if the economy is rebounding I hope he doesn't get re-elected, but instead is replaced with a different Democrat. He's been a terrible president. Just now, he's trying to take away black people's jobs and force them to be outsourced overseas. Why does Obama want black people, the people who supported him the most in 2008, to be forced into unemployment?

What's really disgusting is how no one ever talks about how the people have another option in 2012; they always frame it as Obama vs. the Republican who wins the primaries. Being the President does NOT guarantee that you'll win your own party's primaries; four times before, a sitting President did not, plus LBJ gave up on his re-election campaign when early results showed his popularity to be in the toilet. The Democrats need to elect someone else. Any of the other Dems running in the primaries in 2008 would have made a better President than this guy.

Re:Not all bad

[ultranova]

I would be interested to know why people would pay money to change the geography of their Internet servers when they could simply switch to a darknet. I'd recommend trying Freenet for a while and see if you have any complaints besides it being slower than the observable Internet.

I'm genuinely interested in why more people do not take this approach.

Because in order to use Freenet as a darknet, you need at least 3 friends who are already doing so. And if you're not using it as a darknet, you're setting up a big neon sign of "I have something to hide" above your head.

Then there's the fact that most "content" on Freenet makes 4chan seem mature.

Re:Not all bad

[Smauler]

This is slightly off topic, but relevant.

I'm thinking of buying lots of music online, entirely legally, and making a few CDs for my sister's birthday. Now, technically that is against copyright law in the UK. I'll still have the music, and I'll be distributing it to my sister. Absolutely open to litigation, and I could be sued for this.

If I thought I would be sued for this, I wouldn't get close to buying the music. I would not buy the music at all. I'm a truck driver - I listen to this music all day, every day on the radio.

And I'm breaking the copyright laws by buying the music and slapping on a CD.

I'm close to saying fuck them and everything they stand for, since I'm going to be breaking the law anyway.

Re:Not all bad

[Smauler]

I take it you've never driven a Honda Integra Tpye-R DC2? Admittedly it's a turn of the century car... but you're wrong.

Crappy suspensions
Wrong.

underpowered engines
Wrong

and lackluster fuel economy
Depends how you drive it. Deleterious fuel economy if you rev hard

Re:Not all bad

[Smauler]

Everyone likes their own car, but seriously... comparing a Fit to a Ferrari 355?

Have you ever driven either close to the edge of their performance? Because small cars can seem nippy when you drive them nowhere near that edge. Front wheel drive cars have the habit of massively understeering out of corners on power

I personally drive a Honda, which weighs about the same as yours, could have the same engine displacement, is a front wheel drive, has 4 proper seats, has more space in the boot, and has done the nurburgring in 8:43 in stock form. It won't get your mpg though ;).

Re:Not all bad

[Smauler]

You're wrong. Your 1974 Dodge Charger does not hug the road brilliantly compared to just about any car with independent suspension. Your Charger may be faster in a straight line, but it doesn't go round corners that well, at any mph.

Re:Not all bad

[plover]

Why would the source code to a medical device matter to you? First, there isn't a thing you could change about it. If you changed it, as a different patient I wouldn't want to trust your changes. If I were your doctor, I don't know your qualifications so I wouldn't trust your changes, and so I wouldn't prescribe the use of the changed software. All software and changes to the devices have to be tested and certified.

The only thing you might think you could do would be to make a choice of "certified machine A" or "certified machine B" or "no treatment." But even that's a false choice. Medical devices undergo a testing regimen based on how they're configured and used. Machine A when used in manner A is supposed to perform in method A every time. Machine B when used in manner B is supposed to perform in method B every time, but this is not exactly the same as method A. The doctor would make his choice based on his training and experience, and select the best one for the job (best according to his criteria, not yours!) As your patient, your doctor may decide your illness would be best treated using method A. Open source or not, the trained professional has decided it's the best methodology for the job.

And there's a lot more to a machine than the software. Other key differences would include the manufacture. Would you ask for blueprints of every part of that machine? Would you demand to see the tolerances for the hinge pin? Would you need to see the testing report for the hinge pin that shows it was manufactured to within all specified tolerances? If you're not going to dig that deep, why not? It's because at some point you trust that parts of this machine were designed and made to a certain level of quality. What makes the software any more or less deserving of your trust?

Now, all other things being equal, you might ask your doctor "hey, I want you to use machine B, it's open source" and he might agree. However, that means absolutely ALL other things have to be equal, and they never are. He may have experience with machine B's hinge pins jamming. He may have always had great results with machine A. Or he may simply have no experience with machine B, and very limited time to learn it. Would you be comfortable being his first test subject? And would you pay him extra for the time he needs to spend learning to use machine B?

You're weighing "device invention and development" and "millions of dollars worth of testing" and "years of doctor experience" against "the patient who has more at stake than the doctor, but whose qualifications are completely unknown, looked at the source code." As an independent third party, I'd choose the machine meeting first set of qualifications over the second set every single time.

As a patient you may or may not be a crackpot, but look at the average person the doctor has to treat. He's got people coming to him saying "I read in a magazine in the airplane that you should use avocado pits to treat my lymphoma" or "wave magnets over my wrist, I read it on the wiki-peter!" That doctor has essentially no way to trust that you're not giving him equally stupid advice.

A completely different question, and probably more valid, is "Should the software source be opened up to a panel of trusted professional third party software engineers for review?" To that I'd say absolutely. And for all I know, that might already be part of the certification process.

Re:Not all bad

[cffrost]

If I were a Kiwi (slang for New Zealander in case you didn't know)

Impressive; you must be a serious globetrotter (slang for someone who travels a lot in case you didn't know). =)

Re:Not all bad

[Grishnakh]

I take it you've never driven a Honda Integra Tpye-R DC2? Admittedly it's a turn of the century car... but you're wrong.

That's funny, that's the exact car I own. Guess what? They haven't built that car in a decade. I'm not talking about Honda 10-20 years ago, I'm talking about Honda now.

Crappy suspensions
Wrong.

underpowered engines
Wrong

and lackluster fuel economy
Depends how you drive it. Deleterious fuel economy if you rev hard

Is that all you can say? "Wrong"? Are you 12 or something?

Yes, their suspensions are crappy. Any car that doesn't have fully independent suspension these days has crappy suspension. What's pathetic about Honda is they used to be the leaders in suspension technology, but they gave that up around 2001, when they switched back to MacPherson struts, and even worse now, since they're abandoned IRS and gone back to torsion beams, which are straight out of shitty 1970s-80s American cars.

Compared to all the other manufacturers these days, their engines are very underpowered. This isn't new for Honda, they've always been a little underpowered but they made up for it with reliability and handling and low weight. Everyone now is moving to either turbo engines, or high-performance V6s (take a look at the Mustang and Camaro), but Honda still refuses to go turbo so their engines constantly suffer from a lack of torque.

And their fuel economy is nothing great, when you consider the giant lack of power. Even their hybrid cars totally suck; look at the CR-Z: only 2 seats, but only a pathetic 37mpg for something that's dog slow (and has shit suspension and handling too). You can get more power out of the much larger Prius.

Strangely enough, the Camaro is looking pretty attractive these days if you want a car with good performance. Unlike Honda, which has regressed in the suspension department, this car has finally abandoned the old live axle and switched to an independent rear suspension. Plus it gets 28mpg, which is about the same as my Integra (once you adjust for the difference in the EPA's testing methodology between the late 90s and now; older cars show higher numbers than they would with today's testing methodology), but with a whopping 312HP, which is about double what my car gets. I don't see any Hondas that come close to comparing to this.

Or maybe I should just get the updated version of my Integra, now called the RSX... Oh wait, they stopped making those back in 2005! The only performance-oriented car they make is the Civic Si, which is really quite ugly (especially the dash--WTF were they thinking?). From Edmunds: "Also the extensive use of low-budget hard plastics makes the cabin feel cheap, especially compared to competitors that have invested in upgraded materials for their interiors." Weird, my Integra doesn't have that problem at all, so I guess they had to cut corners in the last decade. It looks like the VW GTI is probably the leading car in this segment these days, though the Volvo C30 also looks quite nice, and neither of these use low-budget hard plastics, and have very nice turbo engines.

Re:Not all bad

[igreaterthanu]

So what is your solution? That we all switch to communism and abolish intellectual property? That creators of intellectual property don't get paid? How is that going to work for software developers and book authors?

Re:Not all bad

[miasmic]

Good Post, I also drive a DC2 Integra coupe (not a type R though, but still they're all nice cars), and used to drive a DA3 (mk1 with pop up headlights) a few years ago. DC2 is by far the best car I've owned, the light weight (1181kg), double wishbone suspension f+r and the stiff chassis make an incredible car to drive. It's 16 years old but everything electronic works and the engine is still smooth all the way to the fuel cutoff. Nothing like dropping a couple of gears to overtake a line of trucks. The DA3 was maybe more fun in traffic though as it had a lot better visibility and handled like a go kart at low speeds, but the engine was no comparison to the DC2.

Fully agree that Honda and many other manufacturers have gone to shit recently. Nearly every car looks like an MPV, ridiculous blade runner interiors to impress housewives who want to look trendy, electronic power steering that feels like, ah, um, doesn't feel. Fully agree, the Civic Si is a very poor mans relation to the sporty cars they had 15 years ago.

Re:Not all bad

[bzipitidoo]

Use some other system, not copyright. Copyright is only a means of encouraging art and science. It's hardly the only means. Nor is it a good means. Nor is it necessary for other purposes, such as stopping plagiarism. No, it is not communist to want to abolish intellectual property. Do you think it is? Why?

Patronage is one such system. It worked for Mozart and Beethoven. Today, we can do up a much better patronage system. Base pay on various measures of value and popularity. The idea would be that with enough different prizes, criteria and so on, every worthy contributor will get something. Collect money through sales of real goods, advertising, donations, and possibly even levies and taxes. Would have to watch for corruption and cheating of course, but you always have to do that when money is involved.

