Ganging up on Pirates...

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

I'm not sure... is someone a "distributor" if they don't actually distribute? Making it available for download should only be relevant if people who weren't authorized to have a copy got one.

I wasn't talking about the "making available" theory.

I'm trying to think of an example of someone busted for distribution of copies to authorized recipients. It's hard to come up with anything, because most distributors who aren't resellers covered by first-sale rights are at the upper-corporate level. All I can think of is something like a magazine distributor who sends out copies a week early. Or the post office (except they're covered by safe harbor provisions--but I don't know how that works if the content was labeled "Do not deliver before [date].")

First off, what is an "authorized recipient"? I don't think that exists in copyright law.

As to what you're getting at, the closest I can think of is Amazon. At one point they were selling/distributing copies of books that they technically didn't have the rights to (I think it was part of their "self publish" thing a while back?). In other words, they were not authorized distributors. Technically, Amazon was infringing the copyright, even though the people buying/downloading from them weren't doing anything legally wrong.

[Shaggy]

deleted

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

Just put something up for download, collect all the IP's that try to download it, and away you go.

Fortunately, it's not that easy. If the copyright owner puts something up for download, then there is no copyright infringement. What you describe above is just "giving it away for free". That's not illegal.

It wouldn't even need to be the actual product you put up for download, it could just be an mp3, video or ebook that said "Ha ha ha, we got you! Say goodbye to your internet."

That definitely wouldn't be copyright infringement, unless they wanted to argue that "Ha ha ha, we got you! Say goodbye to your internet." is copyrighted.

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

You're fogetting the purpose of the new laws. They don't need to prove anything, just provide the ISP with a list of IP addresses so that the ISP can hand out punishments. Whether anything useful is downloaded or not doesn't matter, since the owner of the IP address is presumed guilty as soon as they are accused.

It's worse than that. They could theoretically just start accusing random IP addresses. Forget "useful" downloading, there doesn't even need to be ANY downloading.

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by Hellmark

ISPs dont get a cut of online sales, so they dont care.

They should care, since they get paid for the connectivity. When an ISP kicks off a user, they're eliminating one of their own customers.

[Hellmark]

Originally Posted by Shaggy

They should care, since they get paid for the connectivity. When an ISP kicks off a user, they're eliminating one of their own customers.

but if they have to goto court because of the actions of that user, which is better to their bottom line? Loss of the customer but no lawyer fees, or still have the customer but being sued?

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by Hellmark

but if they have to go to court because of the actions of that user, which is better to their bottom line? Loss of the customer but no lawyer fees, or still have the customer but being sued?

The point of this legislation is to avoid *anyone* going to court. If the media corporations thought they had grounds for lawsuits, they'd be using them, on ISPs and individuals both. They don't. They want laws that say "you don't need evidence that would hold up in court; your word that someone is hurting you is enough." They want laws that say, "it's the obligation of ISPs to patrol their customer's use of their services"--rather like a downtown parking lot being held responsible for the actions of people who park there. (If those parking lots didn't make it easy to hang out in the inner city, we'd have so much less crime & gang activity, right?)

There's no threat of "we'll take the ISPs to court if we don't get this." This is sheer whining... "we can't tell you who's causing us damage or how much damage is being done, but we're ABSOLUTELY CERTAIN we're losing money that we should be getting! Punish those people for not paying us! Never mind whether they were legally obligated to pay us--they're having too much fun for free!"

[Phogg]

Originally Posted by Hellmark

but if they have to goto court because of the actions of that user, which is better to their bottom line? Loss of the customer but no lawyer fees, or still have the customer but being sued?

Are you living in some magical cloud kingdom in which customers who have lost their internet by a mistaken allegation arent going to be taking ISPs to court, backed by the local judiciary?

And if say a disabled person who gets meds for a heart condition and six other things dies during the service interruption...what do you think the award will be?


I expect this to become an empty threat in pretty short order due to the obvious liabilities it will create for the ISPs.

