OK so someone will be wise and wonderfull about this – and the odd moral one who has NEVER, NOT ONCE watched a dodgy video, coppied his mates CD, has absolutly never installed a bit of softwear on his PC that he didnt buy. But for all those that do the odd download here and there (Film, softwear, music) what do you recon the implications are to the article bellow?
There is a law comming in in NZ expect it will be world wide soon – if not already where if someone says to your ISP you have been downloading, they are obliged to cut you off with no warning etc. (no proof required)
Are there other ways of downloading that cant be easily traced back to the pc that is downloading? i use Utorrent and sites such as mininova.

link to said discusion someone be smart and make it clicky.
http://www.vorb.org.nz/pirate-bay-gets-taken-court-t93021.html

A copyright test case involving one of the world’s biggest free file-sharing websites that could help music and film companies recoup millions of dollars in lost revenues has started in Stockholm.

Four men linked to The Pirate Bay were charged early last year by a Swedish prosecutor with conspiracy to break copyright law and related offences.

Companies including Warner Bros., MGM, Columbia Pictures, 20th Century Fox Films, Sony BMG, Universal and EMI are also asking for damages of more than 100 million crowns to cover lost revenues.

The accused — Peter Sunde, Gottfrid Svartholm Warg, Fredrik Neij and Carl Lundstrom — denied the charges.

The group that controls The Pirate Bay, launched in 2003, says that since no copyrighted material is stored on its servers and no exchange of files actually takes place there, they cannot be held responsible for what material is being exchanged.

The prosecution says that by financing, programming and administering the site, the four men promoted the infringement of property rights by the site’s users.

The trial could last as long as three weeks and the four accused face up to two years in jail if convicted.

Warner Bros., MGM, Columbia Pictures, 20th Century Fox Films, Sony BMG, Universal and EMI …would be fantastic of all of these went bust and stopped churning out total BS time after time!

Yes its a very crude and clunky piece of legislation – rigth up there with the clusterfck that became the Electronic Transactions Act …..
The Telcos/ISP’s (as it says int he Vorb thread) do already to a lot of reporting on this. What is a bit clunky is that ‘upon accusation’ the ISP essentially legally bears the consequences of what its users are doing, or allegedly doing. I’m not sure it would stand up to be honest but ISP’s are likely to consider the easiest option of disconnection rather than arguing the toss. I would liken it to them bearing the liability for what someone posts on a hosted website which lives on their servers. At the mo I don’t think (but could be wrong) that they are responsible for the content etc. But yeah, bad piece of law being pushed here. But as i said before the ETA is also a shocker and that I had lots of input into !

Torrents represent a valuable resource to a large number of people shareing Open Source software. Many linux distro’s are delivered in this way. In terms of TV the bbc uses torrent technology to make iplayer work.

If you are using torrents for other stuff tick encrypt

I’ve heard that folk who engage in regular downloading use products such as PearGuardian to help blacklist watching sites, not sure how secure that makes things.

Also, I’d assume that one of the reasons that this is getting out of hand is the pre-release versions that are comming out, not old copies of the Magic Roundabout.

Personally I think that the many millions profit that they’re making anyhow is plenty – and folk that can afford to get out and see the latest and greatest movie in the cinema are doing so, or buying the blu-ray disk etc.

Still, can see it getting worse as better transfer speeds and better quality rips appear along with big hi-def movies…

I’ve never understood why it’s different nicking a DVD, CD, software from the web to bike bits from your local bike shop?

Hmmmm intersting, i have always been very careful/scared about this.

We’re safe in Europe. Sarko tried a similar thing over here in france last year (three strikes and you out type thing). EU told him where to stick it. He appealed, EU still told him where to stick it.
http://euobserver.com/871/26884

I’ve never understood why it’s different nicking a DVD, CD, software from the web to bike bits from your local bike shop?

Wow this old chestnut – try thinking about it for more than about a second.

richmars – I suppose you have a point. Technically it is theft, but is file sharing really morally wrong?

If you steal from a shop the shopkeeper/owner has had to pay for the product in the first place so they are 100% out of pocket. The morals involved there are a no-brainer, by you taking something it’s to the detriment of somebody else so that has to be morally wrong.

If a friend of mine buys a CD and lends it to me to listen to is that morally wrong? Technically it’s copyright theft, but morally wrong?