Re:Not all bad

[Grishnakh]

Yep. Actually, I replied a little too hastily to the previous post; I don't have a Type-R either (which isn't a DC2 anyway, contrary to what the OP said; DC2 is the Integra GS-R with B18C1 engine. DC4 is the RS/LS/GS with B18B1 engine, and DC5 is the Type-R with B18C5 engine), I have one Integra LS and one Integra GS-R. The LS is a 1994 though and while mechanically it runs fine, the interior and exterior aren't so great after all these years. There's no way I'm spending the money for someone else to fix it up (plus they'd do a shitty job anyway, esp. here in Phoenix where you can't get service people to do anything right), and I simply don't have the time to do that stuff like I did when I was younger, so a new car is in order.

Fully agree, the Civic Si is a very poor mans relation to the sporty cars they had 15 years ago.

Yep. I was just reading a Camaro forum comparing that car and the Civic Si, and someone brought up a pretty important point: the Si actually has worse fuel economy than the Camaro with its much larger engine. On paper, it's maybe 2-3 mpg better, but the problem is it requires premium fuel, which is generally at least 10% more expensive. So when you account for that, the Camaro is getting about the same fuel economy as the Civic Si, but with about 112 more HP and far, far more torque. That's really pretty sad. The Camaro even has more advanced engine technology: it uses direct injection, which for some reason Honda refuses to use in their engines. The American makers seem to have passed up everyone on that bit of tech, which does quite a bit to improve fuel economy.

So for a new car, it's looking like I should either be looking at the European makers with their hatches, or at the American makers with their muscle cars (V6 versions of course), for something that's sporty and fun to drive while still getting relatively good fuel economy. The Koreans might even be a consideration (the Hyundai Genesis looks quite nice), but Honda has totally fumbled.

Re:Not all bad

[jedwidz]

TelstraClear's cable network offers a superior alternative to Telecom's ADSL, but it's only available in some main centres. Data caps are bad but have improved, I'm currently on 40GB/month for around NZ$80. That's around US$500 and counting by the time you read this (sorry, joke).

The best advantage of the cable is that you don't have to pay hefty landline fixed charges to qualify for internet service - you can go mobile-only or get your POTS fix over IP. I get mine from 2talk - NZ$15/month including 300 minutes of calls to pretty much anywhere and I still have my old phone number.

Re:Not all bad

[GigaplexNZ]

I'd forgotten all about TelstraClear cable. When I moved from NZ to Australia a couple years ago (yes, I'm one of those traitors) I had been using naked ADSL through Xnet - you don't need to pay the landline charges but it's not that much cheaper.

Re:Not all bad

[harryjohnston]

"Computers don't lie."

Actually they do, when instructed to do so. It's easy to frame someone. See http://dmca.cs.washington.edu/

Re:Not all bad

[Kalriath]

Bear in mind that subject to Shareholder approval, very soon that becomes one backbone (Chorus) which has no retail arm - Telecom becomes a whole separate company. Hopefully this improves competition, but I don't see that being all that likely anytime soon (whip out the Southern Cross Cable as a reason we pay too much and I beat you with it - SCC has proven time and time again that their cable isn't even running at capacity, and they've dropped prices quite a lot over the years - our ISPs are just greedy mofos).

Re:Not all bad

[Kalriath]

Can I just point out that here in New Zealand we can't get any episode of Game of Thrones at all. THAT is why piracy continues in New Zealand, because there is literally no way to legally acquire some media!

Re:Not all bad

[Kalriath]

Some folks have already started using Parliament's internet connections to download torrents. Theoretically, if they can get three notices sent to Lockwood Smith (the Speaker of the House), the entire New Zealand government disconnected from the internet (save the Crown Entities who operate independently and get their own connections).

Re:Not all bad

[wwphx]

W00t! More power to 'em!

Re:Not all bad

[AK Marc]

Ever drive a car with a "stabilizer bar" or "anti-roll bar" or "sway bar"? Those are devices that turn cars with independent suspensions into a car without and independent suspension, and they are considered upgrades. I've not followed the Fit, but a quick glance before sending this and it looks like the "torsion beam" suspension is designed to be very similar to an independent suspension with a stiff anti-roll bar. Since "independent with a stiff roll bar" is what you have in most sports cars, I fail to see how something is bad just because you assert that it can't handle well based on your unsubstantiated opinion. Instead, you should have pointed out that the Ferrari 355 will be able to change lanes much faster because the body roll of the massively tall Fit will require slower reactions or it'll have to flip or slide. Anyone who compares their bargain Honda against a Ferrari for handling has obviously drunk the cool-aid and can't be educated. But that's no excuse for incorrect arguments on your part.

Re:Not all bad

[AK Marc]

But why are they protesting now and not before?

I don't know. And unless you can read everyone's mind, I don't think you do, either.

It's simple. It takes a civil action (expensive, requiring proof in a court) and changes it into a criminal action, no proof needed, fine to whomever is deemed responsible for the IP in question, much like speed camera fines and such. If you can't see why a manual process requiring proof in court got fewer complaints than an automated system with no checks all based on the word of organizations who lie about the piracy problem all the time, then you'd not listen even if I could read everyone's mind. You've decided and closed your mind.

Re:Not all bad

[QuasiSteve]

Which, of course, is just another excuse.

A valid excuse, mind you, but an excuse all the same.

The original poster pointed out that if it were made 'impossible' to get such shows by means of making it illegal, that the solution should be to seek out media where the copyright holders allows sharing or even promote it.

In your case it's 'impossible' to get Game of Thrones (I'm sure you can get the DVDs eventually - but I understand the impossibility being directly related to watching it in timely enough a fashion that you can discuss it with others across the globe and also avoid any spoilers) so the solution would be the same - seek out other media.

But your post demonstrates exactly what I was saying was the more likely sought solution - people won't seek out that other media unless they are very strongly convinced in either A. going legit for the sake of being legit or B. going for different media for the sake of 'sticking it to the MPAA/RIAA man'. It's more likely that they'll just find ways to minimize the odds of getting caught downloading/uploading and still be able to acquire the highly popular media they enjoy.

Re:Not all bad

[Grumbleduke]

Now all we have to do is define "reasonable."

Yep, that's the massive hole in much of the "common law" legal system. Usually this means "what a judge thinks is reasonable", sometimes "what a jury thinks is reasonable."

Of course, flexibility in a legal system isn't always a bad thing...

Re:Not all bad

[Grumbleduke]

Computers don't lie. They can get a list of IPs from a torrent tracker and connect to them. If they upload the content, that is proof that the connection is being used to break the law.

Actually, it's evidence, not proof. And only evidence that the connection may be being used. You then (at least, in the UK, I'm assuming NZ has similar copyright laws as I think they borrowed most of it from us) have to prove that the content was copyrighted, prove that whoever uploaded it didn't have a licence (or other legal option) to do so, prove that you own the copyright to said content and prove that a person (you can't sue a computer) did the uploading or authorised it. Then you can sue them for it.

Interestingly, from what I recall, during the ACS:Law fiasco over here, some of the leaked files showed that, of the IP addresses identified as being involved in copyright infringement at a certain time (by ACS:Law's "client"), about 1 in 4 weren't even allocated at the time the alleged infringement occurred. When you have a minimum 25% error rate, there's no way to get a criminal conviction on the basis of that alone, and (combined with the uncertainties in all the other elements), even a civil case is looking unlikely.

Pesky thing, due process; causes all sorts of troubles. That's why these laws (this one, the French Hadopi, UK Digital Economy Act, the US ProtectIP) are created; they're mostly designed to circumvent the requirements of existing law (in terms of what needs to be proven). But who needs due process; copyright infringers are all evil thieves and don't deserve it.

Of course, most UK Internet users infringe copyright on a daily basis (particularly given the recent Meltwater decision, which seems to hold that merely visiting a website is a prima facie infringement)...

Re:Not all bad

[lsatenstein]

Your view is the same view of people living in other countries. In an earlier post I mentioned that small business is favored by our government, because it generates local employment.

Bravo to you

Re:Not all bad

[cheekyjohnson]

You've decided and closed your mind.

I was responding to that guy because he implied that people who protest this law must be pirates. I felt that discussing the reasons that they might be protesting was rather irrelevant since I was making a point. Why all of those people are protesting (and when I say all of them, I mean all of them) is unknown unless they explicitly state it or you can do something like read minds. I don't think someone should say what everyone in a group believes and leave no room for error.

Re:Not all bad

[trum4n]

I push every car to the limit. My 1000$ Saturn that was my first car, Vintage Packards, all the way to a Lamborghini Diablo. I, at 23, have driven more cars than most drive in a lifetime. It's what i do, and i love it. Look up the specs. I didn't make the comparison, CAR AND DRIVER DID. Ask them if they have driven both, i know i have. I can confirm what they said. Thing isn't just a solid axle. It has what is basically 4link mixed with trailing arm. It my be cheap to buy, but it sure as hell isn't a cheaply built. The engineering on this thing is shocking. The new generation has the same vertical centre of gravity as a civic. Impressive since its like 33% taller.

Re:Not all bad

[trum4n]

Also, the car sold to buy the fit was a Lexus SC300. AKA: Toyota N/A Supra.

Re:Not all bad

[hawkinspeter]

I was kidding. Over here (UK), we call it irony. Nice response, though.

Re:Not all bad

[Grishnakh]

Sorry, it can be a little hard to tell sometimes, plus I felt like I needed to rant a little about the sorry state of my country.

Re:Not all bad

[Smauler]

I was assuming that you were claiming the cars they made since the late 80s were lacklustre.... that's why I said you were wrong. Modern Hondas, I don't know much about - I'd never buy a new car. When I was looking for a car recently, my first choice was going to be a BMW M5 E39, which can be picked up _so_ cheap now (£5000 for the cheapest ones). All the one I looked at were dodgy though (I guess you get what you pay for), and I wasn't inspired. That's why I went for the Integra.... it was an ok example, and £3000 from a dealer.

About crappy looking hard plastics etc, I don't care. I want it to drive well. My car sounds crap when you close the door... it doesn't "thunk". That "thunk" is what I do not want, nor do I expect.

It goes round corners absurdly fast, and I'm happy with that.

