Seriously: Where Is The Link Between Copyright Infringement And Terrorism/Organized Crime

from the point-it-out dept

Fri, Jan 29th 2010 7:39pm — Mike Masnick

Over the past few years, the entertainment industry has been pushing hard on the claim that copyright infringement and organized crime (or terrorism) are somehow connected. It's a regular talking point and is often brought up in discussions about ACTA. And yet, where is this supposed link? Glynn Moody discusses what a bogus concept it is, and why a new EU report is massively discredited in simply taking the claim at face value:

I've noted several times an increasingly popular trope of the intellectual monopolists: since counterfeiting is often linked with organised crime, and because counterfeiting and copyright infringement are vaguely similar, it follows as surely as night follows day that copyright infringement is linked with organised crime.

But, of course, that's not the case. In fact, those who traffic in things like counterfeit DVDs are discovering that unauthorized access to online files is actually harming the counterfeit DVD business that organized crime has used in the past. Based on the logic put forth by the entertainment industry, shouldn't we cheer on The Pirate Bay for putting DVD counterfeiters (and thus, organized criminals and terrorists) out of business?

Moody goes on to challenge the idea that copyright infringement leads to people being put in harm's way:

*Counterfeiting* can certainly be a threat to consumer health and safety, and needs to be combated vigorously, but the idea that copyright infringement might be is simply risible, and it's an insult to our intelligence even to suggest it.

Indeed. This is a problem. So, let's start calling the industry on this. Can they show any actual evidence that basic online copyright infringement is in any way linked to organized crime or terrorism?

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Filed Under: copyright, counterfeiting, organized crime, terrorism

118 Comments

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Anonymous Coward, 29 Jan 2010 @ 8:46pm

Evidence isn't exactly something the industry has shown for...well...anything.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 12:16am

Re:
Evidence of absence is not the same as the absence of evidence.
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zcat (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 1:02am

Irrefutable link.

Piracy has a promotional effect; more generally piracy leads to greater legitimate sales. Many studies support this, even some paid for by the recording industry themselves (http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20090604/0117405122.shtml)

This obviously benefits the recording industry.

And you only need look at a typical recording contract (http://www.negativland.com/albini.html) to see that the recording industry ARE organised crime.
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Richard (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 2:38am

And drugs
The other standard association is with drugs.

This is equally ridiculous.

In fact one of the major causes of our current drug problem is the drug use of artists under major label contracts.
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Spanky, 30 Jan 2010 @ 2:47am

re
No, no, no. You're all missing the point. The entertainment industry IS organized crime, and they don't want infringement. See?
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Devonavar (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 3:45am

Well, technically they are correct...
Technically, copyright infringement is a crime. And the release scene is certainly organized after a fashion. It is premeditated, planned, and done in a way to avoid detection. Thus, the sources of most copyrighted material on the internet can certainly be characterized as organized crime. It's highly benign organized crime, but the label is technically correct.

The problem is, "Organized Crime" as a label carries all sorts of connotations with drugs, prostitution and other "gang" activities. Which means that, when copyright infringement is characterized as being a result of organized crime, we naturally assume it is associated with those other, undesirable activities, even though there is no such link.

It's a rather unfortunate conflation of a literal meaning that is correct and a folk meaning that carries great weight, and a very convenient one for a record industry that benefits from creating folk devils around infringement.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 3:49am

Typically, it occurs at the point where internal innovation stops and profits drop.

Yes, that's the very point in which marketing can't engage customers to take their credit card out of their pocket. It's not their fault, and it's easily marketed into terrorism.

Inability or inequity to engage engineering to make a better product and instead turn to legal to expand market share is where the definition of "terrorism" may come in. Never underestimate the power of Marketing. Never, Never, Never. They always want to be the center of attention, even if it means their "lost customer" is a "terrorist".

After all, they can market it that way: that's what they're good at.
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Chunky Vomit, 30 Jan 2010 @ 4:01am

Osama
I'm pretty sure that I read somewhere that Osama made all of his money selling pirated copies of Bruce Springsteen's "Born in the USA" in the 80's.
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NAMELESS.ONE, 30 Jan 2010 @ 4:15am

I'll tell you the link
the link ocmes in countries with super repressive copyright and HIGH COST of the items

then it becomes more profitable then drugs

i have been approached shall we say by 4 ....individuals
and did software for a plastics recycling plant that took the cops confiscated pirated dvdrs and cdrs , and then two years later find out the REAL maffia had been just reselling them and bringing in plastic of equivalent weight

and if you think these people care about laws and ACTA they want it

they want all the laws they can get on you and me so we are forced to buy this crap at 5-10$ off there people so they can do more with more money

who do you think stomps cdrs and dvdrs in tiawan at a rate of ten thousand a day
the kids? heh
hollywood is doing sooo much to harm themselves they dont get it
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KGWagner (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 5:50am

...and mother's milk leads to heroin.
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:), 30 Jan 2010 @ 6:07am

Weakening.
Maybe the true propaganda line is "It weakens our economy and thus greatly empowers terrorists" or "Terrorists are using massive IP infringement to weaken the us".

I read somewhere that Bin Laden has drop the guilty for global climate change at America LoL

But even then those economics downward trends came before the internet exploded.

The real terrorrists use the legal system today to do the terror under the guise of "educational campaigns", hide under hundreds of proxies(plc, ltd. ltda, llc), use extensively "creative accounting" practices and even proclaim to be against evil but act exactly like evil people.

If someone sues the RIAA what could it happen if it was given a crippling blow?

Could be dismantled and would reborn with another name almost instantly, remember Conan fighting in the mirror room?
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Hephaestus (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 6:09am

Seriously, where is the link between laws and changing peoples habits?
"whereas the existing legal framework has proven incapable of effectively protecting rights-holders"

Here in lies the problem. When has a law ever prevented an illegal act from occuring? The answer is never. It has only taken people out of the picture for a short duration. The exception is the death penalty. Creating fear and attempting to justify a law has always been the goal of those who dont want to lose what they have.

From a psyche and historical perspective ...

Prostitution, drugs, in some countries adultery, cheating on your taxes, and file sharing are all illegal here and there. The key here is that they all make you feel good. The song by Taylor Swift I just heard on the car radio, I think it was called "love story", it made me smile. Will I ever pay for the song or the album? No, it did make me feel good though.

History speaks volumes as to where this is going. People dont change, statistics dont lie (they are often incomplete or misinterpreted), and Laws dont change people. They only change the way they present themselves to society (ie they cheat better). Using the law to Impose a code of conduct on people never works. In this case stating that this will prevent terrorism will work and ACTA will get signed. The problem is it wont change 250 thousand years of evolved human nature. It will lead to even larger more grandious attempts at control and greater rebellion in the form of better more encrypted software.

Here is to the will of the people and our nature ... cheers.
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Ima Fish (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 6:15am

"shouldn't we cheer on The Pirate Bay for putting DVD counterfeiters (and thus, organized criminals and terrorists) out of business?"

