mass

Given the backlog in our courts I cannot see any advantage in filing mass lawsuits. With good legal advice those charged could use legitimate means to prevent these lawsuits ever getting to court due to the ability to delay, delay and delay.

It is unfortunate that the movie industry, operating like a dinosaur, finds itself locked into the early 20th century (silent film era) in terms of distribution and access or availability to their product.

The movie industry blames the downloaders but perhaps they have more responsibility to the state of affairs (loss of most video stores etc) than the downloaders. Instead of being ahead of the curve these industry guys preferred to follow their 1920's M.O.

rantnic

I myself wondered how this company in Montreal was able to access the information they reportedly have obtained without acting illegally.

For some reason governments have not been very proactive in ensuring our rights and freedoms, especially our privacy, when it comes to the internet.

The amount of data mining and collecting has gotten out of hand. Even small companies have applications within the POS systems that collect credit and debit card numbers and information without having any adequate security safeguards in place to protect the personal information they collect.

I have seen clerks in small and large stores enter information off of my cards and when I catch them doing this I question them and ask that they remove this information. A few days ago a clerk told me that the system wouldn't allow them to complete the sale until all information was recorded.

Is there something wrong with this?

In the last 3 years my credit card has been compromised twice, I use it very little, and my debit card was compromised once.

rantnic and pwlg

I don't think you understand how this technology works.

They are harvesting data via bit-torrent. If you are using an "open" tracker, like Pirate Bay, where you don't need an account, they can harvest your IP addresses. Anyone could - there is no privacy there.

An IP address and date/time is enough to identify someone. They don't have a name, address, etc. But with an IP address, they know who your ISP is (Telus, Shaw, Rogers, etc). And your ISP knows who had what IP address at what time.

I believe they still have to go back to your ISP and say, "Who was had IP address xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx on Tuesday, November 12th, at 10:14am". If that is the case, they still have a lot of work to do.

If you still think this is a violation of your privacy, then you need to get off the internet. When you browse the internet, you are tracked via IP addresses, cookies, etc. If you are logged into Facebook, and there is a Facebook icon on the page, advertisers can link what you are looking at to your profile.

The assumption of privacy on the internet is just that, and doesn't really hold up in real life.

DavidG

Good points but it entirely misses the mark in the general operation of things in the layman's world. One simple question: Why all the need for passwords and encryption etc if everything is publicly available or, at least, not private?

There is a presumption of privacy on the internet. Unfortunately, that is completely without merit. It's like the general presumption that we live in a democracy or that Canada is a sovereign state. It's what we are told (propagandized) or lead to believe, but it is so removed from the actual world that those who understand such things find it laughable; it is just as you, DavidG, understand that nothing is private on the internet for the typical user. (But that is the status quo's M.O., and they bank on our ignorance every moment of the day.)

Further, the reason the state allows them to use the cover of chasing copyright infringement for the entertainment industry has little to do with WHY they are enforcing copyright. Suffice to say follow the money.

igbymac

What passwords and encryption do you use? I have a password on my PC, and I expect data to stay safe there (within reason).

If I log into Facebook, I expect that my privacy will be respected according to what is provided in the privacy notice, and terms of use. I know that most people don't read them (and I only read them sometimes).

Computers, and the internet, are sophisticated technologies. There are basic laws to protect people from being swindled, but personal data is not considered valuable like the contents of your bank account. And it was always thus, even before the internet. Unfortunately, 98% of the people out there are unsophisticated with regards to the internet, and computers. People need to be smartened up, or computers dumbed down.

Now... regarding whether we live in a democracy, I think that's a loaded statement. Define democracy. The Soviet Union was a democracy, because people voted. True, they only had one candidate to vote for, but they voted. True democracy, or to be governed by the demos, or people, is untenable.

If you want to argue for more democracy, I'll paraphrase Winston Churchill, who said that the best argument against a democracy was a 5 minute conversation with the average voter. Everyone wants services provided, but no one wants to pay. Most people believe in global warming (and that it's caused by humans), but they don't think it's up to them to do something about it.

The other word that has "demos" as it's route is "demagogue" - a populist leader who panders to the desires of the many. Tyranny of the majority is a frightening place where the rule of law falls by the wayside.

As for "sovereign states", read Hobbes, "The Leviathan". We gave up some freedoms for a civil, and relatively safe, society. Nation-states have to do the same.

Any assumption that we're "free", or that Canada is free to act as it wishes on the world stage, holds as much water as the presumption of privacy on the internet.

quickly now...

democracy: "of by and for the people"

Democracy is completely tenable, but not if it can't register in our captured minds. Think global, act local....it is about accountability. The Greeks use to determine the heads of the army and the city waters, for example, by lottery. They presumed competence because they didn't go out of their way to make the population as ignorant as ours does.

Churchill was a war monger and a racist; needless to say an opportunist of epic proportions. Though he may be right.

Hobbes is a sham, an effective con and a great read. I've never signed up for any social contract, nor has anyone else. It is a nice piece of fiction though, an interesting idea. Nor did I give anyone the right to contract for me, so the social contract point needs no further attention.

re: quickly now...

Right - by the people, and for the people. But we don't really expect every citizen to be participating in every decision. Too many cooks, and all that. And again, tyranny of the majority.

So we elect representatives to do it. And sometimes they do things we don't agree with - some necessary (like raising taxes), and some not necessary (signing secret trade agreements with China).

If you want to suggest we break the country into small communes where every common decision is made by committee but with a national legal framework, I'm all for it. It would be communism, within a market economy.

