How The Patent System Is Like A Broken Web Cache

France Three Strikes Law Suggests A Huge Percentage Of French Citizens At Risk Of Losing Internet Access

from the yeah,-that's-not-going-to-play-well dept

Fri, Jul 15th 2011 4:19am — Mike Masnick

When you have a law that a huge percentage of the population violates, you have to wonder if the law is just. The first data is out about the French 3-strikes HADOPI program, and apparently copyright holders have sent in notices claiming 18 million incidents of unauthorized file sharing. The Torrentfreak article suggests that it's 18 million individuals, but I think that they really mean 18 million incidents, which could include some repeat offenders. Still, it suggests a large number of people in France have engaged in file sharing... Of course, HADOPI, much to the chagrin of the entertainment industry, only sent out 470,000 "first strike" notices, 20,000 second strike notices, and just ten third strike notices (which are being reviewed by judges, but no one has been disconnected yet). It'll be interesting to see if there's any noticeable impact on purchases in France. Other reports have already suggested that a mere 4% of unauthorized file sharers in France said they were changing their behavior because of this. Many others were simply shifting to encryption to keep their activities away from prying eyes. Still, the bigger point is that when you have so many people violating the law, perhaps the problem is with the law, and not the people violating it...

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Filed Under: france, hadopi, statistics

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out_of_the_blue, 15 Jul 2011 @ 4:21am

YES, as I've said, if gov't wishes to, they damn well WILL.
So now that the hammer is about to drop, you should hurry up those plans for an "alternate" internet.
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 4:29am

Well, the only possible conclusion is that France is mostly inhabited by immoral people that should rot in prison forever.
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Rich Kulawiec, 15 Jul 2011 @ 4:35am

This leads to an interesting conclusion about Hadopi
They've admitted sending out close to half a million messages.

Obviously, they're all email.

And I think "half a million" easily qualifies as "bulk".

And I see no evidence that the recipients of these messages solicited them, that is, that they asked Hadopi to send them or subscribed to a mailing list. (Given the context, I can't imagine that they would.) Therefore these messages are all unsolicited.

Which means that Hadopi is sending unsolicited bulk email, or UBE...which is the canonical (and only acceptable) definition of spam.

So Hadopi are spammers.
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 4:42am

Re: This leads to an interesting conclusion about Hadopi
"Obviously, they're all email."

Or maybe not. Maybe they were sent by regular mail. Just imagine the carnage of trees that would imply. All of the damages (supposedly) caused by piracy in the whole world would pale in comparison.
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Donnicton, 15 Jul 2011 @ 4:48am

Re: YES, as I've said, if gov't wishes to, they damn well WILL.
Don't worry, Iran is already on top of things.

...Anyone want a free IOL CD?
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Rich Kulawiec, 15 Jul 2011 @ 4:49am

Re: Re: This leads to an interesting conclusion about Hadopi
This Ars Technica piece:

French Copyright Cops: we're swamped with three strikes complaints

specifically says "email".
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abc gum, 15 Jul 2011 @ 4:53am

I imagine there are multiple accusations for the same 'infraction'. How does this get sorted out?

I would like to know how many are false positives, but that is a difficult thing to ascertain as evidenced by the recording industry attempts to foist the responsibility upon the government. If it were easy the industry would be doing it themselves.

This has the potential of becoming another massive government program of little benefit to a majority of the population. Once established, it is difficult to remove. The wise thing to do at this point is rescind the three strikes law.
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 4:54am

Re: Re: Re: This leads to an interesting conclusion about Hadopi
Ah, thanks.
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 4:57am

Easiest thing with those numbers would just be to build a fence around France and just say they are all in prison.
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Chronno S. Trigger (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 4:59am

It ain't going to stop there
18 million complaints, that's between 6 and 18 million people in a population of 66 million. Even on the lower end of the scale that's what 9% of the population? That's a hell of a lot of money ISPs lose just in processing the complaints alone, and then there's all the monthly bills that don't exist any more. Using RIAA math, that's billions lost to the economy.