You don't get it. Because terrorist and organized criminals can no longer make money off of non-violent and safe crimes such as piracy, now they're out blowing up buildings and forcing children into slavery. Apparently, the copyright industry wants to go back to the good old days when pirates actually made good money selling infringing material on street corners and at flea markets.
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Ima Fish (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 6:17am

Re: Re:
The Sphinx? Is that you?
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The Anti-Mike (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 6:36am

In my recent trip to Thailand, I found that much of the pirated software being sold (such as in Pantip Plaza) were basically downloads from torrent sites, plus keygens and hacks combined onto single discs. I have seen similar discs for sale in China as well. In both cases, I saw some pretty obvious "security" guys watching over the businesses, which would suggest some more powerful friends at work.

You might want to consider this book:

http://www.amazon.com/Knockoff-Deadly-Trade-Counterfeit-Goods/dp/0749443790

or this video from National Geographic:

http://www.amazon.com/National-Geographic-Illicit-Dark-Trade/dp/B00153ZQYG

Recentl y when in Hong Kong, a visit to Mongkok street markets exposed me to a number of knock off sales people, all pushing watches, handbags, and other similar goods. Interestingly, a sweep by local police during my visit suddenly made all of these people disappear. I didn't see arrests or anything, but the police presence made them very scarce all of a sudden. They don't have any goods with them, you have to travel to hidden rooms down back alleyways, which is another indication that the sale is illegal, and very likely part of the triad gangs, and possibly some of the government related corruption coming out of southern China (where most of the factories that produce these goods in Asia are located).

There is plenty of indications out there that organized crime is behind much of this stuff, it's very profitable to them, and casts a wider net than drugs or prostituion.
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Roehamster, 30 Jan 2010 @ 7:05am

IP dip dog egg
True, in a needlessly tricksy way - but not relevant. The point here is that peer-to-peer networking technology has cut the counterfeiter out of the loop: the pressing plants/DVD burners, the physical distribution systems of vans, streetcorner hawkers and so on.

Historical evidence was that home taping cut down on promotional budgets by increasing demand for the tangible products in record stores - as well as cementing social networks through the circulation of 'compilation tapes' amongst groups of friends, who likely then went to see concerts together.

Digital copies changed the game somewhat, but rather than setting the IP attack dogs off the leash, minds should have been directed to finding ways of actually PROFITING from the wider diffusion of product: turning every pirated copy of Pirates of the Caribbean into a driver for consumption of tie-in keyrings, T-shirts, ice lollies, visits to Disney theme parks...

Set a random binary generator going and eventually it will produce the complete works of Shakespeare, Disney/Pixar, Chopin and Chuck Jones.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 7:13am

Re: IP dip dog egg
"Set a random binary generator going and eventually"

infinite monkey theorem ?
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 7:22am

Re:
If "pirating" hurts sales, then it hurts everyone trying to sell them, counterfeiters included.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 7:23am

Re: Seriously, where is the link between laws and changing peoples habits?
"statistics dont lie "

Figures don't lie, liars figure
... and
86% of all statistics are make up on the spot
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Capt Obvious, 30 Jan 2010 @ 7:33am

Re:
Ok. Organized crime exists everywhere and they traffic knock off products. This is not news. But I can see where you are going with this.

1. by definition, terrorism is a crime
2. and it seems to be organized
3. organized crime pirates music
4. therefore, music piracy is terrorism

See how easy that is.
This sort of logic twisting can be applied to many things and it is very useful when attempting to convince an unsuspecting public that it is in their greater good to relinquish their rights.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 7:47am

Re:
TAM says:

"There is plenty of indications out there that organized crime is behind much of this stuff, it's very profitable to them, and casts a wider net than drugs or prostituion."

Hmmm, big industry can't compete with free but criminals can?
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George R Lanigan, 30 Jan 2010 @ 7:55am

Dollars rather than terrorism
I find it interesting that an inductry that has significantly contributed to the erosion of american prestige overseas and contributed greatly to anti-american propaganda is now waving the good'ol red, white, and blue. Thanks Hollywood. How about not distributing movies like Rendition, Farenheit 911, or a host of other movies that support an immediate domestic political agenda but are used to demonstrate to a less sophisticated audience the evils of the great satan. Lets not forget that one of the irritants the fundamentalist have is the spreading of "vile" western values via the big screen.
Granted, terrorist will find a way to make money off a host of illegal enterprizes, this is but an other one, if not movies, then cigarettes. I think we have bigger fish to fry than the self-serving interests of the corporate entertainment industry and the naive fools within it.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 7:56am

Re:
Yeah, good thing the counterfeiters won't be able to do any counterfeiting once all the torrent sites are magically shut down in TAM fantasy land.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 8:10am

Re:
"They don't have any goods with them, you have to travel to hidden rooms down back alleyways, which is another indication that the sale is illegal, and very likely part of the triad gangs, and possibly some of the government related corruption coming out of southern China (where most of the factories that produce these goods in Asia are located)."

So your saying that I could walk down a dangerous back alleyways, be taken into a shady back room, and then pay money to an organization known for violence? Why would I even want to download something for free, in my home?

Sounds to me like p2p is fighting terrorism. It removes demand for there product, and cuts off some of there funding. File sharing saves lives!
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martyburns, 30 Jan 2010 @ 8:30am

Re: Weakening.
"Maybe the true propaganda line is "It weakens our economy and thus greatly empowers terrorists" or "Terrorists are using massive IP infringement to weaken the us"."

I dont agree- that assumes each infringement is a lost sale and even if that was the case, I dont burn the cash I save from not buying, I spend it on something else.
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CHRoNoSS, 30 Jan 2010 @ 9:50am

NO
like i said
you make strict laws take it out of hands of regular people
and wheres it end up
IN HANDS A PEOPLE WHOM DONT GIVE A FUCK ABOUT LAW

they will pirate and resell
WHERE you dont get that your over strict copyright creates this atmosphere.

and it puts the bucks right in hands a terrorists and gangs and bikers and maffia
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NAMELESS.ONE, 30 Jan 2010 @ 9:54am

adlib
as i said the more hollywood presses these laws the more you see true counterfeiting and those people doing it dont gvie a flying shit about the laws

in other words it creates teh black market that hollywood thinks it has now

SO again why are they making kids goto gangsters for a mp3 or movie

i think as a society id rather give the kids free
or make a 50 cent net tax and let hollywood and the rest figure out how to get paid form it and NOT have gangs take over the p2p scene

THEY already cant control a bunch a kids , what happens when its majority is NOTHING but criminal gangsters that dont give a shit about ANY LAWS including when you show up to the house with some lawyer and they BLOW YOUR FUCKING HEADS OFF
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PEBKAC, 30 Jan 2010 @ 10:12am

Re: IP dip dog egg
"rather than setting the IP attack dogs off the leash, minds should have been directed to finding ways of actually PROFITING from the wider diffusion of product: turning every pirated copy of Pirates of the Caribbean into a driver for consumption of tie-in keyrings, T-shirts, ice lollies, visits to Disney theme parks..."

