UK Court Orders Block of Three Torrent Sites

angry tapir writes "A court in the U.K. has ordered key Internet service providers in the country to block three torrent sites on a complaint from music labels including EMI Records and Sony Music. The High Court of Justice, Chancery Division, ordered six ISPs including Virgin Media, British Telecommunications and British Sky Broadcasting to block H33t, Kickass Torrents and Fenopy."

Re:My first response is "Must check out those site

[AliasMarlowe]

My first response is "Must check out those sites".

If you're in the UK, you may wish to use a VPN or suchlike. Until they're made illegal outside "reputable corporations".

What's next?

[jd659]

This game of blocking the sites cannot be won. Let’s say it takes, at best, one month from BPI or copyright holder to figure out that one site is infringing the copyright, file a suite and have a verdict against the infringing site. That process takes time and money. On the other hand, duplicating the site’s content on some other IP and the alternative name can happen overnight and is virtually free. So there will always be sites providing free access to any works.

What is more concerning here is that none of the sites blocked hosted the copyrighted works. This is something that only few really consider as a serious shift in the court system. None of the sites blocked for copyright infringement host copyrighted works! What will be the next step? Someone will create a site that will list all the blocked sites along with the new mirrored sites that can be accessed within the UK. Should this new site be blocked? Based on what? It doesn’t host any copyrighted works, nor provides an index to the copyrighted works. Let’s say that the UK block-thirsty judges will issue a new verdict to block the sites that list mirrors. What next? Someone will write a browser plugin that will automatically redirect to the current working mirror of the blocked sites and users will continue to use the sites without even noticing any blocking and without using any VPN. Should browser plugins be blocked or any sites that host browser plugins? Someone will say that it will be good enough if less people are aware of the options. But how did we get to the point that more users are aware of thepiratebay than about the legal ways of obtaining the same material? The reason is that thepiratebay does better consolidating all the media (even that that cannot be purchased anywhere) in one spot at an attractive price point. Offer something better and people will pick the alternative. Otherwise, blocking will not solve any problem that BPI thinks exists.