It appears our friends in the U.K. may have big brother watching them; and you will be paying them to do it! We get wind of new anti-piracy legislation aimed at service providers thanks to the professionals at Variety:
U.K.-based consumers who illegally download music and movies could find their Internet connections severed under new legislation that will be presented to the British parliament next week. Under the proposals, Internet service providers would be legally required to take action against those who use their networks to download pirate content. According to unconfirmed reports, the legislation would force the ISPs to issue a warning e-mail for the first offense, a suspension for the second infringement and the termination of their Internet contract if caught a third time. ISPs that do not comply could be prosecuted and would be forced to make the details of suspected offenders available to the courts.
The legislation would affect an estimated six million Internet users in the U.K., but could save the film and music industries billions of pounds in lost revenues. According to the Times newspaper, Britain’s four biggest Internet providers — BT, Tiscali, Orange and Virgin Media — have been in talks with the Hollywood studios for six months over a voluntary scheme. But the U.K. music industry’s talks with the ISPs have been ongoing for a couple of years and the latest government proposals are intended to lead toward the introduction of new legislation in several months’ time.
It is not the job of internet providers to police pirating. They provide a service that allows us to get on the internet – leave them out of it. This is a losing battle and all the legislation in the world is not going to help you. People always find a way around these sorts of things – you are just wasting time and money trying bail out a flood with dixie cups.
If the studios are interested in battling piracy, they should focus on convenience, customer service and proper price points. People with vision are going to make money and those who seek to hold onto an antiquated paradigm with be left spinning their wheels. A generation has grown up downloading, it is like breathing to them and nothing you do will change that. If after 3 strikes you are out – you just switch providers. Oh, and what do you do if an unsecured wireless router is used? How do you prove who the guilty one is? Do you send the internet police?
People will buy what they can get for free if you offer a quality product; hookers have existed for thousands of years because of this. Don’t fight how people get your product, find a way for them to get it that way from you. If the studios would have talked to prostitutes instead of lawyers 10 years ago they would be in a far better position today.
I thought some might find this article topical.
It is going to be tough to moderate…But the SAG strike hinged on how they are going to make royalties with the new digital formats going forward. It will be interesting how is pans out. Per an earlier comment, people are always looking for a good, and fair deal. And industry will have to figure it out…drinking water is free, but how many pay over 3 bucks a bottle?
IN my opinion this is just the movie and music industry’s way to make even more and more money out average every day citizens. This legislation just enables those b******s to make even more money out of us ontop of the billions they are already making. Why can’t they just give the average person a break, and be content with the billions of £££ they are already making.
Fortunately, this is not going to be as easy as the quote from Variety makes it seem. For a start there are Data Protection issues here – the ISPs are not legally allowed to look at the content of your traffic. To quote the ISP Association:
“ISPs are no more able to inspect and filter every single packet passing across their network than the Post Office is able to open every envelope”
Please, I live in the UK and this is going to be one of the legislations that no one is worried about coming in to place.
People will find a way to get around it.
I am not worried
I don’t what will happen in the uk but here in Argentina I think that a similar law wouldn’t increase sells as much as the companies expect, because the originals are pretty expensive and without piracy the products won’t be a lot cheaper, although they say they will.
“…piracy is a problem in general… But it may not help your films profit but with piracy more peeps see your movie and hear you music…”
Yes, well, as far as films go, why should a film company care if you see their product, if you’re not paying?
Music? Well, this argument’s a bit more difficult to get a proper conversation going on, because of entrenched beliefs. But for anyone who’s interested, here’s a very cogent viewpoint from a seasoned recording artist, running contrary to the standard music industry position.
Worrying times… for me i dl alot of american television… that is not otherwise availble in the uk until serveral month later if at all..
The world has to adapt… piracy is a problem in general… But it may not help your films profit but with piracy more peeps see your movie and hear you music…
You know, when they invented the automobile there were two kind of buggie companies: those who adapted and those who didn’t. Those who didn’t are no longer with us.
What didn’t happen though was a race for government regulations to protect companies from evolution. Basic capitalism is darwanist. As long a government continues to regulate this issue, you are going to find laws like this that do nothing but slump progress.
A day is nigh when things are going to be very different and those who do not adapt will suffer for it. I was talking to a friend in the music business and he offered this nugget:
Concerts used to be a form of advertising. Throw a cool concert to sell CDs. In the future, we might see the opposite happen. Free music to try and get people to go to concerts, which is where the artist will make their money.
With HD technologies advancing so quickly, the studios have more to worry about than pirating. Soon people will be able to make films and record music with a very small amount of investment.
Perhaps they can convince western governments to pass laws against buying such products…
Where to start, where to start?
Let’s see: with the notion that because a group of people have been doing something for so long, ‘it’s like breathing to them’? Does this mean that a generation of pot-smokers aren’t subject to laws against the use? (For the record, I’m pro-cannabis.) If something’s a law, it’s a law. If you choose to break it, guess what? You’re a law-breaker. ‘Good luck with that!’
Or, that it’s hilarious how much like whiney-babies some people get when they have their ill-gotten toys taken away…and then rev it up when they pronounce how mean the takers-away are…and then come the stamping feet, and the crossed-arms, and the blue-in-the-face held breaths… If you stick around long enough, this ‘generation’ grows up…settles down…gets married, has kids, gets boring…and suddenly the vigilantes have become navel-massaging, porn-surfers…and then the live-alone divorced. Bottom-line, their anger and independence and self-righteousness eventually dissipates…just like their testosterone levels.
Or, how about this one: what would you expect from an industry (film; don’t get me started on how bass-ackwards the music industry has been about file-sharing) that has shown how recalcitrant and stuck in the past it is, given the strike we’ve witnessed by the WGA? But then Hollywood has NEVER been ‘forward thinking’. (Watch as Julie Christie beats out Marion Cotillard at the Oscars for proof.)
The British Parliament is simply trying to effect a solution to a problem that ‘big business’ has brought to its attention to. Why should that come as a surprise to anyone? That’s how governments work. In the UK, in the US, in Canada…everywhere.
No, this isn’t going to be a workable solution. But given how little vision anyone involved has (at least on the provider side), I’m sure it’ll make all those involved feel that ‘something is being done’.
BTW, Doug: Your final paragraph makes no sense at all: this ‘generation’ doesn’t want to pay for what it wants…and moreover, when it’s at the cinema, it doesn’t really give a rat’s ass about the rights and privileges of anyone who HAS paid. Self-centred, smooth-pated, ignorant little pissants that they are. : )
Thats it! I’m moving to Brazil!
If this legislation passes, i’ll eat my foot. On top of the excellent points you raise Doug, many of the kids who download are doing so on a computer that the whole family uses. While a parent may very well appreciate an email informing them that someone is using that computer to illegally download, they will certainly not appreciate having their internet service (that THEY pay for) taken away.
Call me a simpleton but if you type ‘watch free movies’ or some such into google, you get a huge number of sites offering pirated content. Stop spending all your free time taking down youtube clips and take down these sites. Scan the P2P networks and take down the illegal files. Take down the source. Oh never mind, they’re not listening to me;)