Cameron's IP Advisor: Throw Persistent Copyright Infringers In Jail

Ob frosty by Hognoxious · 2014-01-23 03:32 · Score: 5, Funny

John Leech? I take he doesn't seed back, then?

--
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."

Re:Ob frosty by NotSanguine · 2014-01-23 04:23 · Score: 5, Informative

He's my MP, but I'm afraid I can't report on his file-sharing habits.
And to lend some context to his words, from TFA:

“The discrepancy I mentioned is a source of great frustration. For example, the private prosecution by the Federation Against Copyright Theft of Anton Vickerman, who was making £50,000 a month from running a website [SurfTheChannel] that facilitated mass-scale copyright infringement, saw him convicted of conspiracy to defraud and sentenced to four years in prison,” Leech explained.
“This level of sentence would not have been possible if he had been prosecuted under copyright law, but FACT was able to prove conspiracy in his actions. Without proof of conspiracy, a serious criminal could have been left subject to a disproportionately low maximum penalty.”
In a way, I do agree with his point; those making that sort of money from infringement do need to be punished properly. However, it'll be all too easy to abuse this sort of measure, and end up with the disproportion going the other way.
The crime here was fraud. The guy sold something he did not have the rights to sell. Kind of like someone selling your house without your knowledge. IANAL, but as I understand it, we have laws (as was seen in this case) that address these issues. Sending someone to prison for ten years (or at all) for downloading the latest episode of some crap TV show or movie for their personal use is ridiculous. That is and should be a civil matter, IMHO.

--
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
Re:Ob frosty by Nerdfest · 2014-01-23 04:44 · Score: 5, Insightful

No, he's still pretty much an asshole, but he was also the victim of some fairly serious abuse of process, involving governments across at least two continents. As with many laws, you have to defend people you don't like.
Re:Ob frosty by RaceProUK · 2014-01-23 04:50 · Score: 2

These days, making big money off the work of others with their express consent makes you a hero.
FTFY

--
No colour or religion ever stopped the bullet from a gun
Re:Ob frosty by DocGerbil100 · 2014-01-23 07:49 · Score: 5, Interesting

Just to clarify, the crime Vickerman was prosecuted for is Conspiracy to Defraud, purely for running SurfTheChannel, a streaming links site.

This is quite a different law from Fraud, it's vaguer and much more prone to abuse - it seems to be FACT's go-to law whenever they realise a suspect they've spent time and money investigating isn't breaking any actual laws.

Without it, Vickerman would probably never have been prosecuted for anything, although civil action would have been likely, IMO.

If some defendant somewhere ever gets an appeal up to the ECJ, I think it quite possible they'll shoot the law down in flames, just for being so badly written.

More information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conspiracy_to_defraud
http://torrentfreak.com/surfthechannel-owner-sentenced-to-four-years-in-jail-120814/
Re:Ob frosty by NotSanguine · 2014-01-23 10:45 · Score: 3, Insightful

No, the crime is copyright infringement. THAT is what infringement is, not someone downloading an episode of Downton Abbey because they missed it the other day.
I don't recognize copyright infringement as a crime. At best it is a tort, IMHO. Yes, I am aware that various governments have criminalized "copyright infringement." That doesn't mean I have to agree, or incorporate it into my worldview.

--
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
Re:Ob frosty by tomtomtom · 2014-01-23 12:53 · Score: 2

Interestingly, digging a bit deeper and looking at the average sentences (in 2009, the most recent year available) for those given immediate custodial sentences (which is not all of those convicted), the statistics say 33.6 months was the average for robbery and 48.7 months for sexual offences (which are statistically the longest sentences on average). Of course the lengthiest of sentences for those offences will have been much longer but as a taxpayer the cost of jailing this guy Vickerman for 5 years for what was, after all, a non-violent crime doesn't sit well with me in context (although admittedly I know nothing about the details of the case). See here, page 40 for the stats.
This brings up an interesting division in how people think about crime. Some (many?) people would say that stealing a penny each from 5 million people is a crime for which a lesser punishment is justified than stealing £50,000 from one individual, despite the monetary amounts involved being the same (and the first scheme being more audacious). The debate over whether harsh penalties for infringement of IP laws are justified (leaving aside the issue of whether the existence or persistence of the IP in question is in itself just) is really another version of that debate. I wonder if perhaps a generational difference in attitudes about this aspect of morality (ie older legislators and executives appear to view infringement so much more seriously than younger people).

rights by Ragzouken · 2014-01-23 03:33 · Score: 4, Insightful

"withdrawing [...] rights from lawbreakers" I don't think that's how rights work?

