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EU Proposing to Make P2P Piracy A Criminal Offense
Posted by
Zonk
on Fri Aug 05, 2005 11:43 AM
from the harsh dept.
from the harsh dept.
brajesh writes "The European Commission is pushing for a proposal (.pdf) to crack down on organized piracy, which could also make indirect copyright infringement a crime across Europe, with implications similar to the recent MGM v. Grokster U.S. Supreme Court ruling. If the directive is adopted, developers who create software for file sharing that is then used for illegal ends could potentially be criminally liable in EU member countries." From the article: "The problem here is some activities, such as the creation of software, can be used for legal and illegal purposes, as is the case with Grokster...It gets really messy, because it is unclear what is legal or not legal, and it is problematic to operate with such abstract terms."
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But I thought Europe was all about freedom? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:But I thought Europe was all about freedom? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:But I thought Europe was all about freedom? (Score:5, Insightful)
corruption and "lobbyists" go hand in hand.. skipping all the way to the IMF/Worldbank.
Parent
Just end it all, please... (Score:5, Insightful)
Let's ban everything that attempts, aids, or incites acts of anything. It would eliminate cars, guns, tools, computers, people, milk, water, and air.
Fuck, let's just blow up the whole earth, some corporation would likely benefit from it -- I'm sure they have a patent on the bombs, cleaning up the destruction, and cloning human life after creating the vegetation and animal life.
Let's stop making laws that only support the businesses that have endless supplies of money please.
Re:Just end it all, please... (Score:4, Informative)
"Let's ban everything that attempts, aids, or incites acts of anything. It would eliminate cars, guns, tools, computers, people, milk, water, and air."
Maybe the summary wasn't clear enough. This is an attempt to institute a standard of liability similar to that of MGM vs. Grokster. The folks behind Grokster were taking active measures to profit from piracy -- their ad campaigns and email trails showed that quite clearly. If you're not sure why Grokster fell into this category and a gun manufacturer does not, it may help to compare Grokster's business model and advertising campaign to that of BitTorrent.
Any moron can slippery-slope this one. We're smarter than that.
Parent
Re:Just end it all, please... (Score:5, Insightful)
The only reason is because of lawyer speak. Guns were created to kill living things but they are marketed with clever wording that includes everything but.
P2P was created to quickly and effectively distribute data without a central server handling all the load. Problem is that the corporations that don't like it being used against their current business models have more money than the users and creaters of the P2P software.
I'm not slippery sloping anything. I'm stating a fact.
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Re:Just end it all, please... (Score:4, Insightful)
If your software is advertised as a way to download copyrighted works without permission from copyright holder, you are a Napster and will be held liable.
If your software is advertised as a data distribution network with no emphasis on copyrighted works, you are a bittorrent and will not be held liable.
(If you are a gun manufacturer and you advertise that your weapons can be used to kill HUMANS you will be held liable. If you advertise that your weapons can be used to kill animals and targets, you won't be held liable.)
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Re:Just end it all, please... (Score:3, Insightful)
It would be more accurate to say that you'd be held liable if you marketed your guns for killing people illegally. Like, "Is your neighbor annoying you? Our guns will shut him up, forever." On the other hand, "Worried about home invasions? Protect your family with our guns" would be seen as a legitimate use of the weapon, which also involves killing humans.
Yes, you can share data with lots of people without it being illegal. If you marke
Re:Just end it all, please... (Score:3, Informative)
Exactly. There's a difference between creating software that can do something, and specifically marketing it for doing that thing. Grokster sat on their site and said "violate copyright with our products". That was a prime reason they were held responsible when their users did exactly that.
Re:Just end it all, please... (Score:5, Interesting)
What happened to the days when a country's movements were so offensive that people would march? That people would have sit ins and public readings and such? Words are just words people, unless any of us is willing to stand up for our rights, we're just blowing hot air.
Perhaps all of those users of P2P programs, software developers, people who feel like their rights are being encroached on should get off their asses and go to DC for a day, sit down on the captial lawn, and get some influential people to talk and unite us. I'm sure RMS would have no problem, nor would Linus or anyone; a day out of their lives to support such an important cause isn't going to hurt anyone.
I'm just tired of hearing about this on Slashdot and having no outlet than to whine about it on here. It's far past time we actually *do* something about it.
Parent
Re:Just end it all, please... (Score:5, Insightful)
Two million people marched in London to protest against the Iraq war.
