AfterDawn: News

British government wants to get tougher on piracy

The British government commissioned a report entitled The Gowers Report which serves to modernize current copyright infringement laws to match the changes seen by the advent of the Internet.

The report states there should be new practices followed against copyright infringement, it does stand by the consumer in stating that the consumer should be able to move, alter or modify their purchased music for their own personal needs how they see fit; such as from CD to MP3. In addition, it recommends that the copyright protection statute of limitations currently set to 50 years, be extended. They'd like to see intellectual properties protected for a proposed 95 years. With copyright protection only at 50 years, works that were released from the UK in the 1950's would soon be open to the general public to do with what they wish. Apparently the music industry is interested in still making a profit after that much time as passed.



The report also brings up the point of punishment. They'd like to see the punishment for people who deliver and distribute intellectual propterty such as music or films on the Internet to be just as harsh as the bootleggers who make hard copies and sell them on the street. Currently, Internet related distribution faces up to 2 years in prison, while selling hard copies warrants 10 years. The reports calls for these two crimes to be looked at equally and punished evenly.

Several British organizations are against this report such as the BPI (British Phonographic Industry) and The Association of Independent Music. A spokesman for AMI stated, "By tidying up a small part of the copyright law, we believe Gowers may well be opening the floodgates to uncontrolled and unstoppable private copying and sharing from person to person, as well as format to format."

Source:
BBC

Written by: Dave Horvath @ 6 Dec 2006 8:31

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• 18 comments

• borhan9

  I am in total agrence with this report. If i buy the product I buy the copyright on it. Minus actually backing it up and selling it to make a profit i do not agree with. But the rest is a good move. And the other organizations are upset cause they have their nickers in a twist :P At least this organization is using some common sense.

  6.12.2006 11:00 #1

• The_Fiend

  I say the british government can stick this report where the sun doesn't shine as far as i'm concerned.
  And the BPI and AMI should be bombed....
  Where's the Unabomber when ye need him ?

  6.12.2006 11:40 #2

• duckNrun

  hey...play nice. lol
  
  The sharing of copies should not be viewed the same as the selling of bootlegged copies. For starters a few mp3's, or an AVI file is not the same as a CD or a dvd in proper format. While there is apparently some (overblown!) perception of value from the prices iTunes et. al. charge you cannot take a copied movie disc or a cd of mp3 to the second hand store and sell them. They have no retail value. However it is also true that people try to sell iPods on eBay chock full of music for an inflated price as well...so the point is at least arguable.
  
  
  The DRM should be able to be bypassed (actually it shouldn't be there in the first place!) to allow the end user who purchased the product to cross platform and use as they wish.
  
  As for the extended copyright I find it hard to believe that A CENTURY of protection is needed to insure creativity is fostered and risks implemented in 5the name of profit. Under that belief the music rolls for player piano's would still need to be a high demand item to turn any real profit.. and they are not! It is merely a way for these companies to stomp on the creative derivitave works that others may build upon, like they themselves built upon to make the work in question!
  
  However, since it appears that nobody is COMPLETELY satisfied with what is proposed it very well could be considered a fair compromise that addresses both consumer and business concerns.
  
  
  

  6.12.2006 13:18 #3

• ddp

  newbie banned & post deleted because of nic.

  6.12.2006 13:23 #4

• ZippyDSM

  duckNrun
  what abotu selling the collection of songs you digitally bought?
  or since DRM is not perfected its like any other "shared" media you cant "sell" it.
  

  6.12.2006 16:36 #5

• mrtoast2

  What is wrong about selling an Ipod with music on it? If you bought the music thru Itunes it is the same as selling the Ipod with a box full of CD's, which can be done with ease. The industry needs to lighten up, the vast majority of buyers are honest people. Make the punishment 60 hours in the stocks, in the middle of town square for pirates. Broadcast their names on live television and see who risks it.

  6.12.2006 17:00 #6

• ZippyDSM

  mrtoast2
  meh better to just not sell the music on it.
  since tis so easy not to have Itune music on it.

  6.12.2006 17:07 #7

• duckNrun

  Well there is that, and I would presume that was what the sellers on eBay were doing.. no pirates there wink wink lol. Under what I think is something called similiar to the doctrines of first sale you do have a right to sell that which you purchased. And if somebody bought $100 worth of iTunes then they should be able to sell them for whatever they can get at fair market value. But yeah, will the DRM allow them to do that or have their rights been taken away even as they pertain to selling what they paid for?
  