Re:rights by i+kan+reed · 2014-01-23 03:47 · Score: 3, Interesting

Yeah, it sort of is. Rights, as we know them, are derived from the social contract, and withdrawal of one or more of those rights(such as freedom of movement) is necessary to preserve the benefits of the social contract to everyone else. It shouldn't be done unnecessarily(like this) or to unreasonable extremes(like removal of right not to be tortured), but protection of rights is done with the understanding that you won't use your rights to infringe the rights of others.
*You can make the argument that rights are natural or divine in origin, but that's an unprovable derail I'd prefer not to go down.
Re:rights by shentino · 2014-01-23 04:20 · Score: 3, Informative

If you can withdraw it, it's a privilege.
Re:rights by shentino · 2014-01-23 04:20 · Score: 3, Interesting

You don't have an unconditional right to freedom. What you do have is the right to due process before it is taken away.
Re:rights by causality · 2014-01-23 04:47 · Score: 5, Informative

So which is it: Do you oppose putting anybody in jail, or do you think freedom of movement isn't a fundamental right?
Generally this is resolved by only depriving people of civil rights with due process (but the US government is increasingly finding ways around that pesky little detail...).

Likewise, there is too much ignorance about the purpose of juries. The purpose of a jury is not merely to determine if the person transgressed a law. The purpose is also to determine if that law should be enforced. If I for one were ever on a jury and the accused is on trial for a nonviolent marijuana possession charge, I would acquit him or her even if I were certain that they did in fact do the deed, because I fundamentally believe that regulating the consciousness of adult people is beyond the scope of government.

Jury nullification is an interesting read, though if you are familiar with it and make this known, you are not likely to be selected for a jury. This demand for mindlessly applying a set of rules with no judgment is a sure sign of a broken system.

--
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
Re:rights by causality · 2014-01-23 04:53 · Score: 3, Insightful

It's generally accepted that withholding rights from some is required to ensure public safety or other collective benefit.
In some cases, I feel that infringing upon certain rights is unacceptable no matter what. Copyrights and patents will always be absolutely disgusting to me because of their effect of private property, and copyright's effect on freedom of speech.
Copyright wouldn't be nearly so bad if it stuck to its original term of (IIRC) fourteen years. That's fourteen years, during a time when movable type was one of the most advanced information dissemination technologies available. Now we can reach many, many more people in much less time, resulting in much greater distribution (and sales) of a work than anything that was possible in the late 18th century. Logically, achieving a similar balance would now mean a shorter copyright term, but instead it's been ridiculously extended. This is why so few people respect it anymore; it simply isn't respectable and hasn't been in a long time.

It's disgusting and maybe no reform would ever satisfy you. I can't speak for you there. As for me, I think a reasonable copyright term of say, 5-10 years, would remove nearly all of the problems with it. I also think that would put a bigger dent in piracy than any unreasonable new laws.

--
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
Re:rights by i+kan+reed · 2014-01-23 05:09 · Score: 3, Informative

Uh, no selective application of the law is the entire purpose of trials. Using circumstance, evidence, and judgement to determine whether the law can and should apply.
Re:rights by SuricouRaven · 2014-01-23 05:10 · Score: 4, Funny

Don't forget that it's practically unenforceable. An unenforceable law is soon made a mockery of.
The UK recently extended our copyright term from fifty years to seventy for music. Mainly to make sure the Beatles stay covered - it's important to make sure their property rights are protected, or they might not make any more music.
Re:rights by causality · 2014-01-23 05:18 · Score: 2

Doesn't your selective application of the law make you as bad as any criminal? The law is, in theory, decided by all of us, so you don't get to pick and choose, IMHO
What I described is in fact laid out by the US Constitution, the highest law of the land. Jury nullification is a civil right protected by the Constitution. So no, I'm not being selective.

