Until now, an amendment existed that prevented EU member countries from barring persistent file sharers from the Internet. Today news of the removal of that amendment has been made public and is believed to have stemmed from pressure from member countries keen to adopt tough anti-piracy laws.
“Barring from the Internet” effectively means that individual countries would be able to ask internet service providers to remove users deemed to be persistent pirates without needing a prior court order.
Two countries already pushing forward with new legislation include France and the UK. The French have just revised it’s “three strikes” system and approved plans which could see pirates removed from the net for up to a year with a judge ruling. While the UK’s file-sharing policy, to be announced next month, is also likely to include a clause about disconnecting persistent offenders.
The move is likely to shock and disappoint most of the European population. That said, I predict an immediate change in online habits until stories of bans start to leak to the press. The legislation is also filled with significant hurdles and difficulties, particularly for the ISP’s. Developing “anti piracy” systems to detect which of its customers are persistently file sharing is no easy task. It is also not in the best interests of the ISP’s to help the governments, and while in some cases they may not have much choice, rest assured they will sway their allegiance to you, the customer, after all they’d be losing business otherwise.
Additionally, I still stand by my rather controversial view that while business models in the music and film industry need to change to match this new world we live in…nothing comes for free, or at least it shouldn’t. Business models such as those from companies like Spotify will need to prove they can succeed and provide solutions that while might not make as much money for record labels and studios as they once did, will still cover costs of production and give those involved opportunities to profit from other revenue sources such as gigs, merchandise and so on.
Exactly why do you think this is “likely to shock and disappoint most of the European population?” Based on the stories we’ve already read about how the UK government most likely dramatically overestimated the number of file sharers within its borders¹, it’s more likely that cracking down on pirates is only going to bother a very small percentage of the European population—rabid file sharers themselves.
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¹http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/351331/how-uk-government-spun-136-people-into-7m-illegal-file-sharers
It is naive to think that such a legislation will only affect illegal file sharers. If you open up banning users from access to the Internet without due process – it will in fact mean an upheaval of free speech.
What about linking for example – could that be seen as “illegal file sharing” – this will stop political debate as well only with the insecurity that will be generated. Fright of being banned from access will put an end to public debate.
And isn’t that exactly what the governments or Europe want? With the Lisbon Treaty ratified democracy is abolished. In combination with this legislation they can do actually anything without being criticized. Europe is now dominated by authoritarian governments – from the right-wing ones in Italy, Germany and France to the Bushiness of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. Not to speak of the political legacy of new member states such as Bulgaria and Romania among others. What kind of democratic traditions are we to except from there? EU is backing into the future – with a script from the 30s of mass deporations, mass surveillance and mass unemployment.
sorry for mis-spelling mass deportations – see http://tinyurl.com/ygwjctb
Zee, if 3 Strikes does indeed become a reality (which I doubt) we will face unprecedented civil disobedience and maybe even consumer boycotts. Why should we have to wait to get what the Chinese music fans already have (via Google, see
http://www.mediafuturist.com/2009/03/why-googles-free-music-deal-in-china-is-important-and-what-it-means.html ) only because we have PREVIOUSLY been nice and ‘legal’ buying CDs and iTunes downloads by-the-unit?
I wrote an open letter to Lord Mandelson 2 weeks ago, see http://bit.ly/w8Fu which outlines the alternative: a public digital music license. Take a look;) Cheers Gerd Leonhard
When are you calling your troops back from Iraq, dickheads?