[Freeshadow]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

This is sheer whining... "we can't tell you who's causing us damage or how much damage is being done, but we're ABSOLUTELY CERTAIN we're losing money that we should be getting! Punish those people for not paying us! Never mind whether they were legally obligated to pay us--they're having too much fun for free!"

@Elfwreck
FYI: I'd have given you K for that but you post good stuff too often.
the board doesn't let me

[Hellmark]

Originally Posted by Phogg

Are you living in some magical cloud kingdom in which customers who have lost their internet by a mistaken allegation arent going to be taking ISPs to court, backed by the local judiciary?

And if say a disabled person who gets meds for a heart condition and six other things dies during the service interruption...what do you think the award will be?

I expect this to become an empty threat in pretty short order due to the obvious liabilities it will create for the ISPs.

Most people, if they lose their connection, they just simply go to another company. The average person doesn't have the time, or money, to start a lawsuit. About 10 years back, my aunt had her ISP drop her, with a false claim. What made it worse for her, was her account technically wasn't even the one being targeted. The person who was supposed to get their connection killed had a different name and lived several hours away from her. It was an obvious clerical error, but the ISP refused to remedy it. It would have been far more of a hassle to sue than to merely switch ISPs. I mean, think about it, lawsuits take months or years to sort out, and for the majority of them, what you are awarded if you win, isn't enough to pay for costs. My experience with lawsuits has been that way. I went after someone for vandalizing a computer of mine in a lab, and while everything was overwhelmingly in my favor (witnesses, etc), it still took over a year before everything was finalized. The award was the replacement cost of the system, however it didn't take into account the time I had to take off work to goto court and dealing with the postponements on their part, the mediator meetings, etc.

Also, a person dies because they didn't get medicine, because they weren't online? Uhm, name me a legit pharmacy company that is 100% online, without a physical store, or number to call. That is a bit far fetched.

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by Shaggy

They should care, since they get paid for the connectivity. When an ISP kicks off a user, they're eliminating one of their own customers.

Heavy duty downloaders tend to be an ISP's least profitable customers, so I doubt they will shed any tears over losing them.

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by Phogg

Are you living in some magical cloud kingdom in which customers who have lost their internet by a mistaken allegation arent going to be taking ISPs to court, backed by the local judiciary?

Don't know about where you live, but in the UK they have also slashed back on legal aid, so you would only be able to do that if you were pretty well off financially. Even then the ISP is likely to be able to afford better lawyers. They've probably already changed their terms of service to say they can cut you off any time they want. Assuming they didn't already have that right? If you offer a product or service for sale you still have the right to refuse to sell to anyone you don't want to sell it to.

[Pinecone]

File a small claim (in teh US no lawyer needed) and specify that you are also asking to be reimbursed your time, inconvenience, and any costs involved with the legal action.

[queentess]

Originally Posted by Hellmark

One of the problems is that how are they able to effectively track who does what. I've been with Charter for just about 4 months now, and I do very little downloading of anything anymore (I've stopped using iTunes, and stuff like that). Most of what I use my net connection for at home is streaming netflix, or a little websurfing. About 2 months ago, I get a letter from charter, accusing me of downloading several episodes of Boardwalk Empire, which I didn't do. I've never even seen the show, and really have no interest in it. I really have no defense against it, since how can you prove you didn't do something, especially when at the time I didn't even have my computer set up at my apartment at the time they claimed it happened (I had just moved). It is pretty much my word verses theirs.

I had the same thing happen to me with Time Warner. I don't remember what it was I supposedly pirated (I think it was something Harry Potter related?). Nope. I doubt it was someone leeching my wireless as we have a 26 key encryption code on it. All I had downloaded were a handful of the Baen cds hosted on fifthimperium, which are large files. And they threatened to turn off or throttle my usage! And shortly after that I was unable to get enough bandwidth to stream Netflix. But it's my word versus theirs.

I've since switched to WOW. Haven't had any throttling issues, great customer service, and no bait-and-switch. Two years in, and so far, so good. Hopefully they continue to be a great ISP.

[Freeshadow]

queentess that sounds great - I don't even try to imagine the ISPs reaction to a linux users dist-upgrades