That being said, I don't know if I like it in the wet yet. The thing about it in the wet is that if you drop the power halfway through a corner, it just slides sideways. So when you're close to the limit, and try to back off... you can't - the best way to get round the corner is to keep at least some power on, and hope you judged the corner right. It's an amazing car.

Re:Not all bad

[hawkinspeter]

Well, if that was a rant, it was an insightful rant judging by your mods.

Re:Not all bad

[MacDork]

I would say insecure, not unsafe. Also, I have to point out that it's insecure against unauthorized neighbors and wardrivers

Anything that needs to be secure is over SSL. But there it is... the notion that my neighbors are somehow stealing the warmth from my campfire. My neighbors are welcome to use my wi-fi if they are in range.

Re:Not all bad

[Kalriath]

Just to point out, my personal approach is to violate the iTunes Terms of Service and use a USA-based iTunes account despite that I am not in that territory. I have no qualms about violating the territorial restrictions in order to pay real money to get media legally. I do not, in fact, pirate any TV shows, software, movies or music.

Notably though, Game of Thrones is not available on iTunes either - meaning I would indeed have to wait for the DVDs, or wait until November when our Pay TV monopoly brings out their $10/month HBO channel, then continue to wait until it finally plays (even though it will still be 6 months+ behind).

Re:Not all bad

[miasmic]

Hadn't had chance to check Slashdot but I thought I'd reply to your post anyway.

My Integra is an 94 LS too, it's in a pretty sweet condition considering the age, inside and outside, I've seen 98-00 models in worse shape. Just wish it had VTEC, but it still seems plenty fast for normal driving, and I've got some decent (as in performance rather than looks) wheels and tyres on it.

Here in NZ it pretty much seems that classic Integras in good condition aren't likely to depreciate at all in value any more, which makes owning one quite a bonus. Other Jap classics from the late 80s/ early 90s like Corolla Levins, Skylines, Silvias, 300ZX etc are in a similar boat I've always wanted a Skyline and if I got something else to replace the Integra I might take that route (an R33 probably, definitely not one of the newer fake Skylines), though I wouldn't be able to expect the same fuel economy.

The key to the Integra's handling seems to be the light weight, that would be my concern with the Camaro at 1700kg. Maybe the suspension, increased torque and wide tires/stance can compensate for it though. The fuel economy is very impressive though without a doubt.

Re:Not all bad

[Grishnakh]

The key to the Integra's handling seems to be the light weight, that would be my concern with the Camaro at 1700kg. Maybe the suspension, increased torque and wide tires/stance can compensate for it though. The fuel economy is very impressive though without a doubt.

Be careful not to confuse tire grip with "handling"; they're not the same thing. A car can have excellent grip, just by having wide, sticky tires, and still have crappy handling by having a bad suspension that has too much body roll, insufficient compliance for real-world roads, or many other factors. I'm not so sure light weight has that much to do with handling. The Nissan G37, for instance, is generally thought to have great handling, but it weighs about 3600 lb, only 150lb shy of the Camaro (it also gets 1mpg worse highway fuel economy, but 2mpg better city fuel economy, with nearly identical peak HP numbers). That's almost 1000lb heavier than the Integra. The Chevy Corvette, similarly, is generally regarded as having excellent handling, but it weighs 3200 lbs, still 600lb heavier than the Integra.

I think the Integra's handling can probably be attributed to its suspension design, which was quite advanced not only for that time, but even now as everyone's been cutting costs in suspension by moving to McPherson struts and twist-beam rear suspensions, at least in the cheaper cars.

Re:Not all bad

[fiatpirate]

There are other choices besides Romney and Perry. I am going for Ron Paul. He is a libertarian running as a Republican (thanks two party system). He is obviously ostracized by the system because he wants to dismantle the corruption of both parties. He has a shot and I hope enough people show up to the primaries to get him elected. Of course, regarding the Obama nomination, the Democrats do not have to re-nominate him, but who else would be nominated that would be any less of a statist control freak?

Re:Not all bad

[Grishnakh]

There are other choices besides Romney and Perry. I am going for Ron Paul. He is a libertarian running as a Republican (thanks two party system). He is obviously ostracized by the system because he wants to dismantle the corruption of both parties. He has a shot

I don't know about that. He seemed to have a lot of momentum back in 2008 too when he first ran, and no one voted for him in the Primaries. The media did everything it could to make him look bad, or to avoid showing him at all. I don't see that anything's changed, and in fact with the rise of Bachmann it seems like fundamentalist Christianity is taking over the Republican party even more than before, so I don't think Republican voters want Paul, they want a fundamentalist that will try to set up a theocracy.

Of course, regarding the Obama nomination, the Democrats do not have to re-nominate him, but who else would be nominated that would be any less of a statist control freak?

Back in '08, Obama ran against a bunch of other Democrats, and any one of them would have been better than him, including Hillary. Obama isn't even a good Democrat, because he just goes along with the Republican agenda; he has no skill in actually getting his own agenda pushed through. Democrats would be utterly stupid to vote for him again, because he's completely failed in living up to his promises, and ANY Democrat contender would be a better choice than him.

As for "statist control freaks", at this point I think we do need a little statism to hold things together and get things on the right track. The problem is that the Republicans' version of statism is just corporatist corruption, and Obama's statism has been pretty much the same thing. We need policies that will actually help the economy for regular Americans, instead of continuing to pursue failing wars overseas and giving money away to badly-run corporations with no strings attached ("stimulus"), or making BS healthcore "reform" which is just a giveaway to giant insurance companies.

Pretty Quiet

[drmofe]

As a so-called IPAP, I have so far received a Grand Total of Zero infringement notices for my netblocks.

Re:Pretty Quiet

[shutdown -p now]

For those curious what IPAP means, and to save you a few dozen seconds crafting the right Google search query:

“IPAP, or Internet protocol address provider, means a person that operates a business that, other than as an incidental feature of its main business activities,—
“(a) offers the transmission, routing, and providing of connections for digital online communications, between or among points specified by a user, of material of the user's choosing; and
“(b) allocates IP addresses to its account holders; and
“(c) charges its account holders for its services; and
“(d) is not primarily operated to cater for transient users

from here.

Re:Pretty Quiet

[Kalriath]

Actually, the law had a little known rider that allowed copyright owners to start collecting infringements from August 11th. In theory, they could have collected up a few thousand and scheduled them to be sent at midnight.

Simple

[Sasayaki]

It'll be enforced almost never, except against people who earn a personal grudge from someone in authority. Turn down that creepy ex-politician for a date? Get a knock on the door from the state sponsored copyright cops. Film a cop beating up a homeless guy and post the video on YouTube? Your NAS gets seized by her majesty's finest.

It's like criminalizing swearing. Since everyone except extreme outliers is guilty of the crime at some point or another, it's not possible to enforce it properly so the law becomes just something else to throw at people who piss off people with power.

Re:Simple

[EvilAlphonso]

Or they could do it like they do in Germany... lawyers contact copyright owners and make a deal (percentage of the money recovered), then they connect to the various trackers to find content belonger to their customers. Once said content is found, they check if there are German IPs in the torrent. If they find German IPs, they go to the judge to get a court order to force the ISP to reveal the account information for that specific IP, with that specific router MAC address, in that specific timeframe. Finally, you receive a nice letter, with a copy of the court order and all the documentation that goes with it... you have one month to sign a form and pay a "small" fine (500 to 1000 euro), after which they are entitled to go after you for a far larger amount in a court of their choosing. Get caught a second time, the fine is multiplied by 10. Get caught a third time, you'll probably need to sell a few body parts to pay the fine.

Re:Simple

[Anonymous Coward]

It doesn't work like that at all.

The copyright owners must contact the ISP with proof of an offence (an IP address from a torrent would be enough), then the ISP passes on the warning.
If you get three notices, then you have to go to court and defend yourself by proving that you didn't download the material.

That is a terrible link in the summary, more detail about the law can be found here.

Re:Simple

[Dan541]

It's like criminalizing swearing.

Like they did in Australia?

Re:Simple

[cheekyjohnson]

If you get three notices, then you have to go to court and defend yourself by proving that you didn't download the material.

So it's guilty unless proven innocent, then? For all they know, you weren't even the one doing it.

Re:Simple

[delinear]

And I'm guessing they're used only when someone with a badge wants to make a point and not blanket enforced? A lot of these "anti-social behaviour" laws seem to be convenient throwaway excuses for picking on people the authorities don't like or who aren't doing anything particularly wrong but they want to move along (I should know, I come from the land that came up with the ASBO. If they were properly enforced across the board they'd be completely unworkable, it's just a legal way to hassle people.

Re:Simple

[russotto]

The copyright owners must contact the ISP with proof of an offence (an IP address from a torrent would be enough)

Right. Because torrent trackers have NEVER been known to include bogus IP addresses which weren't connected.

Re:Simple

[ArsenneLupin]

I've got some good news for you: Günter von Gravenreuth is dead!. So stop worrying.

Re:Simple

[quintin3265]

If we eliminated 9/10 of the laws in our society, there would be little increase in violence.

Excessive laws cause disrespect for the law, and make it difficult for people to become knowledgeable about the law. That leads people to either break laws that they can't keep track of (because there are so many), or simply disregard the law because everyone else is disregarding it.

Review studies on raising the speed limits on major highways. In June, I drove from Pennsylvania to Chicago. As soon as I crossed the border into Ohio, I was surprised to find the speed limits at 70 instead of 65. I assumed that people would be traveling at five over, since everyone in Pennsylvania drives at 70. Instead, people kept driving at 70 because they generally don't want to get themselves killed by driving at an unsafe speed. Coming back, in a 55 zone near Altoona, people keep driving at (surprise) 70.

When everyone is breaking the law, the law has no effect. The law is meant to keep a few outliers in line, not turn everyone into criminals.

Re:Simple

[DJ Particle]

"John Spartan, you are fined 1 credit for violation of the State Decency Statute..."

Re:Simple

[psydeshow]

defend yourself by proving that you didn't download the material.

I wonder how I would prove that I didn't download something?

I suppose if I was provably away from home when the download allegedly occurred.
Or perhaps the absence of log messages in the system log could prove that the system wasn't turned on.
I could submit my computer to forensic examination to prove that a particular copyrighted sequence of bits is not found on the hard drive.
I could claim that such-and-such copyrighted work disgusts me and I would never download it.