Approximately 78% of the electorate did not vote for Tony Blair's Labour party at the recent UK general election.
Our troops still went into Iraq, and Blair is still in power.
If the biggest mass protest in recent history couldn't avert a war that has killed thousands, it's not going to do much about some random Eurocrap. We need to do something more than bitch on Slashdot, but apparently marching isn't it.
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Re:Just end it all, please... (Score:5, Insightful)
In that figure you are of course including the people who did not vote at all, despite being eligible. According to the BBC [bbc.co.uk], there was about a 60% turnout of voters. Therefore, 40% of that 78% didn't vote at all.
I'm not detracting from your main point - that the majority of us did not vote Labour - but the way you present it implies that something dishonest occurred, which is not the case.
We need to do something more than bitch on Slashdot, but apparently marching isn't it.
Our government isn't listening. It hears what it wants to - fears over immigration, terrorism, etc - and acts on that. On other matters - ID cards, the Iraq war, etc - it simply claims to know best and carrys on regardless.
And you know what? It's as much a fault of the 40% who didn't vote at all, as it is of those that voted Labour. (Not that the Tories are any better if you ask me, but that's a rant for another time)
Oh, and a disclaimer: it's my fault too, as in the end I didn't vote either. I didn't see that there was any real point; my constituency (Hornchurch) is split roughly 45/45 Tory/Labour, with the remaining 10% or so "other" (mainly Lib Dem). Not much of a choice, if you ask me.
Parent
Oh please.... (Score:4, Insightful)
That is so much bullshit. NOBODY likes Saddam. What a lot of people are pissed off about is that we were mislead into an unnecessary war. Iraq is NOT about terrorism. It was suppose to be about weapons of mass destruction but the Bush administration takes every opportunity to say that our troops are being attacked by "the terrorists." We invaded their fucking country and a lot of Iraq people are pissed off about that. Those Iraq people who are fighting us are NOT terrorists so let's stop justifying a war that was planned way before 9/11 and impeach the dumb son of a bitch that is the cause of over a thousand of our fine American men and women who faithfully followed the really stupid and evil orders of this administration.
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What are we doing about it? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Just end it all, please... (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
'ere now, what's all this? (Score:5, Funny)
How nostalgic for Europe.
How about cracking down on another kind of... (Score:4, Insightful)
Two wrongs doesn't make a right (i know, three lefts do), but those corporations have no moral ground to talk about lost profits.
Re:How about cracking down on another kind of... (Score:5, Interesting)
You are also free not to buy any of it.
The problems with these types of laws is that you don't always know if what you are downloading off the internet is something that is copyright'd ,and not freely re-distributable, vs something that may be copyrighted, but freely destributable (opensource software, promotional free-music, etc). You usually don't really know until you have it downloaded and can run/play it. Even then, you might not know if it's legal or not. ex: Plan 9 from outerspace was a commercial movie, but it's now being freely distributed legally.
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Lots of tools can be used to pirate (Score:3, Insightful)
Or, heaven forbid, a floppy disk containing copywritten software on it and thrown across the room.
Re:Lots of tools can be used to pirate (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Lots of tools can be used to pirate (Score:5, Insightful)
" What about MSN messenger? I send executable files across that all the time. Or, heaven forbid, a floppy disk containing copywritten software on it and thrown across the room."
I think the person who wrote the summary mistakenly assumed that most readers would know the background of the recent MGM vs. Grokster case.
The whole point is to separate the "bad actors" from the providers of generic tools. That's what the decision showed us -- if you create an ad campaign focused on piracy, build your business model on inciting piracy, leave an email trail showing that you're aware of and condone what's on your network, and then lie to the government about it, you'll get nailed.
Knowledge is power here, guys -- it's important to understand the difference between people who set about profiting off of other people's works, vs. the people who write IM applications. The EFF page linked in the summary contains further links to the supreme court decision and lots of other stuff which would have answered your question.
Parent
Re:Lots of tools can be used to pirate (Score:3, Interesting)
You know the difference between those two? It's only that "people" writing respectable applications like IM are actually large software and media corporations, the same ones buying this legislation; like AOL-TimeWarner, Microsoft..
Which is why internet explorer isn't classified as a piracy device, even though the main functi
Not Floppy's! (Score:3, Funny)
Beer! The other p2p (Score:3, Funny)
sucks to be... (Score:2)
If the directive is adopted, developers who create software for file sharing that is then used for illegal ends could potentially be criminally liable in EU member countries.