Look, if you're hostile to the idea that's fine, tell me why you dislike it. But don't make shit up just to find fault with it. Let's have an adult conversation instead.

--
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
Re:rights by causality · 2014-01-23 05:25 · Score: 3, Insightful

Don't forget that it's practically unenforceable. An unenforceable law is soon made a mockery of.
The UK recently extended our copyright term from fifty years to seventy for music. Mainly to make sure the Beatles stay covered - it's important to make sure their property rights are protected, or they might not make any more music.
Heh that's hilarious and I appreciate the irony you're spelling out (or I could act like a typical Slashdotter and assume I'm the only one who got it because everyone else is so stupid). Of course, the entire purpose of a short-term copyright that expires is that the artist has an incentive to make NEW works, not continuously profit from old ones.

The real problem with unenforcable laws that are widely broken is that they give the government an excuse to target someone they don't like. Many of these laws would require a police state to enforce, something the political class is only too happy to provide ("think of the children!"). Look at the way the idiotic War on (some) Drugs has destroyed the 4th Amendment for an easy example.

You end up with all kinds of mental-gymnastic nonsense just to let them do what they wanted to do anyway. A police dog is a device used to perform a search. Using a dog's nose to search a vehicle is no different from using the police officer's hands and eyes. It performs the same task for the same purpose. It's merely more efficient. Yet it's legal to have roadblocks with police dogs that effectively search everybody in a given area, with no warrant and no probable cause, and if the dog gives an indication (after using its nose to search) then that's all the excuse they need. That's just one example. It's insane. We're willing to give up fundamental liberty in the name of making sure adult people don't smoke weed.

If this society thrives and continues to prosper, it won't be because it deserves to.

--
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
Re:rights by MrBigInThePants · 2014-01-23 07:12 · Score: 2

It seems to me you just like to go down swinging...
Re:rights by SuricouRaven · 2014-01-23 09:12 · Score: 2

But no major-label artist owns their own copyright. The labels do.
Re:rights by VortexCortex · 2014-01-23 10:35 · Score: 5, Insightful

Now, consider that the citizens can withdraw the government's right to imprison them.
Once you've done that enough times you'll soon see that freedom does exist in the absence of punishment or laws or 'rights', but laws do not exist without punishment -- application of force against another's will.
In the natural lawless state we have the freedom to do whatever our moral compass allows. Not all laws are immoral, but history is full of examples. It's better to err on the side of caution and have as few laws as possible, and thus the most freedom.
In the age of information Copyright is artificial scarcity of infinitely reproducible information -- It's propping up a business model akin to selling ice to Eskimos. There is no evidence that Copyrights are beneficial for society. It's terribly dangerous to run the world on untested hypotheses. We should do the experiment and see if the laws that grant 'rights holders' monopoly of information should exist. There is only evidence to support the null hypothesis: That copyrights and patents are not required for innovation or social benefit. The fashion and automotive industries sell primarily on design, are very profitable, and have no copyrights or design patents.
Information is not scarce. Market that which is scarce: The ability to create new information. Sell the labour to create new information instead, and you'll get more art. If you get paid once for your work to build a home, fix a car, make a song, etc. then you have to do more work to make more money.
Re:rights by Rakarra · 2014-01-23 10:46 · Score: 2

I think your story would carry a little more weight if you could provide proof of that actually happening: while obeying traffic laws, someone ran directly in front of the car and were struck despite the best efforts of the driver, resulting in felony convictions.
Re:rights by shentino · 2014-01-23 21:23 · Score: 2

It does have to be fair AND consistent.
The first part is substantiative due process, the second part is procedural due process.
This is also checked by the clause regarding cruel and unusual punishment.

