p2pnet news view Freedom | P2P:- Don’t  cave in to blackmail by the major Hollywood studios and Big 4 record labels to follow France’s lead in trying to institute taxpayer-funded Corporate Copyright Cop programmes, angry Net users in Spain are telling their government.

“Some 300 members of the Internet Users Association (AI), according to police figures, also demanded the annulment of a special tax on devices that can copy music or films, known as the ‘digital canon,’ and the “universality” of broadband connection and use,” says Billboard, going on »»»

The ‘digital canon’ was imposed last year after being demanded by content suppliers and collecting societies. It is fiercely opposed by Internet groups such as AI.

The protest was called to demand “civil rights, universality, and neutrality in Internet.”

The demonstrators shouted slogans against new culture minister Angeles González-Sinde [right], a former president of the Spanish Cinema Academy who has often spoken out against Internet piracy.

AI president Victor Domingo described her as “legally incapacitated” because of “her prior association with the world of cinema,” says the story.

The contents industry, “must accept that business models that cannot compete in the new technological scenario have to disappear, and they cannot sustain themselves artificially at the cost of restricting civil liberties,” the story has him saying, adding:

“In a statement, the AI said ‘to convert public funds into a free bar accessible to just a few, to finance projects without economic viability, or installing privileges such as the ‘digital canon,’ is not just lacking in solidarity, but is profoundly immoral’.”

Remarkable coincidence

InfoPSP.com admin Adrián Gómez Llorente, aka Kuve, was found guilty of criminal copyright infringement and sentenced to six months in jail and fines of 4,900 euros for allegedly operating an ‘illegal’ P2P file-sharing site, said p2pnet recently, continuing

TorrentFreak writer Engimax wanted to know how, and why, this could have happened.

So he asked.

And he discovered the verdict should never have been handed down.

The verdict coincides with the April 7 appointment of new Spanish culture minister Angeles Gonzalez-Sinde (right), who has voiced her strong opposition to P2P activity and its effect on the music and film industries, says the Hollywood Reporter.

Could the remarkable coincidence that she’s the former president of the Cinema Academy have had anything to do with it? – we wondered.

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Billboard – Spanish Protest Against P2P Restrictions, May 26, 2007
p2pnet – InfoPSP admin jailed for something he didn`t do, April 16, 2009
Hollywood Reporter – Spaniard jailed for operating P2P site, April 14, 2009
TorrentFreak – File-Sharing Admin Convicted For Crime He Didn`t Commit, April 15, 2009