[Dara Robinson]

The main article is here:
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/...18.html?via=mr

But to summarise, Minister of State for Enterprise Seán Sherlock is to publish an "order" (no idea what this is tbh) this month that is expected to allow music publishers, film producers and other parties to go to court to force ISP's to block access to pirate websites.
It seems that Minister of State for Enterprise Seán Sherlock has written to music publisher EMI Ireland confirming the order will be published and incorporated into existing legislation in January.

This morning I read this:
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/...310141468.html

It seems that the IRMA (Irish version of RIAA) is now going to court against the Government to try and lob more pressure on them to enact this law. It also seems to all be happening very quickly tbh.

What got me onto this whole topic was this blog (a bit sensationalist but the guy has a point at the end of the day)
http://blog.newswhip.com/index.php/2...t-to-save-cds/

Personally I dont think that any Law's should be passed because a Private company is lobbying or pressuring for it. In fact I think that there should be more scrutiny in these cases.

At the moment my main issue is that there is not enough info out there on what could be potentially passed. Also, it seems to be getting passed in record time (I mean this hit the papers a month ago and its supposed to be passed by the end of Jan) which is kind of scary.
I sent an email to the office of Minister of State for Enterprise Seán Sherlock (which I have attached) but its not very well worded and I doubt I'll get the response I am looking for.

I was hoping to find out what other people know about this, and what people think. Personally I think this can only be a bad thing and legislation like what this seems to be can only be abused by the larger corps against smaller companies, especially start-ups. I am extremely concerned about all the review blogs and similar pages like that (of which I know a few people doing hoping to get a career out of it) as if they are targeted it will only be a loss for the public and for them. And the worst would be targeted use of this, letting some sites go on cause they are more benefit than others and shutting down others doing exactly the same thing but yet these are less helpful than the other ones. Could lead to a whole other thing...

Any thoughts?

[Dara Robinson]

Oh, and for anyone interested there are some pages already up talking about this on FB and twitter
https://www.facebook.com/StopSOPAIreland
https://twitter.com/#!/NoSOPAIreland

post more if you have em

[Darko]

Those for the passing of the law are constantly pointing to the figure regarding the fall of CD sales. Sherlock himself said that the government was losing out on tax because downloading has do hurt sales if CDs.

What they all seem to ignore us that falling CD sales are not the result of rampant piracy but ratcher a change in the manner through which people get their music. Look at iTunes or amazon or play it any of the numerous websites offering legal options to purchase digital downloads through. Millions of tracks are legally purchased through them each year. Look at the past decade and the popularity of ringtones. How many teenagers, one if thebuggedt markets for music chose to simply download the tracks they wanted to their phones rather than pay anything from 13-23 euro for a CD.

There are numerous reasons why CD sales are falling and piracy is only one small aspect if it. The biggest issue is that CDs are no longer value for money aswell as the fact that they are an obselete format. iPods, computers and other digital devices have replaced the CD player and considering that why go to the trouble of having to head into town to buy a CD when any album you want is instantly available legally at the click of a mouse.

[ProjectMoose]

Was there not a European ruling recently that ISPs cannot be forced to block websites?

EU Court Ruling

To summarize: ISPs are not required to proactively search out and block pirated material.

Edit: Personally, if the material was made available cheap enough, I reckon you'd see a big decrease in the number of people downloading illegally. Look at how popular Netflix has become. And it's only been available a few weeks.

[Toby Take a Bow]

Originally Posted by Darko

What they all seem to ignore us that falling CD sales are not the result of rampant piracy but ratcher a change in the manner through which people get their music.

Yeah, I saw a graph (not sure of the veracity or otherwise) which seemed to suggest that the downturn in CD sales was nearly equally matched by the increase in downloads. Of course, this was being measured in download vs CD purchase, which meant that (as far as I understood the article) that it included people just purchasing the odd song off an album rather than the whole thing. I think the music industry seems to be more worried about this aspect (people actually choosing what they want to purchase rather than a whole album of what the consumer perceives as mostly filler) rather than anything else.

Seems a case of that king who claimed he could push back the tide at this point, though.

[Pacifist Pigeon]

RIP Internet

[squod]

More jobs for Iceland. Some needs to sacked over this asap.

