Businesses In New Zealand Worry That New Copyright Law Will Kill Off Their Open WiFi
from the can't-have-that-now... dept
With New Zealand rushing through their new three strikes copyright law to kick people off the internet based on accusations (not convictions) of online copyright infringement, some businesses are apparently noting that the law makes no distinctions on business and personal accounts, and any business with open WiFi may suddenly become liable for actions of their users. In other words, the many businesses that offer free and open WiFi to attract customers may have to turn it off to avoid losing all internet access.
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Filed Under: copyright, new zealand, open wifi, three strikes, wifi
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But nope, they only get tighter on their silly rules.
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Maybe this is good
The world needs to see the vast and far reaching the consequences. When public wifi dries up, and businesses lose their connections, the failure will be crystal clear. Fingers crossed, I'm hoping that one or two of the lawmakers who voted for the law will have their connection severed.
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Re: Maybe this is good
Could happen. Won't be me, though, NZ is a bit out of the way, nor am I a member of that particular group.
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Re: Maybe this is good
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Re: Re: Maybe this is good
also a fair number of 'see? it worked in this compleatly different place that is nothing like NZ, so surely it will work here without any modification!' type plans.
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Re: Maybe this is good
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Cost to society as a whole
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The DEA in the UK has the potential to make schools, colleges, universities, libraries and even local government shut down free open access wifi. A point I tried to raise with both my local MP and the Labour government prior to them pushing through the DEA in the last weeks before the election last year. It is only ISPs BT and TalkTalk that stand a chance of having the DEA or parts of it stricken from law now. Good luck NZ, you're gonna need it!
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http://www.keionline.org/node/1115
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DUH !!! And then the spin...
I wonder if the RIAA/MPAA/BSA will figure the loss of business due to this type of law into their calculations for damage to the economy due to piracy. As in, the pirates forced us to lobby for these types of laws that further harm the economy, so now the total cost of piracy is more than a Bajillion dollars to the global economy.
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Darn right they will!!!
Every country out there... YOU WILL DO AS AMERICA SAYS AND YOU WILL DO IT NOW!!! I don't care who you think you are or how *you* want to run your country. You can run it how you want as long as it follow's America's agenda. Three strikes laws, copyrights, patents, ALL OF IT! You will follow suit and you are going to like it. PERIOD!! Now quit the crying and the back talk.
America is your daddy, and you will listen to every word we have to say. GOT IT?? GOOD!!!
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As teh Fonze would say...
Royalties. What a stupid system. If this is the way they want to play the game, then someone owes me my share at having to put forth the work to watch this series, especially as it started to whine down.
Someone owes *me* for having to work to sit through the episode the Fonz jumped the shark.
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Re: As teh Fonze would say...
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I laugh!
The Senator (Minister, etc) needs to be able to say, with a straight face, "I have never been kicked off the net for infringement. It's not a problem, just pay for your music and movies!"
You think ISPs and the MPAA don't understand this game? If the Senators, et al, got kicked off for downloads they would change the law.
You don't think the teams in conflict are Creators and Consumers, do you? Heck, we're all on the same team. Creators want to create and get paid for it, Consumers want to consume and support the creators. The conflict is between the powerFUL and the powerLESS. Note: the RIAA, the MPAA and the Senate are ON THE SAME TEAM.
No, I'm not suggesting back room deals or vast conspiracies. They are simply all from the same socio-economic class. The rest of aren't. It really is that simple.
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I'm no expert in the new law yet but it would still take a conviction in court for them to do that (or at least once they implement the part of the law which lets them kick you off, which they havent yet).
In court an unchallenged accusation is to be assumed to be evidence of guilt - thats the crappy part you're referring to. What's not clear to me is whether to remove that burden of assumed guilt you just have to challenge the accusation or actually disprove it.
My gut feeling is the court will be reluctant to interpret it in a way which overly prejudices the defendants long standing rights to presumption of innocence. But a good law should never be this unclear.
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three strikes then it goes to arbritration, or some such, and at least some ISPs plan on being rather obstructionist about this.
however, kicking you off requires a court order, which, as the thing was presented when i read about it, didn't actually involve the rest of the process at all.
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Corruption and the end of the pure play Republic.
If anything, this underscores the flaws in Republics or Representative Democracy. We the people MUST establish a means to veto laws passed through corruption. Buying a few political whores is cheap. The laws they impose on their alleged constitutes is anything but.
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Re: Corruption and the end of the pure play Republic.
not that i'm exactly a fan of dictatorships, they're far more prone to going off the rails.... but far easier to fix too. like efficiancy, stability is not inherantly a Good thing... or at least, it has a maximum beyond which it becomes problematic. representative democracy is not at all about the will of the people. it's about preventing revolt and sudden shifts.
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Open access won't matter, will it?
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