The Internet Needs Laws

[Clive Howlitzer]

The internet already has laws in place, adding more vague draconian laws is not the answer.

 

[CrystalShadow]

Saying 'The internet' needs laws, would imply that there is a central point of control somehow.

Laws don't cover places, they cover people. If I steal something, it's not my country that punishes me, it's the people that somehow declared themselves (through one means or another) to own that country that punish me.

They define the laws, they define who judges, and who enforces those laws.

All well and good so far.

But for this to work on the internet, you'd have to define who 'owns' the internet. Which is very difficult, because the internet isn't structured in a way that allows it to be fenced off into easily recognisable regions.

You can't really keep people 'out of your territory', because everything on the internet is somehow outside of any obvious physical boundaries.

And since we don't really have an obvious group that 'owns' things not specifically claimed by any country, it is incredibly difficult to declare who has jurisdiction over anything online, and for what reason.

I'm typing this on the Escapist. I'm a citizen of two countries, and living in one of them. The Escapist is a corporation registered in the United States. The .com domain is apparently 'us property', by some bizarre ruling... Presumably the servers he escapist is on are physically located in the US.

However, since I'm physically in the UK, the message is actually routed through at least the UK and US. But, based on IP traces I've tested in the past, and the way the internet functions, it could quite likely also pass through France, Germany, the netherlands, and several other EU countries first...

So... For the simple task of me typing this message on this forum...

There are at least 2 legal jurisdictions that might apply... And it could easily be argued that there could be any of the following:

Legal Jurisdiction of Top Level domain; (US in this case)
Legal Jurisdiction of company/person owning website; (Also US here)
Legal Jurisdiction based on physical location of the web server; (US)
Legal Jurisdiction of physical location of Person using website; (UK)
Legal Jurisdiction based on citizenship of person using website; (UK & Australia)
Legal Jurisdiction of any of the countries the network traffic may be passing through; (US & UK at least. But could easily involve 6-7 or more intermediate countries)

That's anything from 6 to more than a dozen legal jurisdictions which might all have a claim on what I'm doing here, and may all have differing laws.

And that's without even considering the hypothetical case that the internet had it's own independent laws. (Even if it did, it wouldn't necessarily mean these other laws would no longer apply...)

Compare that to the case of breaking a law within the physical borders of a country... How many jurisdictions are there? Well, depending on the country's legal system, maybe 3 or 4. But these have well-established priorities based on physical location.
In practice it's really just whatever the local laws are. Which is easy to establish.

Jurisdiction on the internet is a nightmare to decide upon...

And that's the problem.

It's all well and good to say 'there should be laws on the internet', but without establishing ownership, the immediate question becomes 'Whose laws?'.

 

[dkeck]

As someone who actually works in the Film Industry (In Australia btw)
I do a few jobs generally as an on set camera technician and also more importantly to look after digital footage make sure that it is safe backed up and secure (we go though TBs a day in space). First of all like the majority of the people in the film industry I don't make much. Seconded of all lets say if footage leaked from my server I can't go shut-down the data centre for letting that happen I have to increase my security as that's my responsibly.
I'm very strong agaisnt piracy as it does end up effecting people down the bottom of the film Industry food chain such as myself, however something like that is not going to do anything at all to the pirating of films and the internet is INTERNATIONAL so therefore Individual countries and companies should not be able to put their own rules into place just like that. It's like saying that its ok for the US Navy to go and sit on the edge of international water and blow away every ship they suspect of piracy.

 

[TheVioletBandit]

Good people don't need laws and bad people don't follow them, so what good are they? Personally, I don't think we need governments and corporations policing every aspect of our lives. There are far to many stupid victimless laws already, we don't need more we need less.

 

[TorqueConverter]

There are laws for this stuff, it's simply companies that make millions on even failure movies/games want to make more money because they feel that any piracy number is a reasonable basis for saying we lost profit.

So if [game] was pirated 4.2 million times, they lost 4.2 million sales. How does that make sense? There's many things that could have factored into that, like people trying the game and there's no demo, or game isn't available where they are, or they had to download it a second or third time because the first download didn't work, etc etc.

Yes piracy sucks but saying we lost x amount because x amount of downloads happened is a shitty reason to give them the right to police the internet.

This bill would smash any little guy trying to make just a living while these corporate heads thumb through a magazine for their next yacht. This bill violates EVERY right we have in this country and anyone ANYONE supporting this is a brainwashed goon backing billion dollar corporations over the little guys: artists, musicians, writers, video creators, creative minds, small businesses, blogs.