The problem with file sharing sites is that rather than my mate lending the CD to me and a couple of other mates he can now lend it to millions of others as well. So in the ‘old’ days a CD that cost £10 would be lent to a couple of mates to make copies so in reality each copy in the public domain has contributed £3.33 to the publisher, ie; 3 copies in the public domain for each £10 given to the publisher, therefore £3.33 for each copy. The publisher is obviously not happy with that but it’s a situation that doesn’t threaten the existence of their business.
Now if that one £10 CD purchase is copied by 1000 people then the publisher only makes 1p for every copy in the public domain, which I’m sure anyone will agree is a massive drop in turnover.
Now the simple maths involved make for a compelling case in arguing that file sharing is morally wrong. Yet, even though file sharing has become more prevalent in the last 5 years or so how come the ‘record industry’ sold more music legally in 2008 than at any other time in the last 10 years?

Yes i have seen that the EU kicked it out, but good ol NZ and our wonderfull (ex) labour decided that we should try to set an example to the world AGAIN – FFS so here we are saddled with another piece of stupid crap! thats probably unworkable! its like the few 100,000 or so people in NZ who are ever likely DL something illegal as apposed to the millions in Europe……..

File sharing is OK, breaking copyright is not however there is stuff in the middle that is a little grey.

Is it wrong to download an episode of Dr Who when I am abroad and still paying a license fee? What about if I have a CD and it is nicked and I want to replace it? The solution is a change in the way things are sold in the first place. Torrents are a great way of distributing stuff. I think somebody just released an album on the pirate bay rather than in the shops, Radiohead made more per sale by selling the album as download then through a record company even when you could get it for free

Lots of grey with file sharing, isn’t there?
There’s a strong case for allowing the distribution of TV programs after airing- not everything goes to dvd, missed episodes in serials, and the fact that tv shows are not normally bought on a per show/episode basis by the consumer.

A school of thought also says that the proliferation of cracked and torrented commercial software is in the interests of the software house, in the same way as selling heavily discounted student versions is- that the student uses said package during training and looks for it as their default tool in the commercial world, which is where the money is.

Films are a different matter in my opinion- I can’t really think of a justification for picking them up from torrents… but am willing to be educated.

There is a law comming in in NZ expect it will be world wide soon…

I believe that is purely wishful thinking on the behalf of the meedja industry.

The music industry has been fighting a losing battle and people will not accept that their ISP has the power to cut them. It is impossible to monitor what is illegal and what is not. A lot of legit stuff is being downloaded through bittorrent.

What really annoys me is that everyone but the record companies can see that times are changing. They were raking in money for many years and technology has now caught up in terms of perfect copies everytime. I had a CD writer over 10 years ago. Its not like it’s a surprise this was going to happen. They haven’t reacted to what was going on.

Apple saw it, with iTunes, and the record companies did all they could to keep the price of music up even though distribution, and manufacturing costs have all but disappeared by delivering electronically.

Now, as broadband speeds and compression technologies improve, the same is happening to video. What’s the film studios response? Have they learnt nothing? Threatening behaviour is not going to stop it.

Whether it is morally right or wrong is not the argument here. It is going to happen. So deal with it. Make it not worthwhile to download a pirate copy. Offer albums at £4, and movies for £5.

We’re safe in Europe. Sarko tried a similar thing over here in france last year (three strikes and you out type thing). EU told him where to stick it. He appealed, EU still told him where to stick it.

Hmm. I’d like to think so, but the discussion about what might be in the next Communications Bill is not very comforting.

deadlyhifi – the music industry has already wised up that times are changing and have changed their business models accordingly. As I said in a previous post there was more music sold in 2008 than in any of the previous 10 years because of the growth in legal downloads.

It’s been proposed before by more learned people than myself that file sharing is nowhere near the menace that the music industry makes out, but is instead a smokescreen for justifying the ridiculous prices being charged for legal downloads. Even though there is no manufacturing and distribution costs they can still charge 60p-£1 per song because they claim to be losing so much revenue in illegal downloads.

I have just finished downloading the barnett’s bicycle maintenance book off a torrent site, better than any film or music CD I have done. Okay it is a little too much to print but if i get stuck then 2 mins reading on the computer will help with any bike related problem 😀

The music industry also like to claim that every download is a lost sale, which is just absurd.

