The CopyKat - fascinating furballs of fun

The Taiwanese Intellectual Property Office, part of Ministry of Economic Affairs, have decided to 'adjust'  a plan to block overseas Internet services that potentially violate copyright laws amid opposition to the plan from free-speech advocates. Wang Mei-hua, head of the Intellectual Property Office (IPO) stressed her office "never intended to challenge or acted to damage" the freedom of speech that Taiwan's people worked so hard to acquire. Our original blog here http://the1709blog.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/my-rights-v-your-rights-cyber-wars.html 

A new paper  by the Analysis Group, commissioned by CCIA, looks at the impact of a 2007 legal change on investment in the webcasting industry and provides a somewhat unsurprising conclusion: when the US Copyright Royalty Board dramatically increased the royalty rates paid by webcasters for the period 2006-2010, venture capitalists perceived that as a negative change to the landscape, and accordingly reduced their investment in the industry. This article says that legal infrastructure can either incentivize or discourage investment, and the innovation that this investment produces.  Whether it is the taxi industry, Internet radio, or music discovery services, the regulatory apparatus can either drive investment away, or draw it in:  http://www.project-disco.org/intellectual-property/060313-further-research-showing-how-copyright-regulations-drive-investment/

TorrentFreak has an article titled "Copyright Monopoly Enforcement Today Is A Mass Psychosis" - and Rick Falkvinge is of the opinion that "That’s where we are with copyright monopoly enforcement today. Saving the old, obsolete industries at any cost, defending the copyright monopoly and obsolete distribution models against the future, and seeing legislators taking part in this neophobic race to the bottom is a clinical mass psychosis." Wow. http://torrentfreak.com/copyright-monopoly-enforcement-today-is-a-mass-psychosis-130602/ 

The Prenda 'troll' saga just gets more and more bizarre. Now it has been alleged by an internet expert in the Florida case of  First Time Videos v Pail Oppold that "Prenda Law's principal, John Steele, is the person who uploaded the infringing pornography in the first place, listing it on BitTorrent index sites with information inviting people to download it -- people whom he then sent legal threats to for downloading those selfsame movies." A fascinating read can be found at  http://boingboing.net/2013/06/03/porno-copyright-trolls-prenda-2.html . In a separate update on this story, it seems that another Prenda / Steele Hansmeier lawyer, Brett Gibbs, had pleaded poverty in court (saying he had substantial debts and no assets) and revealed he has serious brain cancer, in a move to avoid the costs and penalties awarded by Judge Otis D Wright II.  http://www.forbes.com/sites/kellyphillipserb/2013/05/29/copyright-troll-lawyer-pleads-poverty-asks-to-be-let-off-the-hook/

Billboard reports that the continuing debate between protecting copyright and supporting technological innovation dominated every conversation panel at the World Creators Summit, held  on the 4th June in Washington D.C., right through the end of the day when Congressman Bob Goodlatte of Virginia, who chairs the judiciary committee, explained why he wants Congress to tackle copyright revision saying “"We need to stimulate both creativity and innovation," Goodlatte said. "Both sides need to be rewarded because, as California Congressman Anna Eshoo said, they both need each other." More at http://www.billboard.com/biz/articles/news/digital-and-mobile/1565704/government-officials-publishing-and-music-execs-more

And finally,the Jamaica Gleaner reports that one of the country’s music collection society, The Jamaica Association of Composers, Authors and Publishers (JACAP), has reacted to criticism of Jamaica's compliance with copyright regulations. In early May, Jamaica was named by the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) as one of the rogue countries which will remain on a Special 301 Watch List because of its inadequate payment of public-performance royalties. ACAP General Manager Lydia Rose said the collecting agency has made several attempts to educate the industry players about the importance of adhering to the copyright regulations. However, there are still those who are in breach – and some who actively oppose paying royalties. The chair of the recorded music sector’s collection society, the Jamaica Music Society (JAMMS), Danny Browne, had previously told the Gleaner that the highest level of payment resistance came from the lower-level players in the marketplace. He said the more organised companies have a higher level of compliance adding that it is easier to track commercial radio than more informal music industry players. http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20130605/ent/ent3.html 

My Rights v Your Rights: the cyber wars escalate

A proposal from the government of Taiwan to amend the Copyright  Act that would require local Internet Service Providers to block illegal content on foreign Web sites yesterday has come under fire from  venture capitalists and Web users alike, primarily for violating freedom of speech and people's rights. The blocks would be placed on  DNS or IP addresses, and would have to be carried out by Taiwanese ISPs on instructions from the government.