This DOES happen already, but IP attack dogs will never admit it.
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Hugo Cox, 30 Jan 2010 @ 11:03am

Nature of connection between online and offline piracy
It appears that most content used to make counterfeit DVDs etc comes from topsites. It seems highly likely that those who upload illegal content to the web are also knowingly profiting by selling access to organized crime groups who commit other non-copyright offences. As these people operate secretly the exact nature of this relationship seems to be unclear, though it's likely to be commercial. Innocent until proven guilty, I say, but well worth investigating. It would be naive to dismiss this.
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The Anti-Mike (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 11:44am

Re: Re:
Sigh.

In some countries, not everyone has a great home internet connection. In Thailand, many people find it cheaper to pay a few baht for a CD than to wait all day for a download.

Consider I was offered photoshop CS4 for a couple of hundred baht. The retail price? About 20,000 baht. Sort of a no brainer, right?

The criminals only have the costs of duplication, nothing more. They didn't have to pay to create the software, they don't have to support it after, etc. So they have a few cents of cost per unit, where the original creators have much more cost in every unit.

I know you are just trying to troll, but geez, come on, it's pretty obvious, no?
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 12:09pm

Found It!! Where The Link Between Copyright Infringement And Terrorism/Organized Crime Is
It's where whales are attacked by the manbearpig.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 12:33pm

Re: And drugs
In fact one of the major causes of our current drug problem is the drug use of artists under major label contracts.

You are an idiot.
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The Anti-Mike (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 12:35pm

Re: Re:
1. by definition, terrorism is a crime
2. and it seems to be organized
3. organized crime pirates music
4. therefore, music piracy is terrorism

You failed basic logic 101, didn't you?

Music piracy isn't terrorism. You so fail that it is beyond words.

However, those who monetize piracy for organized crime may be contributing directly or indirectly to terrorism or related activities.

Illegal activities are what fuel many terrorist organizations. Afghanistan is pretty much the world production leader of the raw plant product required to make heroin. The trail of illicit sales of this drug on the streets of America traces all the way back to those people who fight against the American military in that country. Are they terrorists? Not specifically, but you would have to be pretty stupid to ignore the connections.
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Capt Obvious, 30 Jan 2010 @ 1:07pm

Re: Re: Re:
"You failed basic logic 101, didn't you?"

Actually no.
However, you apparently failed Sarcasm 101. Now get back to class before I send you to the principals office.
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WoooHooo, 30 Jan 2010 @ 1:13pm

Re: Re: Re:
I learn something new everyday ... the only counterfeiting occurs in Thailand and you do not find it anywhere near high speed internet connections
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Richard (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 1:17pm

Re:
That is because copyright, like drugs, (and prohibition in the past) is a criminal business opportunity.

That is it is an opportunity to make money that is preferentially available to those who don't mind breaking the law.

The only way to stop these things is to stop enforcing (or better still repeal) the laws against them.

The way to make them nastier and to involve bigger more determined criminals is to increase enforcement.

More enforcement means bigger rewards but you have to take bigger legal risks and therefore it is more attractive to organised crime.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 1:20pm

Re: NO
Exactly what the war on drugs does. But of course these people work with the government to ensure that drugs are illegal so that they can unfairly benefit from such laws by having a monopoly on the sale of these drugs. The government is in on it too, they benefit from it as well, or at least those controlling the govt.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 1:22pm

Re: Nature of connection between online and offline piracy
Source: your imaginative psychic abilities.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 2:05pm

Re: Re: And drugs
Or he was being facetious.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 2:09pm

Re: Re: Re:
If only heroin were legalized.

I wonder how much terrorism is fueled by the sale of heroin compared to counterfeiting?

I'm betting that heroin is a significant money-maker as opposed to the counterfeiting of bootleg plastic discs.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 2:10pm

Re: Re:
Well that's because the use of sneakernet and FedEx are so unrealistic when it comes to counterfeiting.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 2:25pm

Holy smokes!
I'm glad you told me, A-M, because I haven't been sending my Triad overlord his end.

Seriously though, that's China, and it has been made pretty clear that they have different priorities than the West on this topic.

I'll bet it generates a lot of good will from their citizenry.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 2:30pm

Holy smokes, again!
Were-whales!?

Now THAT's a movie I would pay to see!
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 2:46pm

Re: Re: Re: And drugs
Or he was eating feces.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 2:48pm

Re:
Its a gateway drug, just like aspirin.
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wvhillbilly (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 3:14pm

Re: IP dip dog egg
The record industry could make a mint off of licensing file-sharing if they only would try it, but evidently they're too stupid to figure that out, or too selfish to let it happen.

I wrote the president of RIAA some years ago suggesting this, but he/they ignored me. They deserve whatever they get.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 3:14pm

Re: Found It!! Where The Link Between Copyright Infringement And Terrorism/Organized Crime Is
THEM MANBEARPIG BE STEALING OUR MONIES!
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wvhillbilly (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 3:34pm

Re: Anonymous coward
Hey! According to the FDA cherry juice and any other natural substance that has health benefits is an illegal drug, and if you make any claims of health benefits for your product they just might raid you and shut you down.

Talk about organized crime!
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Chargone (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 3:40pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: And drugs
So he's a rabbit then?
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wvhillbilly (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 3:41pm

Re: Re: Seriously, where is the link between laws and changing peoples habits?
"Statistics don't lie." Well, is that so!?!?

It has been said, "there are three kinds of lies.

-Lies,

-Damn lies,

-and Statistics."

Statistics can be tilted 10,000 different ways to make them say whatever you want them to say. If that isn't lying I don't know what is.
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Comment Helper, 30 Jan 2010 @ 3:49pm

Re: Re: Re: Seriously, where is the link between laws and changing peoples habits?
I think you meant to reply to the prior poster who goes by the name of Hephaestus
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wvhillbilly (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 3:55pm

Re: Re: Re:
Photoshop for 200 baht... "Sort of a no brainer, right?"

I can go you one better, and it's as legal as apple pie.
Switch from Windows to Linux. It comes with the GIMP for free, and the Gimp works about the same as Photoshop and is just as powerful. In fact the whole OS is free, and you can set it up to dual boot Windows or Linux at will if you want.
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wvhillbilly (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 3:57pm

Re: Re: Re: Seriously, where is the link between laws and changing peoples habits?
I think you're right. My bad.
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wvhillbilly (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 4:13pm

Re: Re:
Note to the RIAA and record companies: Stop fighting P2P file sharing and license it, you idiots! It's going to happen anyway regardless of how much you fight it and how many people you bankrupt in the process. Think of all the money you could bring in if you could make it legal by licensing it for say $5 a month and you could get several million people to go for it. And look at all the exposure your music would get, and all the good will you would create.