The only solution by Kardos · 2014-01-23 03:34 · Score: 4, Insightful

is not to play the game. The rise of creative commons and the like will end this oppressive copyright regime. Free software and free culture is the only way to go.

Re:The only solution by SuricouRaven · 2014-01-23 03:58 · Score: 4, Interesting

No, it won't, for a number of reasons:
- The power of marketing. Commercial interests can throw enough money at promoting anything to make it popular, at least for a time. Who wants to go see Obscure Indie Horror Flick that they read about on facebook when there is massive television advert promotion for Buckets of CGI Blood VII - and it's being featured on talk shows, endorsed by celebrities, and appears on billboards?
- Incidential infringement. It happens, a lot. The greatest source of clipart today is google image search. People frequently grab popular songs to remix or dub over their own videos for youtube. Typically this is done by people who just don't care about copyright and know next to nothing about it.
- Closing the wagons. If creative commons every seriously becomes a threat to entrenched interests, do you expect them to just take it lying down? No, they'll use every dirty trick in the book! You'll probably find informal agreements abound to exclude the upstarts, making it very difficult for them to be promoted outside of social networking. Radio stations will likewise refuse to play creative commons music, for fear of being blacklisted by the major labels they depend upon a lot more heavily. Same goes in software - look at the measures Microsoft has taken over the last twenty years to fight linux with deliberate incompatibilities and aggressive business tactics, and continues to take with such measures as Secure Boot. They've not been entirely victorious, but they've certainly made linux advocates and developers fight hard for every scrap of ground they have gained.
CC may well bring on a real revolution in popular culture, but it's certainly not inevitable.
Re:The only solution by Runaway1956 · 2014-01-23 04:12 · Score: 4, Insightful

Oh, cry me a river. Companies bending over backward? Wooo-hoo. You're hallucinating. THE COMPANIES HAVE YOU BENT OVER A BARREL, AND YOU LIKE IT!
The thieves are those who have gone to Congress to get copyright law changed, so that copyright will never expire. In effect, they have bribed congress to grant them a monopoly on music into perpetuity.

--
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
Re:The only solution by stealth_finger · 2014-01-23 04:14 · Score: 3, Interesting

I'd love to see these people who try to justify being a thief at least put some skin in the game so when their content is ripped off they'll have a taste of what they're dishing out. A lot of "if I made music I'd let people trade it" happening and not a lot of "I make music and I've released it for free" going on.
I love the way it's always thiefs.
Bottomline is, the people that are going to buy it will. They may pirate it first but that will mostly be followed by a sale unless the product is not as good as expected and even then in the case of collectors etc it may get bought anyway. The people that aren't going to buy it won't. They may also pirate as well but only because they can, they get it because it's there but if it wasn't then no big deal.
Obviously there are the minority that are going to pirate everything they can for whatever reason they choose, but they haven't deprived anyone of any property so nothing has been thieved anyway.

--
Wanna buy a shirt?
https://www.redbubble.com/people/stealthfinger/shop?asc=u
Re:The only solution by allaunjsiIverfox2 · 2014-01-23 05:14 · Score: 2

There is overhead involved in music production. If you're using the product without putting money up to support that production then you are, indeed, taking something without paying for it. It may not be physical but it still is "something."
So you're not taking anything. Potential money is not tangible, and you can't lose it; you never had it. Furthermore, it was never yours.

Yes. As a society we have agreed that there is a limited right to monopoly over content. It's called copyright.
Just like, at one point, society allowed slavery. I disagree with society, and society can be wrong. I believe it's wrong in this case. All this demonstrates is that people don't actually care about rights, free speech, or principles; that's sad, and especially so in a country that's supposed to be the land of the free.

The fact that copyright was allowed to be extended (at least in the USA) shows that the masses have nothing against this monopoly power.
Nonsense. I know that many people want at least some form of copyright, but not in the form it's in today. It's just that we have a two-party system and people keep voting for the lesser of two evils, but that does not mean they agree with these 'representatives' on all issues.