None of these approaches seem particularly effective. I predict much fun to be had by hacking unpatched wi-fi routers and installing bittorrent clients on them in NZ this year.

Re:Simple

[BitterOak]

It doesn't work like that at all.

The copyright owners must contact the ISP with proof of an offence (an IP address from a torrent would be enough), then the ISP passes on the warning. If you get three notices, then you have to go to court and defend yourself by proving that you didn't download the material.

Do the three notices have to come from independent sources? If not, this shift of burden from the accuser to the accused could be greatly abused. You're a copyright holder and don't like someone? Just claim their IP address showed up on a torrent list. Then do it two more times and unless he can prove he didn't copy the material (and proving a negative is just about impossible) then he loses his Internet and has to pay a fine.

Re:Simple

[Kalriath]

The New Zealand law does not give the rights owners authority to compel ISPs to hand over account details, so your idea doesn't work.

Re:Simple

[EvilAlphonso]

Neither does the German law, obviously only a judge can compel the ISP to hand over the account details. The agent of the copyright holder goes to the judge with all the evidence collected at that point (file, torrent hash, IP, MAC associated with that IP, time the infringement was noticed) then gets granted a court order for the ISP. You are contractually and legally responsible for any infringement committed through your connection point, so they pretty much don't even need to prove you personally downloaded the file. They just need to establish that you own the equipment used for the infringement.

Now, the "funny" bit is that while some German states do not consider filesharing illegal... the defendant doesn't pick the state where the case will be tried, so if it ever goes to tribunal you're most likely toast. Sending back the form and not paying is exposing you to an additional fine for breach of contract. Not sending back the form will get you done for aggravated infringement.

Re:Simple

[doccus]

Uh.. proving something *didn't* happen? How does that work, exactly? It's darn near *impossible* to prove 'innocence' of a charge.. as opposed to 'not guilty' which simply implies lack of evidence. What kind of 'evidence' though, could one ever supply to prove something *didn't* happen?

Re:Simple

[spazzmo]

Go on then, which two?

As a kiwi. .

[Master Moose]

I don't think that anyone actually wants us to use the internet.

We have always been penalised because of and by it. Expensive and slow by international standards. . . and now this finally passes (it has been on the books for some time)

I would write more, but I am likely to go over my data cap any minute.

Re:As a kiwi. .

[miasmic]

Yeah I'm already over my data cap, I've been waiting a week before I can start watching Youtube videos and download again, only a couple more days to go.

It really is appalling and a backwards attitude is seen from both Telecom providers and the government here. It results in usage of search engines, smart phone apps etc that's years behind countries like the US and UK, even taking into account population differences. I'm totally disappointed to hear that this passed. The country I feel in many areas takes too much notice of what is going on in the US in legislation and corporate policy and not enough of what is going on in Norway, Sweden and Findland, for example, which have more in common with NZ in many significant ways than the US does.

From a previous /. article about undersea cables, NZ is currently poorly serviced, but a more direct, much larger link is going in directly towards the US in a couple of years (as I remember from the map) which should hopefully improve things, with NZ having better connectivity than Australia in that direction rather than the other way round. But it's still little excuse for the current setup of things.

Re:As a kiwi. .

[piripiri]

Findland

I can't find this country on the map.

Re:As a kiwi. .

[miasmic]

They should have called it Lostland then!

Re:As a kiwi. .

[Master Moose]

Odd - especially given its name and all.

Re:As a kiwi. .

[perryizgr8]

we have data caps too (hello from india!), but the net doesn't stop working when you go over, it just gets awfully slow (256kbps).

Re:As a kiwi. .

[pacinpm]

Kids these days. I remember 33kbps was fast (compared to 19kbps).

Re:As a kiwi. .

[sensationull]

Totally agree, another New Zealander here, for a country that keeps BSing on and on about wanting to be a technological powerhouse the government does a damn good job trying to supress technology. They let companies like Telecom cap bandwidth to the point that it cripples net use and add so much additional tax on technology items that they can easily cost double what they cost in other countries.

They are so proud of their fibre to the home plan which will take decades to deliver outdated tech and they have helpfully given the contract back to Telecom. The same company that set NZ communications back 20 years in the first place. I'd like to know who got bribed for that one.

Seriously this country is a technological backwater as the government only cares about dairy farmers and Rugby. Anything else is seen as a threat by their microscopic minds.

Re:As a kiwi. .

[sensationull]

Sounds good in theory but you get put on the very bottom priority level for bandwidth and if you go over moderate usage they traffic shape you into the ground. Its ok in some areas but get any decently congested exchange and it turns into dialup really fast.

You also have the fun of actually trying to deal with slingshot if something goes wrong which will have you waiting on hold for two hours at any time to get to their lowest level of helpdesk.

You also ge the pleasure of paying $10 a month for a single static IP as opposed to getting something like 8 free with many UK plans.

Re:As a kiwi. .

[jamesh]

When people stopped downloading illegal content over your narrow pipe I bet there will be a lot more available bandwidth you to download the legitimate content you've been waiting for!

Re:As a kiwi. .

[PopeRatzo]

I don't think that anyone actually wants us to use the internet.

Of course they don't! They HATE the public Internet that we've been using for the past few decades.

They want you to move over to their nice new PRIVATE Akamai-run Internet where there's a meter on everything.

That regular people ever got access to the Internet was a surprise to most companies. Look at the way the telecoms are scrambling to take ownership of the Internet.

The only reason we ever had a public Internet is that it was developed by the government who let universities in, and then an Open standard (html) got popular. Hell, it wasn't even like broadcast television where the government leases bandwidth to private corporations. If you can get on the Internet, you can use the Internet and corporations just hate that.

If the corporations had been the ones starting the Internet, it would have been cable TV. Do you remember early AOL before you could use it to get to the Web?

Re:As a kiwi. .

[jonwil]

We need governments (both over there in New Zealand AND here in Australia) that are willing to say NO to the US and to giant greedy US media corporations.

Re:As a kiwi. .

[Grishnakh]

Totally agree, another New Zealander here, for a country that keeps BSing on and on about wanting to be a technological powerhouse the government does a damn good job trying to supress technology. They let companies like Telecom cap bandwidth to the point that it cripples net use and add so much additional tax on technology items that they can easily cost double what they cost in other countries.

It's both funny and sad when governments try to pitch their regions as tech hubs, when they clearly aren't. This kinda reminds me of where I used to go to college in southwest Virginia (USA); the state government tried to pitch that whole area as "Virginia's Technology Corridor", mainly because Virginia Tech university was there. They even had giant road signs announcing "You are entering Virginia's Technology Corridor!!!", right in front of some trailer parks or whatever. Apparently, the politicians who dreamed this up had been watching Kevin Costner's "Field of Dreams" too much, and really believed the line "if you build it, they will come" and thought that talking about something a lot would make it reality. The reality was that the area was economically depressed, not urbanized (the only real city was a very, very small city called Roanoke), the state is not terribly business-friendly, and all the university grads leave the area as soon as they graduate. They finally took the signs down and gave up on the idea, but that was after many years. While I don't think they did do anything to actively suppress technology like in NZ, they didn't really do anything to back up their words either, they just made some nice speeches, put up some signs, and made a lot of noise and thought that this would magically bring lots of tech companies into the area. A lot of politicians don't seem to understand that you have to back up words with actions, or else there won't be the positive change you're looking for (or promising to voters). Our President Obama is another good example of this: plenty of talk about "change", but there hasn't been any in his term, just a lot of blame-passing.

Re:As a kiwi. .

[Grishnakh]

Do you remember early AOL before you could use it to get to the Web?

Forget AOL; do you remember CompuServe (or Compu$erve as many called it) before AOL, with their crazy numeric usernames and ridiculous and expensive per-hour charges? I seem to remember charges like $4-8/hour, and this was back in the 1980s when salaries were a fraction of what they are now. Plus there were additional charges for other activities on there.

Re:As a kiwi. .

[nurb432]

I don't think that anyone actually wants us to use the internet.

Sure they do, as long as they can get a reoccurring fee out of you for trying it.

As culture dies in New Zealand

[kawabago]

This should snuff out the last vestiges of culture in New Zealand. The RIAA's own recent study found downloaders are their best customers. If this law is effective in stopping downloaders, the New Zealand music industry should collapse completely. That will be funny!

Re:As culture dies in New Zealand

[moozey]

I'm as confused as you.

Re:As culture dies in New Zealand

[Anonymous Coward]

There those two guys...

Re:As culture dies in New Zealand

[miasmic]

NZ is the only English speaking country I've been to where the music scene isn't dominated by US or UK bands/artists. Local bands regularly make up a fair portion of the charts.

NZ's trademark sound is a Maori influenced 'pacific' flavour of reggae/dub (check out Fat Freddy's Drop), but drum & bass (and d&b influenced stuff like dubstep) is also much more popular in the mainstream than elsewhere. There's also quite a few decent homegrown alternative/rock groups, some of which have achieved international success. I have listed some of the most popular NZ originated bands/artists in the last 10 years.

Roots/Dub/Reggae

Fat Freddy's Drop
Katchafire
Salmonella Dub
The Black Seeds
Trinity Roots
International Observer

Rock/Punk/Metal etc

Stereogram
The Mint Chicks
Evermore
Minuit
The Datsuns
Head Like a Hole
Fur Patrol
8 Foot Sativa
Dawn of Azazel

Drum & Bass

Concord Dawn
The Upbeats
Shapeshifter

Re:As culture dies in New Zealand

[Rennt]

Yeh, because everyone knows that illegally downloading things is also known is "culture".

Ahem. kawabago is talking about the downloading or purchasing of culture. Not the culture of downloading or purchasing.

Re:As culture dies in New Zealand

[Mashiki]

The only culture you're allowed, is the one that you're told to like. Much like Canada, with Cancon. And if you're not paying for it, you can expect to have your net cut off.

Re:As culture dies in New Zealand

[boundary]

There is no culture in New Zealand. It's a place full of homages to the UK. And then there's the All Blacks.