Or, you can just go on spending $millions suing and bankrupting your potential customers, driving them away, and wondering why your record sales are tanking!
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Trollbait, 30 Jan 2010 @ 4:49pm

Teh Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhmbulance
Somebody call the waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhmbulance! It's TAM again!
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Doctor Strange, 30 Jan 2010 @ 5:38pm

Re: Re: Re:
Stop fighting P2P file sharing and license it, you idiots! It's going to happen anyway regardless of how much you fight it and how many people you bankrupt in the process. Think of all the money you could bring in if you could make it legal by licensing it for say $5 a month and you could get several million people to go for it.

To maintain 2008 revenue levels for recorded music, you'd need to get about 293M people worldwide to sign up for such a plan.

This is not a completely unreasonable number, but the practical difficulties, especially in the transition, are evident.

Recall that many attempts at blanket "all you can eat" licensing like this have been conceived and tried, even by the record companies.

There are those that want to just put the $5 a month on your cable bill, but then everyone goes apenuts complaining about how this is unfair to those that don't download any music, that you will never be able to figure out how to distribute the money, and so on.

There are those that offer such plans but take away your ability to play the music through DRM if you stop paying. This is so people don't sign up for a month at a time say, every January and June, download all the new music they want, and end up paying $10 a year instead of $60. If everybody did this, now you need 1.8 billion people to sign up worldwide.

Then there is the issue of who signs up for such a plan, and when. If you institute such an option and still sell CDs, then this is a bad deal for anybody who buys less than about 5 CDs a year. I don't know how recorded music buying patterns work off the top of my head - if it's a power-law distribution (as many such things are) then you'd almost have to simultaneously stop selling CDs to make this plan work. Otherwise, you will just have your top customers (who are providing the overwhelming majority of the revenue) defect to the $5 a month plan and everyone else will keep buying CDs and iTunes tracks for less than $60 a year. This would be like giving people an option when paying taxes: "use the old formula or pay $1,000 a month; your choice." This would be disastrous for revenue.

Finally, there are the various vagaries of contracts with individual artists that may make this difficult or impossible.

Or, you can just go on spending $millions suing and bankrupting your potential customers, driving them away, and wondering why your record sales are tanking!

This is humorous, really. The idea that record sales are dropping because people are mad at the record companies for being "evil" is sort of ridiculous, no? What, nobody complained about record companies in the 1970s or 1980s? This was a huge secret until just recently?
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vivaelamor (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 6:22pm

Re:
"In my recent trip to Thailand, I found that much of the pirated software being sold (such as in Pantip Plaza) were basically downloads from torrent sites, plus keygens and hacks combined onto single discs. I have seen similar discs for sale in China as well."

Now if only you could blame the torrent sites for people buying stuff the sites are sharing for free..

"There is plenty of indications out there that organized crime is behind much of this stuff, it's very profitable to them, and casts a wider net than drugs or prostituion."

Come on, if you stoop any lower your avatar will flip right side up.
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Josh (profile), 30 Jan 2010 @ 6:25pm

Dark Helmet, I believe it was, has conclusively proven the existence of raporism. Surly not even Mike can deny the enormity of this threat.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 7:11pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: And drugs
A rabbit that eats faces?!?
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 7:17pm

Re: Re: Re: Re:
The sales of shiny plastic discs will continue to drop.

Badmouthing on the internet couldn't have had any possible effect on the recording industry! I haven't purchased music, or illegally downloaded it, in over a decade because of the antics of the broken recording industry.
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JEDIDIAH, 30 Jan 2010 @ 9:05pm

Piracy and the internet
The idea that you need the Internet for Piracy or the diffusion of Free Software is rather silly. This stuff all got diffused quite effectively before the internet was a public medium. It just wasn't out in the open or widely publicized so people don't know about it or just ignore it. A cheap disk drive (magnetic or optical) and a bunch of blanks is all you need. Sneakernet does the rest.

Linux also has a long history of cheap mail order optical media. Get 4 distributions for $20, or get a whole bunch of CDs for the same distribution for the same price.

PC game pirates were copying games in earnest even when the blanks were $20 a pop. I always thought it a bit odd but they didn't seem bothered by it.
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Steve, 30 Jan 2010 @ 9:43pm

Pretty darn clear
Being an independent software vender and finding that my software is activated 80% of the time by bogus serial numbers makes it pretty clear that there is an organized talent (Russian from my logs) that is cause of my woes, increased prices and 'terror' in my life. So go figure. I blame The Pirate Bay first and foremost.
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Doctor Strange, 30 Jan 2010 @ 10:00pm

Re: Piracy and the internet
The idea that you need the Internet for Piracy or the diffusion of Free Software is rather silly.

The pre-Internet diffusion of digital media was orders of magnitude more effort-intensive. Sneakernet involved copying floppy disks, one at a time, five or ten minutes each. BBSes were point to point, with a phone line required for each connection, at 1600 bytes per second on a clean line with an expensive 14.4 kbps modem.

Before the advent of the MP3 format, which became widely available in 1996 or so when the Web was getting big, digital music was 10MB a minute, which was still a rather big chunk of a hard drive. Pentium-class processors made MP3 viable and dropped the rate to 1MB/minute. Movie piracy would not go digital for years, and the options there were primarily VHS copying, which was slow and effortful for most people.

Software developers arguably confronted piracy first, even in the pre-Internet days. They had the advantage that most businesses will buy, rather than pirate, software, and they retain that advantage. Game piracy was much more prevalent, and efforts to fight game piracy go back well into the 1980s. I think the game industry has been less shocked by it because it was always around, and so the industry never had a contracting period where piracy went through a major upswing.
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Doctor Strange, 30 Jan 2010 @ 10:02pm

Re: Pretty darn clear
Being an independent software vender and finding that my software is activated 80% of the time by bogus serial numbers makes it pretty clear that there is an organized talent (Russian from my logs) that is cause of my woes, increased prices and 'terror' in my life. So go figure.

Have you tried selling the Russians T-shirts?

Also, don't you feel bad for locking up our shared culture by selling, rather than giving away, your software?
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copyright terrorism, 30 Jan 2010 @ 10:20pm

Re: Re: Pretty darn clear
I think I missed it, explain again how this is related to the linkage between copyright infringement and terrorism.
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:), 30 Jan 2010 @ 11:37pm

Start Fight!
According to John Morton we are all loosing money.

"ICE pledges a sustained law enforcement effort with our partners in the IPR Center to target the new threats enabled by the Internet in the same way that we have targeted 'hard goods' in the past,"
Morton said.

The ICE Reports are hilarious, you see the testimony of a poor high level representative from a African manufacturing toothbrush that is complaining about competition and how that shrank their market but the real question is and the other didn't grow are they coming from outside the country? who are the others players? Those questions are never answered, even the looses numbers a eerily familiar "200 Billion dollars in looses and millions of lost jobs" and the reports end of course telling their partners about how for $190 bucks they can register their goods and use that to speed up enforcement at the borders of the country and they call all law enforcement and registered business partners to suggest solutions of course the public has no voice there that is not for the public.

More disturbing is the fact they are trying to convince people who has nothing, to adhere to IP laws why?