I'm really not sorry these guys have piracy problems because they already make billions of dollars and they're actively attacking OUR rights because of the few that are doing bad. (I in no way condone piracy I'm merely making a point that I don't care what their problem is when their solution is to come out with a bill that attacks everyone's rights. )

There's a better way and they should be (strangled) ashamed for lobbying this anti-rights bullshit against us.

I believe rampant piracy to be a result of a service problem. If 4.2 million illegal digital downloads of a game were to occur, I would certainly believe that the game publishers are not providing a proper service. Rampant piracy occurs when the pirates simply offer a better service than the legal venues. Look at the digital music industry. The illegal downloading of pirated MP3s lead to the development of legal digital downloads of music, games and movies with services like steam and netflix.

I agree, this bill is bullshit and will do nothing but hurt the little guys. I don't think the corporations liked finding themselves in a position in which they had to provide digital downloads for media. I think they liked their old system. Ingenuity is the one and only thing I can give as praise to pirates.

 

[JesterRaiin]

I ask you, Escapists: Should the Internet have laws and some form of control? How should people and companies be allowed to protect their intellectual property?

You don't invent one kind of shoes for whole nation, you don't invent one set of rules for The Internet. Simple as that.

Also : Free flow of information. FTW.

 

[Prince Regent]

We don't need laws!
We already have rules. And I know that we at least have 34 of those.

 

[Jazoni89]

Complete and utter lawlessness is entirely preferable to even the slightest increment of government control.

What, and have paedophiles share naked pictures of children all over Facebook for example.

If that is what you are implying, no thanks...

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

It already has a number of laws. Law 34 is rigorously enforced. As is 35 and 36.

Laws 1 and 2 have become lax over the years though.

 

[Joccaren]

The Internet has rules. What it needs is not more rules, but better enforcement of them. Sadly, this is largely impossible without removing a lot of the functionality of the Internet.
Even then, lets say they do find a way to enforce them, they need to have more reasonable punishments. Anything over a $60 fine for downloading a single song - something that costs $2, but I am hearing you can be fined $25K for - is extreme. Of course, scaling would need to be worked out for other items to be more appropriate. It should cost more to pirate and get caught, but not send you straight into bankruptcy. If they tried to enforce any fine like the 25K one on every pirate - most of the country would likely go broke. I'd wager that the majority of Internet users, especially younger ones, have downloaded at least 1 file illegally in their time, or illegally used an image. Charging everyone 25K for every single thing they pirated/illegally used would not end well.

Also, something funny.
http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/lamar-smith-sopa-copyright-whoops
Link to photographers page: http://www.flickr.com/photos/oxherder/4189641199/
It also seems that if the page linked in the description is the same, that image has been removed)
Also, for further lols, this:
http://ohinternet.com/Rules_of_the_Internet

 

[TheEndlessSleep]

People must make more money from the internet than they lose or there would be nothing here... It's a non-issue.

 

[Yopaz]

The internet has laws. The laws are also enforced.

I dont see what the hell you are on about.

The thing is, the laws as they are do not work, as is evidenced by the rampant and easy piracy of media. This leads to companies trying to protect their property by creating increasingly draconian measures to protect them. I'm not an expert in copyright law or other laws that govern media and free speech, so I want to know if anyone out there knows a better way to structure the laws of the internet rather than the "our way or no way" version proposed in SOPA and PIPA.

Laws entail a court system. These legislations will give the power to the companies themselves, rather than the judicial system, to decide if something is allowed or not.


Companies are in it for the profit, not for justice, they will abuse this power to make more money and in doing so censor everything.

So do you think we should make a deciding body, perhaps an organ of the UN charged with finding and maintaining a balance with copyright and free speech?

Spend some time in a country were a majority of the population is poor. Now notice how many times your wallet or other possessions are in risk of being stolen.
Are there no laws against stealing in that country just because people get their stuff stolen? As there has been said there are laws on the internet. It is in fact illegal to use threats of any kind. Threatening someone that you are going to kill them is illegal both online and offline. Not usually enforced in any case, but the internet does have laws as it is. It is also illegal to download games and those who have been caught uploaded and lost lawsuits over it can tell you that the punishment is in no way light.

You're not asking for the internet to have laws. You are asking for the internet to get its own police force.

 

[FernandoV]

The internet has laws. The laws are also enforced.

I dont see what the hell you are on about.