Re:As culture dies in New Zealand

[tdelaney]

And if you're not paying for it, you can expect to have your net cut off.

I misread this as "can expect to have your nut cut off" and my immediate thought was "will they allow you to choose which one?"

Re:As culture dies in New Zealand

[sensationull]

Its not all like that, there are plenty of styles of NZ music avalible:

Pacifier/Shihad
Elemeno P
Autozamm
Slim
Goodnight Nurse
Bulletproof
Dragon
Eight
Fur Patrol
Midnight Youth
Etc. etc. etc.
http://nzmusic.org.nz/artists/search/

Re:As culture dies in New Zealand

[NoMaster]

Not the second time...

Re:As culture dies in New Zealand

[spazzmo]

Now this does need translating for foreigners: Waikikamukau looks like a maori place name, but is a joke: Why kick a moo-cow

So

[Billly Gates]

So if someone mysteriously downloaded copyrighted material at Microsoft's New Zealand's office they would get shut down?

What about SCOs?

Re:So

[Kylon99]

I'd like to say yes, but as we all know, the people with lots of money and connection... it's legal. The people without money or connections... it's illegal. That's probably how it'll play out.

Sigh.

Re:So

[mcl630]

The last line of TFA says businesses and schools are also liable, but somehow I doubt big corporations would ever be charged with this.

Re:So

[supertrinko]

There's already a guy that has access to the government internet connection and is continually downloading. In the hopes that Government will see how ridiculous it is when they get their internet cut off.

When?

[JustOK]

Do they mean midnight at the start of 1 Sep or the one at the other end?

Re:When?

[Cimexus]

Midnight is 00:00, (or 12am, if you prefer it that way), thus is the beginning of the day, not the end. Midnight, 1 September, means the time one second after 23:59:59, 31 August.

Re:When?

[poofmeisterp]

... means the time one second after 23:59:59, 31 August.

Oh, no. Uh... So hey my friend, good buddy, old pal..... Can ya give me some friendly advice? How do I remove a cached IP address from torrents and peoples' machines... Let's say, oh... I dunno... My IP? How could I do that, my bestest friend in the world? :>

HUMOR, HUMOR.

Chronicles of Ridiculous

[digitaltraveller]

1. All Content is Copyright by default.
2. How do you distinguish the legal from the illegal content?

Re:Chronicles of Ridiculous

[russ1337]

1. All Content is Copyright by default.
2. How do you distinguish the legal from the illegal content?

Exactly. In other countries they refer to the 'sharing' as the illegal part. Here in NZ it appears to be the 'downloading'. Does that mean if I watch 'RayWilliamJohnson' on youtube he can have my internet cut off?

How am I to know whether the person who posted the video has the rights to post it, or not?

If they're talking about 'sharing' then it's certainly not very clear in their education campaign.

Re:Chronicles of Ridiculous

[blahplusplus]

Copyright is the new enclosure of the commons. The digital commons is being enclosed by corporate/government powers because it is a threat to the status quo.

Re:Chronicles of Ridiculous

[Stormthirst]

How am I to know whether the person who posted the video has the rights to post it, or not?

IANAL but I wonder if you could mount a legal defence based on YouTube's user policies and their policing of the content they see to be doing these days

Re:Chronicles of Ridiculous

[QuasiSteve]

2. How do you distinguish the legal from the illegal content?

You're right - we can't 100% distinguish that. Especially not when somebody may have a personal video up on YouTube and in the background happens to be a piece of footage from a film on a TV, and the copyright owner of that piece decides to present a copyright claim.

And because we can't make that distinction, we might as well download:

• Don__t_Be_Afraid_of_the_Dark_(2011)_DVDrip_XviD-VRBH
• TrollHunter.2010.LiMiTED.720p.BluRay.x264-NODLABS
• Rise_Of_The_Planet_Of_The_Apes__2011__%5BDVD.XviD-miguel%5D_%5BENG%5D
• X-Men_First_Class_%5B2011%5D-720p-DVDrip-xviD-StyLishSaLH
• Cowboys__amp__Aliens_2011_DVDRip_XVID_-_NOVA

After all, perhaps the movie studios relinquished their copyrights to the public domain. We just can't make that distinction!

Re:Chronicles of Ridiculous

[poofmeisterp]

1. All Content is Copyright by default.
2. How do you distinguish the legal from the illegal content?

1. It's given me a headache since I was a kid.
2. Wait for a suit. How else can you be 100% (and I mean 100%) sure? :)

HUMOR.

At least they got patents right

[walshy007]

At least there are no software patents there. So free software and creative commons thrive without the impetus that is the idea of people owning applied math on a computational device.

Re:At least they got patents right

[nzac]

That has yet to pass the final reading and they gave no good reason for the delay (I would think they are being lobbied by "people" from US). I would think it will eventually pass though.

The NZOSS did tell MS where to stick their OOXML patent though.

Hey New Zealand...

[IDarkISwordI]

Just wanted to say, your welcome. -America

Re:Hey New Zealand...

[linatux]

Thanks for writing the legislation for us, our politicians are too dumb to write their own!

Re:Hey New Zealand...

[RPoet]

Oh America, when will you ever learn the difference between "your" and "you're"?

Bandwidth

[Anonymous Coward]

We get an average of 30 gigabytes download on most plans. How is our piracy doing anything? I live in a flat with 5 people on 30 gigabytes, we don't even pirate and burn through 35 gigabytes easily.

IIRC this law was pushed through with emergency laws to deal with an earthquake in one of our main cities (Christchurch). Even if I did agree with it, I'm against it in principle because of this. Politicians suck all over the world.

Guess we lead the world for wrong reasons...

[Anonymous Coward]

I AM a kiwi, and to try and play it safer have uninstalled utorrent from all the PC's. Feels here like it's back to the '90s again, broken downloads, and I have no doubt we'll see erroneous notices regardless. However, I've noticed since then just how much use is derived from torrents (e.g. speeddemo archives, general large files) without even really having noticed it. Also hadn't realised how bad general HTTP downloads had got, and how many sites don't allow resume.

It's a funny law change - Youtube content, SSL VPN's, RapidShare are all exempt or not monitored (existing copyright legislation still applies). Also worth noting that we can't keep up with the content you folk watch over in the UK/States etc, because distributors haven't figured out how to charge us for it. Don't believe me - look for latest content that's on iTunes USA but not iTunes NZ... Maybe the industry will figure out that they're able to distribute on a global scale and allow audiences to share experiences/drive story plots (sci-fi seems to take quite a bit from Internet discussion and generate show content/plot) if all the audiences get to see it at the same time - not a year or two down the track...

So a reminder to all you other folk who have **AA type folk pushing for similar measures in your own territory. This is a great example of what happens when people who don't understand the technology (or general premise that the Internet exists to allow content to be copied over a variety of protocols) come up with legislation changes (even though copyright legislation still covers everything else as it always had)

Re:Guess we lead the world for wrong reasons...

[cheekyboy]

download from IRC bots, the riaa would never look there.

Re:Guess we lead the world for wrong reasons...

[rich_hudds]

Why don't you just sign up with a VPN provider for a few $ each month then?

Set up Comodo as a firewall to block utorrent unless the VPN is connected and you are good to go.

Re:Guess we lead the world for wrong reasons...

[Cimexus]

Torrents kinda suck anyway - just use Usenet/NNTP. No uploading required, fast, and unlikely to be monitored...

Re:Guess we lead the world for wrong reasons...

[spazzmo]

The Green Party

Illegal law in most countries

[terminal.dk]

In most countries, a law like this would never be approved.
I think there is a higher law that says you can not be convicted for crime you have not done.
So if you are not downloading warez, they can not be penalized for that.

This is a law waiting for high court to throw it out.

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[Wolfling1]

Yes and no. NZ is famous for eliminating political correctness. If you ever visit their hot mud springs, you will see signs that say things like 'If you cross this line, you will die in a pit of boiling mud'.

Having said that, there is impetus for laws that are based on the concept that 'you can be held accountable for the actions of others'. For example, speed cameras. If your car is recorded speeding through a camera, you are legally accountable. It is your responsibility to demonstrate that you were not behind the wheel at the time.

For many, this is a breach of some of the fundamental principles of law (innocent until proven guilty, etc) - but it allows for the crimes to be prosecuted easily - AND it has the added bonus of people becoming very responsible about who gets to drive their car.

Translate to broadband = "Be very careful about how you secure your broadband. You are accountable for it."

Now, whilst there are a large number of people out there who don't know how to secure their broadband, its actually not that hard, and they'll learn. I don't see their ignorance as a justifiable reason to throw out this kind of law.

The real problem I think is going to be mobile broadband - or free broadband hotspots. Companies that offer those services will be in big trouble when they find out what people are using their broadband for...

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[Anonymous Coward]

Except that it's practically impossible for someone to be driving your car without you knowing about it.

Unless they were driving it illegally, in which case you'd have a total defense.

Does an equivalent defense exist for internet usage? If so, then there's a simple solution:

Every day or so, submit a filing to the NZ Police, to the affect of:
"I have reason to believe, having just reviewed my logs, that at some point on [day], a person or persons without authorization to access my WiFi probably downloaded copyrighted material. Should you wish to investigate further, these logs will be kept available for an officer to collect in person, until my next review in about 24 hours' time."

Insist upon a report number every time (hint: they won't give you one. They'll give you an "information number" instead, which means "any person quoting this number is wasting our time").

Then, you'll always have a complete defense!

CAPTCHA: idealism

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[Anonymous Coward]

In most countries, a law like this would never be approved.
I think there is a higher law that says you can not be convicted for crime you have not done.
So if you are not downloading warez, they can not be penalized for that.

This is a law waiting for high court to throw it out.

You're an optimist. Copyright laws are above the constitution or whatever highest laws you previously had. There's so much corruption surrounding IP laws that they can get aways with almost anything.

For example in Germany, the account holder is simply declared an accomplice ("Mitstörer") to everything that happens on his account/connection. Of course that only applies to regular citizens. Corporations get the usual DMCA-ish "you just have to remove/stop infringing content in a somewhat speedy mannner".

