[QUOTE=Elfwreck;2098352]
There are plenty of high-profile, isolated cases of the law going after people who cause a great deal of damage, financial or otherwise, to specific, identifiable victims online. The law is much less interested in stopping outright fraud (I cannot tell you how many emails have promised me a bigger penis if I click on their links), hate speech (Stormfront still has a website), privacy invasions, and various forms of illegal and coercive contracts.
I repeat: when I see legal action meant to shut down spam categorically, I'll take seriously the claim that the gov't intends to eliminate illegal data transfers online. Until they're willing to address the millions (billions?) of emails that promise benefits they won't and can't produce, they're not addressing the problem of "people using the anonymity provided by the internet to perform actions they couldn't legally do in person."[I],
Er, a simple Google search reveals
LINK that the DOJ has been pursuing spammers since early 2004. Gould they do more? I'm sure , but its not like they ignore spam-they do prosecute spammers.
I'm also not accepting that copyright infringement is causing more damage than DDOS attacks, viruses, phishing, identity theft, and other types of online attacks.
If you arguing that the DOJ doesn't go after those types of offenders, then you are wrong
AGAIN.
Aside from the problems currently going on in the Megaupload case... where's the assault against the dozens of other online storage/exchange sites?
The Avengers movie came out after Megaupload went down... did it take longer to hit the internet?
(Shrug) The Avengers didn't come out on the Megaupload and Ninjavideo sites, did they?
You'll find that the Avengers became available on sites where the DOJ can't get to -yet. Those pirate sites are currently beyond the long arm of the law. But eventually, the federal marshal will ride into town. I hope its soon. I want movies like The Avengers to be made in the future. They won't be made if piracy ruins the movie making business model.
They haven't given up on arresting high-profile criminal site managers. That's not the same as "bringing the rule of law to the internet." There's no attempt to go after the thousands (millions?) of small cases of fraud, defamation, harassment, and hate speech that occur every day.
If a person stood in the middle of a town square and yelled about how his ex was a vicious lying douchebag [insert string of profanity here], the police would arrest him for "disturbing the peace." Are there similar situations online? Are there arrests--or even legal warnings--for being deliberately rude and obnoxious?
"Rule of law" doesn't just mean "we go after the big criminals where the fines will be worth the cost of arrest." It's supposed to mean "we go after a lot of things, including tiny ones, so that people are careful to treat each other politely, for fear of retribution if they don't have the decency to do so for other reasons."
Rule of law has to start somewhere. You begin by getting rid of the Wild Bunch and the Hole in the Wall Gang -to extend the Wild West metaphor , and end up by prosecuting the small fry.
Translation: if it's illegal in the US, it should be illegal everywhere. And the US should be the ones to prosecute.
Somehow, I doubt that translates to "if it's illegal in Australia, we should send people to Australia for prosecution, even if they were in the US at the time they 'broke' the law." (I have written stories that are illegal to publish in Australia. They're freely available online. Should I be prosecuted?)
On the contrary, rooting out the pirates will require international cooperation. Governments throughout the world are realizing that piracy causes harm and that government intervention is necessary. The pirates overplayed their hand.
You are free to publish what you like. You may not be free to commercially exploit what you publish. That's the law, currently, in the US and Australia.
Do you have evidence for that? The claim that they're all run by the same types of guys, I mean? Or do you just assume that anyone breaking the laws you think are important must all be alike?
There's a popular myth that pirates are somehow Internet heroes, standing up for freedom. In reality, they are generally simply criminals, out to rich themselves on any Internet scam they can get away with. The pirate sites make money by hawking ads for just those fraudulent ads you object to in other contexts.