The new boogieman: Thought Crime

[Marco]

http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=18815

If you didn't hate Obama before, you might now.  At least most of you might.  He's cracking down on piracy.

But of course, what's going to be even more outrageous is this being labeled as a 'thought crime'.  If you think it, you're under arrest.

Among its plans is to assist copyright organizations in prosecutory efforts, such as sending out threat/collection notices. The government also looks to legislation imminent infringement (thought crime), criminalization of P2P development, and criminalization of DRM bypassing later this year.

In other words, if you search Google for 'transformers movie torrent', you could be charged with a crime.  In my opinion, that isn't a thought crime.  It still takes an active process for a human to put what they are thinking into a search engine.  They're pretty much just using technology to see the clues to people who might actually steal.  It may turn out to be a misdemeanor.  I'm sure they can't make the penalties too aggressive on something like that.

My personal opinion:  I know many think piracy is your right; you are entitled to free software and entertainment because it is available.  It seems to be the popular trend on the Internet.  You can justify it any way you want, but ultimately, it is still stealing, it is still circumventing a system put in place to collect money based on a transaction for entertainment.  Personally, I don't have trouble reconciling the morality of this.  I will download stuff if I need it.  But at the same time, if it disappears, I'm not going to cry about it.  There will always be inventive ways to circumvent the system.  And if they do cut off every last point of access, then it was good (for me) while it lasted.  I also won't make this my fight though.  It's an unworthy battle.  We've beat the system in this way for a long time now, I'm not gonna take up arms or waste a solitary thought process to stop something morally questionable such as this.  To each their own, as I said, just my opinion.  

[Krazy]

"Thought crime" seems like a misnomer here.  Asking to pick up a whore is also illegal ("solicitation") in some places, iirc, why would asking for illegal software (if it is indeed seen as illegal) therefore be OK?

That being said I don't think any government in existence has anywhere near the impetus or manpower to actually enforce legislation like this, even if it was passed... yet.

[IskatuMesk]

lol trying to stop pirating

It won't work, it hasn't worked, it will never work. Just as there were pirates in the open seas there will be pirates on the internets and all this money thrown at vain efforts to stop them will do nothing. How can America afford to do this shit when they're so far in the gutter? They can't. But here they are, doing it anyway.

*queues up a bunch of random shit from demonoid*

Not that it matters for me, I live in a country run by delusional retards who don't recognize anything other than their own pockets as an interest. It's a double edged sword, really.

If people want to enforce copyright infringement you end up going into stupidly ridiculous bounds, like sueing radio stations and people playing music on their car stereos, modders, anyone who uses anything even remotely related to copyrighted material without paying royalties or having permission is ultimately breaking some kind of fine print somewhere and then has to be forced to be made accountable. There's no way that will ever happen. Obama is probably just trying to get the white dog to stfu so he can focus on firing military personnel.

[AA7Dragoon]

Nothing to fear.  In fact, the Obama Administration has been out friend when it comes to net neutrality.  Things under a McCain Administration would have looked a lot more bleak for internet freedom.

There actually isn't anything extremely specific here that is cause to worry.  Essentially, this was a vision for eliminating piracy rather than policy.  There's no practical solution to end piracy on the net other than a kill switch introduced by Joe Lieberman. 

[Mucky]

rofl @ criminalization of DRM bypassing

Copyright law is a gigantic mess that not even lawyers can fully understand. It needs some reform, but that probably won't happen. I don't know of any politician who even acknowledges the problems with the current system.

And I just facepalmed at Biden touting the age-old claim that downloading is the same as breaking into a store and stealing physical property.

Also, good luck trying to enforce copyright overseas.

In fact, the Obama Administration has been out friend when it comes to net neutrality.

Not really.

[Xenon]

"Our friend when it comes to net neutrality"? BLARF. "Net neutrality" is the same as this: a blatant power grab. Hecks, when the court said the FCC didn't have the authority to regulate the internet, what did they do? THEY RECLASSIFIED THE INTERNET AS A PHONE SERVICE.

Ever heard of the CBDTPA? Probably not, since it was killed in 2002 and promptly swept under the rug.

The bill, called the Consumer Broadband and Digital Television Promotion Act (CBDTPA), prohibits the sale or distribution of nearly any kind of electronic device -- unless that device includes copy-protection standards to be set by the federal government.

There was an article from Glenn Reynolds about how the Democrats, receiving money from the media industry, supported the CBDTPA, but the link is broken now.

[Archangel]

"Our friend when it comes to net neutrality"? BLARF. "Net neutrality" is the same as this: a blatant power grab. Hecks, when the court said the FCC didn't have the authority to regulate the internet, what did they do? THEY RECLASSIFIED THE INTERNET AS A PHONE SERVICE.=

Nooooooooo. You miss the point, Xenon! The Government is our frieeeeeeend! It's called "Net NEUTRALITY!"

"Neutrality" is a fun, friendly word! That makes it nice and sweet! Except when used by soldiers when they kill someone and say "Target Neutralized." But that's the evil twin cousin of Neutrality. Neutrality is good and it's kind of like "Freedom!" Because Freedom is also a sweet and nice word. Except it's not as vapidly dogmatic!

[IskatuMesk]

dogmatic!

[imgwh 580x417]http://www.gadgetreview.com/wp-content/ ... 80x417.jpg[/imgwh]

[Alevice]

Okay, I lol'd at that.

That said, now that I earn more fat cash, I don't feel compelled to go pirate, in particular when the things I really want are often morbidly cheap (read, Homestuck soundtrack)

[mAc Chaos]

Net neutrality is just a buzzword for a lot of regulation and government control of the internet.

[Xelxiuz]

I don't know, it still might affect us Mesk. Canada is pretty much America's bitch. But then again it would be silly to be in Obama's shoes and not try something like this. After all Blizzard's doing it right?

[IskatuMesk]

They've been trying to bully Canada into this kind of shit for years and have gotten nowhere.

[Aiursrage2k]

America is a third world nation now the sooner they get that the better.

[Taeradun]

oh awesome my country isn't the only one trying to do stupid things to the internet any more