Submitted by Yes, even more copyright and intellectual property stuff. We have several stories on this one today, so I figured I’d throw them all together. First and foremost, ACTA has finally been dragged out of the shadows and into the light (thanks to the EU parliament), so we can take a look at what’s in there. Is it really as bad as everyone thinks it is? Short answer: yes. Long answer: Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees.
ACTA
Yes, ACTA is pretty damn bad. Take the Digital Millenium Copyright Act, add some of that wonderful three strikes nonsense, throw in full internet traffic surveillance taken straight from China (isn’t that an IP violation?), stir, let it cook for a while until it’s boiling hot. Garnish with severed kitten heads and ground baby powder. That’s pretty much ACTA in a nutshell.
The United States government, led by big content puppets Biden and Obama, have clearly had a major influence on ACTA. It would pretty much export the DMCA to countries adopting ACTA, making it illegal to hack the devices you bought, such as iPhones or game consoles. The DMCA is reviled, and for good reason. It turns ordinary, inventive, and clever individuals into criminals.
While ACTA would create a theoretical safe harbour for Internet Service Providers, this does come at a price. The safe harbour is conditioned on the ISP “adopting and reasonably implementing a policy to address the unauthorized storage or transmission of materials protected by copyright”; this is almost an exact copy of existing US law. While ACTA no longer specifically advocates three strikes laws, it now does promote internet disconnections and website blocking.
The second condition is the existence of a notice-and-takedown process. For instance, when YouTube receives a takedown notice from a rightsholder, it must take the content in question down immediately; he can only restore it once a counter-notice has been received from the uploader. After that, the rightsholder can go to court. This, of course, goes against the very core of our justice system – you know, that whole “innocent until proven otherwise” business.
Non-commercial infringement will be prohibited as well (“significant willful copyright or related rights infringements that have no direct or indirect motivation of financial gain”), which is probably an attempt to make file sharing illegal (which it is in the US, but not in many European countries). Computers and devices used to infringe can be confiscated and/or destroyed.
Whereas the RIAA/MPAA/BSA are trying to get US customs to search your devices when you enter the United States, this option is not part of ACTA – at least, not explicitly. ACTA does give customs the ability to act on their own initiative, without having to wait for rightsholders to complain.
ACTA also gives rightsholders the ability to get injuctions for infringement that hasn’t even take place yet – so-called “imminent infringement”. Yes, believe it or not, big content wants to treat you as a criminal even before you committed copyright infringement.
ACTA goes into some great detail regarding camcorder ripping, since it calls for this practice to become not a civil matter, but a criminal act. Since at least one delegation has asked for this section to be removed, it might not make it into the final agreement.
“Perhaps ACTA’s most unfortunate provision is the imposition of ‘secondary liability’,” writes Gary Shapiro, head of the Consumer Electronics Association, “This obscure provision of copyright law – generally disfavored by courts – holds that a business, such as a manufacturer or Internet provider, should be liable for a third party’s copyright infringement.”
So yeah, it’s pretty bad.
The Netherlands
Since it’s impossible for me to talk about all countries that participate in the ACTA process, I’ll focus on my own country. The Netherlands has a relatively sensible copyright law that allows going after “professional” infringers while at the same time not criminalising the entire population, since downloading of copyrighted content, even when uploaded illegally, is not illegal.
There are plans to change this; the government has been talking about a “dowload prohibition”, which would be conditioned to big content coming up with suitable alternatives. However, this condition hasn’t been defined in any way, making it hard to measure what “suitable” means.
Since our government has fallen a few months ago, we are working towards elections in June of this year. A lot of parties are including segments in their programmes on digital freedom and copyright, and at least one of them, D66, has entered into its programme that internet access is a “fundamental right”, meaning that internet disconnections would not be possible. Since many (government) institutions and services rely on the internet, cutting off the internet is deemed to invasive a penalty. This party’s programme also explicitly says “no” to the proposed download prohibition.
They might want to eventually abolish the monarchy (which goes against every fibre in my body) but their position on matters of digital freedom and copyright are enlightened. They will most likely get my vote.
Dutch lobby group Bits Of Freedom is currently undertaking a massive effort to make political parties aware of the issues we here on OSNews discuss so often, which, among other things, has resulted in D66 adopting the above, and there’s a chance other parties will adopt similar provisions. This is good news for us Dutch people, but sadly, it won’t help people in other countries.
Der Untergang
Do you like those Der Untergang (Downfall) parodies with Hitler in his bunker at the end of World War II? Well, enjoy them while you can: the production company behind the film is taking them down from YouTube, which seems pretty perplexing since the film’s director, Oliver Hirschbiegel, is a fan.
