Experience with tougher copyright laws in France

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by Kali Yuga

Incorrect, a hearing with a judge is required before fines or sanctions can be levied.

With the burden of proof on the accused rather than the accuser ... and if it is anything like the UK version, you would also need to pay a fee before you had a chance to prove your innocence.

How would you go about proving you didn't do something anyway? I'm reasonably computer literate and I wouldn't have a clue how to do that.

Originally Posted by Kali Yuga

Should the costs of maintaining traffic lights be paid back by tickets for running a red light? Should the fines for DUI cover the costs of police overtime and breathalyzers? Should the penalties for cheating on your taxes pay for the hours of the IRS auditors? If my neighbor is making too much noise, should the police hand my neighbor a bill every time they show up? No, no, no, no.

None of those are offences that only hurt a few large corporations. What the Hadopi does is like expecting tax payers to cover the cost of having police officers in every shop doing the job of store detectives so that the shops don't have to hire people to do the same job. Except it isn't every shop that gets a free store detective, it is only the very large ones, the independent shops still need to hire their own security staff. So all you are really doing is subsidising the large shops at the expense of the smaller ones.

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by azazel1024

Those "little guys" who might simply download a movie could still face an actual penalty, yet not have the ridiculous "weight of the law" potentially choking the life out of them for a very minor crime.

It's actually worse than that. A family who share internet access could lose that access if one member of the family is accused of unauthorised downloading. These days, that would have a major negative impact on that family. It would affect everything from school work to booking doctor visits, not just messing about on websites like this one.

What we need is someone to look at it logically and calmly, someone who is immune to bribes. Put the burden of proof back on the accuser, let them have their day in court, let the court hand down an appropriate fine when guilt is proven beyond all doubt. It works for other types of crimes, there's no reason why it wouldn't work with this one.

[anamardoll]

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

It's actually worse than that. A family who share internet access could lose that access if one member of the family is accused of unauthorised downloading. These days, that would have a major negative impact on that family. It would affect everything from school work to booking doctor visits, not just messing about on websites like this one.

Nice online business you have here. It'd be a shame if something happened to it...

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by anamardoll

Nice online business you have here. It'd be a shame if something happened to it...

They aren't nicknamed the MAFIAA for nothing....

[Andrew H.]

Originally Posted by Ninjalawyer

You're applying a very specific theory of morality, one that isn't universal. The utilitarians (Benthem, John Stewart Mills, etc.) would say you shouldn't pass any law where the harm created by the law is greater than its benefit.

Yeah, but it's a huge jump from what they said to the idea that the criminal justice system has to be a profit-making machine. It costs a hell of a lot more to prosecute, try, and convict a burglar who breaks into your house and steals your TV than the TV is actually worth. But surely you aren't suggesting we shouldn't prosecute burglars?

I would tend to agree [with the utilitarians]; why shouldn't the standard for a law be that it should bring a net benefit to society rather than a net detriment? How can you justify a law that is more damaging than helpful?

Like laws against burglary?

[anamardoll]

Home burglaries have measurable costs of personal safety and psychology beyond the financial value of the items stolen or damaged. I've yet to see compelling evidence that the same applies to piracy.

[HansTWN]

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

It's actually worse than that. A family who share internet access could lose that access if one member of the family is accused of unauthorised downloading. These days, that would have a major negative impact on that family. It would affect everything from school work to booking doctor visits, not just messing about on websites like this one.

They would not lose their internet access unless they just couldn't stop the person who does the downloading from doing it over and over and over again. If that person doesn't stop after the first or second warning, the family would also have the opportunity to cut that person off from using the shared internet connection. Thus avoiding future trouble.

Overall this seems to have been a pretty fair and balanced approach. Special care has been taken to avoid punishing the innocent and it has shown to be quite effective in convincing offenders to stop downloading.

The penalties involved are also very appropriate, we are not talking $100,000 fines and 10 years in prison. I don't see how you can do any better than this, except for those of you who take Giggleton's position.

As for the burden of proof -- these are obviously cases where there is very strong evidence that illegal actions have taken place. And just as in any other investigation you are expected to provide an alibi when serious circumstantial evidence points at you. As the small number of final cases shows reasonable explanations have been given and accepted for the vast majority of investigated cases.

[Andrew H.]

Originally Posted by anamardoll

Home burglaries have measurable costs of personal safety and psychology beyond the financial value of the items stolen or damaged. I've yet to see compelling evidence that the same applies to piracy.

What are these "measurable costs" of personal safety and psychology? How much are they worth? At what price is investigating burglary too expensive? $1,000? $10,000?

In fact, these claims *are not* measurable at all. Which of course doesn't mean that they aren't real, it just points out that trying to add up monetary costs of enforcement vs. monetary costs of crime doesn't work.

And I would imagine people who have had their hard work stolen and offered for free might feel differently about the costs of piracy than someone who is not a victim.

[HansTWN]

Originally Posted by Andrew H.

What are these "measurable costs" of personal safety and psychology? How much are they worth? At what price is investigating burglary too expensive? $1,000? $10,000?

In fact, these claims *are not* measurable at all. Which of course doesn't mean that they aren't real, it just points out that trying to add up monetary costs of enforcement vs. monetary costs of crime doesn't work.

And I would imagine people who have had their hard work stolen and offered for free might feel differently about the costs of piracy than someone who is not a victim.

Exactly. And the major part of the savings that law enforcement provides for society is crime prevention. A lot of people think twice if they are afraid of getting caught and the crime rate is being reduced -- greatly lowering the overall damage to society.

So the simple calculation "how much is spent on bringing a criminal to justice vs how much is the monetary value of the damage in that particular case" just doesn't make sense.