Offer albums at £4, and movies for £5.

Lots of albums are actually THREE pounds here
http://www.amazon.co.uk/MP3-Music-Download/b?ie=UTF8&node=77197031
with no DRM at all. can be copied onto your laptop/MP3 player/work computer etc.. problem free.

Charging 8 quid for a downloaded album is ridiculous. They are often cheaper on CD from HMV etc..

I dont’ want to defend downloading films, but the media industry REALLY needs to catch up and start offering them for download in a legal manner without covering them in an enmourmous amount of copy protection like iTunes did. Its counterproductive.

I’ve just been looking at changing broadband supplier. I almost did but then eventually didn’t go with Virgin specifically because of their anti-torrent stance.

HH is right, the media industry has got some serious soul searching to do.

The future is FREE, future business models will vary massively from what we (well maybe not fully ensconced internet users) are used to. We have a growing generation of young internet savvy people who are not used to having to pay for things. 20 years ago if you wanted the news, you went out and bought a newspaper, the same went for job adverts, second hand goods etc.

Open Source s/w developers do it already. Say you develop an open source product, it works well and big business wishes to use it. great, how do you make money? big business will be willing to pay for support for free products which funds or at least makes insignificant the fact that smaller and private users don’t pay for the s/w. Some big companies like IBM already develop and release open source s/w which under current business models would seem to make little sense.

Media need to latch on to this ‘Free future’ before the get left a very very long way behind.

Piracy really is the troublesome older brother of corporately subsidised media sharing, it’s here to stay but one day we’ll have forgotten about it’s misdemeanors

As an aside to Jamie’s “too true to be funny” poster, mrsDezB bought me a DVD for Xmas and it’s got a F**king SNICKERS advert on it! It’s like they want us to use pirates.

#
samuri:

I almost did but then eventually didn’t go with Virgin specifically because of their anti-torrent stance.

Really? Guess I must be with a different Virgin Media.

DezB :

As an aside to Jamie’s “too true to be funny” poster, mrsDezB bought me a DVD for Xmas and it’s got a F**king SNICKERS advert on it! It’s like they want us to use pirates.

I love the people who say that using peerguardian can block “watching” sites – what a chuckle, I mean assuming there’s soemone watching in the first place, who in their right minds would set up the watching system under a fixed IP that is known to be linked to a watching organisation? I’m fairly sure they’d have thought of that, since its possibly the most easy method of them being spotted.

‘Home Taping is killing music’

No, it din’t. The music industry grew.

‘VHS piracy harms the film industry’

No, it din’t. The film industry has grown.

Torrents are harming the music and film industries’

Ermm…

DezB raises agood point. So many ads in a DVD now, you may as well have it for free. These industries just want as much money as possible, to line their pockets. While there are talentless chunts like 50Cent and Poof Daddy out there, earning millions, then people should be working to reduce the greedy bastards profit margins.

I downloaded a copy of Wall-E. Watched it, absolutely loved it. Will be buying the DVD, to have the best possible quality. Might even get the Blu-Ray version! And I NEED Wall-E and EVE toys to sit on my desk. And I really regret not going to the cinema to see it.I will definitely go, if it comes on again. And I’ll probbly want to buy copies of whatever media exists in 50 years or so, to show my kids/grandkids etc.

See, quality will always sell. It’s the shite that keeps on being pushed at us, that is a waste of money. The film industry could save themselves hundreds of millions a year, by simply not producing crap like some of these ‘teen’ materialistic bullshit films. Likewise with music, and 50Cent etc.

I think it’s more immoral to try and charge for shit like that, than to download stuff for free.

After all, it’s an ‘entertainment’ industry. I would rather download stuff, and give the money to try and help people in’t Third World, or sick kiddies or whatever. Far more important.

I suspect people who handle a couple of hundred meg will fall below the radar Jamie, they’re looking for prolific uploaders, not occasional downloaders. The virgin anti-torrent trial was well documentated with a number of reports of actual warning letters being sent out. I’d rather not get involved with any company who even starts making nioses in that direction.

Couple of hundred mb? It works out as roughly 2GB up/down per day…..would be more but there is usenet.

Anyways,

After only a day suprise, suprise:

“Pirate Bay joy at charge change

Half of the charges levelled at the founders of the Pirate Bay file-sharing site have been dropped.

