[Article] Music-swapping sites to be blocked by internet providers

jos22

skelliser wrote: »

maybe a online petition?

irma would request it to be blocked.

if irma can get sites blocked there no reason why others can't. if this gets through others will aim to block porn or any website which could offend or not be rated PG.

this is pure rape of our freedoms.

no website should be blocked in order to protect a multi billion dollar empire which has never proven it so called loss

charlie_says

I agree with the censorship issues being wrong. P2P whether anyone likes or not it is here to stay, there needs to be sensible management of it rather than some kind of crusade, like the war on drugs and terror.

I am wondering though, has there been any other statements from the other ISP players here?

Just to clarify as I'm not quite certain, if the IRMA go for a any other ISPs and they take the same line as Eircom, will it get pushed through the courts on a company by company basis or does this all hinge on whether the judge in the Eircom court order case rules on the side of IRMA?

If the court (which court will it be out of interest?) does rule in favour of IRMA vs. Eircom will that set a precedent for all other ISPs? My legal knowledge is lacking here, the wording is probably way off.

Also what is the time frame for all this, have Eircom already officially included this in the contract terms to the end user?

Donald-Duck

alan dunne 27 wrote: »

It'll be very interesting if rapidshare does get blocked.



They ? Who is they ?
I know that Rapidshare have lots of money to contest cases.

The German RIAA, rapidshare were up **** creek this time last year and I'm not actually sure how they got out of it, but they lost court cases on it.

Cabaal

jos22 wrote: »

irma would request it to be blocked.

if irma can get sites blocked there no reason why others can't. if this gets through others will aim to block porn or any website which could offend or not be rated PG.

this is pure rape of our freedoms.

no website should be blocked in order to protect a multi billion dollar empire which has never proven it so called loss

Ok lets not take this out of context, nobody is going to block any kind of on-line petition and no ISP would allow this.

Stick to actual facts and proper issues here instead of spiraling off and suggesting utter nonsense about eircom/irma blocking non-music download sites.

CaptSolo

skelliser wrote: »

So we need to organise. moaning, arguing and non senical analagies arent gonna stop this or get us anywhere.

In order to stop this, we need real activities both online and offline.

New Zealand is in a similar situation with the government proposal to cut internet access. They started the petition and #blackout internet rally where people would turn their avatars (hey, even Stephen Fry's twitter avatar was blacked out) and websites black in protest of the new legislation:

http://creativefreedom.org.nz/blackout.html

They did succeed in getting the legislation delayed for the moment. Perhaps we need #blackout-ie ?

Cabaal

CaptSolo wrote: »

In order to stop this, we need real activities both online and offline.

New Zealand is in a similar situation with the government proposal to cut internet access. They started the petition and #blackout internet rally where people would turn their avatars (hey, even Stephen Fry's twitter avatar was blacked out) and websites black in protest of the new legislation:

http://creativefreedom.org.nz/blackout.html

They did succeed in getting the legislation delayed for the moment. Perhaps we need #blackout-ie ?

Agreed, however it is extremely important in such a campaign that certain individuals need to forget that its ok to download copyright material (it is not in anyway!).

Such a campaign needs to be against censorship in general and not about the blocking of your favorite P2P site that is seen to contain a majority of copyright material (you may not see it this way but this is how everyone else basically does)

Such an image will only hurt any campaign very badly and nobody will want to touch it and rightly so.

However is heading this will need to approach it logically and can not just go off on rants, neither eircom, the media or the likes of digitalrights.ie want to listen to rants.

Nody

Cabaal wrote: »

Ok lets not take this out of context, nobody is going to block any kind of on-line petition and no ISP would allow this.

You'd be surprised. In Sweden a anti pedophile organisation run a list of sites which they recommend ISPs to block which ISP usually use. They added a child web site to the list because it showed toddlers bathing on a child rearing site for new parents (it got removed after a big roar about it).

This is also a report from Denmark which operate a list for pedophilia with the same issue.

WIKILEAKS PRESS RELEASE Tue Dec 23 01:15:59 GMT 2008

For immediate release.

"Denmark: 3863 sites on secret censorship list"

Wikileaks has released the secret Internet censorship list for Denmark. The list contains 3863 sites blocked by Danish ISPs participating in Denmark's censorship scheme as of February 2008. Danish ISPs "volunteer" to censor their users rather than face legislation and the top three ISPs are particpants.

The system can be used to censor anything, but is meant to be for child pornography sites found by the Danish police and the Danish "Save the Children" group.

The list is generated without judicial or public oversight and is kept secret by the ISPs using it. Unaccountability is intrinsic to such a secret censorship system.