Pfitzer is at the forefront of every IP move as they are trying to convince China to enforce more and call all other manufactures of medicine criminals I wonder too what extend that it is true.

Sources and info used for research.

http://www.ice.gov/pi/reports/index.htm
http://www.ice.gov/pi/iprctr/ipr_reports.htm

John Morton, assistant secretary of Homeland Security for the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)

National Intellectual Property Rights Coordination Center (IPR Center) in Crystal City

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE),

http://www.ice.gov/pi/nr/0912/091214washingtondc2.htm?searchstring=operation%20AND%20hoax

http://www.ice.gov/pi/nr/0912/091214washingtondc.htm?searchstring=operation%20AND%20hoax

Opera tion Holiday Hoax

Time searching 1 hour.
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:), 30 Jan 2010 @ 11:48pm

Start Fight!

"Intellectual property is one of this nation's most vital assets. As goods flow more freely between countries across the globe, protecting intellectual property has become even more critical to our economic security and to preserving America's role as a global leader in innovation," said Assistant Attorney General Lanny A. Breuer of the DOJ's Criminal Division. "The Department of Justice and our partners will continue to hold accountable criminals who profit off the creativity and hard work of others."

Source

I don't know what to say to that as IP laws failed to counter competition from abroad and people lost jobs anyway.

IP property guaranteed the american auto industry survival?
Rescued the U.S. TV manufacturer for going extinct a decade earlier?

Most Americans don't own IP's and those who own transfers jobs to other countries so again how IP is important for the working class that pay for the IP holders income?

How it is that companies that have no IP can make millions and others can't? This is easy to answer they focused on competing not crying about other being able to do things they can't do.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jan 2010 @ 11:55pm

Re: Re: Re: Pretty darn clear
Because everyone knows that when you lock up our shared culture then the terrorists have truly won.
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:), 30 Jan 2010 @ 11:59pm

Start Fight!
This is an insight inside the minds of bureaucrats everywhere and IP holders.

They believe firmly that IP will guarantee them some sort of financial security.

They forgot that the U.S. was build by work not ephemeral property, it was build by the hands of millions of people that worked hard to do something and intellectual property was never a foundation for stability because if it is then we are all screwed, because other can think too and they can even be clever how do you compete with others?

You don't you foster cooperation, you foster an enviroment that makes everyone contributes for a single cause and everybody can reap the benefits of the works of many.

But IP laws don't foster that they foster individualism and greed and result in people fighting.

Open source on the other hand has people contributing from all over the world and people reap the benefits of that work locally, it fosters cooperation among people from different nations and all walks of life and it is growing and infecting people at every turn.

We as persons can do better, we can choose to foster innovation at scales we could never dream achieve alone and it is doable today.
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The Anti-Mike (profile), 31 Jan 2010 @ 1:35am

Re: Re:
Ooo, look, stinky troll bait.
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Richard (profile), 31 Jan 2010 @ 6:01am

Re: Re: And drugs
I'm not an idiot and I'm not being facetious.

Ask yourself "who are the most high profile (illegal) drugs users?".

Answer well known popular musicians.

Ask yourself

"Does it help to make drugs popular amongst young people if their role models are using them?"

I think my point is well made - and you offered no counter argument - just a gratuitous insult.
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Richard (profile), 31 Jan 2010 @ 6:10am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
The idea that record sales are dropping because people are mad at the record companies for being "evil" is sort of ridiculous, no? What, nobody complained about record companies in the 1970s or 1980s? This was a huge secret until just recently?

In the 70's and 80's the companies only did evil things to the artists. The problem was when they started being evil to the public with the lawsuits and the anti-piracy propaganda.

Sadly most people only worry about these things when it starts to affect them more directly.
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Jeremy2020 (profile), 31 Jan 2010 @ 6:26am

Re: Re: Re:
So what you're saying is we need to the Music Industry to stop charging for music so the terrorists can't sell it. It's about time you got on board.
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Richard (profile), 31 Jan 2010 @ 6:30am

Re: Pretty darn clear
"Being an independent software vender and finding that my software is activated 80% of the time by bogus serial numbers"

Try printing the serial numbers on your packaging in larger clearer type.....

Seriously your logic is a bit of a stretch. I don't know how you managed to link the (Sweden based) pirate bay with Russian organised crime.

My guess (and I at least admit it's a guess) is that any torrents of your s/w shared by the pirate bay have had your protection mechanisms disabled completely. The ones that come back to your site are in fact the product of commercial pirates who haven't done a proper job. I expect your software isn't important enough to attract the attentions of the better pirates.
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Richard (profile), 31 Jan 2010 @ 6:52am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
To maintain 2008 revenue levels for recorded music, you'd need to get about 293M people worldwide to sign up for such a plan.

It depends what revenue you are trying to replace.

If you look at historic revenue from selling physical media you will find that the artists typically got 2%. Of course fixed costs of production (recording studios etc etc) also have to be paid for - but they are cheaper now than before.
If (to cover that) we assume a typical (highish) overhead rate for a "frontline employee" then that will turn into 6-7%. Now double that for all the things that I might have left out and you still end up with a cost of production that is
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Richard (profile), 31 Jan 2010 @ 6:57am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
To maintain 2008 revenue levels for recorded music, you'd need to get about 293M people worldwide to sign up for such a plan.

It depends what revenue you are trying to replace.

If you look at historic revenue from selling physical media you will find that the artists typically got 2%. Of course fixed costs of production (recording studios etc etc) also have to be paid for - but they are cheaper now than before.
If (to cover that) we assume a typical (highish) overhead rate for a "frontline employee" then that will turn into 6-7%. Now double that for all the things that I might have left out and you still end up with a cost of production that is
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Richard (profile), 31 Jan 2010 @ 6:59am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
Sorry - I should have realised what a less than sign would do - fixed now To maintain 2008 revenue levels for recorded music, you'd need to get about 293M people worldwide to sign up for such a plan.

It depends what revenue you are trying to replace.

If you look at historic revenue from selling physical media you will find that the artists typically got 2%. Of course fixed costs of production (recording studios etc etc) also have to be paid for - but they are cheaper now than before.
If (to cover that) we assume a typical (highish) overhead rate for a "frontline employee" then that will turn into 6-7%. Now double that for all the things that I might have left out and you still end up with a cost of production that is less than 15% of revenue.
Much of the rest of the revenue goes to cover things like distribution, retail margin etc which don't exist for the new business model. Of course there is also marketing - but now we don't need as much of that because we don't need economies of scale to keep down the cost of a physical product. (We can sell 10,000 copies x 1000 different things if we want - we don't need to force the market to take 1 million copies x10 things to keep margin costs to a minimum).

So a low a somewhat reduced cost of 15% for marketing and you will see that we only need 1/3rd the revenue of before to keep the musicians going. - So your 293 million can be reduced to less than 100 million - even on fairly cautious assumptions.