Swedish prosecutors dropped charges relating to “assisting copyright infringement” leaving the lesser charges of “assisting making available copyright material” on trial day two.”

BBC Linky

surely putting anti piracy clips and notices in legally bought dvds is a bit of an oxymoron?

its theft, no doubt, but then again, music is far too expensive anyway.
any moron can make a cd now, at about 7p each commercially.
the britschool and radio1 prove no talent or skill is needed. the industrys saturated with talentless generic tossers, who make it hard for genuine skill to shine through.
If i think an artist is worth supporting, ill happily pay to go and see them, or buy thier tracks.
also, if youve bought an album on LP, you own a certain amount of rights to the tracks. should you have to pay for it again to get the same album on CD, MP3 or any other format?

All this effort goes into wringing more money from us in the west
and yet in asia and china especially piracy is everywhere, most shops apparently dont know which copies they have are pirated and which genuine

if dvds and cds were priced more affordably say a quid for an album download then im sure they would be sellng like hot cakes
the industry is too greedy they would still turn a huge profit and for **** sake
do you realise what a monopoly that jizbag simon cowel has on the charts at the moment ???

and if a movie is good enough i want the box set anyway
the trouble is that virtualy every movie you ever see falls into 2 catagories
a remake/sequel/reimaging
or
a star vehicle

any time a decent and/or original film comes out it will sell it makes a good xmas or birthday gift or whatever
maybe hollywood should stop churning out so much cr@p and they would be better off

surely putting anti piracy clips and notices in legally bought dvds is a bit of an oxymoron?

Kinda the point of the poster..

See, quality will always sell. It’s the shite that keeps on being pushed at us, that is a waste of money

Exactly. I will buy decent albums, the ones which I’ve downloaded and liked. I will also go to thier gigs.

I got fed up with hearing 1 song on the radio and having to pay 10 quid to realise that the rest of the album is utter dross.

As for films, Lovefilm all the way. Blockbuster have transformed themselves into my Xbox game source since they offer such a good range of secondhand games.

Those posters are great, while I do buy the odd film I tend to rent mine from LoveFilm.com and the anti-piracy trailers are naff and annoying.

I feel that in this situation the law does not work because people, en mass, refuse to obey it. Short of locking up a large proportion of the planet or starting a stasi like ‘net police the industry will have to adapt to the new situation.

I for one will continue to support people like JK Brodrick (Jesu, Final, Godflesh) who make their own music and distribute it for pretty much nothing for the fans rather than to support the coke habbits of Time-Warner exects!

SSP

in asia and china especially piracy is everywhere, most shops apparently dont know which copies they have are pirated and which genuine

this is only because of an historical absence of the pirated/copied brands in that market

down the street from the infamous Yashow market in Beijing where you can buy counterfeit EVERYTHING is a new shopping development including shops from most of the big clothing retailers. being as the brand itself is the perceived value of most fashion clothing it won’t be long before they go after the counterfeiters. The big brands hold too much sway over the export market of the Tiger economies for their governments to risk them going elsewhere/disappearing

I live in Spain but my Spanish isnt good enough to enjoy programs on Spanish tv. BBC iplayer doesnt let me watch anything because i´m in the wrong region, it´s illegal for me to set up a satellite reciever and receive British transmissions, so what do they expect me to do other than download stuff. I dont mind paying for stuff but borders in europe still exist when it comes to television, so sod em.

I use Torrents now & again. Mainly to download Lost because Virgin wont give Sky1 to basic package customers. Virgin throttle your bandwidth now & again for excessive downloading, but they’ve not switched me off yet.
I use LegalSounds for music downloads & that’s probably not much more ethical than Torrents anyway. In all honesty though, if I like an album that much I’ll buy it on CD.
As for software, if its a decent enough program I’ll happily pay the small prices they usually ask anyway. Musicmatch jukebox was one program I paid for. A superb little package for about £12.
Films are a different matter, I’m not a regular cinema goer so its not like the odd flick I get to watch from a Torrent is stopping me going to the cinema anyway.

Apparently the future is bundled Music with Broadband packages.

I’d be lying if I said i don’t use torrents.

Mackem – you can use a proxy to mask your internet address to appear as if it’s from the UK and iplayer will work.

LOL at 7p to make a CD commercially. If only…