In AU, Film Studios Issue Ultimatum To ISPs

bennyboy64 writes "The Australian court case between the film industry and ISP iiNet drew to a close yesterday after the film studios issued an ultimatum: Take copyright responsibilities seriously or leave the industry. 'Businesses such as ISPs want to enjoy the benefit of being able to make money out of the provision of Internet service facilities and they enjoy that benefit. But it carries with it a responsibility,' said Tony Bannon SC, the film industry's lawyer. 'They provide a facility that is able to be used for copyright infringement purposes. If they don't like having to deal with copyright notices then they should get out of the business.' iTnews has done a short one minute interview with iiNet's CEO Michael Malone as he left the court on the final day. Also on the final day, the judge dismissed the Internet Industry Association's involvement in the case."

Re:Oh really?

[TheRealMindChild]

Also, there is nothing stopping the Movie industry from attacking DVD-Recorders and VCR's, they simply haven't. I honestly think if they wanted to go up against DVD-Recorders they would have a good enough case to cause legislation forcing VCR Recorders to lock down the types of recording they can do.

Wrong. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_Corp._v._Universal_City_Studios [wikipedia.org]

Re:Oh really?

[mister_playboy]

This is a bullshit attempt to Karma whore on Slashdot IMHO.

Karma whore? Anonymous Cowards can't karma whore.

You're doing it wrong.

Re:Oh really?

[goonerw]

To be even fairer, the ISPs and AFACT already have a procedure in place to do this. AFACT agreed to it and choose to blissfully ignore it in favour of asking the ISP to illegally do their dirty work.

AFACT can stop abusing the legal system and fuck off. They have a procedure that allows them to inform an ISP of an infringement via a magistrate, the ISP will happily comply with the request and send the agreed details to the respective law enforcement agency. The fact that AFACT have sent 0 of these requests since they were introduced almost 10 years ago proves they really don't give a shit about the ISP, or due process.

An ISP is NOT a judicial body. Infringement Notices are not legal documents and AFACT is not Law Enforcement.

Re:Oh really?

[donscarletti]

But out economy can do just fine without movies. Hm....

Well, in Australia it probably can. There is a profitable domestic movie every 4 years or so, the rest of the time it is relying on imports. If the Australian film industry was to collapse, that would be just one less thing for the government to prop up. Sure, American studios film in Australia, but this has nothing to do with the Australian box office figures, which are going to be trivial either way. If people weren't watching moves, they would be spending their time and money on something else imported from America, it doesn't really have much effect in the end.