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[Chatterton]

"Be very careful about how you secure your broadband. You are accountable for it."

I have an apparatus from my broadband provider letting me open a wifi network. The thing is SO broken that when I activate WEP or WPA i can't connect to it anymore. I have to have some kind of 'false' security by opening my wifi by mac addresses. I have NO way of securing my wifi network as it should be. I am not ignorant, I just can't secure my wifi network.

No, tell me what i should do if this kind of stupid law come into the country i live in?

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[Urkki]

Four basic choices:
1. take your chances
2. stop using WiFi
3. move
4. start revolution

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[Dekker3D]

Buy a properly-working equivalent device?

I understand and agree with your point, I just think your example needs some work.

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[Anonymous Coward]

No.

The big problem are trojans and viruses running that download stuff in the background and send it further along, using your IP address.

Otherwise known as Bots.

This NZ law is going to get a whole cartload of peeps waxed who are infected (and corporations, etc). Either that, or the "I had a bot installed on mah 'puter!" is going to be the common defence...

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[mcl630]

5. Contact the provider that gave you to device and ask for one that actually works properly, explaining you don't want to run afoul of the law. 6. Disable the WiFi on the provider's device, and buy your own Wireless Access Point (or router).

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[mcl630]

Damn formatting removing line breaks!

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[1u3hr]

No, tell me what i should do if this kind of stupid law come into the country i live in?

Spend hours nagging your ISP to replace /fix theirs. Or buy a used wifi router for $10 and use that instead. Save a lot of time and hassle. I just did that (actually mine cost $6).

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[YttriumOxide]

While nice in theory, it has a downside... I'm originally from NZ but haven't lived there in a long time. When I did though, I was once talking to a guy on IRC who was pretty seriously talking about doing some rather nasty things involving explosives and a jet liner... While I couldn't be certain if he was serious or not, I decided to do the right thing and let the police know about it.

What happened for doing my civic duty? Well, the police turn up at my house with a search warrant citing "attempted murder and breach of the telecommunications act" (interesting combo, but yes, that's what it said) and took all my computers away to "investigate". Several months later, I finally got them back, with the HDD wiped on a couple and the power switch physically broken on one.

I made a complaint to the police complaints authority, but was essentially ignored the whole time.

Only minor plus was I got in the Southland Times (newspaper) and it raised a fair bit of attention with the general public (enough that people recognised me on the street for a few months)

Back on the topic at hand: If you did do something like you suggest, I'd expect similar treatment would ensue...

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[Anonymous Coward]

I could think of better schemes than "piss off the police who would otherwise leave me alone because they don't even know about me and have better things to do and consider this law stupid themselves"...

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[delinear]

Yes, the best you could hope for is that they'd give you a caution for wasting police time. Worst case they'd use this to demonstrate that you had ongoing reason to believe someone was using your connection and they'd bring a related criminal charge for your negligence in not acting on that and securing your network. Either way anecdotal evidence suggests be helpful if the police come to you but otherwise just don't get involved, it's rarely rewarded with thanks.

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[Hatta]

Having said that, there is impetus for laws that are based on the concept that 'you can be held accountable for the actions of others'. For example, speed cameras. If your car is recorded speeding through a camera, you are legally accountable. It is your responsibility to demonstrate that you were not behind the wheel at the time.

No it's not. The burden of proof is always on the accuser. If the government fails to meet that burden and still convicts, it is tyrannical.

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[TheGratefulNet]

modern *intelligent* man does not call the police.

they are not your friends, they are DANGEROUS and they can 'backfire' on you, as you found out.

I will deal with the crime before I call the cops. calling the cops is the last thing you want to do, these days. just not smart anymore.

sad but a truism of today's world. does not matter which country, either; they ALL will turn against their citizens if the wind blows that way, that day.

once a cop comes out to make a visit, they HATE returning with 'nothing'. this is yet another reason to never call the cops. they just want to haul SOMEONE away. and that was you, as you found out.

let this be a lesson to us all.

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[Cimexus]

Ummm ... buy a router/gateway/access point that ISN'T completely broken, and actually allows you to secure your WiFi?

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[Wolfling1]

In principle, I agree with you, but the cold hard reality is that your argument will not stand up in a court.

Try it some time. I'm sure the judge will have a lot of patience for your moral outrage.

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[spazzmo]

People I know did :-(

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[spazzmo]

Sorry: Die in a pit of boiling mud.

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[Wolfling1]

Sad to hear that it didn't work for them. It scared the crap out of me.

That and the sign showing a stickman figure falling off a cliff at their snowfields. The subcaption said something like 'You will die on the other side of this fence'.

Having come from an incredibly politically correct country, it was refreshing and disturbing all at the same time.

Re:Illegal law in most countries

[Hatta]

I'm not naive enough to believe a judge would follow basic princples of justice. It's still important to point out the fact that they don't as often as possible. It's the only way we'll ever get anything changed.

interesting....

[akihironihongo]

that is pretty scary. i doubt they can really enforce it on everyone every time. its sounds kind of like stealing candy from a gas station. if you dont get caught your lucky. but theres still a chance you will.

If this were the US

[subreality]

how much actual enforcement is likely to happen

If this were the US, I'd expect it to be like the War on Drugs: Plenty of enforcement, very little justice.

Re:If this were the US

[Air-conditioned cowh]

Any law that comes with an assurance that it "usually" won't be fully enforced does not belong in a civilised society. Again this is the same as with drug laws where, in the UK, you might be let off with a caution for possession but the law says you can be thrown in jail for up to seven years (for class-A substances such as MDMA).

Government VS People

[roman_mir]

As always the same question is brought up and it cannot be answered without answering the most important question: are people more important or is it the government?

Stupid Law

[Adayse]

It's a stupid law - probably got NZ a gold star with the US state department and expected to save some international bandwidth making state owned Telecom more profitable. The result will be risk aversive homes, libraries and schools without internet.

Re:Stupid Law

[neoprint]

Telecom isn't state owned :)

Re:Stupid Law

[Adayse]

You are right Telecom isn't state owned. Why did I think it was? That only leaves US influence.

Re:Stupid Law

[nzac]

No sane copy write holder is going to issue notices against a school, if it was to get close to cutting off the schools internet there would be public outcry that would probably overturn or at least reopen the legislation which will have pissed off every internet user in the country (no free wifi anywhere and having to prevent other who know more than them from downloading).

We pay for a decent cap so its not improving anyone’s profits if we start paying 20 to 60 percent less.

Re:Stupid Law

[Stormthirst]

That hasn't stopped idiotic lawyers attempting to sue Grannies who don't own computers or single unemployed mothers. These systems are usually automated with little or no human interaction.

Re:Stupid Law

[nzac]

I would expect getting damages for downloading in NZ is like getting blood out of a stone. Expecting to make a profit is just insane.

It will cost 75 NZD (3*$25) (at least) to get users details from ISPs a long with wages to send these order for likely payout of less than $500 assuming it all works out.

We also have dynamic IPs (adsl) so if you reset your connection they may have to pay 50 dollars or more to get one of the 3 notices.

To automate this process is likely to loose them money. For about 3 months of downloading the max fine you can be threatened with (probably if you make a profit from it) is $15000 and I am not sure the cw holders would get all of that. Without being able to threaten massive damages the US system falls apart.

The people profit

[samjam]

If someone induces government ministers or departments to download your own personally created copyrighted content, you then each and collectively sue the government and it's departments to oblivion.

Re:The people profit

[tepples]

They'll argue that it wasn't "your own personally created" work but instead a derivative work of a mainstream work. That was the argument in, for example, Bright Tunes Music v. Harrisongs Music.

Re:The people profit

[shermo]

Done 3 weeks ago!
http://www.reddit.com/r/newzealand/comments/jej4o/im_officially_downloading_copyrighted_material_on/

Some links to the actual bill

[matrixskp]

http://www.copyright.com.au/Latest_News/New_Zealand_passes_Copyright_Amendment_Bill.aspx http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/2011/0011/latest/viewpdf.aspx New Zealanders protested quite loudly against this bill - with the internet blackout campaign - http://creativefreedom.org.nz/blackout.html - , unfortunately it was still passed. More proof that politicians are mostly a bunch of money grubbing ass bandits that will do what ever big business wants them to for a little time at the swill trough!

My connection has improve dramatically

[bunbuntheminilop]

I haven't been able to hit 5Mbps for 3-4 years (it's not much, but I'm in rural New Zealand), and I've never been able to stream video in high quality, but tonight I'm totally able to. My ping is only 25ms, and I never thought it would be possible to have a ping so low. Now I can play games online!

I was against it, but, maybe it's not such a bad thing? What do you guys think?

Re:My connection has improve dramatically

[jamesh]

Nice to get what you pay for instead of subsidising someone else :)

Probably Selectively

[Greyfox]

As all such bad laws are. If they prosecuted everyone for it, they'd face a voter revolt at the next elections. They just need to make a few high profile examples to put the fear of God into everyone else.

If you want to fuck with the system, all you guys down there could start generating your own damn content under the commons. At least until the *AAs come back and get the commons outlawed. One of the nice side effects of all that DRM is it makes it significantly harder for your average user to generate their own content. Don't think that fact isn't lost on the *AAs.

Re:Probably Selectively

[poofmeisterp]

As all such bad laws are. If they prosecuted everyone for it, they'd face a voter revolt at the next elections. They just need to make a few high profile examples to put the fear of God into everyone else.

Psh.. Oh, come on. Where have they done that before? :>

HUMOR, HUMOR.

Re:I Don't Suppose...

[Spacejock]

A friend of a friend suggested keeping an unsecured wireless access point powered up, but not connected to your network.

Re:I Don't Suppose...

[Mister Transistor]

What on earth would be the point to that other than adding a few $$ to your electric bill and more pollution to the EM spectrum?

NZFACT

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not surprised at this, especially considering that this law was likely pushed by the same people who've managed to give children all over New Zealand a rational, down to earth perspective on piracy and information security.
 
I thought that people were more rational "over the ditch" (esp. given their sane stance on software patents), but it seems that politicians (and/or lobbyists) have triumphed over common sense and proved me wrong. Bravo!

