RightsCorp To Bring Its Controversial Copyright Protection Tactics To Europe 196
judgecorp (778838) writes "RightsCorp, the controversial copyright enforcer, is planning to begin operations in Europe. In the U.S., the company scans torrents for IP addresses on behalf of media companies, shares them with ISPs, forcing them to send lawyers' letters (using the DMCA) demanding money from the supposed copyright infringers. RightsCorp says Europe needs its help in fighting piracy."
They recently expanded operations into Canada as well.
Re:RightsCorp (Score:1, Insightful)
Hi, I'm a copyright enforcement company. (Score:3, Insightful)
And I shall sell you lists of IP addresses for $10 each.
They correspond to people torrenting files without the copyright owner's permission.
I swear.
Re:RightsCorp (Score:5, Insightful)
Haven't we had multiple court cases and appeals end in the decision that "IP address != real person"?
I guess the people being sent the letters just don't want to deal with the legal hassle. There's a business model for you... "paying us money is cheaper than legally proving you don't owe us money". You'd think that'd be classified as extortion.
Re:Porn (Score:5, Insightful)
So your friend is a blackmailer. The more you know ~~~*
Re:Indie (Score:4, Insightful)
...unless the spurious claimant continues to assert that it's the real owner, in which case Google washes its hands and says you've got to find a lawyer, take them to court, and prove that your own work actually does belong to you.
Said it best ? (Score:4, Insightful)
There's an old cut from Fila Brazillia and they said it well ..
" Suck a tailpipe , fucking hang yourself , borrow a gun from a yank friend .. i dont care how you do it ,just rid the world of your fu****** evil machinations "
" kill yourself "
Dosen't it just sum up what everyone thinks about the copyrights lobby ?
Re:RightsCorp (Score:5, Insightful)
Also, the minimum wage isn't supposed to be a living wage.
And why is that? Someone working full-time should be able to at least support themselves. Or is that too much to ask? Actually, it feeds right into the oligarchs' plans. Keep the great unwashed too poor and busy working two or three jobs to get involved and make a positive difference for themselves and their fellow citizens.
It's disgusting. Even $10.10/hour is only $21,008/year, assuming a 40 hour work week and no time off at all. That breaks down to gross pay of $1751/month. That's net pay (assuming 15% withholding for federal taxes and 6.25% SS/Medicare withholding) of $1378.65/month (note, this does not include state or local taxes, so it's less in places where those taxes apply). Yes, I know that folks making that wage will likely get most of that back as a tax refund, but that doesn't help them on a day to day basis.
So. A single person making ~$1400/month. Please tell me how many of you could live on that. Just you, not your kids or your spouse. And if you have a couple of young kids and need day care, clothes, car, food, electricity (should that be optional?), etc., etc., etc?
But the minimum wage isn't $10.10/hour. It's $7.25/hour. After taxes, that works out to be $989.63/month. Try living on that. Sigh.
I just did some simple calculations. Apparently, that's too difficult for some people. Or they're selfish, mean-spirited jerks who have no empathy. What do we call those with no empathy? Sociopaths.
In the richest country that *ever* existed, in an era of post-scarcity (at least here in the US) with productivity through the roof and increasing rapidly, how can we allow this? It just makes me want to hurl.
Re:RightsCorp (Score:4, Insightful)
Are you willing to pay higher taxes, and higher prices on things you buy? Because that's what has to happen. If businesses pay higher wages, they will pass the cost on to you. I agree that people should be paid a living wage, but that money has to come from somewhere.
Yes. And the tax code should be modified to incentivize reinvestment so that the 100,000 or so folks those who control 40% of the wealth in this country will put it into circulation, perhaps then 30% of our children won't have to live in poverty. Oh? Your kids don't have that problem, so fuck everyone else? I pity you.
Re:Misdirection. (Score:5, Insightful)
Does this smell anything like the platform that our current president ran on, twice?
We don't need to pay more in taxes, we need to stop spending so much on things like war, unnecessary civil developments (Silent railroad crossings?), corporate welfare, politician pensions, etc. You're addressing a symptom of the problem, not the root: government spending and thieving to support private interests that are funneled through government spending.
Yes, there is a lot of waste in government. Especially on the military side. And corporate welfare and all kinds of other things. Government spending is absolutely an issue. Creating a fairer tax code would help too. Also, having economic and tax policies that encourage reinvestment in our society, its infrastructure and instruments of personal advancement (education, fairer employer/employee interactions, health care, child care, etc., etc., etc.) would be extremely helpful, IMHO.
The Democratic party and the Republican party are completely under the control of our oligarchs. Wealth and income inequality, the limiting of social mobility (through poor education, the growth of the prison population, destruction of full-time jobs, etc., etc., etc.), the rise of the surveillance (both government, and more troubling, corporate) society and the huge lies being told and believed about who benefits are all consequences of this.
The Obama administration is doing the same things the Bush administration did. The House and Senate (regardless of party) are just as corrupt and broken. Just because the Democrats sometimes *talk* about social justice and equality of opportunity, doesn't mean they're actually doing anything about it. The political theater of the "left" and "right" (if you really look at the actual, not the stated, policies of both "sides" we're not really very far apart) sets us against each other while the oligarchs bleed us. It's really sad.
Massive government spending is just another symptom. The root of the problem is that our government is beholden to the monied interests. They aren't going to loosen their grip unless we force them to do so. I wish I knew how to do that.
Re:Misdirection. (Score:5, Insightful)
United States military spending is the highest in the world [wikipedia.org] (higher than the countries in positions 2 through 9 COMBINED, and some of those countries are our staunch allies.) If you cut out our allies France, United Kingdom, and Germany we outspend the other 11 on the list on that Wikipedia page combined. Who are we afraid is going to invade us? Who are we planning to invade?
If we wanted to cut our spending to the point where we're outspending China and Russia combined by 50% (at which point our spending would exceed the combined military budgets of China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, and France) we could drop a little over 226 billion dollars. That's not a small chunk of money.