J&J get a win by actually getting paid for the their patented product as opposed to the country wishing to use it for generic purposes from declaring the patent invalid and just producing the generic version without licensing. This is the main point. J&J look like greedy scumbags for not helping HIV patients and get no licensing money by not participating. The countries that would like to use these patents can ignore the licensing if it means saving the lives of their citizens. So in effect by not participating they have the ability to make a lot more by controlling the monopoly but could potentially loses revenue if everyone ignores the licensing and just uses the IP anyway. J&J probably realize this and have done some sort of a cost benefit analysis that predicts they will make more money from traditional licensing arrangements than they lose from the reduced licensing through the patent pool. The real loss may come from a reduction of goodwill since it appears they are more interested in making money than saving lives.
I can definitely see your point. The wording I used is problematic. What I was trying to get at last night (and it has been a very long week)was that I think there should be some sort of remedy for businesses that are not established if SOPA is used to derail them before they get a fair chance to see if their business model is successful. In hindsight, I think you are right in that making numbers up for unquantifiable damages should be left to the **AA's and not done by decent folk.
I agree that this "billion dollar bond" simply will not work. SOPA in itself is terrible legislation and cannot be fixed aside from trashing it and starting from scratch. And by starting from scratch I mean narrowly targeting the actual problems of counterfeiting that SOPA claims to address.
That being said, lets take a hypothetical shot at amending SOPA to be somewhat balanced on the copyright issues and the potential for legitimate business destruction.
1. If a company files a false claim against a legit business, paying their legal fees is the bare minimum that would be acceptable as balance.
2. They should also be fined for the copyfraud. This fine should be no less than the maximum penalty for commercial copyright infringement of 150,000. I honestly believe that the minimum fine should be at least 10x that amount at 1.5M. A company abusing the law to stifle free speech or competition is easily worse than the most single malicious instance of commercial infringement and should be punished accordingly.
3. Furthermore, there should be the ability of the injured party to receive statutory damages to compensate for the business disruption and loss of income or potential income while defending the bogus accusation.
These three steps, to me at least, would be a good start at applying some balance to keep the remedies offered by SOPA from suffering rampant abuse. Perhaps the fines paid for instances of false claims could go to a legal fund to help defend small business and startups wrongly accused to keep them afloat if there is a strong case that they are innocent, but I'm not sure of the criteria that would be used to determine that.
Once again, when even the most strident supporters of copyright are recognizing what horrible bills SOPA and PIPA are, it makes you wonder how Congress can continue to move forward with them.
Mike, this one is easy to explain...
Queue up Pink Floyd, Dark Side of the Moon, Track 6...
I would agree with you. There is absolutely no other reasonable explanation as to why this would be proposed other than revenue generation. If that's what it's about than just say so. No BS about trying to justify this as beneficial or other such nonsense. Say we need the money, and we'll make it easy to auto-renew with an automatic billing feature for the renewal fee so that unless the payment account changes without notice there will never be a lapse in coverage. There should be a mandatory opt-out notice sent each year, and if not responded to, the provider should automatically be billed and their agent renewed. There... problem solved. No lapse in coverage, transparency towards the revenue generation, and life goes on. Why do we always have to go through this bullshit song and dance routine?!?!
To be clear, I do not support this change, but if it has to happen, then making sure there isn't an administrative burden to renew or the possibility for a lase in coverage due to a "calendaring" mistake is essential.
The Safe Harbor provisions of the DMCA are the only saving grace of an otherwise terrible piece of legislation. While I agree that those offering infringing (not stolen) content and not profiting from it should be held harmless and not liable, it simply isn't possible for large sites like Youtube to "vet the content for copyright clearance". I believe the statistic is that Youtube receives 48 hours of content every single minute. There is no possible way to screen that amount of content. Safe Harbors are absolutely necessary for the internet to function with user generated content. The only alternative is to make it a broadcasting platform which completely undermines the greatest communication medium ever conceived.
Here are a couple more examples that are equally as valid as the one you just put forth:
1. If you care so much about artists making money, why do you spend so much time making sandwiches?
2. If you care so much about artists making money, why do you spend so much time responding to my posts and making me look like a fool? (excellent question but a completely false comparison)
Now here's a good comparison:
If you care about artists making money, why do you spend so much time trying explain how to connect with fans to give them a reason to buy and leverage the scarcities that can be used for profit. Also, on an unrelated note, it would seem that you also spend a lot of time discussing problems with extremely poorly crafted and problematic legislation.