Of course this is very disruptive and it implies that many people will lose their jobs - but then that is progress and I never saw the corporate establishment whingeing when it was miners, or locomotive firemen or print workers losing their jobs.
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The Anti-Mike (profile), 31 Jan 2010 @ 7:40am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
If I want to buy a Porsche, I am not interested about hearing about a kit car that I can assemble myself that looks sort of like a Porsche.

I sort of wish the linux flunkies wouldn't try to push me onto their stuff every time something comes up in discussion. You guys are possibly the only more annoying group than the Jobs Yobs that insist that everything apple is perfect and the rest of us are idiots.

More importantly, you comments about Gimp have little or another to do with piracy. Move along please.
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Anonymous Coward, 31 Jan 2010 @ 8:19am

Re: I'll tell you the link
these internet kids don't understand things that happens offline unless it comes to them via a news article that's a restatement of a press release.

like the back room warehouse deals that go down for "coach" and "hermes" and "prada" and "louis vuitton" bags in NYC's chinatown... it happens all the time, and you can go down to chinatown and take part in it yourself. but because it's a civil infraction, the government generally doesn't give a shit unless it's happening at customs.

i don't know about terrorism, but anyone who's worked customs at a major international port knows how much organized crime makes off of counterfeit goods. while unauthorized dvd sales have basically died in the US due to the p2p, it's still really prevalent in asia and some places in europe (and ships going to, or coming from there). these are usually markets where the rights holders are only selling discs for what amounts to months of work at average wages.

a lot of the time, these rings are paying off the local governments too, and it's virtually impossible to gather hard evidence on this corruption. if you don't believe that it's hard, just think about all the organized crime that's gone on in the US, and how it's so incredibly difficult to prosecute -- you know it's going on, because all local opposition "disappears", but it's definitely happening.

as i said, i don't see any relation to the big terrorists and counterfeiting, but organized crime? definitely.
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chris (profile), 31 Jan 2010 @ 9:08am

Re: Re: IP dip dog egg
The record industry could make a mint off of licensing file-sharing if they only would try it, but evidently they're too stupid to figure that out, or too selfish to let it happen

i think the problem is that the industry isn't fully convinced that they have lost the war yet.

they see itunes, hulu, pandora and the like, but they are still holding out for something with a better markup. pay per download distribution is great, but it's not selling a 10 cent disk for 20 dollars. i think the industry is still hoping for a "sit back and watch the money pile up" solution and itunes and hulu aren't it.

in time they will see that these outlets are the best bet for pay per download, and the only way to see big time markup is on blanket licenses on peer to peer sharing. blanket licenses are how the industries dealt with the VCR, cassette recorder, radio, and cable television, so it makes sense that the trend will continue.

i am holding out for a pass that lets me keep doing what i do now, but i pay a fee to be left alone. i call this the "piracy pass" where i get some sort of license number to present when my ISP gets a letter about my activities. it would be a voluntary tax, so people that don't download don't have to pay and the people who want to stay below the radar the way they do now can continue to do so.

there are already services in place like media sentry to watch peer to peer networks and send take down letters, but i use ip block lists, encrypted connections, tunnels, and private trackers to avoid them. this is fine, but it would be more convenient for me to just use a public tracker where torrents have tens of thousands of seeds and i could get better speeds if i ran everything in the clear.

if i could register my license with the industry and my ISP then the whole "DMCA notice and takedown" process can be automated to the point that the MAFIAA bot sends takedown notices, the ISP bot checks that my license is current and sends a denial. ASCAP and the other royalties organizations can distribute the funds from the license fees to artists the way they always have, only now there would be a lot more money to hand out.

also, if everyone torrents in the open, the spy companies like media sentry could also collect neilsen type market data about what's being downloaded to determine what's hot and so forth.

not too much has to change, the piracy infrastructure is already in place, the peer to peer spy networks are already in place, the royalties organizations are already in place, and the notice and take down process is already in place. all that is left is to build a mechanism to collect the blanket license fee, and a way to show the IP watch dogs that i am paid up.
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:), 31 Jan 2010 @ 10:39am

Re: Re: Piracy and the internet
Sneakernet was not that difficult I remember my youth.

- Radio taping.
- Radio gave out music to everybody to record in full.
- Copying mix tapes.
- Going to the public library(I miss libraries)
- Getting your friends to exchange all LP's
- Doing the same thing with video rentals.

And the game industry is bigger then hollywood today even as they are pirated to exhaustion and the old media industry had much more experience with piracy since the late 1800's with things like the gramophone and auto-pianos, later the advent of the radio that reduce earnings for composers and complained and got their first collection agency(ASCAP was founded by composer Victor Herbert in New York City on February 13, 1914) and artists would gain less but didn't had to work for it to happen and it abused that power so much that BMI was founded in 1939, then came pirate radio stations that operate to this day.

Early Radio Industry Development (1897-1914) - As with most innovations, radio began with a series of incremental scientific discoveries and technical refinements, which eventually led to the development of commercial applications. But profits were slow in coming, and for many years the largest U.S. radio firms were better known for their fraudulent stock selling practices than for their financial viability.

This sounds just like the early filesharing(Napster anyone?)

But here is the future sneakernet.

- Thumbdrives can be sent anywhere and cost pennies to do it.
- People can digitize everything and 3D TV will be what DVD sound or SACs where for the music industry, I think bluray will die very soon or could be the last physical format time will tell.
- Darknets are a viable option they are encrypted point to point and the only thing you need is a friend somewhere in the world. Retroshare is a good example of that.
- Private servers for neighbourhoods can use WiFi to stream media to all, people don't need to even have an ISP(netsukuku here we go).
- FEMTOM cells could even augment wireless networks.
- Cellphones can exchange data, you can take anything from anybody anywhere you go you can even have apps that don't contact servers but use their radio signals to build a public radio station based on what other have stored in their cellphones.
- Encrypted e-mail could be used to give people an IP address to a media-party in private.

My bicycle was superseded by cables and radio :(

Those who don't pay attention to history are fated to repeated it.
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you got issues?, 31 Jan 2010 @ 10:41am

Re: Re: I'll tell you the link
"these internet kids don't understand things that happens offline"

That is a rather broad, all encompassing, statement. I know a few people you would probably include in your internet kid stereotype and they are cognizant of many things which occur offline and are not part of the standard press release or news program / article. It is easy to take swipes at groups of people for whom you have little regard, and in all likelyhood you will receive confirmation from others around you who share the same bias. This does not however, make it any more palatable to those around you which see things from a more balanced perspective.
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Anonymous Coward, 31 Jan 2010 @ 11:06am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
No one sells pirated copies of Gimp. I think that's what they were saying. How is that not relevant?
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Anonymous Coward, 31 Jan 2010 @ 11:06am

Re: Re: Re:
Ooo, look, stinky troll.
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Richard (profile), 31 Jan 2010 @ 11:24am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"If I want to buy a Porsche, I am not interested about hearing about a kit car that I can assemble myself that looks sort of like a Porsche."

If you are the kind of fool that buys a "badge" rather than a car then that is true.

At the end of the day what actually matters is functionality not branding, and Linux and the associated open source apps. are often equal to if not better than the proprietary competition.