  I'm sure that there's people (they're iTunes members!) who would see, for instance, Dark Side of The Moon, or Zep IV or heck maybe even Yani's Greatest Hits (lol) in mp3s and would be willing to come off 10 bucks for it. And so addressing the penalties or lack of for those who are illegaly selling/sharing/distributing them is a fair discussion for the panel to have I guess.
  
  I'm just a snob. For me to pay $10 for an mp3 album would require it to be like a 10 box CD set. I'm just not going to pay that kind of money for mp3s, and protected ones at that! Now I have been known to spend my hard earned money at Allofmp3.com and pick up albums (lol that word dates me eh?) for $2-3 and be happy with the fact that they are in 320 bitrate and not the actual CD. But thats the MOST that I would be willing to pay. I just don't see any retail value in them for me. Plenty do though.
  
  Also since I don't use iTunes I do not know if I can buy a song and place it on my friends system without further degrading the quality through the 'uncompressing it onto a cd first and then recompressing onto a hdd' scheme to break the DRM.
  
  If one could buy drm'd tunes and actually share the files in the protected downloaded format that would give more value to them.. but again why pay $10 for a mp3 cd when you can spend the same and get the ACTUAL cd?
  
  @ mrtoast2: There is NOTHING wrong with that in MY book. The only question is: did the seller KEEP a copy of the music for himself? If they were digital files did he delete them off his HDD? If they were ripped from a CD did he destroy the CD? If he sold the music then he no longer retains ownership rights to listen to the music. And can you put DRM'D iTunes on an iPod and sell it to someone else and not have an issue when they connect that iPod to a computer running iTunes that is not one of the 5 PC's authorized by the seller? I think it was more likely that these sellers were putting unprotected content on the iPOds and then selling the same songs over and over and over...
  
  ok ramblin done.. i'm off to Wally World to get me a new Cable Modem to test my connection vs my existing modem..
  
  Gotta love Walmart's return policy!

  6.12.2006 17:08 #8

• Alcareru

  I was just about to write a reply to this news and decided to digg a little deeper. I checked the BBCs original news and what the frigging hell!?! Was Davedough on drugs or something as he wrote this nonsens? It's almost all totally wrong.
  
  I'll show you who how exactly:
  
  Quote:It also recommends the 50-year copyright protection for recorded music should not be extended.
  Quote:Many artists and record companies had pressed for the current 50-year limit to be extended to 95 but Mr Gowers has rejected this.
  Quote:The British Phonographic Industry (BPI), which represents the mainstream recording industry, broadly welcomed the report but said it would continue to press for the copyright extension.
  -- BBC
  
  
  Quote:In addition, it recommends that the copyright protection statute of limitations currently set to 50 years, be extended. They'd like to see intellectual properties protected for a proposed 95 years.
  -- Davedough
  
  Davedough faild to mention that it was NOT in this report that the 50 limit was suggested to be extended. It was the BPI that wants that and that infact in the report by Mr. Gowers there were stated exactly the opposite!
  
  Quote:It calls for penalties against people who sell pirate versions of music and films on the internet to be brought in line with those who make hard copies. Currently, the former face two years and the latter 10.
  -- BBC
  
  
  Quote:They'd like to see the punishment for people who deliver and distribute intellectual propterty such as music or films on the Internet to be just as harsh as the bootleggers who make hard copies and sell them on the street.
  -- Davedough
  
  Uhm.. "People who sell" does not mean the same as "people who deliver and distribute". This is especially the case when we talk about delivering and distributing by internet where most of this kind of services provide this intellegtual property freely and DO NOT SELL anything. I was just about to comment that fact in the news and... Quote:The sharing of copies should not be viewed the same as the selling of bootlegged copies.
  -- duckNrun
  ... someone already had commented the exact same thing too.
  
  I have a suggestion. Someone remove or correct this news. It's a disgrace. Makes me wonder how many news provided by afterdawn I have swallowed up without bothering to check their accuracy. I sure hope my worries towards other news found here will be proven to be in vain...
  
  ***********************************************************
  From here on my actual comment on the original news by BBC
  ***********************************************************
  Quote:While it proposes new powers against copyright infringement, it also says private users should be allowed to copy music from a CD to their MP3 player.
  Quote:But the report recognised the ease of copying material can be useful to the economy and backed a strictly limited private copying exception.
  This would mean "format swapping" like putting music from a CD onto an MP3 player - theoretically illegal under present laws - would be allowed.
  -- BBC
  
  I totally agree!
  
  Quote:It also recommends the 50-year copyright protection for recorded music should not be extended.
  -- BBC
  
  Thumbs up!
  
