Effects of antipiracy in Finland

[Pumalite]

The good guys from AfterDawn.com got hit and will have to redo their site.

[Baldrick]

please include a direct link to the news...


http://www.afterdawn.com/news/archive/7179.cfm

[Noahtuck]

Holy Shit!!!!!!!

[GullyFoyle]

Meanwhile the rest of the world moves into the Twenty First Century
http://www.slyck.com/news.php?story=1038

French National Assembly Says 'Oui' to P2P
December 23, 2005
Drew Wilson


Shortly after being heavily lobbied to ban all free software, France’s National Assembly recently approved a proposal that would essentially make sharing movies and music legal. The legislation passed by a slim two votes - 30 in support and 28 against. Many believe the legislation passed because most of the lower house’s 577 total members were not in attendance. In order for this legislation to become effective, it still needs to pass the upper house, or French Senate.

While the proposal would allow the private use of sharing copyrighted material, as the old saying goes there is no such thing as a free lunch.

The amendments come at an additional cost of €5 a month for an individual’s subscription to the internet. It's the equivalent of a levy that has plagued recordable media sold in Canada. Some experts contend it's only fair to offload the cost of music onto the hardware that provides the media in the first place.

It's also an idea that is being tested by an ISP in the UK. The legislation passed on midnight, but it'll be tough to determine the reaction from citizens, the local record industry and consumer advocates alike the morning after. Although this is far from being law, it does shed new hope that free P2P networks can be worked with and not against as demonstrated by current entertainment industry tactics.

Christine Boutin, an opponent to the proposal said, "Today, there are more than eight million internet users who download in France and we still have the gall to say that these eight million people are law-breakers and thieves," she added, "but it's too late: the debate is already out there in society."

Michel Sardou, a French singer, who is another opponent to the proposal said, "If music becomes free, then I want the government's representatives who work for the public good to also do so for free."

It seems that cinema and music industries also disagree with the proposal as they issued a joint statement describing this as "the expropriation of authors' rights on the internet." They are currently calling for the government, who has expressed their own dissatisfaction to the proposal, to step in.

And who wouldn't choose to pay an extra $5 monthly to shut up the MPAA/RIAA fascists?

[fritzi93]

I sincerely hope that Sweden does not enact anything similar. That would affect this site, would it not?

[ROF]

I don't think $5 will eliminate the RIAA/MPAA from engaging in legal action against US citizens. When the MPAA/RIAA goes after French citizens you let us know because I believe that's not their jurisdiction.

In any case, I don't think the French laws have anything to do with laws in Finland unless such laws involve the EU of which the law which is discussed in the original post does not.

As a member of AD I am quite sad to hear of them having to close out a large portion of their website. Some of those tools do have purposes besides illegally ripping DVDs, but I understand the reasoning behind the decision they made to remove them. It's also going to be interesting to see what ramifications this law will have on the forums and links to such software contained in posts while discussing the legal uses of such software.

January 1st is going to be a sad day for AD members, but I'm quite sure the site will continue to provide outstanding service to it's membership and continue to provide great insight no matter what.

[GullyFoyle]

Here is the problem as defined by non RIAA attorneys

Recording Industry vs The People

A blog devoted to the RIAA's lawsuits of intimidation brought against ordinary working people.
http://www.recordingindustryvspeople.blogspot.com/
Quote:
These are referred to in peer to peer ("p2p") file sharing actions brought by the RIAA. Although some have referred to these cases as "music downloading" cases, I find that terminology inaccurate. Based upon the cases I have seen, the RIAA does not know of any specific conduct by the defendant, or of any specific instances of copyright infringement. The complaint simply alleges that the RIAA 'believes' the defendant has engaged in 'uploading, downloading, and/or distributing', and attaches (1) a short list of songs which the RIAA has itself downloaded and (2) a long list of songs which were found in a shared files folder on the internet, which is associated with an IP address that is associated with the defendant. The complaints do not refer to any known acts of copying. Accordingly, I prefer to term the cases 'peer to peer file sharing' cases, since that is what they are, at most. -R.B.

If the RIAA is creating a false argument and they are simply bulldozing people and governments because they can wield their sledgehammer like rescources, then some nations will cave into the pressure.
Others like Canada and France will attempt to move beyond big medias unethical and deceptive practices into something much more reasonable.
Some legal that defends the consumer, the little guy enduser against the big bad greedy multinationals.

[painkiller]

Sorry - Didn't see the other thread/topic that started with this story.
Yet - I'd think it applies here as well.
We may see something result from this here in the states - good or bad, hard to tell.


From AP News Today .....

Mom Fights Downloading Suit on Her Own
By JIM FITZGERALD
Associated Press Writer
Originally published December 26, 2005, 3:25 AM EST
WHITE PLAINS, New York // It was Easter Sunday, and Patricia Santangelo was in church with her kids when she says the music recording industry peeked into her computer and decided to take her to court.

Santangelo says she has never downloaded a single song on her computer, but the industry didn't see it that way. The woman from Wappingers Falls, about 80 miles north of New York City, is among the more than 16,000 people who have been sued for allegedly pirating music through file-sharing computer networks.

