Also, as far as “foreign law” and Ginsburg and whatever else, what about the various jurisdictions like Spain where filesharing itself is legal, so they have to do stuff like bust the guy because the site had ads? The “foreign law” thing cuts both ways, and everybody knows it.

But really, the megacorps attempted to rig things from the start, in regard to copyright law.
Look at any site advocating copyright reform/strengthening of the public domain, and you’ll probably come across some blather to the effect that the U.S. can’t enact substantive changes because of “International treaties”. Hmmm…..who do you think lobbied for those “treaties?” I wonder. (Scratch head, roll eyes, smirk devilishly.)

Looking at this from a slightly longer view, a different — and altogether more optimistic — picture emerges:

1. The p2p thing is global, which is why the MAFIAA have to keep doing what amount to piddly little trials (and trust me, in the grand scheme of things, trying four guys is piddly). Further, they have to contend with the fact that it’s simply not going there way in a lot of jurisdictions — cases tossed out, cases snared in weird technicalities, etc etc.

2. Thanks to our former chimp-in-chief Dubya, the rest of the world (justifiably) hates America’s guts, and regards the U.S.A as some kind of gun-totin’, swaggering, waterboarding, habeas-corpus-violatig, imperial juggernaut. To put it bluntly, various national governments don’t want to look like they’re cozying up to America, with good reason.
Now, I’m from the U.S.A., but unlike a lot of others who’d rather engage in mindless flagwaving and “supporting” whatever the State happens to do, I actually think about stuff. I know when “my” country is wrong. The rest of the world does, too.

Who pushed through the de-regulation, “Free trade” agreements and other crap that seriously damaged the world economy?
(Hint: which country had a presidential run where “socialist” was used as a slur?)
Which nation has also been jackbooting everything in it’s path for the past eight years?

So, basically, the rest of the world isn’t particularly happy with how the Imperial Capital (”worlds only superpower”) has been treating “the provinces”. It’s not altogether unlikely that the rest of the world will take this — or other — opportunities to tell U.S.-backed lobbying groups what they can go do with themselves.

Right now, there’s a “perfect storm” aspect to this that nobody seems to be mentioning:

1. The p2p thing demonstrates just exactly how the corporate megaliths feel about ‘innovation’ and such.
2. A significant proportion of very smart people have finally realized that IP laws have been bought and sold, and everybody else is getting shafted as a result.
3. The country that is MOST friendly with the corporate giants is ALSO the least popular country on the entire planet due to a series of really questionable political/military adventures (Yay team!)
4. World culture isn’t particularly “pro-corporate” right now (due to the fact that our Corporate overlords’ quest for short-term profitability now threatens to wreck world civilization etc.)

Just sayin’.

recently badass ginsberg declared even foreign law can be used to establish precedent in our country so you can see how anal these people get with this. it’s called “judicial activism” : the precedents and ruling of the court are actually used to re-make the law. legal or otherwise it is how the law is enforced. and those guys do have the big club

the next step in the process for TPB will be the appeal. If the courts are indeed using this to establish a precedent then the appeal willl be granted and the outcome will be the same and the precedent will be established in law. right or wrong they will enforce it in accordance with the precedent

nope, and english is my second language so go easy on me

its a philosophy, and not covered by copyright, feel free to share the wealth.

like many have said before me. the more you push back on ‘pirates’ the more innovation gets implemented”

I’m looking forward to that article, ive read a little, but love to learn the how it works stuff
stw

“… and for the record, I meant the industry regularly gets screwed by those horses ”
thats a right visual there mate!!
stw

First, I don’t believe in “Freetards”: that’s a straw-man created by Big Media, specifically as a way to undercut anybody who would urge for copyright reform, or suchlike.
I mean, think about it: if “Freetards” are such an evil thing, then how exactly is advocacy of the public domain any different? I mean, at base “all” Big Media wants is for people to “pay for stuff” — THEIR price, for as long as possible.
That’s why they spend so much time propagandizing people about the “sacred right” to perpetual copyright monopoly.

The public domain, on principle, pisses them off, because it’s use of “content” that they can’t monetize, and make no mistake, the ability to monetize is what every step of their bullshit is about.

So the first step is to realize that copyfight etc. isn’t all that different from the “freetards” we’re supposed to all dislike.

let’s say copy”right” terms were reduced to something more reasonable (like say, the original 11 years). That’d still leave “content creators” (or more realistically, the distributors) a decade during which they could gouge the hell ouf of everybody to their heart’s content, but Y’know what? They wouldn’t be able to monopolize content past that point, so tremendous amounts of “content” would be ‘legally’ available inexpensively, or even gratis (for free).
Think of it: a vast (and genuinely vibrant) sea of culture and art that didn’t depend on bribing some perpetual “gate-keeper” for it’s use. Oh heaven forfend!