Even you pointed out that it is a monopoly situation.
I pointed it out because I disagree with it with the monopoly situation, obviously.

And presenting fallacies like free markets and uncited censorship
Neither of which are fallacies. The censorship comes from the enforcement of copyright. What happens when a website facilitates copyright infringement or infringes upon copyright itself? As we've seen... the 'solution' is often censorship.
There isn't even any proof that copyrights/patents are effective. Even if they were, I'd still be 100% opposed to them, but there isn't any. All you people do is speculate about what the world would be like without them, and that's not proof in any sense of the word. Since you're limiting rights here and proposing policies/laws, the burden of proof is on you. Sadly, our system doesn't care about proof, as is apparent to anyone who's been paying attention.
Thankfully, even if copyright remains, the government will never truly be able to stop any of it. Hopefully it'll all collapse at some point.
Re:The only solution by allaunjsiIverfox2 · 2014-01-23 06:38 · Score: 2

It's not potential money. It's labor.
If you're talking about the labor they put into it, then that's already been "spent." No one can take it from them. And since that was their own choice and no one else's, it has nothing to do with the people sharing files.

And the laws involving slavery were changed. Feel free to go for it yourself. Aside from that what you "believe" has little to do with the reality of the situation.
What I believe is relevant because I'm speaking of morality. As for changing laws, well... people are trying. I vote for candidates that I feel would represent me (no democrats or republicans) and write to my so-called "representatives" about issues like these often. I join protests when possible. I try to remind people of freedom. Sadly, it's probably not enough.

Again, if the masses were that set against it the system would change.
Not if they're preoccupied with 50,000 other issues that the One Party distracts them with. It's easy to divide and conquer when there are only two parties. All issues that the majority doesn't think are "top priority" get ignored and the One Party can do practically anything it wants with regard to those issues.

I'm just as much if not more so against the two party lie but that doesn't mean that the law doesn't apply to me
I recognize reality and that the law applies to me. I just don't respect the law.

It still doesn't change the fact of the matter. I pointed it out that you pointed it out because at least you are grounded in the reality of what it is from a legal and social standpoint.
I don't see why you bother with this. I know that copyright exists and people don't care about freedom at the moment. You don't need to keep pointing it out. I'm saying it's wrong. Saying that it exists misses the point and is completely useless.

Yes, they are.
Saying that a certain market should be free is not a fallacy, which was my intention. Not specifying how censorship is at work is also not fallacious.

No, the burden is on you as the laws in question are already in place.
Wrong. The onus of proof does not suddenly change hands just because someone forces policies and laws on people. The burden of proof is still on the people infringing upon people's rights and advocating that these policies/laws remain in place. I'm not talking about the legal onus of proof, but principle. The law is often illogical.
Re:The only solution by msobkow · 2014-01-23 10:28 · Score: 3, Interesting

I'd love to see these people who try to justify being a thief at least put some skin in the game so when their content is ripped off they'll have a taste of what they're dishing out. A lot of "if I made music I'd let people trade it" happening and not a lot of "I make music and I've released it for free" going on.

Funny. There seem to be thousands of open source projects like mine (MSS Code Factory) where people have done exactly that: put in years of work and released it for free.
Furthermore, while I do torrent movies and music, I've also spent in excess of $60,000 so far in my life on media. There comes a point where you realize it's just an insane amount of money to be spending on entertainment. Particularly as I've watched a whole two movies to the end in the past year, giving up on most after 20 minutes as being an utter waste of time to watch such drivel (and that includes a number of "big name" block busters like the latest "Star Trek" drek.)
Most of the music I do download is music I already own. It's easier to download it than to go rifling through the boxes to find that particular CD. And ripping 5,000+ CDs would just be a royal pain in the anal sphincter. Not to mention requiring an obscene investment in hard drive storage.
Sure I end up getting some albums I never owned and checking them out. But with a collection my size, I don't feel I've "ripped off" the media industry in any size, shape, or form. They've gotten more than their fair share out of me.
I worked it out once. What I've spent on media so far is the equivalent of paying a $100/month "streaming fee" for my entire life, from birth to expected death around 72 years old. And that's just what I spent on physical media -- it doesn't include movie tickets or cable and satellite fees, nor the massive numbers of movies I rented over the years.
Nope. I'm pretty guilt fee about my "theft" nowadays. They've been paid, paid, and paid again over the past 49 years.

