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US bill favours the copyright cartels
A BILL has been introduced in the US Senate Bill to give the entertainment industries more power to combat copyright infringement.
The bill is intended to appease big US media conglomerates. The Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act is specifically designed to give US federal prosecutors the power to shut down a site's domain registration anywhere in the world.
This means there would be no localised safe-haven like Sweden for Pirate Bay's servers. If the bill is passed, users popping along to the Pirate Bay website will get a domain error message instead.
The US is so keen to get behind the bill that it was introduced by Republican and Democratic Senators Orrin Hatch and Patrick Leahy. French news agency AFP reported that the Senators are acting as the puppets of US media cartels.
"Each year, online piracy and the sale of counterfeit goods cost American businesses billions of dollars, and result in hundreds of thousands of lost jobs," Leahy told AFP.
"Today's global economy the Internet has become the glue of international commerce -- connecting consumers with a wide-array of products and services worldwide," Hatch told APF.
"But it's also become a tool for online thieves to sell counterfeit and pirated goods, making hundreds of millions of dollars off of stolen American intellectual property."
The US entertainment media powerhouse Viacom has already responded with a love letter to Hatch and Leahy for proposing the bill.
"The film and television industries are responsible for millions of U.S. jobs and tens of billions in wages to American workers. However, businesses hiding offshore are generating large profits from global theft of intellectual property in digital form, threatening our nation's prosperity and one of its most vital exports."
"The bipartisan legislation introduced today by Senators Leahy, Hatch and eight other original cosponsors provides necessary authority and flexibility for the Department of Justice to keep pace with the complexities of fighting digital theft. This bill is an important step forward to help curb rampant piracy here and abroad, and protect American jobs. We look forward to working with the Senate and House Judiciary Committees and Congressional leadership on its passage."
If the bill is passed US federal prosecutors will finally have powers over the Internet that the government has been seeking since the Bush administration pushed for similar laws during its tenure. It also seems that the Obama administration isn't a stranger to supporting laws that suppress online freedom.
Only last week we reported that the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a landmark data privacy ruling that had curtailed the US government's computer search and seizure powers. The ruling was reversed due to pressure from the Obama administration to create a "public safety" loophole so the feds could search the personal data of US citizens without having to show probable cause. µ
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Glad I don't live in the land of the no longer free,US citizens have given up their freedom in fear and the hope of safety they are now like cringing sheep!
Well, no surprise there because in US it is legal to lie? Don't believe it? You can say whatever you want on TV for example. You can also label things with stupid sh*t and it's all OK ;)
US is just a big bully corporation that thinks it owns the whole world, run by idiots with too much money. Innovation, hi-tech and such, all done mostly by foreign people, foreign ideas bought by lots of money.
I hope I don't ever go there. It makes me puke just reading about that inhumane pile of crap over the Atlantic, let alone actually be there :P
Nope, only a slight improvement.
Both parties are deeply corrupt bowing to the all mighty dollar.
Your pointless cheerleader rant detracts from the real problem, that the general public gets completely screwed by this bill.
...is pretty simple to figure out:
1) In what country is "Hollywood" located?
2) Which country has the most rich, greedy lawyers?
3) Which country has just made a public declaration equating "cybercrimes" with "weapons of mass destruction" AND which country recently bombed and invaded another peoples' country after accusing them of having WMDs (despite the absence of any proof)?
4) Which country has a media cartel pasty for vice-president?
5) Which country has a recent history of being run by its vice-presidents (who operate the lame-duck "president" like a hand-puppet)?
(Hint: the country is geographically located between Canada and Mexico).
Just remember, they vote this black, democrat because he was suppose to be better than Bush and any Republican candidate. Boy, were they sure mistaken. He's a bigger tool than Bush ever was. And getting the Nobel Peace Prize for doing nothing. I mean WTF happen to the US?
U.S. law is not enforceable outside U.S. borders, except by invasion. So, look out Sweden, you may be having 100's of cruise missiles coming your way. Vietnam, Gulf 1, Gulf 2 and Afghanistan wasted the lives of American boys for the return of lucrative defense contracts for the small number of already filthy rich American share-holders in the American armaments industry.
So Lehay told AFP "Each year, online piracy and the sale of counterfeit goods cost American businesses billions of dollars, and result in hundreds of thousands of lost jobs,". Those billions of dollars hardly ever reach the people who actually deserve it - the American working class.
It's long overdue, but the American working class will never wake up and realize that they are being conned and robbed from birth to death by the ruling American elite. And when they do wake up a true socialist revolution will occur and those hyper rich capitalist bastards who enslave all will be cast down.
Then true freedom will come to all in America.
I suggest a boycott of music, film and video products.
Censorship at any level is Marxist , you buy a Movie or CD and yet you do not own it . Funny the rich and wasteful try and squeeze every dime from people just so they can keep it for themselves .
As for me I stopped buying CDs and DVDs just because of the attitude of the Industry , if it is not mine after purchasing it , then you can keep it !
"The Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act is specifically designed to give US federal prosecutors the power to shut down a site's domain registration anywhere in the world."
Since when did the US have the power to enforce its legislation worldwide ie outside of it's own boarders?
We are in an economic recession (still), the banks have gambled away billions and these "useful idiots" saw fit to give them more, and the number 1 priority on their list is copyright protection. Of course the good Senator from Utah, Mr. Hatch, wouldn't have any conflict of interest (http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/16/weekinreview/16word.html). We need to go ahead and drop the pretense and just rename this country the United Corporations of America, or the United States of Corporate America. After all, we've tried this whole "Land of the free/individual" thing for 200 years now, and let's be honest, isn't it time for a little "rebranding" (possibly some truth in advertising)?
They can easily change numbers to make it fit what ever they want. When I first got on the wibble in the 90's we were passing mp3's back over BBS net feeds (the only real gateway most of us had for years).. Because I was young there was no way I could ever be buying all of those mp3's/cd's.. But what did result was that the few cd's I could afford to purchase I was getting based on the mp3's I heard..
So for the "millions" in sales that I "stole" there was probably a negative loss to the media companys at the time.
24$ for a new CD (if we are talking music) is the problem with the industry. Ozzy recently done an interview and he said the problem wasnt the quality of the music, quality of the publishing, quality of the writing.. He said the problem was that the artist "writers/singers/composers" are now drip fed on so little of the profits that the pay is crap.
I have a long time family friend who over the past 2/3 years has had about 5 strong us #1's (single chart/writer) and he's had to move in with his girlfriend to make the ends meet.
I'd like to know what metric they used to come up with those numbers. And if, after they get their law passed, those jobs haven't returned, the law should be overturned and the politicians deported.
PS guys. I'm in London and working, working on a film. Would be too sad if I didn't get to stop by and say hi, after all these years of reading:) Drop a line!
-Mike V.