Judge: ISP Not Responsible for Illegal Downloads

[metalfellow]

http://www.peermediatech.com/
http://baytsp.com/
If you are in the US I would be very careful about what you download, this is the future, those with the money can circumvent "evolve or die" and just enforce whatever they want on us.

 

[rhelme]

This is great news... Could you imagine this in a different light... Imagine your local bank suing the City for providing the vessel (the road, the train, the city busses) for giving the robbers the ability to escape. What the Studios' (ie the banks in my example would want) is to have every one (every bit of data) checked and recheck along the road, train, bus) to make sure they aren't doing something wrong.

If they would have won this case and the ISP was responsible, I would have filed a suit against the city for providing vessel's for my wallet being stolen and for providing the robber access to streets to get away on...

If you think of it that way, you quickly see how crazy this case was in the first place

 

[nukem950]

In a period of 59 weeks starting June 2008, nearly 90 films and TV episodes were downloaded using BitTorrent...

That's odd. I thought there were thousands of tv shows and movies out there. Were they offended that much of the media is terrible?

 

[scryer_360]

VINDICATION AWAITS! TO PERTH!

 

[jojesa]

[citation][nom]amarok[/nom]My ISP would be glad for the verdict.in the last hour alone, I have downloaded 12.345 25gb bluray movies,76.543 albums - 10.000 of them was the same shitty album from U2 - just to annoy them,99.999 porn clips,123.456 ebooks - all about Martha Stewart,33.333 programs - here 30.000 of them was from Adobe,1 file without name or filetype, but I found it interesting that is was the only one without copyright warnings,I wonder what I might find in the next hour....[/citation]

That verdict won't stop the ISP from providing your download history to the MPAA and RIAA.

 

[Guest]

"...there was a lot of excitement from ISP's standing outside the courtroom."

Wow, there were whole ISPs standing outside of a courtroom? They must have rather large hallways.

 

[Guest]

As a customer of this ISP, I've been following this quite closely.

The situation was, roughly, AFACT employed a IT Consultant, that then became a customer of the ISP, for the sole purpose of using BitTorrent to share out Moves/TV shows on his PC (about 90 different ones).

He collected all the information on the people that downloaded from his torrents and reported it back to AFACT, who then used this information (minus the IT guys details) to show that people were downloading movies etc via the ISP's network, gave details of the IPs and demanded they be sent warnings or be disconnected.

They did this for almost a year, sending multiple reports to the ISP (who forwarded them to the local police) before springing the legal action claiming they weren't doing enough.

Basically, they set them up. Would this be entrapment in the U.S. ?

Here's the court findings.

www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/cth/FCA/2010/24.html

 

[matt87_50]

is Energex (the electricity company) responsible when I use their electricity to power my dooms day devices??

I suppose when someone is electrocuted by a heater falling into their bath, blame should be divvied up evenly between the electric and water company?

progress will be painfully slow until people start treating the internet like the utility it is.

 

[twu]

[citation][nom]warmon6[/nom]Agree. the only people responsible for there actions is the ones that did it. Not the person providing the services.but if the world ends, whos gonin to get you. better have lots of food. jk[/citation]


Haa if the world ends, no one will make movie for him to download, no company offer him link to the www.

 

[randomizer]

[citation][nom]slapdashzero[/nom]Only 90 unique peices? In over a year? Must be the lowest per capita concentration of pirated movies and TV in the world. Unless 4 people live in the Perth area. Which I know isn't true.Everyone else nailed it though. It's absolutely right not to hold the ISP responsible, IMO.[/citation]
Those 90 films would be the ones the investigators were tracking. Obviously there are downloads of more than 90 films in reality.

 

[mdillenbeck]

[citation][nom]MountainFlip[/nom]Drug traffickers use public roads to move their goods. The Government must be sued!Same concept.[/citation]
I see a lot of these types of analogies - but also consider:

In the United States, if a bartender (equivalent to the ISP) serves drinks (equivalent to packets from a know torrent site containing pirated material) endlessly to a person who gets drunk and then gets in an accident when driving (equivalent to using pirated material), then it is possible that both the business AND the individual can be sued.

