BPI Continues To Make Things Up When It Comes To ISPs And File Sharing

from the why-does-anyone-take-them-seriously? dept

Tue, Sep 29th 2009 2:52pm — Mike Masnick

Last week, in responding to claims that it would cost ISPs more to police the internet than the music industry claimed it was losing from "piracy," BPI boss Geoff Taylor made a few funny statements, including the ridiculous claim that ISPs used piracy as a part of their "obsolete business model" without any support at all. It appears that Geoff can't stop making stuff up. As he continues to hit back at BT for the cost claims last week, he's now suggesting that BT broke the law in not stopping file sharing:

"It's shameful for a company like BT to know that a high percentage of the traffic it carries is illegal material but do nothing," Taylor told The Mirror. "If you operate a commercial service and know it is being used to break the law, taking steps to ensure it is used legally is a cost of doing business."

Of course, it's not quite accurate to say that BT knows a high percentage of its traffic is illegal material. BT doesn't know that, because it has no real way of knowing exactly what much of the traffic is, or what's authorized and what's not. Furthermore, Taylor is flat out wrong in saying that if you operate a service that is used to break the law, you must stop it. BT also runs a phone service, but no one's saying that it has a responsibility to stop phones from being used in the commission of a crime. BT accurately suggests that if BPI finds evidence of a copyright violation, it should prosecute, but that none of that is BT's issue. I'm reminded of how Australian ISP iiNet responded to similar charges last year:

They send us a list of IP addresses and say 'this IP address was involved in a breach on this date'. We look at that say 'well what do you want us to do with this? We can't release the person's details to you on the basis of an allegation and we can't go and kick the customer off on the basis of an allegation from someone else'. So we say 'you are alleging the person has broken the law; we're passing it to the police. Let them deal with it'.

Once again, it appears the entertainment industry thinks everyone else has to bend over to make sure their old business model still works. But that's not the way the world works.

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Filed Under: music, uk
Companies: bpi, bt

17 Comments

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LoL, 29 Sep 2009 @ 3:25pm

Freeloaders.
Who are the freeloaders now uh?!

BPI should be ashamed for trying to pass not only the responsibility but also the cost to others.
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Anonymous Coward, 29 Sep 2009 @ 4:09pm

I heard a criminal listening to music yesterday. I think the music industry should subsidize police officers to make sure that their music is not being used for criminal activity.
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Chris (profile), 29 Sep 2009 @ 4:39pm

Even though what they're doing is wrong...
... they're still going to get further with these kind of messages than anybody trying to advocate that they're wrong, simply because not enough newspapers or mainstream websites want to acclaim their mistakes. Average Joe simply doesn't care enough about IP laws, and this will always be the major problem we'll face until there is more legislation to oppress us further, or simply put... It's too damn late.

-C
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LoL, 29 Sep 2009 @ 4:46pm

Copyrighted music increase criminal behavior.
And should be banned LoL

- Music incite criminal behavior and should be stopped.
- Music turn children into criminals, think of the children stop music now.
- ISP should do more to stop music from turning children and teens into criminals, any sound should be filtered.
- Music costs the public a lot of money, the industry should be more heavily taxed to pay for all that protection infra-structure no freeloading allowed.
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LoL, 29 Sep 2009 @ 4:57pm

iPod costs $30 000 to fill up
http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/05/microsoft-it-costs-30000-to-fill-an-ipod/

No wonder people turn to criminal behavior. Who has $30 000 to spend on music?
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Anonymous Coward, 29 Sep 2009 @ 5:43pm

If the law is on your side argue the law. If the facts are on your side argue the facts. If neither are on your side make something up.
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Anonymous Coward, 29 Sep 2009 @ 5:52pm

Re:
This is basically what intellectual property maximists do.

When the law is on their side they argue that, according to the law, everyone is infringing.

They would argue the facts if only the facts show that intellectual property was somehow good for society. But our current intellectual property system causes FAR more harm than good so the facts are not even close to being on their side on that issue.

So what do they do when neither the law nor the facts are on their side? They make things up.

"Infringement costs our industry 3 times the U.S. GDP" and "without stricter copyright laws the world would come to an end." They think that because they can make up some incredible nonsense stupid people will listen. And for the most part they're right (ie: they go to court in the Eastern District of Texas because they know those people will listen to their made up nonsense either because they're stupid or bias).
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..., 29 Sep 2009 @ 5:56pm

Heh
I think that Geoff Taylor is saying that he would fine with the authorities tapping his phone 24/7, you know, just to be sure that nothing illegal was going on. Otherwise, how could the phone company sleep at night, knowing that criminal activity could possibly be occurring on Geoff Taylor's phone line?
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Anonymous Coward, 29 Sep 2009 @ 6:30pm

Re: iPod costs $30 000 to fill up
Even if you had the cash, who thinks the music is worth anywhere near $30000?
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Joseph Young, 29 Sep 2009 @ 10:36pm

Recalcitrant Child
It gets even worse, if you read what BT told PC Pro. BT claim that they had a Government-brokered agreement with the BPI, but that the BPI went far beyond that agreement. Completely overboard. It makes the BPI appear like a recalcitrant child – pestering BT in the hope that BT will eventually given in to their demands.
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theorang3box, 30 Sep 2009 @ 1:27am

mafiaa
Fu*k the MPAA, and FU*K the RIAA....
April 1, 2006 - Motion Picture Association of America, Inc. (MPAA) chairman Dan Glickman and Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) president Cary Sherman today announced the historic merger of the two organizations. The newly-created entity is being called the Music And Film Industry Association of America™, Inc.
LOL
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Lance Bledsoe (profile), 30 Sep 2009 @ 1:43am

BT=British Telecom, BPI=Music industry lobbyist group
In case there are others who have only followed this story casually and may be confused by the acronyms:

BT=British Telecom (the primary broadband ISP in the UK)
BPI=the major UK music industry lobbyist group
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Hephaestus (profile), 30 Sep 2009 @ 7:37am

Re: Even though what they're doing is wrong...
"Average Joe simply doesn't care enough about IP laws, and this will always be the major problem we'll face until there is more legislation to oppress us further, or simply put... It's too damn late."

That is unless you are a pirate party member, read techdirt, or live in Canada .... GRIN
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Hephaestus (profile), 30 Sep 2009 @ 7:46am

Re: mafiaa
That is so funny ..... MAFIAA is that a spoof site or is that really the name they are choosing?
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www.eZee.se (profile), 30 Sep 2009 @ 8:43am

@Hephaestus,

Check the date mate...
April 1st...

;)
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theorang3box, 30 Sep 2009 @ 5:44pm

MAFIAA
http://mafiaa.org/
World Police for the Music and Movie Industry artist of America.
the Dumb-arses trying to shut down the Bay and half the net!
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Anonymous Coward, 1 Oct 2009 @ 11:31am

Logic
By Geoff Taylor's logic then the BPI is responsible every time one of their artists infringes on the copyright of another artist by plagiarizing their music. So the infringed artist should sue the BPI as well as the infringing artist.
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