[Kevin Irving]

I'd put money on it being far easier for Anonymous to take down Irish government websites than the FBI website. Should be a funny day.

Of course, everyone will just shut up and accept it since FG will blame the recession on piracy.

[pmcmahon]

Whatever about the recession and all that,but if something like that came in There would be a national emergency called because of the riots it would incur.

[Darko]

Originally Posted by Toby Take a Bow

Yeah, I saw a graph (not sure of the veracity or otherwise) which seemed to suggest that the downturn in CD sales was nearly equally matched by the increase in downloads. Of course, this was being measured in download vs CD purchase, which meant that (as far as I understood the article) that it included people just purchasing the odd song off an album rather than the whole thing. I think the music industry seems to be more worried about this aspect (people actually choosing what they want to purchase rather than a whole album of what the consumer perceives as mostly filler) rather than anything else.

Seems a case of that king who claimed he could push back the tide at this point, though.

The beauty of downloading is that you don't have to put up with the crap thats regularly include on many albums. There's a reson that CD players had a skip button and thanks to digital downloads you don't need one anymore as you can pick the good stuff and leave the filler alone. It terrifies companies like EMI as they can no longer make major profits off of a hastily released Best of album that includes 1 or 2 classics mixed in with the tracks no one wants. Think of how many mediocre artists have multiple best of albums with each one only getting one or two actual hits. Hell how many one hit wonders have a best of available that sold thousands of copies thanks to that one song.

With digital downloading that type of crdp doesn't work any more and record companies are terrified. But when you consider that the a stage ticket price has at least doubled if not tripled in cost over the past decade you really have to wonder just how much piracy could hurt them.

[nommm]

This is absolutely ridiculous. You can't block all 'pirate sites', it would be impossible and it would also ignore the fact that many of us use these sites for perfectly legitimate reasons such as backing up our files or sending huge files to other people. I actually know a casting agent that relies on clients uploading their audition tapes for her business.

This really shows how out of touch the politicians in this country are. There's so many social problems that need to be tackled and yet again they're concentrating on corporate interests.

I too will be sending an email to Sean Sherlock about this and I'd encourage others on boards.ie to do the same. His email address is sean.sherlock@oir.ie.

[Darko]

I sent a number if emails to Sean Sherlock regarding this when it was first mentioned a few months back. I pointed out the EU law, digital downloads, ect and asked why was it that the Irish government was lobbying on behalf of private companies to help protect profits and restrict access to the Internet. I asked him would they allow sites such as Flickr to be removed as there are numerous copyrighted images on the site or if they would take in google, yahoo, bing, etc which offer easied access to copyright material than any other site. I asked him to provide me with documents/proof that could link the fall of CDs with piracy.

I've yet to receive a reply.

[Gunmonkey]

Originally Posted by Toby Take a Bow

Yeah, I saw a graph (not sure of the veracity or otherwise) which seemed to suggest that the downturn in CD sales was nearly equally matched by the increase in downloads. Of course, this was being measured in download vs CD purchase, which meant that (as far as I understood the article) that it included people just purchasing the odd song off an album rather than the whole thing. I think the music industry seems to be more worried about this aspect (people actually choosing what they want to purchase rather than a whole album of what the consumer perceives as mostly filler) rather than anything else.

Problem being the record companies are pig-ignorant of downloads. Read an interview with the head of an Irish RC (could have been EMI) a few year or so ago claiming digital downloads were a "fad" and they were actively pushing to get "record" sales back on top.

Love how they see a business model thats easier, cheaper and more easily accessable to their customers and ignore it. They are the winners at business

[krudler]

Originally Posted by pmcmahon

Whatever about the recession and all that,but if something like that came in There would be a national emergency called because of the riots it would incur.

pfff, if we wouldnt riot for having the country near bankrupted we wont do it for this.

[ygolometsipe]

How about this.

The government should figure out how much is lost to illegal downloading
and work out the average cost to every citizen. Then just have a blanket "illegal activity tax" kinda like the (tv licence aka house broadcasting tax)

Im sure it would be very expensive. maybe 10-20K per person a year
but since im in the hole for ~100K with the bailout, I would'nt mind another 20K.
At least it would help get through the depression, cos I could watch loads and loads of NON-RTE ****e happy days for all!!



* I may or may not be serious.