Plus with open source if it's not quite what you want you can change it yourself.

The comment about Gimp is relevant to piracy - it falls into the "piracy of software is no longer necessary" category.
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Richard (profile), 31 Jan 2010 @ 11:33am

Re: Re: I'll tell you the link
The link that is being proposed by the industry is between P2P filesharing and organised crime.

There is of course plenty of evidence for linkage between commercial physical media piracy and organised crime but if anything the link between P2P and commercial piracy (organised crime) is a negative one - P2P takes away the criminal's market - whilst DRM (if effective) and lawsuits against P2P sharers only serve to restore it.

Copyright is a criminal business opportunity that becomes bigger and more attractive to organised crime the more it is enforced.
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:), 31 Jan 2010 @ 12:05pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
The porsche of OS's is Linux visually (Compiz

And under the hood Intel likes linux.

The price to pay is high because the knowledge requeriments is still a bit steep but some can pay that price.

The importance of the Gimp is that one doesn't need to pay for photoshop therefore there is no need for piracy he presented a solution to a problem.

If people doesn't like Gimp there are others open source projects like Krita, Photoxx, NetPaint, Panini, Gimpshop, Cinepaint etc

All free and all willing to end piracy forever.

Hummm did you know people sell Gimp?

Yep, people make money out of the Gimp, I saw people selling openSUSE too in a Big electronic store no less.

Cracking down on piracy could lead stores to offer more opensource can you image that?

Mind boggling I know.

One thing that happens when rulers start pushing to hard is rebellion the "Peasant's revolt" is very well documented and that lead to a change in how people ruled even though the peasant's lost.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popular_revolts_in_late_medieval_Europe

That lead to civil disobedience today
http://thoreau.eserver.org/theory.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_disobedience

Bu t there is a solution for piracy in the music industry, book and software those are areas where good solutions exist already.

Jamendo, librivox, guttenberg, FOSS are great and can curb illegal activity offering high quality products at a very low cost.
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Headbanger, 31 Jan 2010 @ 3:40pm

Re: Well, technically they are correct...
Err, I thought copyright infringement was a civil offense and not a criminal one. I could be wrong, however, and be thinking merely under the legality of non-commercial p2p distribution.
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Steve, 31 Jan 2010 @ 4:41pm

Re: Re: Pretty darn clear
Nope. Need to eat. Don't you feel bad being a worthless lazy ass consumer that just takes, takes, and takes that which you clearly have no right to?
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painter, 31 Jan 2010 @ 7:34pm

They both involve crimes of intent, one of intention is an issue of national importance.
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Anonymous Coward, 31 Jan 2010 @ 7:37pm

Re: Re: Re: Pretty darn clear
Since when do starving artists need to eat? The gall!
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Anonymous Coward, 31 Jan 2010 @ 7:42pm

Re:
The one intention being the terrorism/organized crime one, right? And not the copyright infringement one? Which is apparently an issue of global importance, hence ACTA, which, as a treaty, happens to not include either India or China.

I say, good show!

You've got the counterfeiters right where you want them. Once they are caught counterfeiting three times, you'll be able to kick them off of the internet.

You win!
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Anonymous Coward, 31 Jan 2010 @ 7:58pm

Re: Re: Re: Pretty darn clear
Don't you feel bad not knowing the definition of a simple word?
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Anonymous Coward, 31 Jan 2010 @ 8:34pm

Re:
Anti-Mike, I have read several of your posts so I'm pretty sure you aren't joking. You do realize that whether or not p2p existed, those street vendors would still exist, right? You don't actually believe that if we shut down thepiratebay they would close those big counterfeiting factors in China, do you? Everyone knows that counterfeit goods are sold by black market agents. What the article is pointing out is that the connection between the supposed copyright infringement of file sharing and the black market counterfeiting operations is a fabrication of bad logic, and that they are actually indirectly proportional.
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painter, 31 Jan 2010 @ 10:04pm

Re: Re:
200 years They used to hang people for petty thefts or transport them for life to the otherside of the world. The convictions were often based on suspect not very fair trials. It did not work all that well.
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painter, 31 Jan 2010 @ 10:08pm

The approach that did eventually( it took a long time) work was to spread property rights much more widely, create millions of people in the middle who had a personal small stake in maintaining good and fair order.
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Mike Masnick (profile), 31 Jan 2010 @ 10:15pm

Re: Re: I'll tell you the link
like the back room warehouse deals that go down for "coach" and "hermes" and "prada" and "louis vuitton" bags in NYC's chinatown... it happens all the time, and you can go down to chinatown and take part in it yourself. but because it's a civil infraction, the government generally doesn't give a shit unless it's happening at customs.

But that's counterfeiting. We know that exists. We're asking for the link between file sharing and organized crime/terrorism.

i don't know about terrorism, but anyone who's worked customs at a major international port knows how much organized crime makes off of counterfeit goods.

Again, that was never in question. The question is why does the industry get to link counterfeiting with online file sharing, when the two are totally separate.
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Anonymous Coward, 1 Feb 2010 @ 12:55am

Re: Re: Re: And drugs
You understand that drugs legal or illegal may technically be a crime, but .. come on drug use is an artifact of every culture thats ever existed. It's only been taboo in the last 60 or so years. The argument is moot because 98% of people in this country have at one time or another used an illegal narcotic. The other 2% are compulsive lairs
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Devonavar (profile), 1 Feb 2010 @ 1:03am

Re: Re: Well, technically they are correct...
I believe copyright infringement can be criminal, but I hadn't really made that distinction in my original post. As far as I know, you're right though, P2P is largely a civil offence.

It's still illegal though, which makes it feel like splitting hairs not to call it a crime even though it's semantically correct.
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peter, 1 Feb 2010 @ 1:33am

health and safety
*Counterfeiting* can certainly be a threat to consumer health and safety.

Eh?

I know "counterfiting is terrorism" is a stretch and a half, but Health and Safety? Where is the evidence for that statement.
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peter, 1 Feb 2010 @ 1:34am

health and safety
*Counterfeiting* can certainly be a threat to consumer health and safety.

Eh?

I know "counterfiting is terrorism" is a stretch and a half, but Health and Safety? Where is the evidence for that statement.
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Richard (profile), 1 Feb 2010 @ 1:39am

Re: Re:
"and that they are actually indirectly proportional."

I guess you mean inversely proportional.
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Richard (profile), 1 Feb 2010 @ 1:44am

Re: Re: Re: Re: And drugs
Don't really disagree - in fact I would add that the other major cause of our drug "problem" (along with usage by high profile people) is the fact that we try to control it by using the law.
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Richard (profile), 1 Feb 2010 @ 1:56am

Re: health and safety
Counterfeit physical goods can be dangerous (eg electrical equipment, car parts).

Of course this is nothing to do with digital goods.
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Marcel de Jong (profile), 1 Feb 2010 @ 3:46am

I may have a solution
Instead of trying to punish the "illegal" downloaders, why not give incentives to your customers.

