Fail

Copyright issues are back in the news. We are again going backwards. The motion picture and music industries have once again bribed politicians into getting another bogus idea passed.

This time they have enlisted the help of internet service providers to police the internet. ISP's will begin sending notices if a customer is suspected of sharing copyrighted materials. After six notices they can slow your connection or discontinue your service. Sound fair to you?? This will put an end to hotspots. Libraries, internet cafes, open wifi..etc. will all definitely be shut down.

The logic behind this idea is to put the brakes on pirates. The main problem I see is that copyright holders need only claim infringement and you are suddenly marked as a pirate. What is funny is they will only be shooting themselves in the foot. No doubt that nobody in their right mind will pay $35 or higher for dial-up speeds. The ISP's will lose accounts. It won't be a major problem for ISP's that have a monopoly in an area where there is no competition, but in urban areas they will lose business.

So the movie and music industry plans to have ISP's do their dirty work AND lose customers. I don't see how they can expect the ISP's to bear the burden of loss of business unless they are on the payroll from the industry. If that is the case we have a huge conflict of interest going on here. You shouldn't have to prove innocence, they should prove guilt.

They don't seem to understand that people don't want to buy an entire CD because they want a single song. I haven't needed to download any song I wanted to listen to for several years. I don't own an ipod, I just listen online.

As for movies, I'm definitely not going to a theater and paying ten bucks to watch the crappy movies they keep releasing. I can wait until it's on Netflix or just simply pass on seeing them. Movies are ridiculously expensive to produce because everyone is blatantly overpaid. It isn't my fault if they paid Julia Roberts $20 million for another stupid romantic comedy. It's pretty simple, adapt to today's economy or be consumed by it.

It's entertainment and we can do without it. I suggest that we begin boycotts against the greedy bastards and hit them where it hurts, the pocketbook. If everyone were to start pirating content do you think the ISP's would turn off the net? That's not very likely.