--
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.

Impractical? by MeesterCat · 2014-01-23 03:37 · Score: 2

Because our prisons are already nearly full...

https://www.gov.uk/government/...

--
"I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don't let anybody tell you different." ~ Kurt Vonnegut Jnr.

Wrong approach by Peter+Simpson · 2014-01-23 03:38 · Score: 4, Insightful

The only way to fight personal, noncommercial "sharing", is to provide a one-stop download center with reasonable prices. It has worked for Amazon and Apple, but the media companies stubbornly refuse to cooperate and make their complete catalogs available in one place...so Pirate Bay does it for them.

The market is speaking as loudly as it can, but the media companies refuse to listen.

Re:Wrong approach by serviscope_minor · 2014-01-23 04:07 · Score: 5, Insightful

And add to that no DRM.
Yeah they love the DRM for some reason I can't quite work out. But basically it makes the product crap. It's either "streaming" in which case you need a decent, wired internet connection (how's your 3G data usage doing...?) or it's locked to some device in some way which means playing it on a decent screen or another portable device will suck.
The problem is not competing with "free" it's competing with "better".
Of course, most people don't really know about DRM. But that doesn't matter because they are at least vaguely aware of the effects. The pirate bay is better because:
* Excellent search engine.
* Nice one stop place for all media.
* Excellent choice in download clients (can prioitise, batch up, etc)
* You can use your favourite media player.
* You can play on any devices you own.
* You can copy from your laptop to your phone, tablet, other laptop, builtin player in TV
* You can transcode to a smaller file for your phone
* You can shove it on a USB stick and go to a friend's house for movie night
* You can play on any screen you own.
* Generally good download speeds, excellent for popular stuff.
* Generally a good choice of different size/quality
* Available in your country right now.
The fact that's is free is at worst icing and best actually a minor disincentive since a good number of people don't like the idea of being a freeloader.

--
SJW n. One who posts facts.

non violent offenders in prison = overcrowding by Joe_Dragon · 2014-01-23 03:39 · Score: 2

Just look all of minor pot / marijuana offenders in jails / prisons.

also what the cost to keep people locked up as well

How about jail for copyright enforcers? by melikamp · 2014-01-23 03:40 · Score: 5, Funny

UDHR article 19:

Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.

Since enforcing copyright against people who share information online non-commercially is clearly a violation of a human right according to UDHR, to which UK is a signatory, how about throwing copyright enforcers in jail instead? How long is the public going to put up with this oppression?

Will plagiarizing speeches count? by sandbagger · 2014-01-23 03:40 · Score: 2

Given how often his colleagues have been found to be using other peoples' speeches, this could thin out the Tory caucus.

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---- The above post was generated by the Turing Institute. Maybe.

plea bargain by k6mfw · 2014-01-23 03:43 · Score: 3, Insightful

I can see it now, someone arrested for copyright infringement accepts a plea bargain for a violent crime conviction to get less jail time.

--
mfwright@batnet.com

Re:Penalty Doesnt Match the Crime by gstoddart · 2014-01-23 03:44 · Score: 5, Insightful

Is this guy a martyr or do we just chalk this up as another politician with crazy ideas that won't pass the majority test?

You seem awfully confident it couldn't get passed into law.

I'm less certain of that. The copyright owners and their lobbyists are working to chip away at our rights to make them secondary to theirs -- because they essentially want all digital technology to be controlled and used as they allow us.

I fear this could be something which happens eventually. And I fear that they will be pushing this exact same agenda elsewhere.

Case in point, the FBI gets called in because someone was wearing Google Glasses in a movie theater, even though he wasn't recording. And ICE and DHS do domain takedowns of places suspected of violating copyright (or facilitating it).

