A Look At How Many People Have Been Kicked Offline In Korea On Accusations (Not Convictions) Of Infringement
from the one-strike dept
With the Hadopi three strikes program in France kicking into full speed, it may be worth jumping halfway around the world to South Korea, which put in place a very strict copyright law last year, that included the ability to kick people offline for accusations (not convictions) of file sharing. It's worth noting, of course, that the reason South Korea put in place such a draconian copyright law was due to serious diplomatic pressure from the US as a part of a supposed "free trade" agreement between the two countries. It's also worth pointing out that the trade agreement between South Korea and the US was, according to many, the basis for the initial draft of ACTA (though, obviously, it's changed a lot since then).So, now that the law has been in place for over a year, what's been happening in South Korea? Well, it turns out that people are getting kicked offline for accusations of filing sharing -- but worryingly, it appears they're being kicked off with one strike, not three. Glyn Moody points us to a report on the data behind what's going on in South Korea.
Now, it's important to understand the specifics of the law there. There are two ways a user can have his or her account suspended. The first is if the Minister of Culture orders the ISP to suspend the user. However, this can only come after the user has been warned three times (hence: three strikes). However, there's also a separate way, which is that the Copyright Commission can "recommend" that ISPs warn someone, block or delete materials believed to be infringing or suspend accounts. Deleting or suspending doesn't require any prior notice or warnings or anything. Basically, the Commission says "we recommend you censor this content and/or suspend this user" and the ISPs then have a choice to make. Guess what they do? That's right, they obey. Nearly every time. Out of over 65,000 "recommendations" by the Commission, ISPs have only declined to follow the recommendation 40 times -- 20 times in sending out warnings and 20 times in deleting content. It's never declined to follow a recommendation to suspend an account.
Below is the full chart of data concerning the Copyright Committee's recommendations, and what was done about them:
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Filed Under: bans, infringement, south korea, three strikes
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But this could be due to the launch of a bunch of legal ways to get content. They both happened around the same time (unsurprisingly - I'm betting the "big players" said they wouldn't enter the S. Korean market until those laws were in place.)
And it could be due to neither of the above. So the jury's out, really. I'd like to see a more comprehensive study (done by someone other than the IFPI, which has a history of lying).
Of course, even if it did result in more sales, it's still unjustified because it infringes on basic human rights.
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Wow...If I was that bad at my job...
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The real question is: has piracy increased? The logical assumption is "yes".
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If there are only [30 lessthan numberOfPirates lessthan 100], that surely does put the lie to their statistics for the epidemic of file sharing.
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Useful analogy
And Ima Fish makes a good point; I too seriously doubt that any of this non-sense even began to help reducing piracy.
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Re: Useful analogy
I believe the opposite would end up happenning. People can still copy files without the Internet, and since they do not have Internet anymore they would have more free time and probably a desire to pirate even more to "get even". Thus, it would end up increasing piracy, but in a way which is harder to detect.
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Think, they're losing customers left and right, those people need internet. So they go to cafes and find service from someone else to avoid this BS.
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Re: Useful analogy
I believe the opposite would end up happenning. People can still copy files without the Internet, and since they do not have Internet anymore they would have more free time and probably a desire to pirate even more to "get even". Thus, it would end up increasing piracy, but in a way which is harder to detect.
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I agree with the sentiment
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Another question
Do you really want to give these people a reason to protest?
They protest every year for the Japanese honoring their dead during WWII. They also have violent protests about China.
I can only imagine the Starcraft crowd riots. That may be worse than a Zerg swarm.
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Suggestion for Mike
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Re: Suggestion for Mike
You're looking for the Mike from Istanbul, who is probably related to the Mike from Azerbaijan.
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Granted, there are PLENTY of reputable places to buy these things, but when you see a cart outside the mall with the largest movie theater in town and all the movies that are still playing in theaters on a DVD you can buy for KW5,000
(something in the neighborhood of $3.50 US at the time) you wonder why you would pay $30 for a couple to see a movie and buy snacks when you can walk 3 blocks to the house and pop it in any DVD player because it just happens to be region free.
Those 31 users were PROBABLY just the really big downloaders, or perhaps anyone who could have been targeted for a political agenda. Strikes happen in several places, almost every weekend. Koreans will rally and strike if a government official's aide even farts in the wrong direction.
Speaking of Korea and farts, if you're ever there, don't accept Room 9. Its a Korean joke. The Korean word for room is "pbang" and 9 is "gu." There may be variants of the Romanization that opt for p or b rather than both, and sometime k for g, but anyway, when you add those two words together, "pbang-gu," they mean fart.
My barracks room as a young soldier was room 9 and guess what the KATUSA's always said about me and my room?
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what exactly is wrong about those numbers? If it were the opposite I would understand, because that would mean alot of witch-hunting. What am I missing?
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Re: What's wrong?
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> What am I missing?
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A scary word "precedent".
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Re: What's wrong?
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> What am I missing?
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A scary word "precedent".
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That seems awfully low, and 31 persons kick off the internet?
Yeah right that will show those pesky pirates who is the boss now LoL
Those people who come up with those solutions just live in another reality.
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There's a very disturbing pattern here. Why are so many governments deciding, almost all at once, to screw their citizens in favor of corporate interests? What exactly is going on?
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Censorship
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Synchronicity and mimetism
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Hangook Surfing
한국 비피엔
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They were not disconnected by one-strike
What I meant to say in my blog was to emphasize the difference in the statutory requirements between the suspension made by the order of the Minister and one by the Copyright Commission's recommendation. No statutory requirement of prior notice for the latter.
Currently, the Copyright Commission has its own bylaw that requires sending prior notices at least three times before recommending suspension. Yet how many to send the prior notice is left to their discretion. They are free to enforce one-strike suspension.
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If these "freeloaders" aren't going through the proper legal channels to purchase or license music from the copyright holders, why should the "content industries" be expected to go through the proper legal channels to shut them down? This is yet another unequal argument in a long line of copyleft double standards and adolescent ideologies. We will fight fire with fire. This is war...what did you expect? Don't cry about it every time we push back.
No One Likes A Freeloader
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