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"I assumed that when I explained to them who I was and that I wasn't a computer downloader, it would just go away," she said in an interview. "I didn't really understand what it all meant. But they just kept insisting on a financial settlement."

The industry is demanding thousands of dollars to settle the case, but Santangelo, unlike the 3,700 defendants who have already settled, says she will stand on principle and fight the lawsuit.

"It's a moral issue," she said. "I can't sign something that says I agree to stop doing something I never did."

If the downloading was done on her computer, Santangelo thinks it may have been the work of a young friend of her children. Santangelo, 43, has been described by a federal judge as "an Internet-illiterate parent, who does not know Kazaa from kazoo, and who can barely retrieve her email." Kazaa is the peer-to-peer software program used to share files.

The drain on her resources to fight the case -- she's divorced, has five children aged 7 to 19 and works as a property manager for a real estate company -- forced her this month to drop her lawyer and begin representing herself.

"There was just no way I could continue on with a lawyer," she said. "I'm out $24,000 and we haven't even gone to trial."

So on Thursday she was all alone at the defense table before federal Magistrate Judge Mark Fox in White Plains, looking a little nervous and replying simply, "Yes, sir" and "No, sir" to his questions about scheduling and exchange of evidence.

She did not look like someone who would have downloaded songs like Incubus' "Nowhere Fast," Godsmack's "Whatever" and Third Eye Blind's "Semi-Charmed Life," all of which were allegedly found on her computer.

Her former lawyer, Ray Beckerman, says Santangelo doesn't really need him.

"I'm sure she's going to win," he said. "I don't see how they could win. They have no case. They have no evidence she ever did anything. They don't know how the files appeared on her computer or who put them there."

Jenni Engebretsen, spokeswoman for the Recording Industry Association of America, the coalition of music companies that is pressing the lawsuits, would not comment specifically on Santangelo's case.

"Our goal with all these anti-piracy efforts is to protect the ability of the recording industry to invest in new bands and new music and give legal online services a chance to flourish," she said. "The illegal downloading of music is just as wrong as shoplifting from a local record store."

The David-and-Goliath nature of the case has attracted considerable attention in the Internet community. To those who defend the right to such "peer-to-peer" networks and criticize the RIAA's tactics, Santangelo is a hero.

Jon Newton, founder of an Internet site critical of the record companies, said by e-mail that with all the settlements, "The impression created is all these people have been successfully prosecuted for some as-yet undefined 'crime'. And yet not one of them has so far appeared in a court or before a judge. ... She's doing it alone. She's a courageous woman to be taking on the multibillion-dollar music industry."

Santangelo said her biggest issue is with Kazaa for allowing children to download music without parental permission. "I should have gotten at least an e-mail or something notifying me," she said. Telephone and e-mail messages seeking comment from the Australia-based owner of Kazaa, Sharman Networks Ltd., were not returned.

Because some cases are settled just before a trial and because it would be months before Santangelo's got that far, it's impossible to predict whether she might be the first to go to trial over music downloading.

But she vows that she's in the fight to stay.

"People say to me, `You're crazy. Why don't you just settle?' I could probably get out of the whole thing if I paid maybe $3,500 and signed their little document. But I won't do that."

Her travail started when the record companies used an investigator to go online and search for copyrighted recordings being made available by individuals. The investigator allegedly found hundreds on her computer on April 11, 2004. Months later, there was a phone call from the industry's "settlement center," demanding about $7,500 "to keep me from being named in a lawsuit," Santangelo said.

Santangelo and Beckerman were confident they would win a motion to dismiss the case, but Judge Colleen McMahon ruled that the record companies had enough of a case to go forward. She said the issue was whether "an Internet-illiterate parent" could be held liable for her children's downloads.

Santangelo says she's learned a lot about computers in the past year.

"I read some of these blogs and they say, `Why didn't this woman have a firewall?' she said. "Well, I have a firewall now. I have a ton of security now."

[jimdagys]

Baldrick- you're next.
I've been downloading all kinds of software just in case you get shut down.

[Noahtuck]

Baldrick- you're next.
I've been downloading all kinds of software just in case you get shut down.

That is not even funny!!!!!!!
Beside's, he is in sweden :P
I'm gonna have to move over there, well, that or amsterdam 8)

[GullyFoyle]

Everyone knows actions like this stop nothing. Frankly they create more of a backlash than anything else.
Big media is losing the battle for hearts and minds. Their only victories are a handfull of unchallenged settlements.
But even that trend is changing. More and more people are standing up to these foul and unjustified tactics.

[ROF]

I wonder if any of the larger companies will stand up for their customers rights or their market share in Finland now being attacked by these laws which unjustly attack their profits. Too many companies and their products on the list have uses beyond the illegal. I can understand products whose sole purpose is to defeat and copy protected material and the need to shutter those products but when you take away conversion software, virtual drive software, or other similiar software I think they've gone too far.

It should be noted some of those companies are already in legal trouble in the US because their purpose is solely to defeat copy protection.