Slashdot Mirror
TVShack Founder Signs Deal Avoiding Extradition
another random user writes with news that the founder of TVShack probably won't be thrown into a U.S. prison for life. From the article: "Richard O'Dwyer, from Sheffield, is accused of breaking copyright laws. The US authorities claimed the 24-year-old's TVShack website hosted links to pirated films and TV programs. The High Court was told Mr O'Dwyer had signed a 'deferred prosecution' agreement which would require him paying a small sum of compensation. Mr O'Dwyer will travel to the US voluntarily in the next few weeks for the deal to be formally ratified, it is understood."
Looks like Jimbo going to bat for him generated a bit of bad press. As usual, the MPAA is not enthused. Different articles are reporting that his mother is the one traveling to the U.S. to finalize the deal.
But I personally wouldn't be travelling to "finalize a deal" in a foreign country, no you can just mail me the paper work.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
This is how we know that our copyright system is completely out of control. Extradition over links?
Palm trees and 8
It's a trap! Don't do it!
Send a representative who isn't going to get arrested at the airport.
Quit with the subtle disparaging of anonymous sources. The term for decades was "an anonymous reader". Who suddenly decided to call them "random users?"
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Looks like Jimbo going to bat for him generated a bit of bad press.
Not being intimately familiar with the story, I wondered who the 'Jimbo' in the summary was. I should have guessed it was he of the 'please give Wikipedia money' banners, Jimmy Wales. In fairness, there have been a couple of stories on /. about it, and it is in one of TFAs; but some context in the summary from the editors or submitter would have been nice. While I'm at it, The Guardian has some coverage too.
Here ends the obligatory grousing about the article summary.
If all you have is a grenade, pretty soon every problem looks like a foxhole -- MightyYar
As it was explained to me, deferred prosecution is like a pro-active parole. They don't bring you to trial, but if you do anything illegal and they catch you within the period of the deferment, they bring the old charges back with both barrels.
This is a crafty way of neutralizing an activist. You keep them out of the media circus of a trial, but then you've got a sword of Damocles to hold over their heads. If they continue their activism, they face old and new charges. If they do not continue, they become irrelevant and end up working in some back room, coding websites for dubious startups.
Free Dmitry Sklyarov shirt, and a sharpie.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Seriously DO NOT TRUST THIS!
Why can't this simply be carried out at the US embassy in London?
Why do they want him to be physically present in the USA?
Also, this is the most disgusting use of the extradition "agreement" so far, much more so than the McKinnon case. The reason being is that what he did isn't even a crime in the UK. Well, perhas/probably not. The CPS decided not to bring a case because noone is sure. Apparently a "test case" is needed.
So apparently here not only do yu have to know the local law in more detail than even the government, you also have to know that even if you're not comitting a crime here you also have to know all the USA laws too just in case the government decides to hang you out to dry and try to extradite you for a crime that doesn't even exist!
At what point does ignorance of laws of a country you've never visited and never dones business in become a valid excuse?
At least this madness is possibly over.
But I certainly would not trust the USA authorities if I was him. If he can pay, then he can mail a cheque to the embassy. Anything else is way beyond the boundaries of trust.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
You'd be a fool to step foot in the usa like this....
Second you get here you're going to break some imaginary law and lose your deal. Goto jail. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200.
Bet.
There's using legitimate political means to agitate for change. I agree that this is usually legal in industrialized countries.
There's also pushing the limits by being a test case, which is usually neither legal or illegal. You're waiting for the courts to decide. In the meantime, you may be arrested and raped in jail.
It's a tough life, this activism stuff.
...can someone please remind me how much of my money is being wasted on this shit?
Cole's Law: Thinly sliced cabbage
The "Jimbo" in the summary is Jimmy Wales of Wikipedia. I usually get shouted down for suggesting that summaries could do with a bit more context on occasion, but this is ridiculous.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Blair sold us to Murdoch, he sold us to Bush, he connived at the deaths of many Iraqis.We really cannot point the finger at the US political system; we elected him all by ourselves.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Guantanamo, after all, is not a U.S. prison. And people posting links to copyrighted content are arguably enemy combattants, fighting against the government by trying to destroy its funding from movie lobbyism. "arguably" meaning "it might be possible to find a lunatic making this argument", so let's lock this one up in 'namo until we find that lunatic for making this argument so that the military tribunal can commence. Could be a few years, but who would want to have 09/11 repeat?
I found an interesting assessment of this US-UK extradition pact:
It could be that what you're seeing is that the US, at five times bigger, is merely making more requests because it has more interests. The treaty may not be unfavorable at all.
It is undisputed that the first part of the statement is clearly non-objectionable because selling of GPL software is entirely permitted. Therefore at least half of the O.P.'s assertions are non-sequitor. Why, would anyone object to selling GPL software unless they were unaware of the working mechanisms of the GPL? That part of the statement is pointless and redundant since the O.P. meant to declare grievance (i.e. "ripped off") from the point of view of a copyright holder. Therefore it is LESS of a stretch to interpret that he linked these two statements, rather than meant for them to stand each on their own. The G.P.'s interpretation is by far most likely the correct one.
You're applying your own moral judgment to which laws are important. That's not how the law works.
Among other things, extraditing him here would allow the court battle to rage and a decision be reached on what behavior is or is not legal.
He did not host any content, he only had a website that had links to content on other servers and sold advertising. Isn't that what google, bing, etc. are doing? How can that be against the law? How can he be responsible for the content? So if he is responsible in some way, then they should go after google also, because I'm sure you could do a simple search and get links to infringing content.
So if his links make him liable in anyway, the natural extension would be that any links to undesirable content also makes you responsible. So if you link to a some site that happened to have somewhere on it what was considered "hate speech" by some group you are liable. This will quickly destroy all the little bloggers and unofficial sources for information of any kind.
This part struck me as particularly interesting:
I can't agree here. The internet and global trade mean that we have to find ways to collaborate on standards between countries.
And someone just walked into my office, so I have to address the rest of this later (sigh
In the law books you can clearly see there are requirements to have a license to drive a car, practice medicine, fly a plane. But there is no such law for video, music or software. A License is just a buzzword used so much that everybody believes it. The only protection for those items is copyright, and anything else is made up nonsense.
With a 10-year layover at the Guantanimo Terminal...
I wonder what the minimum body size is with standard text. The title really says it all.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
It's a trap. Just like on Law and Order, you've got a deal with one set of cops and an agreement or plea bargain, and you're forgetting that there are other branches of the government with teeth, so either
-- a different prosecuting branch will arrest and try on the same charges
-- the same branch with which he thinks he's made an agreement will arrest him on a different set of charges with a slight variation, using the old "we gave you immunity for X, but not for Y" trick.
I agree, there's no reason he should come over to the US to avoid extradition,, when the point of extradition is to bring him over to the USA. Seriously, he's trusting this?
So the point that's being missed is "when exactly and why did having a link become illegal?"
.
Doesn't the fact that Google searches the web and provides links to copyright infringing material that is hosted on Youtube show that Google is performing contributory copyright infringement by providing links to material which infringes copyright? Should Google be facing the same charges?
I wonder what the minimum brain size is for making a pointless reply.
Even if Obama in person says not to worry. They'll fuck you over the moment you get off the plane.