“Someone sends me the links every time there’s a new one,” says the director, “I think I’ve seen about 145 of them! Of course, I have to put the sound down when I watch. Many times the lines are so funny, I laugh out loud, and I’m laughing about the scene that I staged myself! You couldn’t get a better compliment as a director.”
“The point of the film was to kick these terrible people off the throne that made them demons, making them real and their actions into reality,” he ads, “I think it’s only fair if now it’s taken as part of our history, and used for whatever purposes people like.”
That, my friends, is the difference between an artist and a content provider. Telling, isn’t it?
Wow, either noone has posted a comment yet because this topic is a dead horse, or the sheer insanity ACTA has caused all OSNews’ readers’ heads to explode.
In any case, someone will eventually find a way to work around the ACTA. And make money doing it. Exploiting loopholes (and the poor) is what America is good at.
My head certainly did. The fact that anyone would consider ACTA sane is a testament to their insanity.
personally, my head blew up
What has happened to “innocent until proven guilty”? I thought that was what our justice system was supposed to be based on.
So, could I theoretically just say that any random video on YouTube that I don’t like is infringing on my copyright and have it taken down without due process? What is our world coming to?
It just boggles my mind how idiotic these people are. Sometimes I just wish I could punch every one of those politicians in the face.
Has it ever really worked that way? These monkeys are just now figuring out how to use the available tools to make “guilty until proven innocent” a more effective net with which to catch what they think of as bottom feeders; basically every single Human Being who is not them.
ACTA is bad for the vast majority of us, the people pushing it are misinformed at best, and evil at worst, and you’d better bet they’re not going to be enforcing their monopolies over their imaginary property with anything less than real bullets.
It is sickening how they wish to extend this blight over all the world. I certainly hope that there are enough semi-sane people in power to tell these jerks where to go and how best to get there.
Well, looking at the youtube video archive, nearly 80% of the content could be removed because of that.
But there must be some way to go against this. I think, law is always a two-sided sword. Or am I wrong?
While there is actual good and legal content on YouTube, at least 80% is crap crap crap, whether legal or not.
I can’t possibly imagine what imminent infringement could be. I mean what are they going to do? Sue people that looked liked they were going to download something? The linked article didn’t have any details.
I sure can (but I might be wrong). If you have copyrighted material available via file share, they can bust you – even if they can’t prove there was any copying. Normally, it would be hard to say you violated copyright if nothing was copied, but this would relieve them of having to prove that copying actually took place.
I guess if you’re commenting on this article, you’re already making yourself a suspect
1 year ealier: http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/05/when-fair-use-fairly
Unfortunatly article is all about technical mambo jambo. Real issue is this, if someone makes video(lets call it Burt) out of small piece of video (lets call this Lester) that is made by another person and maker of Burt gets money from showing Burt is it fair use? Shouldn’t maker of Lester get some part of money from Burt maker? If you look these Hitler videos clearly it might look like that there isn’t any money on play, but there is actually alot. Even if the maker of Burt don’t get any money the site that hosts Burt might get, is it fair for maker of Lester?
but this is not the issue here, the makers of the Hitler vs. PS3, Hitler vs. GTA4 tech issues, Hitler vs. nVidia Fermi etc don’t make any money, the hosting service does through ads… and that’s a different thing
moar: http://ideas.4brad.com/studio-does-content-id-takedown-my-hitler-vi…
There has been a lot of mobile news this week like Adobe giving up on the iphone but I guess Thom’s personal vendetta is more important than providing news with technical substance.
Hey remember his streak of H.264 preaching? How well did that go?
Or, how about: I provide you this service for free and have a life, too?
The Adobe story is in the works.
Edited 2010-04-21 22:25 UTC
Because in the long run this is way more important than Adobe or the iPhone will ever be?
Thom has said it before: They do take submissions. If you have a topic you feel is important to spread to the OSNews community, WRITE about it and SUMBIT the article.
Sidenote, As of this writing, this article has 4 thumbs up, and the Flash CS5 one has none.
Edited 2010-04-22 01:57 UTC
probably because ACTA could have more impact on technology and innovation than Adobe giving up on the iPhone.
“They might want to eventually abolish the monarchy (which goes against every fibre in my body) ”
I live in a country that has never had a monarchy, so I do not understand why you would want one. Please help me understand why family heritage is a better system of choosing leadership than the will of those being led.
Why is monarchy so bad? At least, most of the time of human civlisation has been done by kings, so that system can’t be that wrong 🙂
And i think this news about the ACTA is some more important as the newest IPhone News.
Well, considering that it can really suck when a bad ruler comes into absolute power… but still, given the crap chute we’re making of things lately maybe an absolute ruler wouldn’t be so bad.