Law enforcement is like an insurance contract. Everybody in society pays for it through taxes and shares in the benefits of security. People here are, in effect, arguing that they are not getting your money's worth unless they have been a victim and the authorities have to make an effort on their behalf.

[sbroome]

Originally Posted by Andrew H.

What are these "measurable costs" of personal safety and psychology? How much are they worth? At what price is investigating burglary too expensive? $1,000? $10,000?

In fact, these claims *are not* measurable at all. Which of course doesn't mean that they aren't real, it just points out that trying to add up monetary costs of enforcement vs. monetary costs of crime doesn't work.

And I would imagine people who have had their hard work stolen and offered for free might feel differently about the costs of piracy than someone who is not a victim.

As Colleen Doran said regarding this era of online ad revenue..

Pirates and impecunious fans inform me that pirating my work is great publicity, for piracy isn’t nearly as dangerous to an artist as obscurity.

Fame doesn’t necessarily pay, either. Just ask the cast of Different Strokes.

I made my comic series, A Distant Soil, available as a free webcomic less than two years ago. Despite assurances that the many sites pirating my work were doing me a favor with their “free advertising” I never saw a single incoming link from them, saw no increase in traffic, and made virtually no money.

Frequent original content (often pirated the day I post it,) increased my traffic, not pirate “advertising”. Pirates draw traffic from my site, and cost me millions of hits annually, which cuts my advertising revenue.

LINK

[anamardoll]

Originally Posted by Andrew H.

What are these "measurable costs" of personal safety and psychology? How much are they worth? At what price is investigating burglary too expensive? $1,000? $10,000?

In fact, these claims *are not* measurable at all. Which of course doesn't mean that they aren't real, it just points out that trying to add up monetary costs of enforcement vs. monetary costs of crime doesn't work.

And I would imagine people who have had their hard work stolen and offered for free might feel differently about the costs of piracy than someone who is not a victim.

You're right, they're not easily measurable in money (I'm not going to do psych 101 in this thread because that always gets nasty, but there are other systems of measurement than the almighty dollar), which is one of the reasons why there is wiggle room in terms of how, when, and how rigorously burglary is investigated besides simply "how much monetary value was lost?"

When my satellite dish was stolen from my front yard and I noticed in the middle of the day, a very different response was given by the police in their investigation (they took my information by phone and filed a report and that was that) than would have been given to the theft of same from the center of my living room in the middle of the night (where someone would hopefully have been sent out to ascertain my safety).

The fact that the immaterial costs of home invasion are not easily reduced into a monetary quote does not mean that our legal system does not make a good faith attempt to parse subjective difference.

Copyright infringement seems to be one of the few places where our law does not attempt to reasonably match circumstance with severity. I wonder why that is? (SPOILER: Corporations.)

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by HansTWN

They would not lose their internet access unless they just couldn't stop the person who does the downloading from doing it over and over and over again. If that person doesn't stop after the first or second warning, the family would also have the opportunity to cut that person off from using the shared internet connection. Thus avoiding future trouble.

What if they don't know who is downloading it? There's no shortage of open wifi routers where I live, and even if they have a password on it that can be cracked with scripts. There are also programs that will inject fake IP addresses into a torrent swarm, it's not beyond the realms of possibility that an actual genuine IP could be used, either by coincidence or maliciously.

All of those would be impossible for a defendent to prove, and showing them computers that don't have any unauthorised downloads on them wouldn't work either because the prosecution could just say they deleted them or bought a new computer.

Originally Posted by HansTWN

As for the burden of proof -- these are obviously cases where there is very strong evidence that illegal actions have taken place. And just as in any other investigation you are expected to provide an alibi when serious circumstantial evidence points at you.

An alibi wouldn't work on the internet, you can be in lots of places at the same time.

[carpetmojo]

France is getting to be fairly uptight place, compared to previous days....

From July 1st, in time for the summer rush, all drivers (note not just French drivers), must have a functioning breathalyser in the car.

Stick that in yer 2CV and smoke/drink it........

[xg4bx]

Originally Posted by carpetmojo

France is getting to be fairly uptight place, compared to previous days....

From July 1st, in time for the summer rush, all drivers (note not just French drivers), must have a functioning breathalyser in the car.

Stick that in yer 2CV and smoke/drink it........

totalitarianism is taking the world by storm i guess.

don't give american politicians any ideas. that breathalyser law sounds like it'd be right up their alley. kneejerk reaction to a drunk driving tragedy, name it after/capitalize on said drunk driving tragedy and BAM!, we'd have it too. state governments are big fans of kneejerk laws.

here in NJ, half our laws are named after dead children

[Ninjalawyer]

Originally Posted by HansTWN

Exactly. And the major part of the savings that law enforcement provides for society is crime prevention. A lot of people think twice if they are afraid of getting caught and the crime rate is being reduced -- greatly lowering the overall damage to society.

So the simple calculation "how much is spent on bringing a criminal to justice vs how much is the monetary value of the damage in that particular case" just doesn't make sense.

Law enforcement is like an insurance contract. Everybody in society pays for it through taxes and shares in the benefits of security. People here are, in effect, arguing that they are not getting your money's worth unless they have been a victim and the authorities have to make an effort on their behalf.

Utilitarian theory isn't based on monetary costs (although that can be a consideration). It's more the idea that you shouldn't impose laws that create harms that are greater than the benefits. The essential idea is that those passing laws should take a holistic view and determine: (i) who benefits from the law and in what way; (ii) what restrictions on liberty will be imposed by the law (jail time for offenders, etc.); and (iii) what secondary benefits/harms will result (reduction in freedom of speech, greater money injected into the copyright system, etc.).

There is no simple equation that can be done - like any theory of morality it dosn't produce an easy answer. This theory is more a rejection of morality as handed down by a god or "just knowing" something is wrong.