Italy Blocks The Pirate Bay Yet Again

from the the-stick-your-head-in-the-sand-approach dept

Mon, Feb 8th 2010 2:45am — Mike Masnick

Well, here we go again. A year and a half ago, an Italian court ordered ISPs to start blocking access to The Pirate Bay. Oddly (and inexplicably) many ISPs redirected all such traffic to a website owned by the IFPI, which seemed highly questionable. Why should a private entity receive that traffic? Either way, it didn't do much good, as the block only drew more attention to The Pirate Bay, leading more visitors to reach the site from Italy than before the block! Not long after that, a court struck down the ban as being unreasonable.

But, of course, this is the entertainment industry we're talking about, and if the courts save it from shooting itself in the foot, it will just keep shooting. So, once again, it is going to get The Pirate Bay a lot more attention by getting a court to require the site be blocked again. Basically, the original ruling saying that Italy couldn't ban foreign sites was overturned by the Italian Supreme Court, and thus, the lower court went back and decided, again, that the site should be blocked.

What I really wonder is if anyone actually thinks this will make a difference?

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Filed Under: block, isps, italy
Companies: the pirate bay

44 Comments

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Nick Taylor, 8 Feb 2010 @ 3:34am

Oy Vey
Well to be honest (and I am), I didn't start using The Pirate Bay until this Swedish Trial business.

Two things are worth of note about this:

1) I am (like most pirates) a real fan. I spend a lot of money on movies... and just because I have a p2p version, doesn't mean I won't spend money on the same thing in future - in fact it increases the likelihood.

2) The thing that really hits home when you start visiting The Pirate Bay, is just how many movies the traditional "Industry" chokes out of existence. You never see them in your local video store, let alone the cinema. If it wasn't for the internet, they simply wouldn't exist.

The bottleneck of the traditional industry is a real content/creativity killer.
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IronMask (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 3:50am

It's like trying to stop the incoming tide with a chain link fence. Every now and then the fence still needs maintenance. Doesn't do it any good though.
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Cynix, 8 Feb 2010 @ 4:57am

So, am I right in saying that as the Supreme Court has banned it, that the ban is now permanent?

This is what the corrupt RIAA/MPAA organizations want and once again they're winning.

Saying people will find a way around it is missing the point. They have established that a precedent that TPB is "illegal" and should be censored. They will just be able to put up more and more roadblocks to accessing TPB, which increases pressure for it and other sites like it to be shut down. Also helps with three strikes...

If and when Big Media manage to close the net so that only they can distribute content, they will be able to totally control distribution and yes, make more money (unfair, corrupt money, yes). And the reason to buy? Well it's bloody obvious - people want the content and there will be only official sources to get it, controlled totally by these parasites.

When you see the big picture, you can see that their strategy makes sense to maintain their monopoly power.
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Chronno S. Trigger (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 5:11am

Re:
"So, am I right in saying that as the Supreme Court has banned it, that the ban is now permanent?"

I don't know about permanent, but the rest is right. According to the torrentfreak article, the lower court banned it and an appeal to the Bergamo(?) court overturned it and then another appeal the Supreme Court banned it again. I would bet that the appeals aren't yet over.

As for this being any kind of step to Big Media being the only source for anything, that's just wrong. Something else will crop up in it's place, they always do. That, and TPB is not in Italy so it can't be shut down by them.
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The Anti-Mike (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 5:13am

Re:
when Big Media manage to close the net so that only they can distribute content

This is a classic mistake made here.

If you want to make your own content and distribute it, go for it. You probably would want to use a "legal" torrent site to do it, as you won't be able to reach the Italian market if you are using The Pirate Bay. Then again, I can't picture a legit business wanting to be associated with pirates.

people want the content and there will be only official sources to get it

Isn't that just the way it should be? If people are willing to pay for it at the market price asked, then there is no issue. If the people don't want to pay, the market will adjust.

Again, nothing stops you from freely distributing your own work. All this does it try to stop you from choosing what other content producers will do. If they don't want your free distribution and "free marketing", why should you be allowed to choose it?

Basically, your post is exactly right, except you have forgotten that you still have the rights to make and distribute your own material, and you have the right to enjoy whatever free material that other content producers put out there. Vote with your wallet, and quit acting like you have some divine right to take other people's content without permission.
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Excuse Me ?, 8 Feb 2010 @ 5:26am

Re: Re:
"quit acting like you "

Your use of the word "you" is ambiguous.
Who are you addressing?
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Feb 2010 @ 6:15am

"...as you won't be able to reach the Italian market if you are using The Pirate Bay"

Which shows once again that when it comes to internet technology you are a moron. No one can block shit. Got that? No one. No wonder you fight the internet. It's something beyond your safety little world on your masters' lap.
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The Anti-Mike (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 6:19am

Re:
yawn.