And I'm surprised that only 4% said they would change. Usually with a survey like that the numbers are skewed the other direction for fear of prosecution. Unless they're counting all the people who said "no comment" and "I don't infringe" (doesn't look like it).
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infinidiv (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 5:05am

KISS
So now French citizens are paying for downloads through taxes and rate hikes from ISPs. Why not skip the bureaucracy and give that money directly to the music and film industry and make file sharing legal?

Oh, wait, then EVERYONE would know what is really going on... damn.
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Richard (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 5:07am

When it gets to 50 Million...
They'll have to repeal the law - cos as the old song goes "50 million Frenchmen can't be wrong"
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abc gum, 15 Jul 2011 @ 5:11am

The war on music, just what we need - another grandiose waste of time and money for the sole purpose of enriching a few multi-millionaires. Wooot!
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martyburns (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 5:14am

Re:
From

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/07/french-agency-were-swamped-with-three-strike s-complaints.ars

...Another reason for the apparent backlog is that, in some case, Hadopi has received numerous notices for the same user. "If we get the same notice, from the same people, the same week, with the same software, it's counted as just one notice, not 10, or 15, or 20," said the spokesperson.../i>
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abc gum, 15 Jul 2011 @ 5:24am

Re: When it gets to 50 Million...
99 Luftballons
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ASTROBOI, 15 Jul 2011 @ 5:28am

Sinners
The human race, at least that part of it that lives in what we refer to as "the west" seems to be prone to passing laws that criminalize big chunks of the population. Consider: how many people would be in trouble if you could identify every single use of prohibited drugs, every instance of driving too fast, not wearing a seat belt, underage drinking, cheating on a test in school, etc. etc.Maybe its our somewhat daffy religious heritage. We are all sinners. We always will be. Even those that have given up on religion can't help but be affected by the momentum of those old legends. So when somebody rules that a large portion of the population needs punishing for letting somebody else borrow their music or book or movie, its a natural. This crazy idea that we are all evil in one way or another has made low-level loonys out of our otherwise somewhat logical population. The first country that dumps this insanity and decriminalizes stuff that everybody does anyways will be light years ahead of the rest. Of course its unlikely that any country ever will.
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Kingster (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 5:31am

I see money in the future of...
Seedboxes. Time to start renting some servers in Sweden and leasing portions out as seedboxes.
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 5:44am

Re: I see money in the future of...
Or maybe people should stop freeloading and pay for the song/movie instead.
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out_of_the_blue, 15 Jul 2011 @ 5:45am

"It'll be interesting to see if there's any noticeable impact on purchases in France."
No, it won't. First, likely won't be able to dig the numbers out of the noise, especially of general decline. 2nd, even if certain that it's not brought any /increase/ of income to content providers, they'll STILL be happy that no one is watching without paying.

So as usual, your anti-copyright bias plus your ability to ignore real world factors means that your "economic" predictions are trivially wrong.
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Gabriel Tane (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 5:47am

Re: This leads to an interesting conclusion about Hadopi
I know you're being sarcastic... but I would group these under 'transactional communications' from your ISP. That is, technically, solicited since you purchased their service and agreed to their TOS.
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Chronno S. Trigger (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 5:49am

Re: Re: I see money in the future of...
You automatically assume that he's seeding something that wasn't meant to be seeded.
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Gabriel Tane (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 5:49am

Re:
Well, since NONE of the reporting processes are EVER abused, I think they assume that if there's THAT many reports on a single person, they MUST be a pirate and they just shoot them.

