01.15.14

Copyright Law May be Reformed in the West, Infringement (For Now) Treated as Worse Than Murder and Rape

Posted in Intellectual Monopoly at 7:36 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: It is becoming clear that amendment of laws (for the better) is now treated like “terrorism” (or worse, based on espionage-driven surveillance of regulators in the EU) and those who claim to be enforcing copyright law are actually breaking the law

BRITISH ISPs seem eager to censor those who suggest copyright reforms (Web sites blocked for delivering news which those in power don’t agree with). One site that blocked British ISPs that used DPI has just shared an interesting post titled “Opposing Copyright” [1] and other sites with an alternative message write about the travesty of Public Domain being lost to the copyright cartel/monopoly [2,3]. If only more people had access to such views… instead we have the copyright moguls/Hollywood structuring our schools' curriculum to indoctrinate children regarding copyrights.

“The US special forces target Dotcom like he is a terrorist, raiding his mother’s house in Germany (at gunpoint) and illegally raiding his own house in New Zealand.”There are talks about copyright reforms right now. It’s happening in the US [4], central Europe [5] (Web site blocked by some British ISPs, so see original in [6]), and in the UK (article from November) [7]. It should be noted that Google deserves some credit for helping copyright reform [8,9] (in self interest) and promoting Fair Use [10], unlike Rupert Murdoch’s Fox [11] (news site blocked by British ISPs). There are many misconceptions [12,13,14] (last news site blocked by British ISPs) and it leads to out-of-control attitude towards sharing sites (which can also be misused by users).

Take Kim Dotcom for example. The US special forces target Dotcom like he is a terrorist [15], raiding his mother’s house in Germany (at gunpoint [16]) and illegally raiding his own house in New Zealand [17]. The only criminals here are those who sent out dozens of people with rifles to his house, which had many kids in it and a father who is innocent (but an easy target for Hollywood).

Now take the Pirate Bay’s founders, who are treated worse than mass murderers from the same bunch of countries (Scandinavia) [18,19] (the latter news site is blocked by British ISPs). What does that say about the priorities of these states? It’s all corrupt. They blame people rather than blame bad laws which make sharing illegal if anonymous users — not administrators — may upload some infringing material.

“It sure seems like those who claim to be enforcing the law are the real criminals and instead of adopting reasonable legislation they are going after the messengers and the activists, making an example out of scapegoats.”The zealous pursuit has led more people to proudly state “I am a Pirate” [20] (British Pirate Party, which has just added numerous people to its ranks). In Britain, the BBC proves that business models are the real problem [21] and the City Of London Police proves that it itself — not some so-called ‘pirates’ — is the criminal [22] (this news site is blocked by British ISPs). The City Of London Police is taking down sites on behalf of businesses, without even a trial. This is illegal. It’s overreach.

Last but not least, “Viewing Pirated Streams is Not Illegal, German Govt Says,” [23] but you might not know it because this news site is blocked by British ISPs.

So much for protecting the law, eh? It sure seems like those who claim to be enforcing the law are the real criminals and instead of adopting reasonable legislation they are going after the messengers and the activists, making an example out of scapegoats. █

Related/contextual items from the news:

1. Opposing Copyright

   This brilliant criticism of monopoly is spoiled only by the false assertion that it’s a necessary evil, but clearly it isn’t, it’s merely a misguided convenience with no actual benefit to anyone except the monopolist, and even then only a marginal benefit at best.

2. What Could Have Entered the Public Domain on January 1, 2014?

3. The Grinch Who Stole The Public Domain

   As they do every year, unfortunately, the good folks at the Center for the Study of the Public Domain at Duke have put together a depressing list of what should have entered the public domain yesterday. As you hopefully know, until 1978, the maximum amount of time that work in the US could be covered by copyright was 56 years (you initially received a 28 year copyright term, which could be renewed for another 28 years). That means, back in 1957, everyone who created the works in that list knew absolutely, and without a doubt that their works would be given back to the public to share, to perform, to build on and more… on January 1, 2014 at the very latest. And they all still created their works, making clear that the incentive of a 56 year monopoly was absolutely more than enough incentive to create.

4. Copyright Week: Taking Copyright Back

   Copyright used to be a pretty specialized area of law, one that didn’t seem to affect the lives of most people. But with the proliferation of digital technologies and the Internet, a funny thing happened: copyright policy became speech policy, and it started to show up in all sorts of unexpected and unwelcome places.

5. EU Offers Public a Chance to Fix Copyright Law

   Copyright and the Internet have been struggling to get along for many years and some feel we are now due a comprehensive update of the former in order for it to work more harmoniously with the latter. In deciding how to progress the EU Commission has opened a public consultation which allows all citizens – even those in the U.S. – a rare opportunity to change the path of copyright law. But with just three weeks left, time is ticking away.

6. Reform of EU copyright rules: your chance to give your views!

7. Dear government, copyright reform – is it happening?

   These are beguiling but bad arguments. People dislike legal risks, so avoid them. We also know plenty of people get caught up in disputes, even resulting in Youtube takedowns, when parodies are accused of copyright infringement. Such actions are an infringement of free expression, yet do no real harm to copyright owners. Many countries, including copyright hardliners like France and the US, have legal protection for parodies.

8. Glorious day!

   Google has launched a simple way to filter Google images by reuse rights.