Re:Here's a thought

[EnergyScholar]

Hey, have other slashdotters noticed the increasing number of astroturf posters in the past year or two? I presume everyone reading this knows that one can hire consulting firms that maintain stables of fake online identities to 'contribute' to the 'discussion' on all sorts of threaded discussions. I think five years ago they were few enough to barely notice. In the past year I've spotted several probable astroturf trolls attempting to sway discussions. The **IA agents are especially obvious.

Combined with...

[Tei]

Some people in Los Angeles have buy some games for 20$. This is because Amazon give discounts. Is all ok, but on the other side of the pacific, people play for the same game maybe 80$. Media in that part of the world are more expensive for not real reason. And I am talking about a digital download. I suppose the media cartel there can use higher prices, since physical good can be really more expensive, if are produced elsewhere and imported. But theres not good reason to apply that to bits. You can have a server in NZ and it will cost you more, but not all that much. The media cartel is overcharging NZ and aus guys by some orders of magnitude.

Another country that get cheap games is UK. You pay less, because traditionally the englishmen gamers are very picky about price and quality, and wait until a price is "fair". So USA pay less for games, UK pay less for games, and australia/nz that are also a english speaking country... pay way more.

Is even more rich, because Australia and USA have some trade agreements. So if you try to do this to a USA citizen, he could use the weight of his govern to screw you.

Combine that with a Internet that mostly suck. Digital citizens on that part of the world have a real problem. Digital enteirnament is way too expensive, Internet is slow and expensive. And now the MAFIAA make so abusive laws are approved. Well.. It has to suck to live in that part of the world :(

Affects Sharing of Internet Connections... :-/

[Anonymous Coward]

Wonderful... so, NZ's filmmakers will have a slightly better chance of selling into US & other markets, because NZ's gov't helps the larger countries' movie makers bring in every nickel from their films.

But this kind of law makes people feel "unnatural terror" about sharing their ISP connection, cause "you never if that elderly/pensioner/neighbor (who can't afford their own I'net connection, due to their food costs & energy expenses rising faster than their fixed/pension incomes) will download a book, movie or course" that'll get you fined & the (shared) Internet service cut.

Remember when the UK ISP - BT? - actually ENCOURAGED folks on their unlimited plans to share with neighbors? A great idea that might have created many local communities, neighborhood Internet circles or people helping each other, in natural & friendly ways.

Well, all that's "off" in NZ, now... UNLESS people are brave, & find bulletproof mechanism to protect their services from successful prosecutions (eg, buy & use old WiFi routers that ONLY provided WAP-level security... the kind that ANYONE can breech, eg, by brute-force password checking... ie, so they'd have a way to say: "I didn't d'load that, someone must have found my password & used my I'net service without my knowledge or consent. I only learned that this was possible after being button-holed for IP theft," etc.)

How about "saving" content?

[v(*_*)vvvv]

File sharing? Most of us don't even go there anymore. Everything can be taken straight off youtube in broad daylight:
http://en.crav-ing.com/

Another awkward moment for justice, for being able to do the same thing but legally... and for it being powered by google.

Moronic laws

[Wowsers]

I have a website, but I didn't explicitly authorize NZ residents to view it. Does that make it illegal for NZ residents to download my copywritten material just by visiting the website? Politicians and lobbyists really do live on another planet.

Re:Moronic laws

[HopefulIntern]

Copywritten? Past-tense of Copywrite...?

Re:Moronic laws

[spazzmo]

Wouldn't that be Copywrote?

Re:Moronic laws

[HopefulIntern]

Yes, I think so. Copywritten is past-particible isnt it?

there's only one thing stopping them now

[Anonymous Coward]

That's the $25 a pop for the copyright owner to send a notice. The industry wanted $2 per infringement so hopefully their planned litigation business model is no longer profitable.

Remember that policy drives behavior

[paper tape]

If I lived in a country that had such a law, the first thing I would do is ensure my children never had internet access - since as their parent, I am financially liable for their behavior.

I would also turn off the wireless on any internet-connected devices and go hard-wired only.

There are certainly other measures one could take to protect oneself from inadvertently becoming a victim of this sort of law - but those are a couple of basic ones.

I wonder if the people who voted for the law will like the consequences of people trying to protect themselves from it.

Sucking IP through a straw

[boundary]

It's not like we have enough of a broadband infrastructure in New Zealand to actually download anything worthwhile in the first place.

You connection, your problem.

[asdf7890]

I'm all for people being held respnosible for what their computers and connections do - then maybe people will finally start taking some responsability and be careful with online security instead of just bringing their machine to me when they get an infection that stops something working (and tell me when I point out that some of the malware has been on the machine for many months that "I know, but I never put my credit card details in or anything so it couldn't hurt me" - considering the fact they might infect other peoples's machines to be somebody else's problem), expecting me to fix it for them as a matter of urgency.

Re:You connection, your problem.

[cheekyjohnson]

What a great policy to implement considering the amount of people that are technologically inept. You downloaded some executable file off of the internet that made your computer participate in illegal activities? Your fault! Someone used your wifi to download something illegal? Your fault! You should be an expert in all subjects!

Or we could blame the people who actually commit the crime and stop acting as if stopping the potential loss of potential profit is of the utmost importance.

Re:You connection, your problem.

[asdf7890]

If they have been sufficiently warned about a potential problem (unsecured WiFi, malware left to roam free on a machine, and so forth), and I can tell you that the people I'm talking about have been sufficiently warned, then not quite but they are at least aiding and abbetting through deliberate neglegence.

Re:You connection, your problem.

[cheekyjohnson]

They might not understand what you said. Sorry, but if you want to 'ensure' that no one is ever the victim, you'll have to secure everything for them. Otherwise, too bad for you.

As for me, I think I'll advocate going after the real criminals.

Re:You connection, your problem.

[asdf7890]

Thats all fine. But not easy if the real criminals can easily gain anonymity and untracability due to the inaction of fools.

Re:You connection, your problem.

[cheekyjohnson]

Then I guess no one will be punished. Some criminals simply get away. That doesn't mean you need to punish someone in place of them.

stupid attorny generals

[cheekyboy]

Why do people in real high power approve such shit laws?

Sure if we all received a nice 350k salary we would never ever pirate anything.

And stop using the term pirate, we arent raping people on boats.

Its civil copywrite violations.

Oh and btw every cop in NZ uses bit torrent to download movies for their kids, they sure dont get paid enough to buy games/movies.

I wanna see politians on 55k salary.

goodluckwiththat

[mwvdlee]

The 'account holder needs to know what's going on even if they themselves don't do anything online...'

So if a lowly government employee downloads a copyrighted MP3 on the government network, the government falls?

Re:goodluckwiththat

[JockTroll]

Of course not. The lowly government employee is punished, but nothing else with happen. If a high-ranking government official is involved, an "amicable arrangement" will be negotiated. Don't ever believe the law is equal for all, it is not.

Re:goodluckwiththat

[poofmeisterp]

...If a high-ranking government official is involved, an "amicable arrangement" will be negotiated...

...and you will never hear about it :)

Some good links

[Mistakill]

here is some good reading by a leading NZ IP lawyer, on the new law...

http://lawgeeknz.posterous.com/copyright-cheapskates
 
  and http://lawgeeknz.posterous.com/nzs-copyright-proposal-guilty-until-you-prove

Its only for torrents!!

[nzac]

The law only applies for using p2p at the the application layer. I would think about 3 out of our 120 politicians have a basic understanding of torrents/internet.

There are so may obvious ways around this but they either cost or are less convenient. http://bayfiles.com/ is just in time.

It also makes it so you are very unlikely (a little less than before) to be prosecuted under our general copy-write law. I would say the stupidity of discrimination against protocols makes will make piracy easier.

Re:Here's a thought

[Whuffo]

I've noticed it too. Maybe it's time to ban Anonymous Coward - or at least start his posts at -1?

Re:Well, it is obvious now, isn't it?

[badran]

My old Dlink 2640 from 2007 had WPA2.

The end result of this law

[neurosine]

What this does is gives big media authority over the police, to use public resources for their private purposes. It also allows them to say "We've got you....Pay up, or else." This is a huge misappropriation of funds, as you can imagine, in most cases.

Re:The end result of this law

[JockTroll]

This is EXACTLY the intended result. Big Media is going to be, de facto, our new unelected world government - without the trappings of what being a government is supposed to be (care for the citizen... er, minions). It's all about the power, absolute and unyielding, and the turning of the internet into a massive, unescapable surveillance tool. This should be now crystal-clear for everyone: they will not stop, they will prevail - UNLESS measures are taken. Everyone working for Big Media should be considered a legitimate military target for reprisal. As the saying went in Italy, "to kill a fascist is no crime". Now it's "to kill a MAFIAA member/worker is no crime".

Re:The end result of this law

[ErikZ]

Bah. It's *media*. Who cares?

I got a notice from my ISP about my downloading "Battlestar Galactica" torrents. You know what I did? I stopped watching them.

Period.

It's just entertainment. I can easily live without if it comes to it.

Agreed

[AlecC]

Strong agreement to this. They don't enforce these laws rigorously because they know that society wouldn't accept it. But that actually means they are bad laws: laws should encode the rules that society has agreed to. The reason these laws exist is to give power to the authorities. Their threat, and their occasional use, is immensely empowering to the police. You don't have to hit people with your big stick to make them obey: the threat is nearly always enough.

_ terrorized into customer

[ego centrik]

Intention here is, to terrorize netpeople into customer. As simple as that. This farce of a law is un_applicable. If applied consequently, the ISP's will lost vast amounts of customers and the courts are overcrowd with lawsuits, with attorneys/lawyers as the big player. Never mind. The net community and maybe open minded ISP's will watch very, very closely at the downloads of the maker + supporter of this law and their lawyers. Let us see what lawmakers and their enforcement apparatus download on the net in their spare time. And: Once the law is coming into force and the sales of copyrighted material declines furthermore, the supporter of this law have to answer serious questions, publicly.

Tell that to Murdoch.

[Anonymous Coward]

He puts his website on the internet, writes a file to send spiders to the page correctly and then complains when Google has his stuff.