/sarc
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out_of_the_blue, 15 Jul 2011 @ 5:49am

Re: I see money in the future of...
You're practically admitting intent to infringe, where that means make /money/ off file-sharing of copyrighted material. It's a valid reason for copyright maximalists to lay charges not only in this little forum, but in courts.
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Chronno S. Trigger (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 5:52am

Re: Re: I see money in the future of...
You automatically assume that he's seeding something that wasn't meant to be seeded.
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Crosbie Fitch (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 5:54am

Re:
There is another conclusion, that copyright is an unjust law created by a corrupt government for the ulterior benefit of having its consequently enriched and beholden press suppress sedition.

Thomas Paine tried to explain natural rights to both the French and the Americans, but they too enacted simulacrums of Queen Anne's statute of 1709 that annulled in the majority their natural right to copy - leaving it, by exclusion in the hands of a few (copy-right holders).

If you support copyright, you won't like the natural rights explanation of its demise in the face of the people's natural liberty and right to copy, so don't read this: http://culturalliberty.org/blog/index.php?id=276
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:02am

Re: "It'll be interesting to see if there's any noticeable impact on purchases in France."
So what you're saying is that the result of all this pain and effort is nothing apart from the moral satisfaction of a few and extreme annoyance of many?
Stop 'freetards' and there's still going to be a decline of sales?
So...you're saying the two aren't linked then.
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Andrew (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:06am

Re: "It'll be interesting to see if there's any noticeable impact on purchases in France."
How can you say his predictions are wrong...predictions imply that he knows what going to happen, he is simply saying lets see if there is a noticeable impact. I am also interesting to see what happens

Stop jumping to conclusions like this, if you think something different fine I respect that but don't come with this attitude like oh your predictions are so wrong.
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Richard (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:07am

Re: Re:
Agree with you - but I think the A/C above was beign sarcastic...
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Rich Kulawiec, 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:11am

Re: Re: This leads to an interesting conclusion about Hadopi
I'm not being sarcastic; I'm quite serious.

Worth noting, though, is that these email messages are not coming from the ISPs: they're coming from Hadopi. While users may have agreed to receive communications from their ISPs (e.g., "There will be a network outage from 2 to 4 AM on Friday") they have not agreed to receive same from Hadopi.
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Frost, 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:11am

Systemic problem, anyone?
It's amazing to me on a daily basis that people are unable to see that things like these are a massive indicator that society is designed horribly wrong from the start. Obviously, file sharing is something people want to do, and just as obviously it has no downside - except that people want to and need to make money somehow. Isn't it time to start thinking of a society where people have their needs met without having to make money, and where art and culture is done for the sake of making art and culture? For instance, the resource-based economy concept that is envisioned by Jacque Fresco and others.
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AJ, 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:11am

Re: Re: "It'll be interesting to see if there's any noticeable impact on purchases in France."
"So what you're saying is that the result of all this pain and effort is nothing apart from the moral satisfaction of a few and extreme annoyance of many?
Stop 'freetards' and there's still going to be a decline of sales?
So...you're saying the two aren't linked then."

Your close....but..... What he's ACTUALLY saying is that he's an idiot, and at the first opportunity he will confirm this by posting another comment.
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Richard (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:15am

Re: Sinners
prone to passing laws that criminalize big chunks of the population.....
.... aybe its our somewhat daffy religious heritage. We are all sinners.

No that's the wrong conclusion from the religious heritage.

The correct conclusion is based on "let him who is without sin cast the first stone." Because we are all sinners we should avoid condemning others when we are no better.

The problem is that the religious heritage has been garbled - we need to go back to the original version.
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Richard (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:20am

Re: Re: I see money in the future of...
When the sellers stop profiteering ( selling downloads for 10,000 times marginal costs and around 10x what goes back to the artists) then you might have the beginnings of a point - in the meantime - pot - meet kettle.
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Bruce Ediger (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:24am

Re: Re: Re: I see money in the future of...
I downloaded CentOS Linux CD ISO images the other day. As near as I can tell, this is perfectly legal.

It's also the first time I've fired up a BitTorrent client since I downloaded Slackware 13.1 Linux, also perfectly legal.