I guess it sucks to be the guy who wrote mIRC or the guy who came up with the FTP protocol then....
What a dumbass, overly broad law. Wouldn't survive a court review in the US.
Messy? Unclear? (Score:2)
If you distribute copyrighted stuff from your computer without any formal agreement with the copyright holder to perform such distribution, you're liable. If you distribute non-copyrighted stuff -- public domain, creative commons, or (gods forbid!) something you've created yourself, -- you're okey doke.
One may disagree with the scope and breadth of legal protections afforded copyright holders, but that's a different debate.
Of course, you're not liable if you download only and don
Stupid! (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem here is some activities, such as the creation of software, can be used for legal and illegal purposes, as is the case with Grokster...It gets really messy, because it is unclear what is legal or not legal, and it is problematic to operate with such abstract terms."
Well, let me make it easy for you! Here's a hood ... it can protect you in a snowstorm, or you can use it to rob a bank. Ban hoods!
Geez!
zRe:Stupid! (Score:5, Insightful)
You may laugh, but in some countries (eg. Costa Rica) it is ILLEGAL to sell full face motorcycle helmets because these were used by criminals to rob banks...
I guess it was easier to create this law than for bank security to USE COMMON SENSE AND DECENCY and ask customers to remove their helmets before being allowed in the bank.
Back on topic:
Funny how they never managed to make cassette tapes and tape recorders illegal, yet people used to tape stuff and make copies of casettes all the time. But now because someone THINKS they have the right to tell MY computer what to do (that's a real funny one), copying digital information is seen as "criminal behaviour".
At least some of us know HOW computers work, and we will never be stopped. It listens to me, not to you.
Parent
Funny, I thought piracy was already a criminal act (Score:3, Insightful)
Isn't the former just a subset of the latter?
Do we need special laws to make FTP piracy illegal too?
Usenet piracy?
IRC piracy?
Stupid law... (Score:3, Interesting)
Another stupid law. Using this reasoning any web browser manufacturer could be found criminally liable.
1. Open mozilla browser.
2. Download image and share with friend.
3. Lawyer sues mozilla because they let me do it.
If I buy a pencil and poke my neighbor in they eye with it the lumber company should not be sued either.
They should go after the actual criminals but they don't because there isn't any money in it.
This law should be called the EU Extortion Act.
Re:Stupid law... (Score:3, Insightful)
My understanding with the Grokster case is that Grokster opened themselves up to trouble because they promoted it as tool to help trade illegally shared files, which "incitement" was almost an accurate term for it, the way it was promoted.
Mozilla does not promote Firefox, Mozilla Suite, etc. as a tool to break the law, which is a key difference, even if Firefox could be used to do so. Firefox could be used as a means to trade child porn
Bram Cohen (Score:2)
Why? Because he would probably be target #1 for all of the rampant piracy that occurs via bittorrent, all despite his original intentions for the protocol/system.
not gonna happen (Score:2, Insightful)
"Abstract Terms" (Score:5, Interesting)
Whoever came up with the "abstract terms" locution was pretty clever; that's certainly a new twist on it. Usually, the folks who want unenforceable laws want the laws to be abstract. Now that there's so little left unregulated, they can take the gloves off and come out and say it -- "everything not compulsory must be forbidden, and everything not forbidden must be compulsory."
Mass criminalization (Score:5, Insightful)
If you lower the bar far enough, and make most everyone criminal, You can pretty much take away everyone's rights.
Once you are 'assumed' to be a criminal, just because you breathe
As well as destroy other rights you had, such as privacy.
Old adage (Score:5, Funny)
Didn't you see this coming? (Score:5, Interesting)
I would equate this level action similar to what police do in inner city areas. You live there for years and there is a murder here and there, a few robberies a day and every once in a while some grandmotherly-type is raped and beaten. The police generally do nothing and it seems this is all just happening and nobody can do anything about it. Does this not sound like the level of copyright enforcement today?
Well, one day (actually more likely a dark night) the police come. Not just your usual two officers assigned to the neighborhood patrol car, but tens or even hundreds of cops in vests carrying all kinds of heavy weapons. Anything that gets in their way gets thrown into the paddy wagon and hauled off. Some people get shot, some by accident and some because they thought they would stand up against this invasion. Like what happened in Philly, maybe a building gets burned down as well.