Tell that to the US DoD. Their machines are unprotected, Alien-Invasion nut goes looking on it, now it's HIS fault they didn't secure their machines.

You see, this will only be the case for those without power or connections.

Privileged. It means "Private Law".

Re:Here's a thought

[KDR_11k]

You can set AC scores or even hide AC posts entirely in your preferences.

Re:Here's a thought

[Stormthirst]

Except:
the quality of the movies produced has gone down
the price of popcorn has shot through the roof
you have to sit through 10 times the adverts (and it's never for anything local any more its always big companies trying to sell you more sh** you don't need)
and the seats are still as uncomfortable as ever

I don't know which part of the world you're in, but the price of the ticket is as expensive as buying the DVD when it first comes out. And there I get to watch it as many times as I please, with as many people as I like, in my rather comfortable living room. Which part of the cinema model has improved?

No, not a troll actually

[fireylord]

An interesting viewpoint, not that I agree with the sentiment.

    My big issue with copyright and I.P. in general is big business has managed to get politicians to start turning copyright from a means to reward publishing works for the good of the community _with_important_timelimits_and_caveats_ into a means for big business to own IP in perpetuity and to the detriment to society and the people in it, purely so that they can continue to maximise profits from it.

    When you couple this with the desire of business nowadays to monetise every possible feature and benefit they think they can get away with we end up in a situation where consumers are basically being ripped off, and true innovation doesn't happen. With regards the topic in my opinion the New Zealand legislative branch needs replacing as it is obviously rotten to the core and does not represent the people that put it there. (other than the ones that paid for the politicians^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H electoral campaigns)

HAH!

[fireylord]

I think that you should have complained to your isp years ago about their pathetic network management and backhaul arrangements!

This law is crap

[countach]

I rent a couple of rooms in my house to students and I include free internet. I have no clue what they might be downloading on it.

If I were a Kiwi, I'd be connecting to my ISP through a cheap shelf company. That way if I get sued, they can sue the empty shelf company and get nowhere. Don't know if that is a loophole or not....

This is a great opportunity...

[FellowConspirator]

Media companies violate copyright all the time, using various image purloined from the Internet, distributing GPL'd software without the source code, etc.

Simply find a major media company that has made an infraction, report it, and make a stink when their Internet access isn't cut-off. Lather, rinse, repeat. At some point, the hypocrisy will start to become obvious even to a casual observer. Also, for those that get caught they can say: "Your honor, Sony violated this law 50 times last year and their website is still accessible; doesn't it seem improper that you'd take away mine after one infraction?"

I guess there's a wrinkle in that the law only seems to cover P2P (more or less), though any major player using Akamai or similar is effectively using P2P (as far the law is concerned) for distributing copyrighted content.

This will end well

[udoschuermann]

Next up: Bot nets start downloading illegal content. Hilarity ensues.

Re:This will end well

[Shagg]

I'm surprised that isn't being done already.

Re:Here's a thought

[NeutronCowboy]

Welcome to corporations gaming the social world. They understand that advertisements only barely work, and are looking to game the system we trust. Expect it to get worse, as social network datamining and posting tools improve from their current stone-age level.

NZ Digital Copyright law change

[Demonsunder]

New Zealand today has changed its Digital copyright law to try and combat online content piracy, the kicker to this law change is that your guilty until proven inoccent. One of the ways companys have been catching people to send the infringment notices to is to seed the file and capture the IP adresses of those downloading it, as long as the IPS is given the exact IP address date and time of the infingment the IPS has to pass on the infringment notice once 2 notices have been issued to the same account holder the next incurres the wrath of the Copyright Tribunal which can fine upto $15,000 per offence and yes you read right, the account holder is responsible for any/all downloading and can be fined it dosn't matter if somone leeched your net or your a large company and an employee downloaded a song. The reason why I think torrents are so popular here in NZ. For those of you that dont know what its like to only have 10 Tv channels, (5 standard, 1 Music 1 Horse and Dog and 3 Misc ) Imagine you just started watching Justified a new (well for NZ) top rated US Tv show which in the US is in its 3rd Season currently 39 Episodes released, NZ TV 1 showed 2 Episodes and then moved it from a 9:30 pm slot to 11pm on the otherhand we can watch Masterchef 3 times a day on the same channel and the TV company's wonder why torrent files are so popular? This is also only the tip of the iceberg. There are many, many shows that will never see the light of day here It's also not just limited to TV shows, movies 6 months after release overseas, PC games that just dont make it to our shores for example the new mmorpg being produced by Bioware/Lucasarts and EA will not be available in NZ on release day because, well I don't know why I recently preordered this from EB games and they couldn't give me a release date yet if I torrent the client when its available (which is now illiegal) and buy a copy from the states (get them to email me the headstart key) I will be able to play on release. thier are many ways around this law for the tech savvy Geek, use a proxy with an overseas IP or once you get 2 notices change service providers or use an IP masking tool like Bit guard. This law will only catch those people whom once in a blue moon download a song.

IT Crowd anyone?

[MikeUW]

This is perfect material for the final season of The IT Crowd - I hope they didn't finish writing it already.

Communism

[Artemis3]

Actually, true communism has no separate government; everyone is part of it. A modern communist society would have a direct democracy system where everyone is consulted of everything, not a dear leader or a selected party/assembly taking decisions for you and me (much less oligopolies, lobbiers etc). In the past such a system (direct democracy) would had proven unfeasible, but IT today can actually make it happen.

The only problem is the rich would oppose it. Because richness needs poverty to exist. Unless this battle is waged by the majority poor against the minority rich, it will never occur. Which why the theory of a violent revolution as a means of change holds.

Of course there are many theories about how to make a transition into it, some claiming a middle stage (socialism) needed, others saying this middle stage would actually make it impossible since it would make a State too powerful against the people to ever relinquish power (here is where Socialists/Anarchists clash).

In the mean time the rich remain rich, while striving to become even richer and more powerful and the poor become poorer and more oppressed to prevent the necessary revolt that could put and end to it.

Re:Communism

[Grishnakh]

Actually, true communism has no separate government; everyone is part of it. A modern communist society would have...

That's why I added the words "in practice", because invariably someone pops up and says "that's not true communism!" Everything you say here is really just the No True Scotsman argument. In REAL communist societies, especially the former USSR, what I said is true. You can talk all you want about imaginary societies, and give them whatever name you want, but it's really irrelevant, and it's like me saying my shirt is red when everyone else says it's blue.

The only problem is the rich would oppose it. Because richness needs poverty to exist.

No, actually, for non-poverty to exist, the system you advocate can't be adopted. There simply aren't enough resources on this planet for everyone to live like Westerners do. The only way a highly-equal society can exist is if it's relatively small, and only the people inside that country are equals, but different from everyone else in the world around them. There are some countries where there really aren't any poor people, and the standards of living are very high: places like Norway, Sweden, Luxembourg, and Switzerland. But you don't see the people there sharing their wealth with the world around them, but then they wouldn't have any.

Copyright by default

[tepples]

Not accurate in any respect to say "All Content is Copyright by default." The opposite holds true.

In what way? Under the law in all parties to the Berne Convention, exclusive rights under copyright begin the moment a work is fixed in a tangible medium and are relinquished only by an overt act of the copyright owner.

"your own damn content"

[tepples]

all you guys down there could start generating your own damn content under the commons.

Please see my reply here.

More effective than you might think

[petrus4]

Easily made, easily broken.

I think as it's been said, the real goal here is to terrorise the general public into compliance, by randomly crucifying a single individual every so often.

Unfortunately, such tactics tend to work. Most of the p2p networks I've been able to access have generally declined in usage/content in response. The great irony is that, although such laws are impossible to uniformly enforce, the intense paranoia that is generated by sporadic enforcement, is actually more effective.

Although you know that it's probably only one out of every thousand people who will end up in court, you really don't want to be that one. So ultimately, everyone loses, on the basis of fear that is largely hypothetical.

Re:More effective than you might think

[Demonsunder]

this is true, but what if this was actually enforced? say you were a rival company/pissed off at your ex gf/annoyed because your next door neighbour plays loud music, hack/bribe an employee download a few file, screen cap the torrent's send the caps to the owner of the file so they make a complaint instantly you get a nice law suit aginst your rival making them spend alot on either lawyers or payout's, I know it would be harder to do than this but I read some figures from an overseas ISP then shows that 64% of the "claims" of dowloading was from Rival company's. This is a stupid not very well though out law.

Payback

[Vokoder]

So if your neighbor wont return the lawnmower you loaned him just crack his wifi and start the downloading.

You can't be cut off (yet)

[harryjohnston]

As a factual correction, the part of the legislation that allows for (alleged) infringers to have their internet connection cut off is not yet active. It won't kick in until such time as the government deems it necessary.

Hope this cost $0 to implement.....

[dethjester]

.... I mean its not like we don't have enough other things, like earthquake stricken cities to deal with. Looking out for another country's interests (and lets face it, most of the parties benefiting from this law are not in NZ) should be way down on the priority list. It is my understanding that the owner of the IP in question has to pony up with some cash to actually make the complaint in the first place, but I am assuming that it is our legal system that has to prosecute these offenders.

Not 'Kiwis'

[bobkoure]

Maybe folks in Aus call folks from NZ 'Kiwi's', but the people who actually live there are more likely to self identify as NZ-ers ('en-zed-er' for those who pronounce the letter 'z' as 'zee').

>>I'm an Aussie (the bigger brother of the Kiwis)
I'm also pretty sure they don't think of Australians as 'big brothers' either - at least I never met one there who expressed that opinion (was there for some months on an extended motorbike holiday).

To re-phrase part of your comment: ...Having said that, I'm from the US (the bigger brother of the Ozzies) and...
Grates on the nerves, doesn't it?
And, no, I don't actually think that, but give the NZers a break, would ya?

Re:Not 'Kiwis'

[atomicbutterfly]

Well it was mainly a joke about the "big brother" bit. I do not wish to denigrate anyone - my mother is from New Zealand. We Aussies just like making fun of the NZ-ers every now and then (hence the famous "sheep" jokes with regards to the New Zealanders).