And Of Course: DOJ Announces New Focus, Funding On Intellectual Property Enforcement
from the did-you-expect-anything-else dept
As we all know by now, the new administration hired a bunch of the entertainment industry's favorite lawyers, and during the confirmation hearings for the most senior among them, a desire to have the Justice Department focus more on intellectual property was a key point. So, it shouldn't be much of a surprise that the Justice Department has announced new grants to focus on intellectual property enforcement. It's not a huge amount ($1.9 million) and, as per the DOJ's purview, the focus is on criminal intellectual property infringement, but you really wonder if there aren't more important things for the DOJ to be focused on these days. Still... thanks to the Justice Department PR folks who sent me a press release for the first time ever. Apparently, someone there is reading us.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: doj, intellectual property
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
WTF?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: WTF?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
$20 says it's Neil MacBride.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
DOJ owned now
[ link to this | view in thread ]
So much for "change we can believe in"
He and his supporters bemoan the fact that big money and coroporate fat cats have too much control in healthcare. I guess he doesn't care if they run the IP infrastructure and further ruin our IP laws to benefit a few greedy pigs.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Change the department title
to
Department of Protecting Media companies.
screw the people.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
[ link to this | view in thread ]
d.o.j. has to
s.3325 became, without a vote on the senate floor (now that's! democracy), public law 110-403. specifically, section IV:
"Sec. 401)
Amends the Computer Crime Enforcement Act to allow existing grants to combat computer crime to be used for activities relating to infringement of copyrighted works over the Internet. Authorizes appropriations. Authorizes the Office of Justice Programs of the Department of Justice (DOJ) to make grants for training, prevention, enforcement, and prosecution of intellectual property theft and infringement crimes. Authorizes appropriations."
where actually does the money go? lord only knows, and only the *AA care.
the only thing going on here is regulatory capture at its finest.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Its not just the DOJ its our whole system that needs to be scraped and/or fixed
[ link to this | view in thread ]
On Noes!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in thread ]
It might be a RIAA, the MPAA, it might be the Pharmaceuticals, it might be the wealthy in their community, but rarely is it the voter. Otherwise, where are the border fences a clear majority of us want, why does money keep going to banks that give it to international interests, why does every program end up costing twice as much and taking twice as long to enact as they tell us it will- and why is the guy doing the work always related to a congressman?
It doesnt matter what you believe, giving the govt the power will simply result in more debt and less freedom - always. It is because the government is owned by interests who hijack the party most likely to get elected in a particular district and people blindly vote the ticket not caring if their guy is a puppet. This administration has big $$ from the entertainment sector so expect to see all kinds of laws to protect and extend their rights and expect it to make them more money which they will kick back a portion to the politicians. Expect them to pay people to monitor these blogs and try to shame us for loaning our records...or cassette tapes... or files or even books for someone else to use or lord forbid even recap the ball game we saw last night to people sitting at the lunch table at work.
I dont think a law has been passed in 40 years that didnt profit someone or destroy a competitor. So did your party win the last few elections or the few before that...did it ever result in things getting any better? If it did then why every few elections is the other party sitting in power? It is because in order to get into power the parties must give in to corruption to get the money to win or overthrow elections.
Government by nature is corrupt regardless of party the only answer is to limit its influence by making it smaller.
If you want a big government to take care of you then you have to accept these facts.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Techdirt -- Gitmo Edition
[ link to this | view in thread ]
[ link to this | view in thread ]