You keep thinking the whole world will work hard and use all sorts of means to get around things. Most people won't take the time. They pirate stuff because it's easy, it's safe, and they don't need to know anything other than how to turn on their computers. and download utorrent.

When that becomes an option that doesn't work, some of them will give up. Each time it gets harder, more people stop trying.

You can never entirely stop anything online, you can just make it difficult enough or risky enough that most people will stop trying.

Got that?
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aguywhoneedstenbucks (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 6:26am

Re: Re:
Then again, I can't picture a legit business wanting to be associated with pirates.

I sell eyepatches and peg legs for a living you insensitive clod.
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Anti anti Mike, 8 Feb 2010 @ 6:30am

Re: Re:
And people like me will educate the ones that don't know or are having problems learning it. You might think that you can stop people but the people will stop you.
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The Anti-Mike (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 6:42am

Re: Re: Re:
knock yourself out.

Just remember all the good you could do if you put that much energy towards creating something, rather than helping people to "infringe".
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Richard (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 6:53am

Re: Re:
Again, nothing stops you from freely distributing your own work. All this does it try to stop you from choosing what other content producers will do.

Except that any site that can host user generated content can also host pirated content and therefore will become a target for the "official" content industry.

The Pirate Bay was an easy target for them because of its name and the "attitude" of its admins - but all it is is a site that facilitates users sharing any files that they have in their possession.

Make no mistake, what they want is to return to the old "stationers monopoly". (A closed shop with perpetual copyright). Every move they make is in that direction.

They will fail to stop piracy of course, but the legitimate free distribution of content will be severely damaged by their tactics.
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chris (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 7:14am

Re:
It's like trying to stop the incoming tide with a chain link fence. Every now and then the fence still needs maintenance. Doesn't do it any good though.

i like your analogy better than my own. i always likened fighting p2p to playing chicken with a train. your opponent isn't going to alter its course, indeed it lacks the capability to do so even if it wanted to. even if you win, you just get plowed under.
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AJ, 8 Feb 2010 @ 7:15am

Yawn is right....
I agree with the Anti-Mike's yawn in this case. So they got rid of a big, main stream, torrent site. Just as what happened before, hundreds will pop up to fill the void. On goes the wack a mole game. They haven't slowed anything down in the long term, they haven't removed the "need" from the people doing the downloading, nothing has changed.

Hell, just do a filetype search on google. You don't need the pirate bay, or any other mainstream site to find a torrent.

nameofmedia filetype:torrent

Move along.....
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chris (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 7:30am

Re: Re:
They pirate stuff because it's easy, it's safe, and they don't need to know anything other than how to turn on their computers. and download utorrent.

people just downloaded napster and napster got shut down. then more people just downloaded kazaa and that got shut down. then more people downloaded utorrent...

with each wave of shutdowns, the tools improve. the centralized system that napster and kazaa relied on was eliminated. distributed hash tables and magnet URI's have all but eliminated the hosting of torrent files.

there is no "hard work", the tools just improve and things return to normal and then usage increases because each time the tools improve, more people use them.

bit torrent moves way more stuff to way more people than napster ever could and the thing that replaces BT will move even more.
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Feb 2010 @ 7:46am

Re: Re: Re:
It is only ambiguous if you do not understand English.

If you will recall your basic grammar:

I = First person singular
Thou = Second person singular (Obsolete)
He/She/It = Third person singular

We = First person plural
You = Second person plural
They = Third person plural

Thus anytime someone says "You" correctly they are referring to a group in second person which is in friendly format.

Unfortunately pollution of the word has rendered many to interrupt it as second person singular which it is not.
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Overcast (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 8:07am

Gee, that should stop people from searching for torrents.

These are the kinds of decisions that caused the downfall of Rome, lol
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Feb 2010 @ 8:42am

Re: Re:

Isn't that just the way it should be? If people are willing to pay for it at the market price asked, then there is no issue. If the people don't want to pay, the market will adjust.

I agree, the market will adjust and that is exactly what's happened with copy right infringement.

The problem is you, and those like you, continue to beat a dead horse in the hope it will get going again. It would be much better to accept copy right infringement and figure out how to use it to your advantage, which is basically what Techdirt tries to point out on a daily basis.