Most sites on the list are still censored (i.e must be on the current list), even though many have clearly changed owners or were possibly even wrongly placed on the list, for example the Dutch transport company Vanbokhorst.

The list has been leaked because cases such as Thailand and Finland demonstrate that once a secret censorship system is established for pornographic content the same system can rapidly expand to cover other material, including political material, at the worst possible moment -- when government needs reform.

Two days ago Wikileaks released the secret Internet censorship list for Thailand. Of the 1,203 sites censored this year, all have the internally noted reason of "lese majeste" -- criticizing the Royal family. Like Denmark, the Thai censorship system was originally promoted as a mechanism to prevent the flow of child pornography.

The Danish filter is maintained by the National High Tech Crime Center of the Danish National Police and Save the Children Denmark. The police department is led by Peter Carpentier, and can be reached by phone: +45 33 14 88 88. The Save the Children-project is led by Kuno Soerensen, +45 25 14 00 69.

The list can be independently tested by any customer of a participating Danish ISP by visiting the URLs of the sites listed. If the customer is presented with a "STOP!" page, the site is still listed in the filter.

In short lists with blocked sites tends to grow once started for what ever purpose and the updating process is usually dubious at best.

Do I think they would block such a site today? No. Do I think they would try given a chance? Heck yes! And I fully expect IMRA will be going for the same secret list set up if they fail in court with getting the court to agree.

Cabaal

Nody wrote: »

You'd be surprised. In Sweden a anti pedophile organisation run a list of sites which they recommend ISPs to block which ISP usually use <SNIP>

Ok fair enough I see where your coming from but lets deal with what we do know rather then speculate endlessly, its bordering on parania to say they'll block a petition site....by the same logic they'd also block eircomsucks.com and irelandoffline and boards because thats caused trouble in the past and were used to create groups that have caused problems.

CaptSolo

Cabaal wrote: »

http://creativefreedom.org.nz/blackout.html

They did succeed in getting the legislation delayed for the moment. Perhaps we need #blackout-ie ?

Agreed, however it is extremely important in such a campaign that certain individuals need to forget that its ok to download copyright material (it is not in anyway!).

Absolutely. It is about people's privacy and online rights. If we get on a slippery slope of private companies telling when to disconnect us from the Net, their appetite will only grow. Who knows, maybe some day they announce that all discussions about your rights online should be blocked.

Cory Doctorow has good comments on this in the TWiT 183: Pirates' Circus podcast episode.

If you think of it, cutting off someone's internet access for downloading (which is a ubiquitous activity and very much like audio cassette copying decades ago) is a *very* disproportionate response. You will cut off someone's means of work, communication, social activities. For something he maybe even did not do (music industry is known to sue people who don't even own a computer) or what maybe their kids did.

A possible reply - "but they are guilty!" Guilty of what? Downloading a file?! Disabling network access is a very draconic measure for something like that.

An distant analogy would be if you spit on the street and in response to that get a house arrest (without trial and with no process to contest the decision) so that you will never be on the street again. Hell, even convicted criminals in jail have Internet access (or so Cory says in the podcast).

CaptSolo

Digital Rights forum on boards.ie.

Apparently there is a forum specifically devoted to peoples' rights online. Might be a good place to write to if organising a petition or other activities.

skelliser

Dear Sir/ Madam,

I am writing to you in relation to recent reports that you have written to Irish ISP’s requesting that they block websites that you deem to be responsible for illegal file sharing, or face court action for failing to do so.

In the public interest, I would appreciate it if you could answer the following questions for me:

* Why does IRMA believe that it has the right to force companies independent of IRMA to censor the Internet?
* Would it not be better for IRMA, and by extension those that it purports to represent, to educate the general public regarding the legalities of file sharing, rather than blocking the parts of the Internet it does not agree with?
* How will IRMA compile the list of websites that it wishes to see blocked?
* What criteria will be used to judge if a site is responsible for illegal file sharing?
* Will IRMA require that all search engine results for search terms such as “illegal file sharing”, “p2p”, “bittorrent”, etc also be blocked?
* Is IRMA aware that circumventing an ISP block is as simple as using a proxy server? Therefore, will IRMA also require ISP’s to block access to proxy servers?
* Is IRMA aware of how the Bittorrent protocol works, and that .torrent files do not contain any copyrighted material?
* Do IRMA believe that this action will achieve any other purpose then to highlight the fact that this material is available online and severely harm IRMA’s reputation?

I would appreciate a reply at your earliest convenience, and please note that I intend to publish your reply online.