The thing is, the laws as they are do not work, as is evidenced by the rampant and easy piracy of media. This leads to companies trying to protect their property by creating increasingly draconian measures to protect them. I'm not an expert in copyright law or other laws that govern media and free speech, so I want to know if anyone out there knows a better way to structure the laws of the internet rather than the "our way or no way" version proposed in SOPA and PIPA.

Laws entail a court system. These legislations will give the power to the companies themselves, rather than the judicial system, to decide if something is allowed or not.


Companies are in it for the profit, not for justice, they will abuse this power to make more money and in doing so censor everything.

So do you think we should make a deciding body, perhaps an organ of the UN charged with finding and maintaining a balance with copyright and free speech?

It's cute that you're looking to defend corporate profits but look out for yourself first.

 

[ShindoL Shill]

The thing is, the laws as they are do not work, as is evidenced by the rampant and easy piracy of media.

there are lots of murderers and drug dealers in the world that havent been caught either. does that mean that the police system doesnt work? no. does it mean that we should give the victims the right to vigilante justice to help the system work better by allowing them to kill the criminals and anyone suspected of helping them? no. so why the hell should we let companies take down entire websites for simply linking to a website with copyright infringement for "helping piracy"?

 

[Westaway]

I rather like how the internet is the wild west. And Sopa will do alot more damage than good.

 

[Odbarc]

Isn't this new law just going to affect the good guys while hackers and such will get around this internet-DRM and have MORE laws and restrictions put in place that affect, once again, only the people not doing anything wrong?

I haven't really kept up with it all.
If it's on the internet, it should be free. Technology should be moving towards anti-copy, not anti-use.

 

[MLionheart]

As far as I'm aware it's more of the case of SOPA and PIPA being so vague that it could ruin the internet and DRM is just badly done. Yes there should be laws, but laws need to be done done right before they become "official" otherwise it just becomes a dictatership.

I could be wrong. This is just what i've come up with with what i've heard about from others.

 

[Kopikatsu]

See, the comments being made about SOPA/PIPA (END OF THE INTERNET AS WE KNOW IT, blah blah blah whatever) were the same ones being made about DMCA way back when. DMCA passed. The world is still spinning, no?

 

[CrazyGirl17]

While I think there should be governing laws to the internet... I also believe in having limits. And that means not turning it into freaking 1984!

 

[TheDooD]

There are laws for this stuff, it's simply companies that make millions on even failure movies/games want to make more money because they feel that any piracy number is a reasonable basis for saying we lost profit.

So if [game] was pirated 4.2 million times, they lost 4.2 million sales. How does that make sense? There's many things that could have factored into that, like people trying the game and there's no demo, or game isn't available where they are, or they had to download it a second or third time because the first download didn't work, etc etc.

Yes piracy sucks but saying we lost x amount because x amount of downloads happened is a shitty reason to give them the right to police the internet.

This bill would smash any little guy trying to make just a living while these corporate heads thumb through a magazine for their next yacht. This bill violates EVERY right we have in this country and anyone ANYONE supporting this is a brainwashed goon backing billion dollar corporations over the little guys: artists, musicians, writers, video creators, creative minds, small businesses, blogs.

I'm really not sorry these guys have piracy problems because they already make billions of dollars and they're actively attacking OUR rights because of the few that are doing bad. (I in no way condone piracy I'm merely making a point that I don't care what their problem is when their solution is to come out with a bill that attacks everyone's rights. )

There's a better way and they should be (strangled) ashamed for lobbying this anti-rights bullshit against us.

As long as there's weak minded people too caught up on money this will always happen. I realized we don't need internet laws. The first thing that needs to change is money as a whole and business practices. I say this because the main reason people pirate games, movies, books, etc. Is that they don't have the throw away funds to enjoy such things because needed items in life are becoming very almost obscenely expensive and the money makers that are already set for a few generations want to charge more eventhough said products my not reflect the price. Look at the prices of cable, satellite TV, video games, and movies. Pretty much the main stream stuff doesn't seem worth the price. You'll end up only watching like 7 or so channels out of a few hundred. Or wait until you can buy the game used, or you can get the movie on DVD or wait for it to be on HBO.

A majority of media companies backed SOPA because holy shit the stuff they're producing isn't really entertaining anymore. I barely watch TV I mainly have it on as white noise or if it's a show I REALLY want to watch. They blackout coverage on SOPA until the net blacks them out. Forcing them to say something about it. Youtube, sites like it, plus Justin TV / Twitch and other streaming sites provide a lot of entertainment for free. Then some of the makers STILL get bank by making it. It's something the popular media can't get around they want to overcharge people and pretty much force them to watch crap TV because they want it to be their only outlet.