That, or you can try to debate the morality of it and convince Joe public to stop their nefarious sharing activities LOL
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AR, 8 Feb 2010 @ 8:46am

Re: Re: Re:
Dont forget about the free advertising for the new technologies and innovations. I mean heck the RIAA shuts down the older ones, because they aren't Keeping up fast enough with the innovations (surprise!!), Then when the articles are , tell everyone about the new ways the "criminals" are getting around it. making more people better informed and allowing them to go and do it themselves, growing the "market".

Hmmm...

maybe we are looking at this all wrong. The RIAA chasing after the older ways of doing it, is actually fuelling progress and the innovations that are two steps ahead of them. Then the advertising campaign they run, telling how good they are for shutting them down, actually advertises the new ways of getting around the shut-down. Im going to make a huge assumption here that they aren't that dumb to just be chasing their tail. Maybe they have a bigger hand in it then we think. You know, kind of like an arms dealer selling guns to both sides and selling bullets and vests for double to whoever is losing at the time, I can see the model now:
Charge the artist an extra premium to fight piracy
Charge the consumers extra to fight piracy
funnel a small portion to the software people to create the programs.
distribute the programs for free, but collect money for ad space.
Every so often do a take-down on the older tech to force people to the new tech.
charge even more for ad space.
charge the artitst and consumers even more to fight the growing problem.
Get free advertising from the news outlets when they write about the take-downs and the new ways to get around it
the money would be rolling in from all angles.

BRILLIANT
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Stefano Quintarelli, 8 Feb 2010 @ 8:46am

Italian justice has NOT BLOCKED TPB AGAIN
The supreme court ruled that requiring ISPs to "inhibit" access to TPB is not against the law and sent the trial back to a lower level court. and there we are. this court has not ruled. (at least so far).

this is the reason why, if you read italian websites, they all write in conditional: "eventually could be blocked again"
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Anti-Mike is a moron, 8 Feb 2010 @ 9:06am

Re: Re:
Enough, we know you know jackshit about what you pretend to be talking about.

"Dirt is dry water"
The Anti-Mike
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Chronno S. Trigger (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 9:32am

Re: Re:
The Anti-Mike has got it right here. If it becomes too difficult to access The Pirate Bay, they will just stop trying. They will just switch to another site that's not directly in the cross hairs and is easier. It's happened before with Supernova and it will happen again. As TAM has said many, many times before "this is nothing new".
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Feb 2010 @ 9:34am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
Just remember all the good the industry could be doing if they diverted all the money spent flailing around failing to stop piracy into actually doing something useful.
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The Anti-Mike (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 9:49am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
Next time I will use the more accepted American terms "y'all" or "youse guyz".
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The Anti-Mike (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 9:53am

Re: Re: Re:
Exactly. The question becomes will the court systems in that country move to a more generic "block P2P traffic" at some point, thus making it significantly harder for the average joe (or jill) to be part of a P2P community?

People will route around problems, and they will keep doing that until it becomes too much effort to route around, then they will change their ways.

The wild west didn't last forever, and it won't last forever online either.
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AJ, 8 Feb 2010 @ 10:17am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
Almost there! Now, lets take it a step further...

"People will route around problems, and they will keep doing that until it becomes too much effort to route around, then they will change their ways.
"

I love the above statement, because it works both ways. Replace "People" with "Big Media", is it any less true?

When do the Media Companies stop Routing around what the customer wants, and change? If the "Pirates" give up, both loose (Media looses a distribution platform, and a sub-culture wrapped around their products). If Big Media gives up, they will eventually become popular again. Bonus if they find a way to make money off of the "Pirates", while they "appear" to be giving up...

Instead of trying to change the customer, and pissing off the pockets they want so badly to reach into, why don't they change their model, give them what they want, and make money in the process?

So in loosing, ya'll win, in winning ya'll loose. Such a mixed up world we live in :)

Had to work the ya'll in for the grammer nazi!
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Killer_Tofu (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 10:26am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
The difference here is in the amount of effort each side puts forward.
Efforts to control like DRM and lawsuits cost tons and tons of money and time. The efforts to break them take one guy, 100$, and a weekend.
Kind of shows who will win in the end.
Recording industry, technology advances, adapt or die.
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Feb 2010 @ 10:33am

Legalize it.
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Feb 2010 @ 10:35am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Don;t forget about all that goodwill that the old industry has fostered by being total fucking asshats.
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Feb 2010 @ 10:39am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
The internet is a communications platform. The internet is nothing like the wild west.