See how much more sense that makes when you avoid the false dichotomy and ask a relevant question?
This is the same thing I was thinking. In many cases the parents would own the copyright on their children's faces, but not always. The creator of the creative work owns the copyright, so as long as your parents used a method other than the missionary position that should be enough to meet the "creative" standard. As for all the conception that resulted from boring sex, I think that's all public domain material... :P
GoDAddy made the decision to support legislation that the general public is adamantly against. The general public then called for a boycott of the company that stands for things that are anti-consumer and against their wishes. This is a consequence of taking a public stance supporting legislation that isn't in the interest of the public ie: your customers. When you piss off your customers you can't bitch about it when they stop doing business with you and tell all their friends not to do business with you either.
It's quite sad that you would condemn the public for taking actions against a corporation with the only power we have: our business. If anything, the boycotters should be commended for standing up for what they believe in and they should be encouraged to do this more often. The market is who should be running the show, and the businesses that serve the market need to realize their place in the equation.
Exactly. If people back down now, it's a sign of weakness on the part of the consumers and next time GoDaddy might think they can just call the "bluff". They need to see that any support for draconian, unconstitutional legislation whether retracted or not will not be tolerated, and the only way they will feel these consequences is through a loss in their business. Some companies don't seem to understand the monetary value of a loss of goodwill until it hits their bottom line. Hard lessons are the ones that are normally retained.
I see this as pretty much "too little, too late." GoDaddy was balls to the walls full ahead in support of SOPA and defending that position tooth and nail up til 2 days ago. I hope the netizens do not call off the drop your GoDaddy domain campaign and continue on with it. GoDaddy needs to learn this lesson in their wallets so that hopefully next time they have to make a decision about supporting legislation, they will consider their consumers before going all in.
You are missing the point. They support the general idea of legislation that will help protect their IP, is narrowly focused on that specific issue, and will actually be effective. Since SOPA is the polar opposite of all of those ideals it is easy to see why they would be against it. It's simple bad legislation plain and simple, and anyone who supports it is effectively supporting censorship to prop up a dying business model. When people see the legislation for what it actually is they want to be as far away from it as possible.
I would tend to agree with you, but I don't see Verizon going that route. Although they should embrace openness and all of the benefits that will come with it, they seem too stuck in the gatekeeper roll and appear to enjoy the profits from nickel and diming. If they would stop trying to charge for tethering, provide unlimited data, and more flexibility in allowing consumers to customize their plans, I can't even imagine how many people would switch over to them. It seems like the entire cell industry got together and came to a mutual agreement on how to screw their customers.
This whole google wallet thing is pretty pathetic. It is speculated that Verizon is trying to set up a competitive service but since it isn't ready yet it seems that Verizon doesn't want to contribute to google getting ahead in market share. I can't understand why they make decisions that lose them so much goodwill for the possibility of future profits.
Don't blame the rights holders - blame the sites that abused the law.
No thanks, I'll keep blaming the content industry that refuses to adapt rather than the legitimate businesses that have found working business models that operate within the confines of the law. The content industry is 100% responsible for the situation they find themselves in. \
Consumers asked for reasonable things like being able to pay for content once and experience on the multitude of platforms available... the industry said no.
Consumers asked for content to be delivered to them at the same time as everyone else... the industry said no.
Consumers asked for the content they pay for to be priced reasonably to reflect the huge savings from digital distribution platforms... the industry said no.
Consumers asked for a product that is easy to use without burdensome restrictions and warnings treating them like criminals... the industry said no.
So what happened? The consumer decided that if the industry wouldn't provide what the market demands then they would find it elsewhere. The industry is absolutely to blame, and your zealotry in defending their failures is laughable.
The analogy was definitely a fail, but the defense of the analogy reaches failure of epic proportions.
I explain for the slow people, if you take the logic set used to dismiss something that happened, committing the crime that he went to jail for, which you pirate/freetard types are dismissing since he didn't profit, didn't hurt anyone, its not a big deal
I believe you may have misread the article and the majority of the comments. No one has dismissed the crime. What many people have said (including the post author) is that the punishment is disproportionate. A year in jail simply does not fit a crime where no harm can be shown.
Your "logic set" analysis does not hold up to scrutiny. To say your analysis of crime A, when applied to crime B means that you condone crime B because you disagree with the sentencing result of crime A is completely preposterous.