So there are some cases where we say the provider of a service does have some liability. Another instance in the states would be the gun dealer who knowingly sells weapons without the required background check or filing the proper paper work.

As to piracy itself, I believe it occurs due to outdated business models. For example, regional licensing means the BBC can only provide certain shows for streaming to UK IPs. Does this mean signing up for a proxy service in another country means you are engaging in piracy - and does that change whether you are a foreign national or a UK citizen who is currently abroad?

There is also frustration and confusion with high-cost media, such as blu-ray or DVDs that now sell at a premium with a "digital copy". What do you own? Do you buy the physical disk, the right for you as an individual to watch the movie, or something else? If I buy a DVD, I can loan it to a friend - but if I buy a digital copy, it is tied to a specific machine and I can't even port it to another machine in another room of my own house!

Thus I think the discussion needs to shift its focus on who is liable for what (although that is still an important discussion) to what is a reasonable business model along with what is reasonable limits to intellectual property.

 

[randomizer]

[citation][nom]MDillenbeck[/nom]I see a lot of these types of analogies - but also consider:In the United States, if a bartender (equivalent to the ISP) serves drinks (equivalent to packets from a know torrent site containing pirated material) endlessly to a person who gets drunk and then gets in an accident when driving (equivalent to using pirated material), then it is possible that both the business AND the individual can be sued.So there are some cases where we say the provider of a service does have some liability. Another instance in the states would be the gun dealer who knowingly sells weapons without the required background check or filing the proper paper work.[/citation]
The difference in both cases is the volume of "product" being moved between provider and customer, and the number of customers. Is it reasonable for a bartender to check the condition of each customer when there are thousands of customers concurrently waiting on their beer? Is it reasonable for a gun dealer to do a background check on thousands of their customers at the same time? No it's not, and that's what Hollywood wants done here.

Also, a better example of a similar business to an ISP is the post. They are a carriage service and don't have the resources to inspect every letter or parcel. If child pornography is acquired by post, is the post responsible for not checking first? Should they be forced by law to inspect every parcel and letter (breaching privacy laws unless those are also changed), thereby increasing the costs of providing their service by orders of magnitude?

 

[atomyc]

finally, a judge with some common sense.

 

[ch42832n]

Justice was served...in your face Hollywood studios

 

[lasaldude]

I Don't Understand Why They Don't Take Advantage Of This By Offering Media At Say . . Early Release Movies(Theater) 2.99 - 4.99 With Dedicated Servers At High Speeds. I Would Jump On That In A Heartbeat. 3 Dollars Is Better Than No Dollars. Do They Think I Enjoy Waiting For People To Seed And Worrying About Viruses And Shit? Revamp Your Shitty, Broken, Old Ass Business Model And Get Some Young Fresh Smart People In their Running Things

 

[jsc]

Another analogy: Local police department sues Ford Motor Company because a Ford owner was caught speeding. Or better yet, because someone used a Ford as a getaway vehicle.

 

[azxcvbnm321]

Some sort of enforcement has to be found. Just looking at the entitlement attitude of these pirates shows that they'll accept no business model other than one that gives it to them for free, and throws in early release as well.

 

[drip50291]

BS they cant stop them. THEY HAVE CONTROL OVER PPLS INTERNET, THEY R THOSE PPLS INTERNET! They can shut off the port or make an ACL. That judge is a fucking moron.

 

[aethm]

I'm getting real sick of these anti-piracy people. I have yet to read a well done independent study that concludes piracy hurts anything. I'm not condoning piracy, but when I see the entertainment industry posting record profits year after year and still doing quite well in a recession, I don't "Feel for them" I think their Draconian measures over the past decade have been deplorable and completely ineffective.
It's time to change the business model people... wake up!

 

[aethm]

[citation][nom]Drip50291[/nom]BS they cant stop them. THEY HAVE CONTROL OVER PPLS INTERNET, THEY R THOSE PPLS INTERNET! They can shut off the port or make an ACL. That judge is a fucking moron.[/citation]

They don't really have control. They are a road-map. Spying on internet usage would be an invasion of privacy.