The internet is also nothing like a car or a pizza shop but I guess that doesn't stop people from trying to make an analogy.

The interent is something new and different. The wild west wasn't that new or different. Untamed frontier? Look towards history and you can find other examples of it in other lands. But the internet?

Nothing like the wild west.
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Richard (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 10:51am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
The question becomes will the court systems in that country move to a more generic "block P2P traffic" at some point, thus making it significantly harder for the average joe (or jill) to be part of a P2P community?

Thus removing the most economical way for people to share their own content and invalidating your previous statement:

If you want to make your own content and distribute it, go for it. You probably would want to use a "legal" torrent site to do it,

But there won't be any legal torrent sites -see the problem?
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chris (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 11:33am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
When do the Media Companies stop Routing around what the customer wants, and change? If the "Pirates" give up, both loose (Media looses a distribution platform, and a sub-culture wrapped around their products). If Big Media gives up, they will eventually become popular again. Bonus if they find a way to make money off of the "Pirates", while they "appear" to be giving up...

it's a war of attrition. both sides wail away until one side is out of resources.

problem is the media companies' resources are finite. they only have so much money to invest in these games before it affects their profits.

the other problem is the p2p side is using ulimited resources. they primarily on time and talent.

when framed that way, the question is simple: how much money can the media companies waste before they just start giving people what they want?
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Feb 2010 @ 11:36am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
You forgot to say that they should just should turn the internet to protect a dying industry.
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Feb 2010 @ 12:51pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Or how about TAM terms like "FOAD" and "Does your mommy know you're using the internet?".
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:), 8 Feb 2010 @ 1:02pm

Next Generation Tech.
Funny how things work.

Osiris Severless Portal was born in italy.

Is P2P web portal creation and hosting tool that is resilient(almost impossible) to censor and it is anonymous and encrypted.

Another one:
http://www.boingboing.net/2010/02/05/tahoe-lafs-a-p2p-fil.html

Not to mention OMEMO and other means that already exist.
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Glenn, 8 Feb 2010 @ 2:05pm

All I want to do...
now is make sure that those in the "entertainment" industry never see one penny of my money again. They already waste the money they get due to the way they spend what they get from "approved and legal" sources. Now they want to waste my and everyone else's tax money, too. I'll also vote for the opponents of anyone voting in a legislature for what the labels and movie houses et al want. Having the govt. steal your money is bad enough as it is.
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Dark Helmet (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 2:26pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
This grammar is far more concerned about all those extra "O's" you are using....
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Dark Helmet (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 2:30pm

Re: All I want to do...
"I'll also vote for the opponents of anyone voting in a legislature for what the labels and movie houses et al want."

Ah, but what do you do when they own their opponents as well? I've said it before, but it bears repeating:

You don't control elections by manipulating who votes for whom or how those votes are counted. You control elections by making sure that no matter who wins, it's YOUR guy....
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The Anti-Mike (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 5:39pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
I keep those for you and RD. FOAD.
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RD, 8 Feb 2010 @ 7:22pm

Re: Re:
"Isn't that just the way it should be? If people are willing to pay for it at the market price asked, then there is no issue. If the people don't want to pay, the market will adjust."

Bullshit. What about all the works that were/are not available to buy legitimately at ANY price?

American Anthem Soundtrack CD: NOT IN PRINT

John Larroquette Show: Broadcast, NEVER made available on home video in any form

and many others. You CAN NOT buy these, so what is the alternative? You never answer THIS question. You just leave it at "well, the rights holder can do whatever they want for the length of the copyright term" which is JUST as 'immoral' an answer as 'piracy.' So, the copyright bargain becomes abrogated, and that JUSTIFIED to you?
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RD, 8 Feb 2010 @ 7:34pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"I keep those for you and RD. FOAD."

Wasnt me man, I didnt write that.

But you can f-ing coathanger your Granmama for all I care.
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The Anti-Mike (profile), 8 Feb 2010 @ 8:32pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
reading skills... something you lack.

"I keep those for you and RD".

I didn't say that you were that specific AC. "you and RD" pretty much says more than one person.

Feeling guilty?
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Feb 2010 @ 8:37pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
For trolling a troll? No. You?
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RD, 8 Feb 2010 @ 9:17pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Guilty? Not me. You must be projecting. What are you feeling guilty of? Must be something significant if you are so obsessed and cant let go.
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