Sell some product, and with each sold product there is a little unique code in the box or with the download. With that code, the buyer can register himself at a website, and you can give him or her incentives to promote the works to his family and friends. Like, for instance, offer a discount on other copies of the disc, the more people he or she helps to the product the higher the discount, and offer special swag.
That way fans can support their bands, and the band knows who their fans are and where they live, so they could specifically tour in those regions.
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senshikaze (profile), 1 Feb 2010 @ 5:35am

Re: Well, technically they are correct...
best quote about organized crime:
"It is hardly organized."
(from Sneakers)

but yea, i agree that the RIAA and MPAA are playing to the stupidity of the general populace.
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Killer_Tofu (profile), 1 Feb 2010 @ 6:26am

Re: Re: Re: IP dip dog egg
The rather large gaping flaw I see with this plan is that I hate the companies you mention. The idea of my money going towards those organizations I find revolting. I want those organizations to die and go away. When I want to give my money to an artist, I would rather give it directly whenever possible. With some artists right now that is really easy, and with others not so easy.
Companies like ASCAP and the others have a documented history of not doing much to help the artists. For this I would rather see them gone then set up another crappy blanket license.
I would rather my money only go to the bands that I will listen to countless times (Nine Inch Nails, Metsuo, Infected Mushroom, etc). Not to some shoddy organization who shafts most of their "members".
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Paula Producto, 1 Feb 2010 @ 8:18am

Mike, the copyright industries and brand protection people surely like to emphasize the connection between organized crime and infringements of various kinds as much as possible, because it helps make what many people (including the police and the public) regard as a minor form of crime into something serious. So it's definitely in industry's interest to conflate things like counterfeiting with copyright infringement in certain contexts - when they are talking about health and safety risks, for example. As you note, counterfeiting of some products, like drugs or precision parts, can pose a real danger. (Counterfeiting of luxury goods or infringing copies of DVDs, not so much.)

But I don't really understand the argument you're putting forward about copyright infringement and organized crime. There is little doubt (and mounds of evidence) that plenty of people, including plenty of organized criminal groups, are making plenty of money off selling pirated DVDs, CDs, video games and software. Mainly they do it by selling actual discs, but there are some revenue-generating sites out there (think east of Europe) that are being run by people who are at least accused of being part of organized crime. On the other hand, for those people selling infringing discs out of the back of their cars in the mall parking lot, maybe the only link some of them have to organized crime is selling pirated DVDs of the Sopranos.

And as you note in your post, the people making money off selling pirated discs stand to lose customers when the product is available on P2P networks and free streaming sites. In that sense, the business model of these disc pirates is just as doomed in the long run as the business model of the big labels and studios (as you so often point out).

But why would industry's logic dictate that we cheer the Pirate Bay? I think you made that remark largely in jest, but it's not as though the copyright industries don't have reason to complain about _both_ of these groups of people (those selling pirated discs for a profit, and those sharing infringing content online for free). You and I may think they are missing the larger point, that they should spend less time complaining and more time coming up with creative solutions to continue to thrive. But it's not as though it's illogical or inconsistent for the copyright industry people to dislike _both_ the black market for pirated discs and infringing file sharing online simultaneously. They have two sets of people they view as doing harm to their economic interests. Sometimes, the two opposing groups also harm each other. The copyright industries may not be terribly upset with the fact that some organized crime group in East Monrotavia is selling fewer pirated DVDs since broadband came to town and people are downloading the same stuff for free from Bittorrent, but it's not as though the copyright industries are making more money when Monrotavians make the switch.
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mrharrysan (profile), 1 Feb 2010 @ 9:04am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
GIMP for Windows is free too!
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DRG (profile), 1 Feb 2010 @ 2:52pm

Cause and Effect?
Can we actually tell whether popularity leads to greater piracy or piracy leads to greater popularity?
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(same AC as above), 2 Feb 2010 @ 12:46pm

Re: Re: Re: I'll tell you the link
well it really depends on what you define counterfeiting as. we define counterfeiting basically as the sale of any goods using the trademarks of the producer/creator, where the instances of those goods (or units if you choose) are not endorsed or created by the producer/creator. that's why it includes those fake prada bags, as well as bootleg DVDs.

when you consider the connection between organized crime and online file sharing (as counterfeiting) it certainly exists. there is no reason to believe that entities charging for access to usenet groups or for the use of rebranded p2p clients was unrelated to organized crime. but more importantly, it is VERY well known that botnet operators (almost always engaged in organized crime) have hidden trojans in popular p2p clients, as well as popular files shared on p2p networks.
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Mark Ryder, 2 Feb 2010 @ 8:36pm

file sharing or gang or bin larden
all of them are in the same bag they just have a different pr..they are thieves and they use others work for profit so they can continue to be thieves so the are all bad and need shooting on sicht!
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chris (profile), 4 Feb 2010 @ 7:16am

Re: Re: Re: Re: IP dip dog egg
The rather large gaping flaw I see with this plan is that I hate the companies you mention. The idea of my money going towards those organizations I find revolting. I want those organizations to die and go away.

you can just keep doing what you do and stay under the radar :-)
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Tank Szuba, 3 May 2010 @ 4:43am

More FUD, This time from CNET
I have already emailed a request to the author to please clarify his posting. Although it is a minor stab it is still blatantly out there as a stand alone sentence meant to stand out in the mind of the reader. My response:
I just wanted to take a moment to ask you why you have blatantly included a Line of FUD in this article

Law enforcement authorities have traced the video-cam recordings of movies to organized crime.

I would hope that a respected technology journalist could have by now separated him/herself from this old party line from the entertainment industry. Without going into any great detail please imagine for a minute how "organised Crime" could possibly benefit by giving something away? Making a movie available online at no cost to the consumer but cost to the uploader makes zero sense. Also it has been repeatedly "debunked" that there even is a connection. I would respectfully ask that you would edit your post to reflect only that which is known fact and not conjecture and FUD on behalf of the entertainment industry or make it know that a particular statement is conjecture or a politically correct acronym for FUD. I would encourage your reading of this post.
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84, 16 Dec 2011 @ 1:56pm

Re: Re: Re:
yea,... the militants are just running around and blowing shit up because theyre experiencing a shortage of copied volumes of the jersey shore to peddle around?

is it lonely on planet retarded as F---k?
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84, 16 Dec 2011 @ 1:57pm

Re:
yea,... the militants are just running around and blowing shit up because theyre experiencing a shortage of copied volumes of the jersey shore to peddle around?

is it lonely on planet retarded as F---k?
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84, 16 Dec 2011 @ 2:10pm

Re: Re: Re: Re:
difference here is that the international heroine trade is controlled largely by the CIA.
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Anonymous Coward, 31 Jul 2012 @ 6:49pm

I think everyone worried about terrorism (or murderously violent Mexican drug-gangs, or "rogue" states like Iran) would be much better served if this kind of attention had been lavished on the banking industry.

There's a direct and obvious connection between HSBC and terrorism, but internet "piracy", not so much.
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