As an aside, it's funny how people get politics and economic mixed up. The Soviet Union was a totalitarian government with a state-capitalist economy. There wasn't much communism in there at all, except for a coating of syntactic sugar. And when the Americans start using the term Socialist, I shudder - they're being demagogues, because that's how you do it in the US.

Churchill was elected after war was declared. Unless you want to argue that he egged the Germans on while a Member of Parliament via his "the Nazis are bad", and "we should be rearming". In addition to winning the Nobel Prize in Literature, and being an amazing historian, he also the source of many great quotes, even better than Mark Twain. Racist, I am not sure. Many people were back then, maybe even more than are racist today. But to condemn him for having the common attitudes of the day is like saying he heated his house with coal.

Hobbes argued that you implicitly agreed to the social contract when you accepted the inheritance of previous generations. Their wealth was amassed within the social contract, and acceptance of that wealth implies acceptance of the contract. Hobbes always said you were free to refuse it, and to be bound only by the rule of nature. But then anyone could do you harm, with out fear of societal repercussions.

Locke arguments amounted to much the same - most philosophers went back to some "State of Nature", and they were all pretty pessimistic about it, except the anarchists (but they're all too busy getting piercings these days to pay attention to much).

@Hakuin

Good article!
You would think so many Canadians are downloading pirated music and software, the industries that pushed these crazy laws, would have come up with a better way of protecting their 'products'. But no, they are going to put the costs on taxpayers and clog up the courts with frivilous infringements. As the article states we are following the US.
Noone seems to care about all the crap (ads, spyware bots, rogue cookies) end up in my browser's cache. I look at it, the same way someone breaks into a house.
And then there are the idiots that will say you left your front door open.
In a few years the internet, will be commercialized the same way television was hijacked by the tobacco industry.
What irks me the most is our government hiring private companies to police the internet, another cost .

politics and economics mixed up

... it is the art of words that has the people confused. Until you define terms specifically, they can easily be seen as one and the same.

Churchill is like essentially every other head of state, a proven servant to power. Had the Nazis won the war, he'd be demonized, accordingly.Arguably with cause, mind you. But to the winner go the spoils.

Whatever Hobbes is railing on about, his foundation of tacit agreement is misstated and, without some luck, so must be his conclusion. Easy to rebut -- one doesn't tacitly agree to being an environmentalist because they inherit a parking spot on the earth.

The coercive empire of culture rains down, and we are awash by it whether we like it or not. We are ruled by naked power with the pretense of legitimacy. I know, oxymoronic. But so is our very upsidedown world, where people and the life force of our world do not matter when they are engaged in a showdown between centralized power and wealth.

rogue networks

Back in the day, there were thousands of private BBS's (bulletinboards). many were available for a small fee and others were free.
It was impossible to control piracy as they mainly connected via telephone modem. As primitive as it was, BBS's could gate data to other boards and the net.

Gateways to send data via the internet existed but setting them up and paying for a T1 line was expensive. Most of the data was sent via mail protocol. Universities and libraries have had internet access for decades
Now we have millions of wireless routers and a means to create more networks outside of the internet (Internet protocol)
A bulletin board is a fancy file server. Even harddrives by themselves on a wireless network are file servers.
It is possible to create a private network unrelated and disconnected from the internet (Internet protocol). It is now, but it costs a bundle to create a private network serving a small village or town.
If anyone is interested in router software they can checkout 'dd-wrt' to supercharge their old wireless router. With a little ingenuity and lots of reading its possible to thwart the mainstream as it exists. Build your own networks,turn your old routers into repeaters and say goodbye to the Internet, until rogue networks become mainstream.
At least one can create a world where the government and the police can't get to you.
A private place in a mess of circuitry.

I remember when some of my peers, raved about how wonderful the internet would be (idiots), I never beleived it, but I adapted earlier than most.
So here we are, gov and big business has polluted it, like they did TV. Thats another constant in this universe.

pwlg

If the costs come out of the $5,000 then there will be no money left. The lawyers will gobble that up with a couple of phone calls.

The real issue

What the content providers aren't getting is that they need to look at their distribution model and their pricing as a solution instead of using the courts to sue their customers.

There are some new movies out that I would like to see. I would gladly pay a few bucks to stream them onto my TV. This is not an option. I have to go to a theatre to see them. For me, this means a ferry ride. Either that, or I can download the films for free. It is a ridiculous choice.

I just bought myself a new 64 GB iPod. To legally load it with even 50 GB of music would cost around $20,000. If albums were a dollar or two, I'd pay it.

These folks have to stop blaming the downloaders and look at fixing their broken business models.

freewilly and chaiwalla

Please. It is not the job of artists or their representatives to do a better job of protecting their product from unauthorized downloading ...any more than it's your job to do a better job of securing your house so that thieves can't break in and steal your stuff. If an artist or their rep hasn't given you permission to take their work, then it's not yours to take. Period. These "content providers" of which you speak are companies that artists have consensually agreed to do business with -- a deal in which the artists provides a share of the profits from their work in exchange for the services the company provides. But if you keep ripping off the content, then the artist doesn't make any money for the service provider and s/he loses his/her contract for services. Any which way, you're screwing the artist, so please stop dressing it up as thumbing your nose at some faceless corporation. Trust me. The corporation will just find some other way to make money. Like selling you overpriced coffee beverages or some other ridiculous thing that you never complain about paying for. If you don't like taking the ferry to go see a brand new movie, move to the mainland. But if you're willing to take a ferry to go to the mall, the Superstore, or whatever other major corporation you need to give your money to, then please take the ferry to see the movie too. And I'm sorry, but nobody's going to sell you an album for a dollar or two. It still costs in the neighbourhood of $30,000 to make one. If you don't like the music enough to pay 10 bucks for it, don't own it. Simple choice, really.