Yours faithfully,
YOUR NAME HERE

Red Sleeping Beauty

Macros42 wrote: »

I'd guess that that site is second on the list. IRMA are a shower of sound-bite twats. tPB is the buzzword at the moment because it's in the news hence it's the primary target. They haven't mentioned any other sites like Rapidshare in case people haven't heard of them yet and they don't want to alert them to it (or other sites).
.

I am desperately trying to understand every term and legal description of well just about everything going on here. In my layman's understand Rapidshare is more illegal than torrents . Difference is, it's restricted to people who pay a membership fee * and of course Pirate Bay is wide open and free.


*you can download a certain amount, a small amount, without a membership

Donald-Duck wrote: »

The German RIAA, rapidshare were up **** creek this time last year and I'm not actually sure how they got out of it, but they lost court cases on it.

Have you got any more info on this ? links to a news report of anything ?

aidan_walsh

In my layman's understand Rapidshare is more illegal than torrents .

Downloading copyrighted material from it is just as illegal as from any other site, regardless of it being a torrent or a single source download.

Difference is, it's restricted to people who pay a membership fee * and of course Pirate Bay is wide open and free.

Functional difference, thats all. It does not effect the legality of downloading copyrighted material from it.

cornbb

I just heard about this now and I'm in shock. I'm very angry that Eircom have the shortsightedness to bend over without appearing to even think about the consequences of this. This (along with the 3 strikes thing) will create a very bad precedent for Irish ISPs (and possibly for foreign ISPs too). If I was an eircom customer I would have no hesitation in cancelling my account immediately on the grounds that they are breaching their side of the contract - they are not giving internet access, only access to a subset of the internet.

The Big Four record companies have a long history of royally screwing up when it comes to digital media - they have constantly vainly tried to battle the inevitable rather than embrace it and try to fully take advantage of it. They have constantly failed at this (see here and here) and now are continuing to resort to hollow bully-boy tactics and I'm so pissed off that Ireland's biggest ISP is now complicit in their latest f*ckup.

Boycott the Big Four and support independent music is what I say :mad:

Donald-Duck

alan dunne 27 wrote: »

I am desperately trying to understand every term and legal description of well just about everything going on here. In my layman's understand Rapidshare is more illegal than torrents . Difference is, it's restricted to people who pay a membership fee * and of course Pirate Bay is wide open and free.


*you can download a certain amount, a small amount, without a membership



Have you got any more info on this ? links to a news report of anything ?

http://torrentfreak.com/music-industry-gets-an-injunction-against-rapidshare-080120/
http://torrentfreak.com/rapidshare-to-be-forced-to-shut-down-following-court-defeat-080129/

MOH

ionix5891 wrote: »

as i pointed out earlier is there some sort of an agreement reached by the moderators, as so far they are the only ones supporting Eircom while every single other member in this thread has expressed outrage

i am sorry but i feel the moderators here dont like this Eircom matter being discussed (fear of a lawsuit or fear of loosing a lucrative advertiser?), and some know deep down that what's happening that is wrong on so many levels but cant admit to it

Do you actually understand how google ads works?

Macros42 wrote: »

I'm actually not sure it is technically illegal. You are not making a copy of it - you are receiving someone else's copy.

Well, you're not really. They still have their copy afterwards. So you're making a copy.

Sparks wrote: »

I think everyone probably agrees that this deal isn't great news; but:
1) They are going through the courts, even if the deal will in effect short-circuit the process somewhat;
2) It's not eircom's job to stand up in court for the rights of its customers. The board of Eircom is bound by the companies acts to act in the best interest of the eircom shareholders not the customers; and standing up for the customers rights to download copyrighted material would be expensive and thus not in the shareholders best interests.
3) It's groups like Digital Rights Ireland who are meant to take cases like this to court; have you donated to their funds or volunteered to help them today?

Maybe I've missed something, but how is Eircom agreeing not to contest any IRMA court case in their best interest? What do they gain from that, apart from a lot of extra work?

Cabaal wrote: »

Also don't try to compare child porn to you downloading a copyright album/episode/movie/software...its not the same thing and its not what the industry is after or reporting on

Just goes to show where priorities lie though. Protecting business interests seems to be the top priority these days. (Completely off topic, but found this extremely alarming)

Mathiasb wrote: »

I'm just trying to protect my privacy here, and the democracy. The Internet is free and should always be. Once you start filtering the contents - you're actively destroying it and the purpose of it. If you read into this "the purpose of the internet is to fileshare copyrighted material" then oh my god... *sigh*

I think I used to prefer the internet before everyone started thinking it was their god given right to use it That said, I'm completely against censorship, I hate DRM, but downloading copyrighted software is illegal.