Am I freeloading?
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Richard (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:26am

Re: Re: I see money in the future of...
Or maybe people should stop freeloading and pay for the song/movie instead.

"God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,"
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Bruce Ediger (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:29am

Re: "It'll be interesting to see if there's any noticeable impact on purchases in France."
If we won't be able to see any increase in sales, then what's the point of the Hadopi dragnet? I'm told Hadopi had a budget of 12 million euros for 2011. That's a lot of money. Why should taxpayers foot the bill for an instrument of repression, if nothing economically positive happens?

When (not if) the "3 strikes" campaign comes to the USA, will this dis-economony come in to the discussion? In business-oriented USA, the lack of bang for the buck would seem to mean we should not want 3 strikes at all.
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Joseph K (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:34am

A Wast of a lot of money
So, let me get this straight. Over the past 9 months the French government has spent probably millions of Euros to find, then notify millions of French citizens, which has resulted in 10 people who might have to pay a fine of 1500 euros and lose their internet access temporarily, while France is still facing a weak economy, has a debt to GDP ratio of 82% and is looking at multiple EU countries possibly defaulting. Does anything think they might be squandering a lot of money to prevent people from illegally downloading things they probably wouldn't buy otherwise?
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Ninja (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:34am

Re: Re:
This is pretty ambiguous. I haven't read the original statement in French but it sounds to me that the 18 million don't count repeated infringements so we could get the list down to like 1-2 million unique IPs over the referred months. That's 1,5 million unique households which makes it 7-9% of French totals (I saw they estimate there are 25 million households in France for 65 million total population, I'm not feeling like adding citations, Google if any doubts). I'll assume they'll make the account holders liable but if you think that there are 2-3 ppl in the houses that makes 7 million ppl disconnected, which is near 10% of the total population. Govt should really move essential services offline heh.

That in a few months...
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:34am

Re: Re: Re: Re: I see money in the future of...
YES!

You are not paying your Microsoft tax.
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:39am

Re: Re: Re:
I don't know... it is the french he's talking about... That fact alone may validate most of his statement...
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:42am

Re: Re: This leads to an interesting conclusion about Hadopi
so I guess now we can add "but, but, global warming" to the list of piracy's crimes and results then? SHUSH before the maRiaa hear you.
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:43am

Re: Re: Re: This leads to an interesting conclusion about Hadopi
they obviously don't need help with stupid ideas
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 6:43am

A 4% change is still a change, and that is before anyone has actually lost their internet connection. That is also only the "admitted" change. Plenty of people still don't admit that they pirate stuff to start with.
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Gabriel Tane (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 7:01am

Re: Re: Re: This leads to an interesting conclusion about Hadopi
My point was that there is going to be some part of the TOS (which are about as convoluted as EULAs) that allows this kind of communication to be 'allowed' and ultimately not spam. Besides which... transactional communication is not considered spam even if it's not from the 'first line' of service. If it's a government agency that regulates the business you're doing business with, that agency can send you communications on behalf of the service provider if it is related to that service.

Not all unsolicited communication meets the definition of spam.
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Old Fool (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 7:05am

Re:
I agree, also imprison people who read newspapers over your shoulder as they are also copyright thieves, and don't forget those who watch TV in a TV showroom'

The worst are those who invite friends to watch TV, that is streaming copyright material to 'thieves' too.

I feel sorry for the likes of George Clooney getting a paltry $15 million dollars per film, (how does he survive on such a pittance?) think what he could ask if there were no pirates!
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Rich Kulawiec, 15 Jul 2011 @ 7:08am

Re: Re: Re: Re: This leads to an interesting conclusion about Hadopi
You're wrong. In fact, you're very wrong.

Government does not get a free pass to spam merely because it happens to have some relationship (regulatory or otherwise) with your business or with a business that you have a relationship with or some involvement in.