Governments are increasingly becoming tools of corporations to enforce their wishes on us.

So what you and I is becoming irrelevant, it's what the big corporations can pay for. And they have far more money than we do.

--
Lost at C:>. Found at C.

Corporate sycophants in office. by MickyTheIdiot · 2014-01-23 03:45 · Score: 2, Insightful

We have it in the U.S. too. People with extreme pro-corporate positions making it to office...

In the U.S. we've got people under surveillance because they have spoken up against Fraking. That's what happens in a corporate state.

Sounds good by EMG+at+MU · 2014-01-23 03:48 · Score: 4, Interesting

Great, it should apply to everyone. Government officials, corporate execs, and the music industry itself.

The problem (besides jail time being a disproportionate punishment for copyright infringement) is that when someone in the government is found to have stolen an image or text from the internet, nothing happens. When a politician illegally uses a song for a campaign rally and the band finds out, all the politician has to do is release some press statement saying an aide made a mistake. When corporations infringe on copyrights nothing happens. When the music industry is found to have infringed on copyrights nothing happens. The only people subject to punishment are the commoner.

If laws applied to us all equally then lawmakers would stop passing asinine laws.

How about applying copyright to corporations? by RichMan · 2014-01-23 03:52 · Score: 5, Interesting

It seems to me when politicians or corporations misuse a photo or song they get off with a "opps". Yet they want to throw people in jail.
Step #1 should be much steeper penalties to corporations and other functioning entities that should have proper procedures in place to avoid violations.

Re:I'd give these guys til the next election... by gstoddart · 2014-01-23 03:53 · Score: 4, Insightful

They may have powerful corporate backers, but these are the kinds of things that the younger generations just aren't going to put up with much longer.

And as long as you convince the older generations (or the wealthy) that you're being tough on crime, doing your best to cut taxes, and cutting social spending ... they'll keep voting for you. Because they don't give a damn about much else.

And, as we saw from the Occupy protests ... they'll just turn the national security forces against them, and either deem them to be terrorists, or actively work to find other ways to make sure they can't get very far -- which is easy when you monitor everyone's communications just in case you need to single someone out later.

Even democracies suffer from those in power trying to keep the world the way they want it, and there's a huge imbalance of power.

I agree with your hope. I'm just far less confident in it.

--
Lost at C:>. Found at C.

The only other solution... by Andy_R · 2014-01-23 03:55 · Score: 4, Insightful

...is legalisation. Non commercial sharing of information isn't wrong, or bad for the economy, so the best solution is to legalise it.

--
A pizza of radius z and thickness a has a volume of pi z z a

Pirate Cinema (by Cory Doctorow) by MondoGordo · 2014-01-23 03:56 · Score: 2

it's a cautionary tale of our future. Peeps in the UK (and elsewhere!!) really need to wake up and stop this shit before it passes.

When the world changes around you by erroneus · 2014-01-23 04:15 · Score: 3, Insightful

So when technology and the interests of the people and technology all change around them and their business model, the best answer they can come up with is punishment? This is the interests of a few dominating the interests and even the needs of the masses. Perhaps not the best definition of tyranny but it rather fits.

Re:I'd give these guys til the next election... by SuricouRaven · 2014-01-23 04:18 · Score: 2

There's plenty of precedent. Just about all the major figures in the US civil rights movement, for example, were under government monitoring - they had quite the file on MLK, considering him a dangerous subversive.

Making money on infringement by WillAdams · 2014-01-23 04:32 · Score: 5, Insightful

Is it possible to make lots of money from copyright infringement w/o breaking lots of other laws?

If that's not the case, why do we need more?

--
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow.

Re:Making money on infringement by Anonymous Coward · 2014-01-23 04:40 · Score: 4, Insightful

I for one wasn't going to pirate anything today. But I am making it a point to hit The Pirate Bay and download whatever catches my eye. Fuck John Leech.

Is There a HowTo on Tar-and-Feathers? by patluri · 2014-01-23 04:46 · Score: 2

The People need a way to hold politicians accountable. Elections no longer work.