That being said, is the Netherlands a true monarchy? I don’t believe it is, as they have a parliamentary government as well, so what’s the monarch’s purpose? Figurehead?
I agree with ACTA news being more important, but it is also a good example of how a small group of people in power can royally (pun intended) screw over everyone else.
I did not say that it is bad. Just that I do not understand it. I have never lived with one, and I am curious about what it is like, and what makes it good. I know the issues of self government, like representatives following the polls instead of the long term good, and the possibility of majority abuse of a minority. I also know the good side, like the accountability of those in government to those they govern, and the ability to change things if they are going wrong.
I have never lived with a monarchy, and as Thom implies that they are great, I am interested to know why.
The monarchy in such countries is meant to be symbolic and ceremonial, and to preserve the traditions of the nation. For example, Queen Elizabeth is still the Queen of Canada (even though we separated from Britain hundreds of years ago), and most of us don’t mind keeping her (with the exception of certain groups like the Quebec seperatists).
Edited 2010-04-21 22:41 UTC
Ditto, American here. A good/bad leader is still a good/bad leader whether king, president, P.M., etc. At least monarchy would maybe save taxpayer money on insane elections that last forever (1+ year) and avoid all the insultingly stupid campaign ads we have to endure.
It isn’t. Anyone who like me has lived in the US as of late can attest to that.
Don’t get me wrong; I still love my country. But its government in recent years is not one I’d hold up as a model, or even claim to be in any way aware of our founding fathers’ principles.
That said, most monarchies now appear to be symbolic, and they generally appear to be good for PR (or entertainment). Whether that is worth the support cost is another debate.
Monarchs are immune to a nifty American invention called “Campaign Contributions”
Hah! They’re not immune to bribery, they just have a more truthful name for it.
No one gave a shit about Obama receiving $656,357,572 in campaign contributions. While if he had received even say a $1,000 bribe, it would have been breaking news on every new network in the US and considered a scandal.
Precisely. A bribe by any other name is still a bribe, even if we’re too stupid as a people to see it.
What makes you think monarchs are the leaders? They’re just figureheads, devoid of any real power that costs the state quite a fair amount of money in upkeep.
Yeah, probably less than 1/1000 of money recently given to banks as ‘bailout’. Oh the horror!
It is closer to 1/100000 of the recent bailouts.
Monarchs are not that costly. Sure in theory all the stuff they “own” has value, but are you really going to sell the Palace if there was no Queen, or do you just have to pay for the maintainence out of a different pocket?
You end up paying the same and only get a small handfull of no income, inherited wealth celebrities out of it.
I fail to see how one wrong thing justifies another.
You beat me to it.
I too found the above to be an interesting statement. This is probably the wrong place to discuss it, so hopefully one of Thom’s “random subject” blogs will expand on the statement.
Edited 2010-04-22 06:02 UTC
Not sure. Those random slow-day posts at least had something to do with OSNews. This would be, eh, stretching it.
At least one part looks unenforcable – imminent infringement. Any user using Tor could be accused of ‘imminent infringement’ under this law.
Yes, sucks for Tor users. But what exactly makes it unenforceable? Besides, as someone else already said, it is probably tool to catch file sharers without having to prove that someone actually downloaded – just ‘making available’ will be enough. Or maybe just going to piratebay and downloading .torrent file.
http://blogs.fsfe.org/hugo/2010/04/acta-threats-to-free-software/
It looks very much like big business doesn’t want people to enjoy the fruits of their own collaborative efforts.
Next up: a ban on growing vegies in your own back yard. SWAT teams to burst into homes and arrest suspected vegie growers.
I’m still waiting for them to pass laws against “imminent murder.”
‘she was by herself in the park, you were bound to chop her up sooner or later.’
Hey, you haven’t seen “Minority report”?
There is already. Start chasing someone with an axe on busy street. Police will not wait until you manage to actually catch and kill your victim – they just have to believe that murder is imminent to arrest you.
Just for the record, file sharing is not illegal in the US, but piracy is. Nobody’s going to come beating down your door for sharing a Linux ISO.
It seems that when people refer to ‘file sharing’ (as in P2P file sharing), what they really mean is piracy. I guess file sharing is just a nice euphemism.
You mean like how the IIPA uses “intellectual property” as a euphemism for monopoly?
Edited 2010-04-22 19:56 UTC
So, how long before we can see an Untergang parody about ACTA?
[Shaking head no]
ACTA is the bomb diggity guys!
Embrace ACTA!!
Long live ACTA!!!
[/end]
OOoops…ATTICA, ATTICA!!!
On a serious note ACTA is a total mess, I just I’m dying to see the news put this on TV but the people who this would affect most don’t watch TV…maybe put it all over facebook?