Make no mistake, according to Big Media, we’re ALL “freetards”, based not on whether we download or share files or whatever, but simply because of our belief that there SHOULD BE areas of culture outside of their gouging. They hate the public domain, and they NEVER intend to have anything enter it again (hence the perpetual increase of term-limits, and the fact that they retroactively prevent stuff from expiring on time, etc.)

Everybody needs to read up on something called “cointelpro”. It was a CIA operation which involved infiltrating “dissident” organizations to spread what we’d now describe as “FUD” — “Fear, uncertainty, and doubt”.

We all know — or at least suspect — that various trolls defending the corporations actions (you know who you are) infest the various p2p-related boards to spew pro-corporate crap and intentionally “misunderstand” our position. But I’m really coming to the conclusion that the REAL threat comes from supposedly “well-meaning” types like EM558 and others, who add nothing to the debate by cynicism and defeatist thinking.

The pattern goes like this:

1. Overstate your opponent’s power at every turn. (”Ooh, I just KNEW the big evil MAFIAA megacorps were gonna win this one!” etc. etc.)
2. Downplay your side’s power at every turn (”What can WE do against a bunch of megacorps and their government goons”, etc etc.)
3. When confronted with evidence that their “win” isn’t as solid or meaningful as portrayed, discount it.

I’m not trying to flame anybody here, but to claim that Big Media is “winning” is a real stretch:
Sure they’ve managed to score a few “hits”, even some high-profile stuff, but in the process they:

A. Pissed a whole generation of people off.
B. Turned copyright (and by extension “intellectual property” itself) into a laughing-stock.
C. Demonstrated conclusively that whatever our economic system IS, corporate capitalism is NOT a “free” market, and they don’t want it to be.

Now, let’s look at the few “wins” they’ve managed to score:
Jammie Thomas: overturned at appeal, so now it gets to grind through the system all over again
That’s out of how many thousands of harassment suits, in the U.S. (the jurisdiction which is MOST favorable to their bullshit), and they’ve only been able to score 1 decisive “win”, which was then over-ruled.

Remember when the RIAA types televised a bunch of teenagers during that award show, having the teens download stuff? I’m really starting to think that their NEW tactic is to have “sincere”-sounding folks post defeatism like the above simply to demoralize us, and get us to over-estimate the threat.

You’re frustrated and think they’re “winning?” You think p2p advocates/corporate watchdogs/grassroots activists don’t stand a chance because the opposition is “too powerful?” Drop out, now.

Because that’s what your defeatist nonsense can ever accomplish.

To put it bluntly, we can’t AFFORD defeatism, because let’s be honest: ALL OUR OPPONENTS HAVE is their cronies in government and a hell of a lot of misinformation. Let’s notgive them the satisfaction of cowering, okay?

TPB is still there, the verdict isn’t even anywhere close to final (and this could take years, as Sunde said) to BECOME final.
“Winning?” Pffffffgh, yeah sure.
(Just like they “won” on the Napster thing, but had to keep their shitty lobotomize corporate knockoff using the same logo.)
But hey, keep sewing seed of FUD, because we all know the best way to win is through defeatist attitude.

Cheers

(Jon: why the cut-and-paste response to both me and 558?)

like many have said before me. the more you push back on ‘pirates’ the more innovation gets implemented.

stw

I’ll drink to that!

There are so many acronyms being used right now, I really find myself lost and even Google does not help out everytime.

… and for the record, I meant the industry regularly gets screwed by those horses

Thanks!
/Ryan

Even if they catch the first (original) horse… its those kids that are screwing them, and I for one know I dont want to be screwed by a huge horse pen*s!”

LMAO……and at the same time its TMI!!
Darknet is already a funtional reality, all it needs is refining (tweaking)
and enuff ppl pissed enuff to jump in and do it, seems to me we have
got that situation as reality right now!!! All thanks to the idiot courts system in Sweden!!

Copyfight & stw

CRIA is sending propaganda material to all the MP’s and the like.

Don’t forget, these are the same MP’s who say people who can get together and discuss a situation/politics virtually is bad. “facebook is scarey”-don’t forget that great quote.

The propaganda and rhetoric is coming.

This will give them fuel for a couple of years.

That horse has been out, has had kids, those kids went out and had other kids and so on.

Even if they catch the first (original) horse… its those kids that are screwing them, and I for one know I dont want to be screwed by a huge horse pen*s!

/Ryan

The appeal process for this verdict will be jammed up the courts for years, and by the time all is said and done there will be new things to replace Bit Torrent. Then the music and movie industries will go against those, and yet more file sharing applications will emerge. Wash, rinse, repeat.

Unless the big corporations can invent a time machine and go back to prevent computers from ever being invented, they have no choice but to adapt to a world of online file sharing. They are just too stubborn to admit that. It’s too late – the horse is out of the barn and you aren’t going to catch it. File sharing is going to be around forever, and will continually be replaced by something even harder for them to monitor and control. Life is change. Deal.