What does a single mother in US have to do to be fined USD$220,000? Defraud a bunch of grandmas? Abuse her child? Start a riot? No, just download and share 24 songs.
Jammie Thomas, one of almost 30,000 people sued or prosecuted by records companies, chose to fight the charges rather than be pushed around by corporate bullies. Having spent over USD$60,000 in legal fees fighting the case, she was nonetheless found guilty of the heinous crime of sharing music and fined almost USD$10,000 per song. Yes, what she did was illegal. However, one of the integral aspects of criminal law is proportionality - the sanction must be proportionate to the crime. It is difficult to escape the conclusion that this is not the case here. When law is used by a multi-billion dollar industry, concerned only with its own profits, to persecute minor infringements for the sake of making making an example of a few law breakers in order to instill fear in millions of others, the legal actions are more harmful than illegal ones. Misuse of law for purposes that have nothing to do with achieving justice is quite offensive.
To top it all of, such measures are quite futile. For every file sharer the records industry prosecutes, there are thousands more who will never be caught and who may be quite content to play the odds. It is safety in numbers. There are so many copyright law breakers that the odds of an individual getting prosecuted are very small. No matter how much money the records industry wastes prosecuting single mothers for downloading two dozen songs, it will not empty an ocean of downloaders with a tea spoon. No matter how many P2Ps it closes down, new ones will emerge. Technology evolved massively in the last two decades, but the industry stubbornly refuses to evolve with it. Instead of devising constructive ways to reduce illegal music sharing, for example by providing access to cheap, easy legal downloads, that are not infected with digital rights management software which plays havoc with the users' computers, the industry is intent on fighting the inevitable. Instead of rising to the challenge of technology, they prefer to use the law as a tool for bullying the users of technology in the hope of turning back the tide. They think they can do it because they are big, powerful and ruthless.
And so were the dinosaurs…before they all died out.
October 7th, 2007
Posted by
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Law, Internet and technology |
2 comments
Yesterday, an Australian, Hew Griffith was sentenced to more than a year in jail by an American court for setting up a software piracy ring. There is no question that Griffith broke the law - he pleaded guilty to distributing pirated software.
However, the case is extremely disturbing because Griffith did not engage in piracy in America. He did it from his home in NSW, Australia. However, because Griffith pirated software made by American companies, because the US government is extremely anxious to suck up to the powerful copyright lobby and the Australian government is extremely anxious to suck up to the similarly powerful American government, Griffith was extradited to face trial in US, a country which he never visited.
Although he could have been prosecuted in Australia, the penalties are likely to have been much less severe. In US he faced up to 10 years jail plus substantial fines. As it was, he spent three years in jail in Australia while fighting the extradition request.
What is a triumph for the US prosecutors anxious to pander to the copyright lobby should be of grave concern to the Australian public. An Australian citizen was handed over to the US to be tried for something he did in Australia.
As Griffith's lawyer pointed out he "was sent to face charges in a foreign country where he has no knowledge of the legal system and no friends or family. He has been surrendered to a country where the penalties for such offences are much harsher."
This appears to be yet another example of our government's ignoble tradition of abandoning Australians to the tender mercies of the US authorities to score some political brownie points. It will be pleased that the US government was suitably impressed.
US Attorney Chuck Rosenberg said that "theft is theft" whether committed with a gun or a keyboard and that the US was prepared to play global cop again to catch " those inclined to steal intellectual property".
Yes, you heard it right - US intends to play "global cop" to ensure that its laws are enforced in every country of the world, including Australia. It doesn't matter that we didn't vote for the US Congress or the US President or otherwise submitted ourselves to US laws. It doesn't matter if we never set foot in US. They think that they can apply their laws to us. And our government is happy to let them do it.
While pondering the mistreatment of our citizens by our own government, it is useful to consider the warped sense of morality of the US Attorney Rosenberg. To suggest that distributing pirated software or movies (freely, without making any money out of it) is on the same level of criminality as robbing someone at gun-point is almost insane. Or, as Griffith's father succinctly put it "It's a load of crap".
The "victims" - being large US companies - claim that they lost some $60 million dollars takings. Their claim is based on the flawed assumption that those who download pirated content would have purchased it had it not been for Griffith's activities. It doesn't make sense. We all know that just because you take something when its free, doesn't mean you would have bought it if you had to pay for it.
But that is beside the point. Rosenberg's comment reveals an obsession with protecting American companies' IP rights, and this obsession is so strong that a presumably intelligent individual thinks nothing of comparing breach of copyright to violent crime. This is yet another reason why Australia (and indeed other countries) should not cooperate with US attempts to enforce their own laws around the globe.
Unfortunately, it is too late for Hew Griffith.
By the way, Anonymous Lefty has some excellent posts on issues of copyright - check them out if you are interested in the issue.
PS. Thanks to the contributors who pointed out that Hew is not an Australian citizen, but is a long-term permanent resident. The point remains the same, but accuracy is important!
June 24th, 2007
Posted by
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Law, Internet and technology, Howard government, United States |
4 comments
It is quite disturbing to read that Google has applied to patent a technology for creating psychological profiles of internet users based on their online gaming behaviour. Online gaming interactions and conduct can be studied to evaluate the users' psychology. This technology is reportedly not limited to PC users - gaming consoles that connect to the internet also provide a harvesting ground for personal information.
The apparent purpose of the exercise is to use the information for more targeted advertising, based on the psychology of the particular consumer. The idea that such personal data is to be provided to or used by advertisers to more effectively entice us to purchase their products, to the mutual commercial advantage of the advertiser and of Google, is uncomfortable enough. Worse still is the thought that such information may be used for other, more sinister purposes.
Early last year the US government subpoenaed search data of several search engines, including Google, Yahoo, MSN and AOL. Google alone chose to fight the subpoenas, resulting in a court ruling for provision of much more limited information. While in this instance Google acted to protect the information in its possession, it is by no means certain that it, or other entities that may gain access to its psychological profiling results, will not yield to the demands of governments or organisations determined to use such data for their own purposes, including tyranny and persecution. It is notable that, at about the same time that Google was fighting the US government lawsuit, it succumbed to the demands of the Chinese government and sensored some websites in its Chinese market. Another search engine, Yahoo! was recently sued by a Chinese political prisoner, who alleged that the search engine provided authorities with the information to link him to pro-democracy postings, leading to his arrest and torture.
In August last year AOL published some 20 million internet queries linked to users (identified by numbers rather than names). The company withdrew the publication and apologised for the apparently unauthorised disclosure, however the idea that such information can be released accidentally and not only deliberately does nothing to alleviate the privacy concerns.
Search engine companies hold an enormous amount of information, whether gathered from cookies, services such as Google History or other sources. This information is extremely valuable, powerful and, in the wrong hands, extremely dangerous. Whether it is disclosed to a democratic government pursuant to a subpoena or to a totalitarian regime as the price of being able to access that particular market or released to the world at large because of an employee stuff-up, it has consequences for our privacy. Whether the consequences of disclosure are a minor embarrassment or a criminal prosecution or arrest and torture for daring to speak out, holding the data gives the search engine companies a measure of control over our lives.
When the information collected delves deeper into our mind, to our psychological and behavioural profiles, the danger occasioned by its possession is greater and so is the temptation to gain access to the data. Online privacy is an immensely complex issue - legally, ethically and politically. Google's slogan of "do no evil" sits uncomfortably with its increasing potential to do so by expanding its data mining into our very minds.
May 13th, 2007
Posted by
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World politics, Internet and technology |
one comment
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