Isaac702 wrote: »

So you are saying they are acting as the infrastructure for distributing the file. Ok then here is a question.
If I burn a DVD with copyrighted content on it and send it to a friend through An Post. Should An Post be shut down just because they act as the distribution method for the trans fare?
.

Well, you could try it. But to be a fair comparison you'd need to clearly write on the outside of the package "Contains illegal copy of DVD blah, from Isaac702, Isaac St, Isaacland".

Donald-Duck

MOH wrote: »

Maybe I've missed something, but how is Eircom agreeing not to contest any IRMA court case in their best interest? What do they gain from that, apart from a lot of extra work?

I can image it would not very nice on their finances to have multiple court cases.

towel401

Donald-Duck wrote: »

I can image it would not very nice on their finances to have multiple court cases.

and they already don't have any money to pay for network upgrades cause the aussies that own them aren`t doing too great

Richard Dower

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=218904

Donald-Duck

Richard Dower wrote: »

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=218904

Good job on linking us to a forum thats talking about the same topic.

A forum where they put their folding at home stats in their signitures, cool place.

towel401

Donald-Duck wrote: »

A forum where they put their folding at home stats in their signitures, cool place.

you say it like there's something wrong with it

AntiRip

You know what, I think they're doing this in Ireland because the majority of the people using the internet are either but mainly both ignorant or don't give a sh1t, so as to set a precedent for the rest of the world. I've mentioned this topic to around 20 people today around the factory where I work and bar one even knew about these torrent sites and didn't give a crap. It's sad to say that it may be only the "pirates" like ourselves (unfortunately I call us pirates because the majority of people think we're pirates for just knowing about these sites!) that are deeply concerned for the rights of everyone on the net. Like I said in previous post, go ahead and block these sites, lets play the cat and mouse games they've been playing since napster, but this will be so negative for "everyone". It goes against everything the internet stands for, Freedom. It's like banning all the cars in the country because so many people are killed in them. Why not ban cigarettes because they cause cancer? Are you crazy! They make SO MUCH MONEY!

I hear talks here about Rapidshare. I know the reputation of RS. But they do take down illegal links very fast and when told so. If they block RS, then they will have to block all of them. What about Photobucket? Found a couple of copyrighted images there...send it to Eircom block them! Oh, found a couple of blogs here with links...block them! That Torrentfreak blog, can't have them telling people about this and that about filesharing..block them. The internet will start to get very very boring eventually.

I'm afraid it just got too easy for ordinary people to come across these sites. If they made it very hard for ordinary people to get this material and forget this handful of people that they will never stop, it would be alot better that internet filtering! I have websense at work I don't want it at home!

GreenHand

Id agree to isp blocking sites with illegal content but if there gona do they have to do it with it all not just some big sites and not just music im sure they are still sites with child porn and other more worst things on them then illegal contents that should be restricted first.. the Only reason that its such a big deal is because celebrities are making a big deal over it. well they prob have the right if they own it.:D

towel401

no don't block the kiddy porn sites. ya see if you block them you have no hope of tracing the source or finding the perverts who use them.

blocking sites only increases the demand for the stuff thats on them but rarely affects the supply

Pub07

LOL come off it the lot of yez. Acting all concerned that Eircom are violating peoples human rights as they start 'censoring the internet'. The only thing that has you guys so worked up is that you will no longer be able to download thousands of Euros worth copyrighted material. You are trying to divert this issue into some freedom of speech argument, which some here have suggested this is the approach you should be taking, as you know you haven't a leg to stand on when it comes to your main issue which is defending your right to rip off copyrighted material.

Mathiasb

Pub07 wrote: »

LOL come off it the lot of yez. Acting all concerned that Eircom are violating peoples human rights as they start 'censoring the internet'. The only thing that has you guys so worked up is that you will no longer be able to download thousands of Euros worth copyrighted material. You are trying to divert this issue into some freedom of speech argument, which some here have suggested this is the approach you should be taking, as you know you haven't a leg to stand on when it comes to your main issue which is defending your right to rip off copyrighted material.

This post is so hilarious, I don't even know where to begin.

jos22

Cabaal wrote: »

Ok lets not take this out of context, nobody is going to block any kind of on-line petition and no ISP would allow this.

Stick to actual facts and proper issues here instead of spiraling off and suggesting utter nonsense about eircom/irma blocking non-music download sites.