Moreover, solicitation isn't transitive -- and can't be, of course, since this would provide an instant excuse to every spammer on planet. (Thus: even if we stipulate that user U has solicited bulk email from ISP I by virtue of becoming a customer of I and agreeing to TOS that say same, U has not solicited bulk email from anyone else, nor can the ISP I do so on U's behalf.)

What you are correct about is that not all unsolicited communication meets the definition of spam. That is why the canonical definition of spam (in the context of email, which is the only context applicable here) is unsolicited bulk email.
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lavi d (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 7:18am

Deja Vu All Over Again
Still, the bigger point is that when you have so many people violating the law, perhaps the problem is with the law, and not the people violating it...

See "Drug War", especiall, "Marijuana"
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Hephaestus (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 7:41am

Re: Re:
That is just so weird. I did a timeline just like that to help a friend with his thesis. It's actually the reason I started reading techdirt. Your 2030 date is off, things are progessing alot faster than any one realizes.
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Hephaestus (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 7:43am

Re: Re:
Watching TV in a TV showroom ... how dare they, thats a public performance!

I so hope some IP max type runs with that one.
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Irving, 15 Jul 2011 @ 7:44am

This is easy to fight
Everyone file 3 quick complaints against each French political party supporting this policy; party headquarters lose their internet access, the system is removed in record time.

I wonder what would happen if people started issuing DMCA takedown notices against the member corporations of the MAFIAA?

Just an idea.
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Greevar (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 7:45am

Re:
Have you been watching Johnny English?
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Crosbie Fitch (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 7:56am

Re: Re: Re:
Note the '??'. I didn't want to 'frighten the horses'. ;-)

And don't worry, I do 'realize'.
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Marcel de Jong (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 8:04am

Re: Re: Re: This leads to an interesting conclusion about Hadopi
How do you solve a problem like maRiaa?

Sorry, I couldn't help myself.
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 8:04am

This is all about fear. Occasionally, someone gets made an example of and before long, nobody cares.

Most Western societies are a system of State law and Church law, although the progressive ones tend to replace the Church with organized crime "protection".

The bubble will burst soon. It will be a mess.
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Marcel de Jong (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 8:10am

Re: Re: I see money in the future of...
2 things that can make money regarding seedboxes and their legality:
- Building seedboxes: NOT illegal.
- Renting out seedboxes: NOT illegal.

What valid reasons? What intent to infringe?
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Marcel de Jong (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 8:14am

Re: Re: "It'll be interesting to see if there's any noticeable impact on purchases in France."
He's saying that the copyright maximalists don't care that the sales won't increase if they can hunt down these nasty pirates. In fact, (s)he says that the content providers will even be happy that no one is watching it without paying.

Both are flat out laughably wrong, but there you see the copytrolls' reality distortion field.
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mike allen (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 8:34am

I must bet a friend in France phone number before they cut her off.
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Gabriel Tane (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 8:38am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: This leads to an interesting conclusion about Hadopi
I don't know how else to explain that if the government chooses to send out its legal notices to people via email, it's not spam. Just because there's a large number going out at once doesn't make it spam. By that logic, if local municipalities chose to send Red-light Camera tickets in a mass-sending (bulk) via email, they would be spamming... which is not true.

Give you another example. I work tech for insurance agencies. One of the things they can do is send late-payment reminders to their customers via email (assuming they have the email address). If they get 50 clients in a single day who missed a payment, and they send 50 form-letter emails saying "hey, don't forget your bill!� they are NOT spamming.

And that's what the government in this case is doing... they have a large number of emails to send out to people for a transactional purpose (issuing a legal warning).

I think one of the biggest differences here is that spam applies to commercial email, and I don't think you'll see anyone enforce that these government notifications qualify for that definition.
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Mr. Oizo, 15 Jul 2011 @ 8:43am

Re: Deja Vu All Over Again
Yes ! Exactly. There is nothing wroing with a big fat joint once in a while. In this case the law is indeed also wrong.