  Quote:It calls for penalties against people who sell pirate versions of music and films on the internet to be brought in line with those who make hard copies. Currently, the former face two years and the latter 10.
  -- BBC
  
  Well, 10 years sounds rather harsh. It's not like they killed someone but I'm not from UK so I don't know what you think is a harsh penalty. But anyway I do agree that those penalties should be brought in line with each others.
  
  EDIT: Removed one sentence

  7.12.2006 10:27 #9

• Ragnarok8

  Of course they want to get tougher on it.....what kind of government wants to say they support "piracy" of any sort

  7.12.2006 14:37 #10

• ZippyDSM

  Ragnarok8
  funny you should say that goverment supported pirates when they fought against other pirates nowadays is more like corperations support governments to fight pirates and other governments 0-o

  7.12.2006 14:42 #11

• duckNrun

  @ Alcareru
  
  Thanks for your research! The difference between the two certainly make a lot of difference.
  
  Seems like I can now agree even more with what the report recommends. And I agree 10 years does seem a long time for piracy when there are certainly other people more deserving of that cell space... but then we here in the states have the same problem of locking up no violent types for long periods while releasing the those who prey on the weak and innocent.
  
  

  7.12.2006 17:31 #12

• deft1

  How about you waste your time on finding terrorist!!!!!!!!... instead of this bullcrap!!!!!

  7.12.2006 19:28 #13

• ZippyDSM

  heres a good way to deal with piracy on both the net and in the real world,only 1/4 of the profit can be used agisnt them,any items gotten from the crime can be liquidated for the fines agisnt them,or better yet a day in jail for every grand of items they sell.
  and a automatic 2-4 year parole,bring this sh!t to simple real world value bring in alittle of the drug/sale of stolen good law but limit the amount that can be held agisnt them to 1/4 or so off the money they made of the total profit.
  
  
  what they are doing now is treating c worse than murderous on the behalf of corperation.
  Just think if the corperations wanted to have murderous teated like murderous 0_o

  7.12.2006 19:54 #14

• tabletpc

  and this is suppose to stop pirates how???
  
  let me explain if you live in a country where a single pair of jeans cost 70.00 us would you pay it no you would go and look for a bootleg version of those jeans its the same thing the british goverment can say this is going to help them but unless you block acess to all bittorrent sites and p2p network software then your aims to stoping piracy do not hold water at all and i know people who have visited the u.k and other countrys and when he got back he was glad to be home because he couldn't even find a legal version of anything people are selling everything illegal they do not want to pay nearly 500.00 pounds for a copy of windows xp which is almost 1,000 dollers u.s when for 7 pounds they could purchase a boot leg copy with patches
  i think this is stupid also if your so worried about pirates then stop allowing companys in your country to produce mod chips but they cannot because it is a real bussiness weather or not you like the bussiness or not

  8.12.2006 07:06 #15

• victedy

  I'm from the UK and lets face it, IF the price went down then I'm sure people would be less likely to buy off piraters etc.
  and another point...technology doesn't compensate us - does it? i.e. when they announced that no more VHS recorders we're being made, did the film companies allow us any money off a replacement movie in dvd?
  and my final point...when I get as corrupt as the British Govt then I will really have something to worry about!!!!

  8.12.2006 08:01 #16

• ZippyDSM

  victedy
  the industry refuses to adapt to the new world without lower its prices and adding full online distro they fail.
  
  and since they are moving arse backwards more and more people will adopt shearing online as a way to stick it to them.

  8.12.2006 12:12 #17

• lynandal

  i agree with this - now only downloading legally, i can't help but always be frustrated by stupid copyright laws - because having recently lost my internet access, i had to wait a month until i got back online before i could authorise my itunes, and now i'm waiting for a few months before i can buy an ipod just to listen to my mp3s on the move - by the ways, these are songs which i myself have paid my money for - and i ca't listen to them on my phone? not because its not possible, but becuse of copywrite problems! i think its an excellent idea, and i look forward to implemetation, because the first thing i'm going to do is reencde my itunes music, when their stupid copywrite thing is made illegal - i wanted an mp3 ringtone the other day and couldn't even trim down an mp4 file from iunes because of these rules, and then downloaded the same song from tescoonline as a wma and then still couldn't edit it, because of copywrite rules.
  
  "the consumer should be able to move, alter or modify their purchased music for their own personal needs"
  
  bought bloody time, if i'm playing by the rules and paying for my music - its about time people that sell the stuff play along too.
  
  

  9.12.2006 11:02 #18