Rape is a particularly poor example because attempted rape is a crime as much as the actual act. Certain crimes have to be carried out in order to be considered criminal activity. You can not be convicted of attempted speeding or attempted tax evasion. Just thinking about or wanting to do some things is not a crime. Other crimes may be criminal once you have taken action towards the end goal of the criminal activity but failed to reach the desired end.
The main point most of the commentators here have made is that he did not profit from his crime, and to address your point, nor did he attempt to profit from it. There was no conspiracy to defraud Fox, there was no breaking and entering, and there was no intent to do anything other than share something he came to posses with the rest of the internet. He had the movie, posted it up online, and called it a day. This is not something that warrants a year in federal prison.
Yes, cops protect and serve by arresting suspected criminals. They build a case and gather evidence and then turn the suspect and the evidence over to a prosecutor. A cop who "wants to put people in jail" is not a good cop. A cop who wants to protect the public by identifying potential threats to it and trying to prove those threats are real is a good cop. If you "want to put people in jail" you should become a prosecutor. And if putting people in jail ever becomes more important than ensuring they receive a fair trial, then you wouldn't be a good one of those either.
The ICE director's statement was poorly made and makes him look like someone who doesn't care about justice and is on a power trip. Defending that statement like this is pretty pathetic.
It makes sense to fill our jails to capacity with as many criminals as possible. Then if we run out of room, we can always let certain ones out on parole.
A lot of trolls have said a lot of stupid things in the comments here on Techdirt, but your comment is one of the most genuinely and willfully ignorant I have ever seen. At least that's something to be proud of...
On the post: Lamar Smith Out Of Touch With The Internet: Still Thinks It's Just Google That Opposes SOPA
Re: Re: Re: Re:
On the post: Johnson & Johnson Refuses To License Three HIV Drugs To Medicines Patent Pool; Invites Patent Override
Re: Re: Re:
On the post: Shouldn't There Be Significant Punishment For Bogus Copyright Claims That Kill Companies?
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
On the post: Shouldn't There Be Significant Punishment For Bogus Copyright Claims That Kill Companies?
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That being said, lets take a hypothetical shot at amending SOPA to be somewhat balanced on the copyright issues and the potential for legitimate business destruction.
1. If a company files a false claim against a legit business, paying their legal fees is the bare minimum that would be acceptable as balance.
2. They should also be fined for the copyfraud. This fine should be no less than the maximum penalty for commercial copyright infringement of 150,000. I honestly believe that the minimum fine should be at least 10x that amount at 1.5M. A company abusing the law to stifle free speech or competition is easily worse than the most single malicious instance of commercial infringement and should be punished accordingly.
3. Furthermore, there should be the ability of the injured party to receive statutory damages to compensate for the business disruption and loss of income or potential income while defending the bogus accusation.
These three steps, to me at least, would be a good start at applying some balance to keep the remedies offered by SOPA from suffering rampant abuse. Perhaps the fines paid for instances of false claims could go to a legal fund to help defend small business and startups wrongly accused to keep them afloat if there is a strong case that they are innocent, but I'm not sure of the criteria that would be used to determine that.
On the post: Heritage Foundation Says SOPA Threatens Free Speech
Mike, this one is easy to explain...
Queue up Pink Floyd, Dark Side of the Moon, Track 6...
MONEY!!!!!
On the post: Copyright Office Seeks To Make It More Difficult To Retain DMCA Safe Harbors
Re: Re: It is a money grab, pure and simple
On the post: Copyright Office Seeks To Make It More Difficult To Retain DMCA Safe Harbors
Re: It is a money grab, pure and simple
To be clear, I do not support this change, but if it has to happen, then making sure there isn't an administrative burden to renew or the possibility for a lase in coverage due to a "calendaring" mistake is essential.
On the post: Copyright Office Seeks To Make It More Difficult To Retain DMCA Safe Harbors
Re:
On the post: Cee Lo Green: Making Millions Even If His Albums Don't Sell
Re: Re: Re:
1. If you care so much about artists making money, why do you spend so much time making sandwiches?
2. If you care so much about artists making money, why do you spend so much time responding to my posts and making me look like a fool? (excellent question but a completely false comparison)
Now here's a good comparison:
If you care about artists making money, why do you spend so much time trying explain how to connect with fans to give them a reason to buy and leverage the scarcities that can be used for profit. Also, on an unrelated note, it would seem that you also spend a lot of time discussing problems with extremely poorly crafted and problematic legislation.