Re:Penalty Doesnt Match the Crime by rts008 · 2014-01-23 04:55 · Score: 2

Yeah.
I actually RTFA when this came out on /., and in the interview with the man arrested, he stated that he thought they were FBI, but it turned out to be the DHS.

Also, when I went back to the the /. article there is now an update:

Update: 01/21 21:41 GMT by U L : The Columbus Dispatch confirmed the story with the Department of Homeland Security. The ICE and not the FBI detained the Glass wearer, and there happened to be an MPAA task force at the theater that night, who then escalated the incident.

It was another typical bad/inaccurate summary by the submitter, and again, typically, not caught by the /. editors.

Yeah, I thought of the Stasi(Ministry for State Security of East Germany.) when they announced the formation of the DHS, and announced it's intended mission.

And if we thought J. Edgar Hoover's FBI was bad, we are in for a rude surprise. This is already much worse; J. Edgar was a piker compared to this.

--
Down With Slashdot BETA!!! I've been around the corner and seen the oliphant; you can only abuse me from your perspecti

This! This! 1000 Times! by Zimluura · 2014-01-23 05:00 · Score: 4, Insightful

This! This! 1000 Times!

Unlike theft, when you share a file it doesn't deprive anyone of their copy, when the **AA lobbies congress to extend copyright it deprives us all of any (even unprofitable) works entering our public domain.

The certainty of all works entering the public domain after a limited time is key to understanding copyright. It was not supposed to devolve into the IP dynasty creation that it is now.

Stealing vs. copyright infringement; not the issue by Nukenbar · 2014-01-23 05:23 · Score: 3

I think most people by now understand the difference. The real question is do we want (what I will call) common copyright infringement, which is already against the law as a civil matter to be criminal fineable or jailable offense.

But now, do we want common copyright infringement infringement to be a crime?

I think most hear can agree that using someone's copyright against their will is wrong. But is it a moral wrong, a civil wrong, or a criminal wrong? Clearly those who own the copyrights don't want others using their copyrights without their authorization/compensation. But is this a battle that we want the government involved in, criminally? Some copyright infringement already is criminal. Remember all of those FBI warnings at the beginning of DVDs? If you start selling copyrighted materials as your own, you could be going to jail. And I think we call all agree that this is a crime. Clearly in large scale infringement cases, for example Microsoft using some Apple copyright, a civil proceeding is warranted and suitable.

But what do we do with individual offenders? The Pirate bay types. What type of crime is is? A moral one like adultery? (used to be a crime, but is not anymore **exceptions noted**) or should it rise to a punishable offense? What is the line between the two?

These are the questions we should be asking ourselves and as a society and not allowing special interest groups to drive the discussion.

Re:This! This! 1000 Times! by causality · 2014-01-23 05:27 · Score: 2

though I guess it should be noted that US congress passing laws for **AA only affects the UK after the WIPO says "a good reason to extend UK copyright terms are to be parallel with the US"

There's no point in having different nations if they can't have different cultures and different laws so the world can see which thrive and which are self-defeating and (get this) actually learn from their examples.

--
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein

Too long punishment by jones_supa · 2014-01-23 05:30 · Score: 2

While I am myself an anti-piracy guy, I still oppose these ridiculous sentences of 10 years for something like piracy. John Leech should do an experiment where he himself goes to jail for just 1 year to discover how long time even that is.

You don't have to consume their product, bitch.

Unfortunately, we're expected to abide by the laws these greedy pieces of trash bribe our government to create. Did you forget what this very article is about? SOPA? PIPA? The DMCA?

So go back to acting like an entitled little fuck.

Oh, and acting as if you can bribe the government to create draconian laws so that your government-enforced monopoly over ideas can be better protected isn't entitled at all! It's actually one of the most entitled things I've ever seen.

Anyone with a brain would want to see these evil companies squirm.

What the fuck do you think gives you the right to take the fruits of another's labors?

Exactly. What the fuck do you think gives you the right to take the fruits of another's labors (tax dollars) to enforce your unjust little monopolies?

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