UK gov: should we have 10 year sentences for internet pirates?

[HEXUS]

To bring sentencing in line with that for physical goods copyright offences.

Read more.

[aidanjt]

No, that's absurd. There's no loss to imaginary property being 'stolen'.

[Tunnah]

Read the title, pooped a little.

I wonder what the statute of limitations is on this sort of thing..

OK so I have a mate who was into warez. This was before torrents back when the only way to get legit releases was to go on boards or actively be a part of the warez scene, he went with the latter. He was good at it, was what they called a techop, he ran the servers themselves, set them up did all the scripting and security etc.

Anyway in Dec 2001 when the raids happened, he was only 16 (had been masquerading as an older guy to get respect) he had to pack up all his stuff and destroy a helluva lot of parts because he was sure he was gonna get picked up. Luckily his security meant he was never identified, but some friends he had become vrey close with were, one of em ended up with a 7 year sentence. So he quit.

For a month. Then he rationalized that by only working on Asia servers he would be safe (young and dumb). Someone was busted, leading to a ring of his servers, again he was at risk. So he quit, again...for a few months. Then he went into internal only servers, the most private and protected ones, refusing all work on other sites. Then one of THOSE got busted, and again all his **** had to be destroyed.

In the end he quit because the threat of prison to a then-18 year old, for something that was a HOBBY, was just...terrifying. So he stayed out, just using a few leech accounts, and moving onto torrents when they became the big thing.

But now, hearing this, over just owning copyright works, is seriously giving him some bad memories and is actually considering just deleting it all ha.

[DemonHighwayman]

That's a very draconian suggestion they have suggested, you get less for rape, murder or gbh ! I think it has been proven before that music torrents mostly help boost sales, don't know about movies or anything but i'd think it would be a similar situation.

[outwar6010]

It's funny that theres no charges or sentencing for the massive banker frauds or the fact that thousands have died due to having their disabled benefits taken away or any other scandal involving this government. No, this is what they concentrate on.

[Biscuit]

Yet another example of the government favouring the needs of private corporations over the protection of its people.

Of course now that encryption is to be banned, ISPs will have to store logs/history of all of the customers traffic and we are not going to be a 'passively tolerant' society, there is no where for the criminals to hide.... but its ok because if you are doing nothing wrong then there is no problem right? These totalitarian shifts would never be abused..... right?

I'm just waiting for the announcement of a new 'special police' to deal with these criminals who haven't been subject to a proper investigation.

[Corky34]

So I would get less prison time for racially-aggravated assault, carrying a loaded firearm, or being a pimp than I would for downloading the latest episode of GoT? Yea that seems right and proper.

[abaxas]

The reason that governments should always favour business is that business creates economic activity = GDP.

Without that, we are all fooked.

[Saracen]

No, that's absurd. There's no loss to imaginary property being 'stolen'.

Speaking as someone who had "imaginary property" stolen, I say that's rubbish.

I write for a living. I'm not a multi-billion pound corporation, I'm a bloke trying to put food on the table and pay bills. One of my "imaginary property" rights is that I control when and where my work is used, and am entitled to get paid when it does.

So when one of those large companies rips off my work by publishing it in Australia, then remove my ability to do so because buyers usually want first serial rights, and certainly, subsequent publications are less valuable, if they actually retain any value at all.

These days, many publishers want "all rights". That is, all locations, all media types, first and subsequent use. Guess what? I'll agree to that [b]IF[/i] the rate paid reflects that. So I get paid a bit more, per word, so that a publisher does have the right to use my material, in a way I don't have the resources or intention to exploit, such as translation into German, or Italian, etc.

That Australian company that "stole" my rights directly deprived me of income .... which is why they paid up and apologised when they got caught.

Without those "imaginary" rights, I could not make a living from writing, because doing so requires investment, in equipment but especially in time. And that applies to a LOT of others, too. Those rights are absolutely essential for me to make a living from my sweat and toil.

Should a carpenter be made unable to make a living from making furniture, because greedy people think they can just take his work without paying anything for it?

The ONLY difference is between physical, tangible goods and 'intellectual' goods. Take either without consent or compensation to the owner and you take their ability to earn from their work. If people are prepared to buy a darpenter's furniture, and buy my writing, why shouldxI be prevenred from earning a living from it? Clearly, my writing has inherent value, or publishers wouldn't be prepared to pay for it. And I can tell you for a certainty that they DO NOT buy from just any old Tom, Dick or Harry that approaches them, because not everybody has the skills necessary to produce work of sufficient quality, jyst like the carpenter's ability to sell a chair, and the amount he gets for it, depends on the quality of the chair, the quality of his carpentry skills.

So, chair or creative 'art', what's the difference? Both have value, both time time and effort to produce. If you could take that carpenter's chair, stick it in a Star Trek replicator and produce 5 more at the push of a button, do you not remove the carpenter's ability to earn from making 6 chairs?

The difference is the same. Copying technology.

What is also the same is the greed and moral bankruptcy of the pirates that want the benefit of someone else's skills and efforts, without wanting to pay for it.

[killer7xx]

It's ridiculous as well as the talked about tax on blank media, the UK government are just being slaves to the greedy music industry. Pirating is not the same as stealing physical goods, pirating is just copying and a lot of studies point to piracy actually benefiting the creative industries more than it hurts them.

[Irien]

I think there's some knee-jerk reactions in this comments thread. They're not (as far as I know) comparing it with theft of goods (eg. "he stole my car/tv/computer"), but rather the sale of counterfeit goods or large scale commercial physical piracy.

It sounds like the targets are those actually distributing/vending pirate games/movies online, and bringing that in line with those distributing/vending pirate games/moves offline. Kind of makes sense, really.

However, I suspect a large amount of this doesn't fall under UK jurisdiction. I don't know the scene, but doesn't a lot of piracy originate in Asia (for example)?

[Saracen]

So I would get less prison time for racially-aggravated assault, carrying a loaded firearm, or being a pimp than I would for downloading the latest episode of GoT? Yea that seems right and proper.

No. Like sentences for most things, these are UP TO ten years.

What do you get for killing someone? Depends on the circunstances. Anything from a complete discharge to life.

When did anyone get a jail sentence for downloading a TV program?

On the other hand, if you get hold of a pre-release copy of a film and upload it onto pirate sites so that it's downloaded millions of times, you risk bankrupting the company or individual that produced it, and putting all their staff on the dole queue.

Sentences depend on circumstances. Just because you MIGHT get life for killing someone, or even for a serious fight, doesn't mean you will. And usually, don't.

[Biscuit]

The reason that governments should always favour business is that business creates economic activity = GDP.

Without that, we are all fooked.

Its not like these big media businesses have been brought to their knees by piracy have they? We are a long long way away from internet piracy 'fooking' our GDP.

The government should always put the protection of the public before the needs of business otherwise we end up in a situation where these companies can do whatever the hell they want and there is nothing we can do to stop them.

[OilSheikh]

Don't you get two years' prison sentence if you crash into another driver thereby killing him ?

[cps1974]

ha good one - there is a shortage of prison spaces at present (UK) and this will not go away anytime soon - can't really see the crown court circuit advising their judges to make max use of custodial sentences for these offences apart from the odd extreme case / making an example of individual etc

[c12038]

BIG BROTHER 1984 does this strike a note somewhere