The Taipei Times has reported that one venture capitalist, Jamie Lin, from the firm appWorks Ventures, told Taipei Times the proposal goes against the values of freedom and democracy, which locals hold in high regard saying  "It doesn't make any sense," Lin said. "The move seems like building a firewall to prevent local Internet users from seeing illegally uploaded content, but the content would still exist in servers overseas and can be viewed by foreign Internet users." And Ching Chiao, vice president for community relations at DotAsia, a top-level domain registry operator, wrote in a Facebook post that the proposal is a "setback for democracy and a stupid policy that wastes people's money" adding  "Countries which have implemented ISP-level blocking are turning the Internet into intranet, the first step for turning a modern country into a self-enclosed country." Another blogger, Tsai I-Chen, said in a blog post that the amendment violated citizens' rights saying "Can you accept the blocking of Facebook because there are too many infringed movies or the blocking of Dropbox because it is frequently used for the transmission of illegal software? This is not a copyright infringement issue, [but] it is an issue on the violation of people's rights."

Taiwan’s web users were quick to set up an online protest campaign that has already racked up more than 15,000 participants on Facebook - who are attending an online ‘event’ in protest:  another 90,000 have been invited. Called  “#freeandopen!, the event has been snowballing, doubling its number of supporters in the last five days, and the page invites users to contact Taiwan's Intellectual Property Office (TIPO)  representatives and let them know that many people strongly oppose the plan. It lists names, contact phone numbers, and email addresses for several TIPO representatives, as well as a generic contact email and number.

The proposed changes have been compared to other legislation like the US’s Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), which caused massive online protests in 2012 and was widely considered a step towards censoring the internet. The bill was ultimately dropped. Techasia adds “Taiwanese net users are hoping that their protests may lead to a similar outcome”.

In the USA, a new 84 page report from the Commission on the Theft of American Intellectual Property proposes a number of ways piracy can be combated, one of which involves “infecting alleged violators’ computers with malware that can wreak havoc, including and up to destroying the user’s computer”. the Commission argue that they need to fight fire with fire and that software can be pre-installed on computers for the purpose of monitoring and identifying copyright-violating activity. If the software detects copyright-violating activities of any of those sorts, it would cause the computer or its files to being locked. Once the files and/or computer was locked, a password would be needed  to unlock the system, and the computer would tell the c user to contact a law enforcement agency, which will have the password necessary to unlock the computer. The plan is to “stabilize” an infringement situation and get the police involved. A second proposal is for the computer to snap a picture of the computer users with the computers built in webcam if they are involved in alleged infringing activity. 

Slashgear reports that the the malware “would allow companies to gather data from a computer, change data located on the network, and destroy it if it feels such an action is necessary – all without permission, obviously. There’s also suggestions that it could be used to do other things as well, including up to destroying the user’s computer and/or network” and the Report itself says 

“While not currently permitted under U.S. law, there are increasing calls for creating a more permissive environment for active network defense that allows companies not only to stabilize a situation but to take further steps, including actively retrieving stolen information, altering it within the intruder’s networks, or even destroying the information within an unauthorized network. Additional measures go further, including photographing the hacker using his own system’s camera, implanting malware in the hacker’s network, or even physically disabling or destroying the hacker’s own computer or network.”

http://www.techinasia.com/taiwan-protests-copyright-blacklist-facebook-rally/  

http://www.decryptedtech.com/news/the-copyright-lobby-wants-more-power-to-punish-pirates-without-the-need-to-file-lawsuits

Taiwan adopts "three strikes" law

Taiwan's legislature has passed an amendment to the island's Copyright Act aimed at discouraging digital copyright infringement over peer-to-peer networks and increasing the responsibility of Internet Service Providers. First off, the country has adopted the much debated ‘three strikes’ system where web users who continue to access unlicensed sources of content after receiving two warnings could lose their internet connections – or at least have access restricted. Whilst a number of countries have looked at this system, so far only France and New Zealand have seriously considered implementing 'three strikes' into law. In France the much criticised proposals are still working their way through the French parliament after a temporary set back when the government failed to get a majority in the National Assembley just before Easter. In New Zealand the Government is still trying to work out how to implement their new law.

The Taiwanese government has introduced the system in order to achieve its two stated aims of cracking down on internet piracy - without flooding the courts with lawsuits from foreign content owners against the providers of file-sharing services or individual file-sharers further overburdening struggling court. It seems the new law means that repeat offenders will have their internet access "restricted" rather than automatically cut off. That could mean temporary suspensions rather than long term denial of service, something that might appease consumer rights bodies as well as the ISPs who don’t want to lose customers (although they equally don’t want to be liable for customers' illegal downloading activities).

Commenting on reports that ISPs could cut off consumers who have downloaded illegal content by mistake, Margaret Chen, Deputy Director General of Taiwan's Intellectual Property Office (TIPO), told reporters:

"That's not really the point. These people are doing something they shouldn't be doing in the first place. Besides, there are lots of ways to restrict Internet access besides cutting it off entirely".

TIPO added that The P2P amendment will "significantly redress the problems of copyright infringement" in a statement. The new laws will also give ISPs ‘safe harbour’ protection although this is balanced by provisions ensure rights owners can have infringing content removed – Billboard says that the new law is based on the 2005 U.S. Supreme Court decision against Grokster and that the ISP liability amendment allows rights holders to either claim their rights via judicial proceedings, or else follow a "notice and takedown" procedure to have copyright infringing content removed.