Three weeks later, everything is back to normal. The drug dealers are back on the corner, the neighborhood liquor store got robbed last night and somebody gets shot and might live. The police came, put up a show of force, and left. They won't be back for a year or so.
We can expect a show of force soon over copyright. China gave up and has ceased all commercial music production. We can expect that in a few years here as well. It is almost the identical situation to the inner city - if the people don't give a hoot about it, the police (and RIAA, courts, government, etc.) can do nothing except put up a show of force. It is all just a show and it will be over soon.
Just take away our computers and be done with it (Score:3, Insightful)
F**king Commission (Score:3, Insightful)
It really is high time that the EU Commission was given the boot.
And they wonder why people across the EU are jumping at the chance to say NO to the EU constitution, which cements the Commission into place...
How on earth did we get this bunch of cretins foisted upon us, and why aren't we the people of the EC allowed to say "actually, no, we don't want them, we never have"?
Democracy? Pah!
Some misconceptions (Score:3, Interesting)
What the hell is it with this unelected bunch of goons? First they do their level best to introduce patents across the EU, despite the will of the (elected) parliament, now they're sticking their noses into another area they know bugger all about.
You seem to be confused about how the EU works. The commission only proposes legislation. But nothing happens unless the Council agrees with it. That means a sizeable majority of the governments of the member states. So if bad legislation is passed in the E
Sheesh... RTFA (Score:3, Insightful)
When you come to technologies like BitTorrent or Freenet, you have technology platforms that are completely independent of what is being distributed. Going after BT because it allows infringement would be like going after E-Mail technology because you can send files, or FTP etc...
The wired article is a piece of FUD trying to scare up some controversy when what this proposal is calling for is to explicityly make criminal IP infringement through P2P. People love to argue that the law is fuzzy on whether or not it's criminal, so now they're clarifying it.
Intention is a legal minefield (Score:3, Interesting)
Intention per se is essentially unprovable without documented evidence, and any law based around intention just results in business via conversations in remote places.
we really need to do something... (Score:5, Insightful)
I have read some of the comments in this thread... I can see we are all pissed off about the way things are going but we are all whinging in slashdot without anything else to do...
I have read some recommendations about 'voting with your money' or 'Talking to your representative' but I think that is *really* not making any difference...
We must find a way to make the government hear us. Governments are supposed to represent the people in our countries not to serve as big companies servants allowing them to profit... We need real actions, movements, people, we need to fight again for our rights, not in UK or France or USA, but in all the world, we have the Internet which is one of the best communications tools which can be useful for us...
Big companies are using the globalization to get more and more of the markets, meanwhile squeezing the goverments are making they take our rights.
I am sure this will continue until there is something more severe, this will end in a kind of civil war but between consumers (us) and big companies... I see this as the next big war, but as they always say it will be a war of information , it will be a 'revolution' to get again our freedom, once, we fought other countries to get freemod (like Mexico from Spain or US from UK or UK from Germany)... now all the world will have to join to fight the big corporations, to get our freedom.
The sad thing is that it is a system a big system which everyone of us is making work, because it is in those big corporations where people like you and me work. Although there are just like a thousand people that controls the 80% of those and it is of they most interest to make the system work smooth, that is what we need to change, we need to break that system and install a new system a new freedom for information, all kind of information.
But then again I am here, siting in my desk just about to press the submit button and then I will continue reading the next story and then I will read my email and then I will just go to sleep waiting for tomorrow to go to work again... although my soul is shouting to go liberated... can we do somehting?
I am FOR this, and all laws like it (Score:4, Interesting)
I think the only way it will stop is that they go too far, and there is some kind of revolution. Let's get on with it...
Re:Imprecise Laws (Score:3, Insightful)
(Note: I'm not saying the EU is totalitarian, mind you)
Re:Imprecise Laws (Score:3, Insightful)
This can only be explained by corporatism. Intellectual "property" protection protects mostly Microsofts and Disneys.
Re:Imprecise Laws (Score:3, Informative)
Socialist governments like imprecise laws...
Maybe (and maybe not), but it's hardly relevant: as of 10th July 2005 the largest bloc in the European Parliament was not the GPES (European Socialist Party - including those notorious revolutionaries in the British Labour Party currently supporting Comrade Bush), but the EPP-ED (European Peoples Party - the conservative/Christian Democrat group): Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]. Nice troll, though.
Re:Imprecise Laws (Score:3, Insightful)
They want to criminalize what software writers create if it's used for an illegal activity, but only for a single type of software.