So, what's your point again ?
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The Groove Tiger (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 8:48am

Re: A Wast of a lot of money
That's 10 "third strike notices". We don't even know if they're to different people. For all we know, it might be 2 people getting 5 notices each.
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 9:10am

Population of france
France only has 65 million people (55 million people if you only count those over the age of 15).

If they are counting individuals rather than incidents, Hadopi's after about 1/3 of the adult(ish) population of France!
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Nicedoggy, 15 Jul 2011 @ 9:46am

Re: Re: I see money in the future of...
You do know that people in France are making bets to see who can pirate more and not get caught right?
Hadopi m'a tuer!
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Nicedoggy, 15 Jul 2011 @ 10:18am

I want to see the French government having the balls to fine and disconnect those millions of people at once.
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 10:43am

I saw a headline earlier that read "Pirate threat forces scientists to turn to Navy for help," and I asked myself what the Navy has to do with file sharing.
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Rich Kulawiec, 15 Jul 2011 @ 10:50am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: This leads to an interesting conclusion about Hadopi
You can't explain it to me because you're wrong -- and you're wrong because you do not understand the canonical (correct) definition of spam and why it deliberately omits certain qualifiers.

For example, the canonical definition of spam (UBE) does not discuss who is sending the email, why they're sending the email, what the content might be (or even whether there is any content at all). These omissions are not an accident: they were done with purpose decades ago when the term was coined, and when we were all engaged in numerous (and lengthy) debates about how it should replace earlier extant terminology (e.g., "mass mail abuse", which was in use during the early 1980's).

It also does not include word "commercial" -- another deliberate omission. It is a newbie-level mistake to presume that non-commercial UBE can't be spam...because of course it is. (Do not conflate the canonical definition of spam with the incorrect ones written into statutes in various jurisdictions. As far as I'm aware, no legislation anywhere in the world has actually used the correct definition of spam. This is unsurprising: not only do legislators wish to exempt themselves, as they've done from telemarketing statutes, but the legislative process is heavily influenced by pro-spam lobbyists. Here in the US, the DMA is largely responsible for the CAN-SPAM bill which essentially legalizes spam.)

Non-commercial UBE from political, charity, non-profit, religious or other entities is still UBE therefore still spam -- by definition. (And of course all of us who are familiar with the long and sordid history of spam and telemarketing and junk faxing are painfully well aware that spammers will go to great lengths to claim otherwise.) This is, incidentally, why it is a fundamental error to use the term "UCE"; while the email in question may in fact truly be commercial in nature, this is completely irrelevant in determining whether it's spam or not.

Your insurance company analogy does not hold: the customers have solicited that email traffic by agreeing to subscribe to the "late payment notification system" or whatever the functional equivalent to that is. So while it's bulk, it's not unsolicited, therefore not spam.

Your government (traffic ticket) analogy does not hold either, but for a different reason: it's clearly spam *unless* the drivers in question have signed up for a "traffic ticket notification via email system" or whatever we might choose to call it. The government does not get a free pass to spam merely because it's convenient or because it has something it wishes to communicate or because it has notices to issue.

Now...this particular case, the one we're talking about involving Hadopi, is very clear: the messages are obviously UBE. We need not concern ourselves with who is sending them; why they're sending them; what's in them; or any of the rest of the irrelevant details. Unless Hadopi is running some kind of "sign up here to receive notifications if someone is accusing you of being naughty" service, and I see no indication anywhere that they are, they're spamming.
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Johnsmith999 (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 11:23am

Re:
Yes PIRATES are terrorists who attack ships at sea, COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT is NOT piracy
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BeeAitch (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 12:09pm

Re: YES, as I've said, if gov't wishes to, they damn well WILL.
It already exists.
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Gabriel Tane (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 12:12pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: This leads to an interesting conclusion about Hadopi
Ok... I see where we're divergent here. You're talking about the concept of spam in general. OK, I grant that just about any email I ever receive from anyone who's not a live individual personally known to me would fall under that definition.