9. How to filter Google image searches by usage rights

10. Google Books is fair use

    After almost a decade of litigation, on 14 November the Southern District Court of New York has ruled on the class action Authors Guild v Google. Judge Chin, who had rejected in March 2011 the agreement proposing to settle the case, found that the activities carried out in the context of the Google Books project do not infringe copyright. In a nutshell, the ruling affirms that reproducing in-copyright works to make them searchable on the Internet is a fair use under US law.

11. Simpsons Pirate Ordered to Pay Fox $10.5 Million in Damages

    A lawsuit against a man who ran websites which linked to episodes of The Simpsons and Family Guy has ended in the most expensive way possible. The judgment, which awards Fox $10.5 million in statutory and punitive damages, is the highest amount ever awarded by the Federal Court in Toronto, Canada. Speaking with TorrentFreak, the target of the lawsuit says that he is now going through a bankruptcy and Fox are chasing “as hard as they possibly can” for the money.

12. Internet streaming won’t save music – the industry still relies on hits

13. Shia Labeouf Brilliantly Parodies Intellectual Property With Plagiarized Apologies And Defense Of Plagiarism

    I’ll admit that, other than knowing his name and that he was a Hollywood actor in some big budget films, I didn’t know very much at all about Shia LaBeouf. However, apparently he’s been facing some “controversy” over a few different examples of plagiarism in his work, with the “biggest” being plagiarizing a cartoon by Daniel Clowes called Justin M. Damiano with the short film HowardCantour.com. Others also pointed out that, in a comic book created by LaBeouf, he apparently plagiarized a bunch of others, including Kurt Vonnegut and Charles Bukowski (if you’re going to plagiarize, plagiarize from the best, apparently).

14. File-Sharing Boosts Creation of New Hit Music, Research Finds

    New research published by Tulane University Law Professor Glynn Lunney shows that online piracy is linked to the creation of more hit music. The increase in output can be attributed to existing artists, who make up for a decline in new hits from newcomers. This counter-intuitive finding suggests that file-sharing advances the core purpose of copyright, and that it should be permitted under copyright law.

15. FBI lead officer speaks out about Dotcom case

16. Kim Dotcom Raid: Megaupload Founder’s Mother Held At Gunpoint , BMW Seized

    Kim Dotcom has seen an internet piracy case tighten around him, and now even the family of the controversial mogul is feeling the heat.

    Reports this weekend said that authorities raided the New Zealand mansion of the Megaupload founder and also targeted this mother’s house in Germany, searching for a car Kim bought for her.

17. Kim Dotcom: The Man Behind Mega

    In October 2013, VICE News was invited to visit the infamous tech mogul and creator of Megaupload, Kim Dotcom, at his palatial property in New Zealand. Even though Kim is under house arrest—since he’s at the center of history’s largest copyright case—he’s still able to visit a recording studio in Auckland. So check out this brand new documentary we made at Kim’s mega-mansion and in the studio where our host, Tim Pool, got to lay down some backup vocals for Kim’s upcoming EDM album while talking about online surveillance, file-sharing, and Kim’s controversial case.

18. Pirate Bay founder Gottfrid Svartholm Warg gets an extended prison stay

    ONE OF THE FOUNDERS of The Pirate Bay, Gottfrid Svartholm Warg, has had his prison sentence extended until 5 February, despite widespread popular support for his release.

19. 50,000 Call to Free Pirate Bay Founder as Court Extends Custody

20. Sephy Hallow: Why I am a Pirate

    My name is Sephy Hallow, and as of December 2013, I became the first ever Deputy Leader of PPUK. As a 25-year-old graduate with a degree in Literature from York, I’m one of the youngest people to be in a position of political leadership in the country, and at times, I ask myself why I’ve been afforded this opportunity. What makes my voice any different from the sound bites of our mainstream politicians? What do I have to say that is any more valid, any better? And why do I deserve to be given a podium to speak from?

21. BBC Fights TV Piracy By Rushing Sherlock Holmes to the East

    Unavailability of content is one of the key drivers for online piracy so it’s of great interest that the BBC has made a pioneering move with one of its current hottest properties. In an attempt to reign in what some describe as rampant infringement, the UK national broadcaster has struck a deal to broadcast Sherlock Holmes on a Chinese streaming platform just hours after its UK debut.

22. City Of London Police Cannot Seize Domains Just Because Hollywood Says The Websites Are Infringers

    Last fall, we noted that the City of London Police, who had just set up a special “intellectual property crime unit” which appeared to be taking orders directly from Hollywood, had issued bizarre orders to registrars, based on no court order or ruling, that they hand over domain names to the police, point them to a splash page that advertised Hollywood-approved businesses, and block the transfer of those domains to anyone else. A bunch of registrars actually did this, despite the lack of a court order or ruling of any kind. Just because the City of London Police said so. The only registrar who apparently resisted was EasyDNS, who pointed out that there’s such a thing called due process. Furthermore, EasyDNS pointed out that the registrars who complied with the order almost certainly violated ICANN policies for registrars, which has a very specific set of conditions under which a registrar can freeze a whois record, none of which include “because some Hollywood-controlled police force says so.”

23. Viewing Pirated Streams is Not Illegal, German Govt Says

Permalink  Send this to a friend