Virus writers do more damage than copyright infringers, but you don't see the people that create software development tools going to jail, do you? That's because lawmakers aren't being pressured by the industry to do so, so we end up with crooked laws that don't make sense... they punish a very small subset of people while other people who are essen
Re:Imprecise Laws (Score:4, Insightful)
>> You should rightly be paid for the original act of creation or performance. Not paid over and over again a hugely inflated price for each damn-near-negligible-cost-to-produce copy thereof.
> But why is this so bad? Why shouldn't the creator continue to be paid for his creation? Everyone says this is a horrible thing, but why is it a horrible thing? Is it just because YOU don't want to pay for something, or is their some grander scheme?
The US Constitution grants the Congress the power to enact laws to "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries." [senate.gov] (section 8). Note use of the word "limited". Once an author creates a work, getting paid repeatedly, indefinitely, for that work does not incent him to continue to author. If he can just take his one book (or song or invention or whatever) to the bank for the rest of his and his children's children's children's lives, what motive would he have to continue to produce?
Notice how science and art are both represented here. Consider what would happen if universities treated discoveries the same way the **IAs treated media. Research would be impossible. If no one was ever allowed to build on the research and findings of those coming before them without financially compensating hundreds of other scientists in the process, it would be too cost prohibitive to research anything, and we'd forever be living in the bronze age. Why should it be one way for science and another way for the arts?
Now Disney and the **IAs want copyrights and patents to be enforcable indefinitely, because they don't want to have to create something new which would supplant the revenues lost when their copyright protection sunsets. This does not promote or incentivize new creativity. To the contrary, it shuts the door on it.
Parent
Re:Imprecise Laws (Score:4, Interesting)
Straw man.
Firstly, the vast, vast major of contracted musicians don't see a penny from their copyrighted works, because they don't own the copyrights -- the labels do. And the labels screw them out of whatever cash they may be entitled to. Even successful artists rarely see a dime until the second or third hit album.
And anyway, copyright and payment is not a bad thing -- if it is limited for a short time. Copyright, however, is now eternal, and the original bargain made by the Constitution's framers is dead. Until copyright is reined in, it is a Bad Thing.
"what does a "free market" mean when there is only a single source of the goods?"
You've changed the definition of the goods. There is ONE source in the world for U2 performances -- U2 itself. That's what concerts are for, to obtain that unique product that only U2 can provide.
BUT, the recordings of the songs are not provided by a monopoly - not anymore - have millions of sources available for repro, are infinitely reproducible at almost no cost, and have a street value of either retail price or free. Amazingly, a lot of people are purchasing the retail package, but free seems to be popular as well. The free market has assigned its values. That the copyright lords do not agree with the reality of the free market doesn't change the reality. The copyright holders should be shudderingly grateful that people are willing to pay anything at all for a 25 cent disc.
"U2 can never compete with the freeloaders on price as long as they have to recoup their costs before they can turn a profit."
Obviously, they can compete. Bono doesn't seem to be hurtin' for money.
Bands, as I said before, rarely make money off of their album sales because of the amazing accounting practices of the recording industry. They DO make money off of their live performances, after the labels eat their share. Live performances are the way to go if you want to eat.
As for the revenues of the labels, who give a crap. They don't give it to their artists, and if you'll recall, they almost slipped a provision into federal law that would have made ALL RECORDINGS "works for hire" -- meaning the payment the artist received for recording the work would have been the LAST payment the artist would ever see, because the copyright would have been owned by the labels forever and ever and ever. And they probably would have taken the payment back from the artists for "expenses" that only they could define.
Wrappin' it up, I can only throw in my only real, extralegal reason for tossing copyright into the trash. Copyright was a deal, a compromise in the Constitution, that let a creator make money for a limited time, and then released the work into the public domain in less than 20 years. That would insure that things like "Huckleberry Finn" would be part of the public heritage, and available for interpretation and expansion or whatever anyone wanted to do with it.
But Twain's writings are STILL COPYRIGHTED, and will be forever; they are held by an IP concern which trades in the stuff like stock certificates. This is the reality. The works of mankind are now product, never to be released.
The deal was broken in the late 20th century. WE did not break it; greedy, selfish and stupid men broke it. They killed copyright by making it eternal, and made it criminal to violate their "property", making "reading" or "copying" equivalent to "stealing". Just the semantic evil of what they've done pisses me off.
They declared war on the human race, not me.
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