UK ISPs To Send Non-Threatening Letters To Pirates 93
New submitter echo-e writes: "A deal has been made between groups representing content creators and ISPs in the UK concerning how the ISPs should respond to suspected illegal file sharers. In short, the ISPs will send letters or emails with an 'educational' rather than threatening tone, alerting users to legal alternatives. The rights holders will be notified of the number of such alerts that have been sent out, but only the ISPs will know the identity of the offenders. Only four of the UKs ISPs have agreed to the 'Voluntary Copyright Alert Programme' so far, but the remaining ISPs are expected to join the programme at a later stage. The debate between rights holders and ISPs has raged on for years. This agreement falls short of the of the proposals put forward by the rights holders groups, but the ISPs have argued that it is not their responsibility to police users and that a legal process already exists for going after individuals."
Re:Why? (Score:5, Interesting)
I see it as basically advertising. ISPs agree to "alert[] users to legal alternatives", i.e. to send them junk mail promoting some streaming services.
Not really a huge win for the "groups representing content creators", but an agreement that ISPs will send free junk mail advertising your stuff is probably better than nothing. It's also at least targeted towards people who care about films/music/whatever, some subset of whom might actually be potential customers.
Re:Why? (Score:5, Interesting)
The music industry is even paying for it £750,000 to set it up, and then £75,000 a year every year afterwards. I can't help but think the ISPs may even be profiting from this.
I don't know what happened, it's like the industry has realised it can't win, that even if it did push through what it wanted - the ability to extort money from people and block them from the age old right to trial and has basically just conceded on every point that matters.
There did seem to be a suggestion that if it didn't work then they could go back to the drawing board but that's a long way off, and if they couldn't win harsher penalties or the ability to bypass the right to a fair trial or the right to privacy this time then I'm not convinced they ever will. I suspect they've conceded that their business isn't in fact above fundamental human rights after all and that no court would let that stand in the long run.
This seems to be extraordinarily good news for once on this front, effectively one of the two most controversial measures in the Digital Economy Act has arrived 4 years late after numerous delays and now that it has has been well and truly gutted.
Maybe Google's closeness and lobbying of the current government and funding for their pet projects like Silicon Roundabout has finally paid off? Maybe the fact tech companies have far far more money than the music and movie industry is finally bearing fruit? Maybe the move of Ian Livingstone from BT to government trade minister has had an impact? Has tech finally learnt how to outplay the music industry at the great lobbying game in the UK?
Comment removed (Score:4, Interesting)