News - UK music site RnBXclusive.com shutdown by SOCA

[HEXUS]

Aggressive statement warns users who have downloaded files.

Read more.

[IronWarrior]

Never heard of SOCA but I hope they have good firewalls, because I sense a new target for Anon to fire them Cannons at.

[shaithis]

RnB Xclusive?

I would have shut that down, illicit activities or not

[dave87]

Never heard of SOCA but I hope they have good firewalls, because I sense a new target for Anon to fire them Cannons at.

Never heard of SOCA?

Serious and Organised Crime Office?

http://www.soca.gov.uk/

[pauleden]

RnB Xclusive?

I would have shut that down, illicit activities or not

On the grounds it's a terrible use of English? I agree.

[aidanjt]

"As a result of illegal downloads young, emerging artists may have had their careers damaged. If you have illegally downloaded music you will have damaged the future of the music industry," reads part of the SOCA message.

Could SOCA not at least pretend to be an impartial enforcement agency not in the pocket of private industry cronies?

[Tpyo]

A ridiculous fine/sentence for downloading materials if applicable. People get less than that for rape/armed robbery etc.

While I could agree that someone distributing illegally obtained material could be commiting a serious crime (in terms of the financial harm done etc.) - surely someone downloading music BUT NOT UPLOADING is committing a crime equivalent to shoplifting a couple (-to a trolley full, depending on the number of tracks etc.) of CDs. As such, shouldn't sentencing be in line with that level of crime?

[Biscuit]

i do find it quite funny people have been posting 'ooooh im soo scared' on twitter... you know that completely public social media system that could easily give them another bit of evidence that you were using the illegal system.

Threatening users with jail time is just stupid though, there isnt enough space in UK jails for the people that are in them let alone a couple of hundred thousand more :/

The connection between the private media industry and the legal enforcement agencies is becoming increasingly worrying though.

[Arthran]

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/201...sic-blog.shtml for more info on this ridiculous move

[crossy]

Could SOCA not at least pretend to be an impartial enforcement agency not in the pocket of private industry cronies?

Hmm, how about all those serial corporate tax avoiders - since HMRC aren't interested.

One question though - granted "ignorance of the law is no defence" - but unless there was something on the site to indicate that the tracks were "stolen", surely the users of the site are in the clear because they didn't knowingly receive stolen material. So what SOCA had on the site originally was rubbish.

Or is it the case that the current govt has changed the law so in crimes against "corporates" you're automatically guilty until proved innocent?

[format]

Is copywrite infringement a serious crime now?

[Valinor]

Is copywrite infringement a serious crime now?

Seriously organised, I suppose. It's likely they had more resources available to collect evidence than any other agency/police force.

[Andehh]

I would hope that the SOCA had better things to do then be the private army of the music industry.

When one mentions serious crime, teenagers downloading albums doesn't exactly strike me as top of the tax payers interests....

[crossy]

I would hope that the SOCA had better things to do then be the private army of the music industry. When one mentions serious crime, teenagers downloading albums doesn't exactly strike me as top of the tax payers interests....

Ah, but if you cast your mind back to those adverts that BPI used to run (and those modern day equivalents in the cinema) it's a mere pigeon-step from downloading the latest toonz from NDubz to dealing coke and AK47s on street corners, while trying to keep your ho's turning tricks.

I like this "sarcasm" thing...

[miniyazz]

This is ridiculous.

The message posted by SOCA on RnBXclusive's site said that "as a result of illegal downloads young, emerging artists may have had their careers damaged", and that "if you have illegally downloaded music you will have damaged the future of the music industry". The content of this warning was influenced by representatives of rights holders, according to the police agency's spokesman.

"It was written by SOCA, but we did have input from industry," he said.

This just diminishes SOCA. They're chasing what is effectively a civil offences (copyright infringement), even if they are trying to represent it as fraud. Haven't they got more important things to be doing with my taxpayer money? SOCA implied serious crime to me - things like terrorism and weapon trafficking. Not any more.

[Jayfunk]

If I direct enough sponsership money to the right people will SOCA go after the cab drivers who keep parking in front of my drive.

Call it people trafficking?