But when you started the thread, you mentioned that the French Government is a spammer because of this. If you mean they are canonical spammers, ok... but who cares? I had assumed you made this comment with the intention that 'something should be done about it'. That's why I assumed you mean they were sending out spam as defined by the laws that actually could do something about it.

Looks like we're both right, we were just having two different arguments. I was talking about enforceable spam, I guess. Even those things allowed by CANSPAM are still spam by definition, but I was talking about those things that aren�t allowed.
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 12:13pm

Re: Re:
@ aptly named Old Fool

I feel sorry for the likes of George Clooney getting a paltry $15 million dollars per film, (how does he survive on such a pittance?) think what he could ask if there were no pirates!

What about the prop man, his makeup person, the boom operator, his driver? Fuck Clooney, there's a few hundred thousand people trying to eak out a middle class existence to consider as well.
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BlewVelvet (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 12:22pm

Yeah..but did they.....
When the "First Strike" notices went out..didn't they get a bunch of notices back with a picture of a guillotine on them?

That's what the French should do! I mean..don't they know their own history?
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Any Mouse (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 12:36pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: This leads to an interesting conclusion about Hadopi
Your definition of spam may be spot on, but if your spam filter catches legal notifications and you don't see them, do you think a judge will care?
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Brendan (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 12:37pm

Re: Re: Re:
Might I suggest requesting a raise or learning a new skill?
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Any Mouse (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 12:37pm

Re: This leads to an interesting conclusion about Hadopi
Maybe true, but anti-spam laws don't cover legal communications, only UCE or harassment.
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Any Mouse (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 12:39pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: This leads to an interesting conclusion about Hadopi
"The government does not get a free pass to spam merely because it's convenient or because it has something it wishes to communicate or because it has notices to issue."

Err... Yes, they do. Anti-spam laws do not include communications of legal matters, and if you think they do a judge might have something to teach you.
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Jordan (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 2:31pm

Re: Re: Re:
None of those people get a cut of the proceeds.
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nasch (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 3:07pm

Re: It ain't going to stop there
18 million complaints, that's between 6 and 18 million people in a population of 66 million.

No, one person could get any number of complaints about any number of activities. All we know without more specific information is that it's fewer than 18 million people. Unless I'm reading something wrong here.
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nasch (profile), 15 Jul 2011 @ 3:12pm

Re: Re: Deja Vu All Over Again
Not to speak for lavi d or anything, but I thought you got his point perfectly. What are you confused about?
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 8:51pm

Re: Re: Re: Re:
Maybe you should stop stealing from working people instead.
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 8:58pm

Re: Re: Re: Re:
Wrong. Writers, the directorial team(including the 2nd, 2nd AD), actors (including the ones minor ones) all get residuals. The behind-the-camera crew's health and retirement plans are funded in part by downstream revenue. On top of that, erosion of downstream revenue kills small (
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2011 @ 11:10pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Trying to explain real-world economics to freetards is a notoriously futile act.
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Jay (profile), 16 Jul 2011 @ 12:54am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Maybe you should learn to benefit from better distribution models instead.
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techflaws.org (profile), 16 Jul 2011 @ 3:08am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
As is being taken serious when acting as an obvious troll like you just did.
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Lawrence D'Oliveiro, 16 Jul 2011 @ 5:25am

Re: The behind-the-camera crew's health and retirement plans are funded in part by downstream revenue.
What does that even mean? Does that mean how much they get to enjoy their retirement depends on how well the movie continues to do a few decades down the track? Won�t it be a bit late by then, like only-found-in-DVD-bargain-bins-or-seen-on-late-night-TV kind of late?
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Djorra (profile), 17 Jul 2011 @ 10:20pm

And yet governments haven't publically moved on BIG groups of people stealing from the LITTLE guys (i.e. "D&G Tees")?
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