I was being sarcastic

but latest on this is
Ireland's largest ISP won't block The Pirate Bay -- the embattled BitTorrent search engine and tracker -- absent a court order, a spokesman said Tuesday.
Eircom is aware of copyright infringement issues but will not block The Pirate Bay unless major record labels can obtain a court order requiring it and other ISPs (Internet service providers) to do so, the spokesman said.
Content monitoring is "not our business," the spokesman said. "We have no interest in it."


source
http://www.pcworld.com/article/160114/irish_isp_we_wont_block_the_pirate_bay.html

Mathiasb

jos22 wrote: »

I was being sarcastic

but latest on this is
Ireland's largest ISP won't block The Pirate Bay -- the embattled BitTorrent search engine and tracker -- absent a court order, a spokesman said Tuesday.
Eircom is aware of copyright infringement issues but will not block The Pirate Bay unless major record labels can obtain a court order requiring it and other ISPs (Internet service providers) to do so, the spokesman said.
Content monitoring is "not our business," the spokesman said. "We have no interest in it."


source
http://www.pcworld.com/article/160114/irish_isp_we_wont_block_the_pirate_bay.html

That's the smartest thing I've read in a while. It's good to know that eircom aren't completely ball-less. However, a courtorder might be easy to get... well well.

PaddyTheNth

Mathiasb wrote: »

That's the smartest thing I've read in a while. It's good to know that eircom aren't completely ball-less. However, a courtorder might be easy to get... well well.

No, it's pretty much pure PR bull****. About standard for Ireland really.

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/02/eircom-no-pirate-bay-blockade-until-we-get-a-court-order.ars

According to a report in the Sunday Business Post this weekend, "Under the terms of an agreement between Eircom and Irma [the Irish major label association], Eircom will not oppose any court application [regarding sites to block], meaning that the orders will be automatically granted."

Pub07 wrote:

LOL come off it the lot of yez. Acting all concerned that Eircom are violating peoples human rights as they start 'censoring the internet'. The only thing that has you guys so worked up is that you will no longer be able to download thousands of Euros worth copyrighted material. You are trying to divert this issue into some freedom of speech argument, which some here have suggested this is the approach you should be taking, as you know you haven't a leg to stand on when it comes to your main issue which is defending your right to rip off copyrighted material.

I've no problem with people getting in trouble for sharing copyrighted material. Having my ISP decide to arbitrarily agree to block access to any site that IRMA decide they don't like? Yeah that sounds like a great idea...

Thousands of Euros :pac:

Orion

Pub07 wrote: »

LOL come off it the lot of yez. Acting all concerned that Eircom are violating peoples human rights as they start 'censoring the internet'. The only thing that has you guys so worked up is that you will no longer be able to download thousands of Euros worth copyrighted material. You are trying to divert this issue into some freedom of speech argument, which some here have suggested this is the approach you should be taking, as you know you haven't a leg to stand on when it comes to your main issue which is defending your right to rip off copyrighted material.

"No longer be able" - get a grip. Any blocking is so easily circumvented that's it's pointless even trying. This is a civil rights issue - once anyone gets the right to censor part of the internet what's to stop them censoring other parts for spurious reasons. As stated before, by me and others, once you start down this road every small step seems reasonable based on the previous step until you, all of a sudden, find yourself in a state where information is controlled. Extreme example - maybe. Historically accurate - yes.

Here's an example from our gorgeous country - Section 31. Sinn Fein were censored - they could not be interviewed on radio or TV because of their 'involvement' in the Troubles. This was only lifted 16 years ago. So here's a question for you. Seeing as Sinn Fein were censored what would have been the reaction if, for example, the Green Party were censored because of their involvement with Greenpeace. Greenpeace were considered seditionists and terrorists by many countries in the 80's and early 90's. So adding the Green Party to Section 31 may have seemed perfectly reasonable seeing as another terrorist organisation was banned from the airwaves. Sure while we're at it add in the Labour Party - they're only communists anyway. And don't forget those independants - they're practising sedition. You see where I'm going here?

Or another example. The banning of information about services legal in another country. Yes I'm bringing abortion into the debate (and I won't answer any question about the morality of abortion - this is an argument about censorship so don't bother). The Irish people were not allowed any information about abortion until we had a referendum to insist upon it.

Once a government or judiciary go down the route of censorship it takes serious action - referendum or public outcry or, in extreme cases rebellion, to turn back from it. I'm not suggesting that there will be a rebellion over this but it is the first step on a path that it is very hard to turn back from. And this fine country of ours has a long and proud history of practising censorship in the name of the greater good. The only difference this time is that the greater good is being defined by a corporate entity instead of a religious or political one. Does that make it worse? I think so.

Now - who's up for watching The Life of Brian?