See how much more sense that makes when you avoid the false dichotomy and ask a relevant question?
On the post: Daft Idea Of The Week: Giving People Copyright In Their Faces
Re: The author of the work is ...
On the post: Breaking: GoDaddy Drops SOPA Support
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
It's quite sad that you would condemn the public for taking actions against a corporation with the only power we have: our business. If anything, the boycotters should be commended for standing up for what they believe in and they should be encouraged to do this more often. The market is who should be running the show, and the businesses that serve the market need to realize their place in the equation.
On the post: Breaking: GoDaddy Drops SOPA Support
Re: Re: Re:
On the post: Breaking: GoDaddy Drops SOPA Support
On the post: Gibson Guitar & Others On SOPA Supporters List Say They Never Supported The Bill
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
On the post: Is Verizon Wireless Violating Its Promise To Be Open By Blocking Google Wallet?
Re:
This whole google wallet thing is pretty pathetic. It is speculated that Verizon is trying to set up a competitive service but since it isn't ready yet it seems that Verizon doesn't want to contribute to google getting ahead in market share. I can't understand why they make decisions that lose them so much goodwill for the possibility of future profits.
On the post: RIAA Whines That Google Won't Let It Program Google's Search Algorithm
Re:
It's the default search engine on all my machines and becomes the default search engine on any machine I touch ;)
I'm kind of a fan of Scroogle.org as well, but duckduckgo has a duck so it's better because ducks are delicious!
On the post: Did You Embed The Leaked Trailer For Dark Knight Rises On Your Blog? Under SOPA, You May Face Jail Time
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
No thanks, I'll keep blaming the content industry that refuses to adapt rather than the legitimate businesses that have found working business models that operate within the confines of the law. The content industry is 100% responsible for the situation they find themselves in. \
Consumers asked for reasonable things like being able to pay for content once and experience on the multitude of platforms available... the industry said no.
Consumers asked for content to be delivered to them at the same time as everyone else... the industry said no.
Consumers asked for the content they pay for to be priced reasonably to reflect the huge savings from digital distribution platforms... the industry said no.
Consumers asked for a product that is easy to use without burdensome restrictions and warnings treating them like criminals... the industry said no.
So what happened? The consumer decided that if the industry wouldn't provide what the market demands then they would find it elsewhere. The industry is absolutely to blame, and your zealotry in defending their failures is laughable.
On the post: Guy Who Uploaded Early Version Of Wolverine, Which Appears Not To Have Hurt Movie At All, Gets 1 Year In Jail
Re: Re:
I explain for the slow people, if you take the logic set used to dismiss something that happened, committing the crime that he went to jail for, which you pirate/freetard types are dismissing since he didn't profit, didn't hurt anyone, its not a big deal
I believe you may have misread the article and the majority of the comments. No one has dismissed the crime. What many people have said (including the post author) is that the punishment is disproportionate. A year in jail simply does not fit a crime where no harm can be shown.
Your "logic set" analysis does not hold up to scrutiny. To say your analysis of crime A, when applied to crime B means that you condone crime B because you disagree with the sentencing result of crime A is completely preposterous.
Rape is a particularly poor example because attempted rape is a crime as much as the actual act. Certain crimes have to be carried out in order to be considered criminal activity. You can not be convicted of attempted speeding or attempted tax evasion. Just thinking about or wanting to do some things is not a crime. Other crimes may be criminal once you have taken action towards the end goal of the criminal activity but failed to reach the desired end.
The main point most of the commentators here have made is that he did not profit from his crime, and to address your point, nor did he attempt to profit from it. There was no conspiracy to defraud Fox, there was no breaking and entering, and there was no intent to do anything other than share something he came to posses with the rest of the internet. He had the movie, posted it up online, and called it a day. This is not something that warrants a year in federal prison.
On the post: ICE Admits That It Just Wants To 'Put People In Jail' With Operation In Our Sites
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
The ICE director's statement was poorly made and makes him look like someone who doesn't care about justice and is on a power trip. Defending that statement like this is pretty pathetic.
On the post: ICE Admits That It Just Wants To 'Put People In Jail' With Operation In Our Sites
Re: Re: Re: Re:
It makes sense to fill our jails to capacity with as many criminals as possible. Then if we run out of room, we can always let certain ones out on parole.
A lot of trolls have said a lot of stupid things in the comments here on Techdirt, but your comment is one of the most genuinely and willfully ignorant I have ever seen. At least that's something to be proud of...
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