French ISP Refuses To Send Out Infringement Notices 302
An anonymous reader writes "Last month it was clear that French ISPs were not at all happy about the whole three strikes Hadopi process in France. Now that the 'notice' process has started, with Hadopi sending out notices to 10,000 people per day, it's hit a bit of a stumbling block. The French ISP named 'Free' has apparently figured out a bit of a loophole that allows it to not send out notices and protect its subscribers. Specifically, the law requires ISPs to reveal user info to Hadopi, but it does not require them to alert their users. But, the law does say that only users who are alerted by their ISP can be taken to court to be disconnected. In other words, even if Free is handing over user info, so long as it doesn't alert its users (which the law does not mandate), then those users cannot be kicked off the internet via Hadopi."
Re:10,000 users a day... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Free's logic doesn't make any sense (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Circumvention via methods such as TOR (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Circumvention via methods such as TOR (Score:4, Informative)
Laws like this are going to push people over to TOR, or Freenet or whatever other new piece of software that guarantees anonymity. The internet pandoras box has been opened for the recording industry. All the king's horses and all the king's men won't fix this.
IPredator [ipredator.se] works better than I expected. I thought it would be slow as molasses running uphill in winter, but not only is the pipe as fast as my own connection, but guess what you find right at the exit point: plenty of other sharers, making it all appear like you had a direct line to your neighbors. Speed is always maxed out when I us it (purely for testing of course).
Posting Anon because I fall under that stupid law mentioned above. Cannot wait for the SACEM (French RIAA) and similar to croak and die in their own vomit.
Re:they only send 100 notices this first time (Score:5, Informative)
Re:10,000 users a day... (Score:5, Informative)
Then Hadopi will last a total of three days, the internets will be clean, honest and law abding, and France will once again become the world's foremost content-producing powerhouse.
ROFLMAO.
Re:You don't have to put yourself out of business (Score:3, Informative)
A lot higher than that (Score:1, Informative)
We probably want to keep domestic violence illegal, even though it is very common in some places. (IE: Some 20% of families)
Re:they only send 100 notices this first time (Score:3, Informative)
I'm enjoying Free since i moved to France about 3 months ago, and i don't see any traffic shaping relating to Usenet or SSL, both which i use extensively. The only time i see the link go slower is when i turn on the Freebox HD, or pick up the phone, but that's to be expected.
If it wasn't for shitty outsourced customer support (i have to run to a forum where the *actual* employees post - ADUF, only then stuff gets fixed) and the shitstorm that is connecting lines with France Telecom, I'd say the package is great - nice hardware, native IPv6, pretty cheap. Tho i still prefer my Cable from UPC back in Poland.
Re:10,000 users a day... (Score:3, Informative)
That basically means the only viable solution left is no more digital music - live performances only.
Nonsense. Quote from [wikipedia.org]
Similar to the announcement that ultimately led to the release of Ghosts I-IV, a post on the band's website in April 2008 read "2 weeks!"[73] On May 5, Nine Inch Nails released The Slip via their website without any advertisement or promotion.[74] The album was made available for download free of charge, protected under the same Creative Commons licence as Ghosts, and has seen individual downloads surpassing 1.4 million.[75] The Slip has since been released on CD as a limited edition set of 250,000.
And you know what? NIN made a profit. Period. Trent Reznor puts almost all his stuff up for download (gratis and with remix license) and you can buy collectors items. He makes a lot of money on the collectors items.
Your argument is wrong, plain and simply wrong.
Re:Where are the parents? (Score:5, Informative)
Rezt of ze world means USA and UK, no?
Most of the "rest of the world" relative to the aforementioned precedent culprits including France uses the napoleonic law system. This system mandates a strict separation of legislative, judicial and administrative powers. In that system the letter of the law is followed strictly and the courts do not go on inventive sentencing and precedent creation spree which practically replaces functions of the legislative branch. Similarly, the parliament cannot suspend, amend, correct and violate fundamental rights the way the UK does on a casual basis under the pretext that "the parliament is sovereign and cannot be bound". And so on.
The law will be returned to parliament, amended and "normal service" will resume shortly. However prior to that the courts will not "replace the pariliament" and engage in "inventive sentencing" the way they do in the UK and the USA.
It is actually more "common sense" than USA and UK because it does not feed endless litigation and appeals of anything regardless how small all the way to the supreme court. It makes the law "stick".
Re:10,000 users a day... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:HERE'S A NOVEL IDEA: DON'T FUCKING STEAL !! (Score:1, Informative)
Too bad Hadopi doesn't give a f*ck about if you download illegaly or not. This thing is a frigging lottery! The equivalent of the RIAA send some IPs to the Hadopi, which relay them to the ISP, which in turn relay them to the user. No verification at all in the process, of the data comming straight out of an interested side. It's a legalization of private police.
And, as was pointed out earlier, what is punished isn't illegal downloading, but "non securization of your internet line". A good joke, if you ask me.
You're completely wrong (Score:5, Informative)
The loophole they're using is not actually a loophole. It's been repeatedly affirmed by the courts that when the gov't has to pay private companies when it passes laws requiring them to do work for them, if what is required of them is not part of their business. Example: wiretaps. Since they're not getting paid, they argue they don't have to do it. It's not just they're not getting paid yet, but the executive order outlining how they should get paid and how it should be calculated hasn't been passed yet. And there are precedents according to which that means this part of the law isn't applicable because of it.
Re:Where are the parents? (Score:5, Informative)
Not all of the US operates that way. The state of Louisiana uses napoleonic law. It's probably the only sensible thing about our state.