Sadly, the phrase does no refer to Neo-Labour’s prospects of getting re-elected which about the same as those of Geeklawyer getting made a Court of Appeal judge. Nor does it refer to the number times a British policeman can beat a G20 protester to death before being being invited to retire due to ‘ill-heath’ where the correct answer is of course ‘none’: G20 protesters are domestic extremists to be suppressed, even the 7 stone lady ones.
No. it’s all about Peter ‘Pink’ Mandelson, Tony Blair’s brain and fan of penetrating rear attacks on political rivals and extremely young male friends. After being wined dined and 69’d on David Geffen’s yacht Mandy decided to go off on a trip of his own: “Three Strikes and Your off” legislation. Three accusations of copyright infringement and you lose the Internet.
Despite well considered independent advice on the economics of policy decisions for the Internet from Professor Gower and various others it seems that all it takes to buy Labour policy is a bribe from a Formula One homunculus or a blow job from a rent boy on a nice yacht. Regrettably while Geeklawyer has a big mouth there some things he wont swallow, one is the member of Hartlepool; not even for something as important as this.
No, the Government has decided to disconnect alleged filesharers from the Internet. The implementation details are not known but if current behaviour seen employed elsewhere by the music industry is followed their will be much injustice. Purveyors of software snake-oil will be seen selling packages supposedly proving who downloaded what when. Some of these packages can work but many are drivel: in the past pensioners with no computer have been accused of file-sharing as have networked printers.
The consequences can be severe. In Finland Internet access is now a civic right. For many the Internet is as important a household service as electricity or sanitation: Geeklawyer often strongly considers what the broadband is like when deciding where to live. If a family’s kids download MP3s the whole household will be blocked from Internet access. Collective punishment. All of this is based on no proven harm, at least none apart from the Music and film Industries telling us that the sky is falling down. To call this a disproportionate and draconian response is almost understating it.
Geeklawyer’s voting recommendation in the upcoming election? Vote for the Pirate Party: rape pillage and sensible IP & privacy laws
Update:
Geeklawyer forgot to plug the Open Rights Group. Doh. ORG do sterling work in this area. If you oppose this then join ORG now! (they do other cool stuff too)
Don’t worry, it’s only “accusation of filesharing”. Just round up a dozen people willing to accuse said member.
oh come on, geekster — it’s a little disingenuous to say this is mandy’s doing. it is almost inevitable if we are actually listening to european law. ever since my beloved(!) 2004/48 the needless (and ineffective) criminalisation of any alleged copyright violators, treating them like major fraudsters and mafia bosses has been on the cards.
wrong — yes.
stupid — yes.
totally brought about by mpaa and others — yes.
work of mandlestein alone — i think not.
and if by ‘well considered independent advice’ you mean the gowers report, it really didn’t say anything except express the wish that people’s copyright should be protected but people should be able to have access to things. and it would be quite nice if the weather were to be a bit warmer. i agree. how that particular circle is to be squared is quite another matter.
i know what i would suggest, but the major economic interest would have my balls on a plate almost as quickly as footage of my testiclectomy could be streamed out via pirate bay.
Gower was a little more substantial than that I think. But if you think that policies alike this are implemented after nothing other than sober reflection on the public interest the politest thing I can say about you is that you are being ‘naive’. Most of these policies have been being floated for several year true but their ‘inevitability’ as you put it has always been far from certain, and whether they get implemented has depended on political will and inclination. It’s how politics works. In this case Mandy’s calculation was that it was to his advantage. Nor am, I had hoped it was obvious, suggesting he invented the policy.
Legislation like this will simply result in a move towards anonymous and encrypted distributed darknets like GNUnet. The spooks know this, that’s why they’re opposing the legislation.
setting aside any to-and-fro re gowers, i totally agree implementation is about political will and inclination. the voices urging harsher copyright measures are backed by billions of dollars and a government of any persuasion would find them hard to resist. i had hoped that was what my post above said, but perhaps i wrote sloppily.
and the thought that a cynical old sod like me could ever believe that ‘policies alike this [or any policies at all!] are implemented after nothing other than sober reflection on the public interest’ brought a tear to my eye. you old romantic, you.
Open rights Group are leading the campaign against Mandelson’s three strikes proposals. We’re having a Q&A session for bloggers to let you in on our work and get your views.
When? 1830, 24 November 2009 (for an hour or so)
Where? irc.freenode.net/openrightsgroup (How to use IRC: http://is.gd/4XcXZ)
RSVP to michael@openrightsgroup.org
We want to make blogger Q&As a regular feature in future so please do get involved with this and feel free to pass on the invite.
For more info, check out http://www.openrightsgroup.org/
Yes. Apologies for not plugging ORG who do a fine job.
I have to be boring and point out that whilst the Government have talked about three accusations of copyright infringement as being the point in whihch technical measures — including getting cut off could be applied, the Bill’s text does not include anything about ‘3 strikes’ — indeed under the text of the bill (which as per the norn for this govt is essentially enabling legislation to allow to real stuff to be pushed through via SI’s) it could be one strike or 101 strikes just as easily.
The sections of the bill which would allow for a 3 strikes rule are of course disproportionate, and will do nothing to deter serious illegal downloaders who are probably already encrypting.
I loved the Guardian’s view that a more honest title for the bill would be the copyright protection and punishment bill. “It is less about creating the digital businesses of the 21st century than protecting the particular 20th century business models used in music and film.” Amen to that.