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UK national extradited to US for film/TV piracy

justice.gov

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Re: UK national extradited to US for film/TV piracy

#11

Post by Symbiote »

vkou wrote: post #4
azalemeth wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They bought DVDs with a paper trail, shipped them internationally, ripped them and then uploaded to scene sites with photos of the retail packaging. Not difficult to see how they got caught. One can't help but feel sorry for them. Commercial copyright infringement in the states probably carries a $1e308 financial penalty and/or life imprisonment. The fact that the article is written about a UK national just highlight…

Your comparison between vehicular homicide and commercial copyright infringement would work better if the perpetrator of the former were not protected by diplomatic immunity.

Diplomatic immunity is intended to prevent the host country (the UK) from subjecting diplomats to unreasonable detention, imprisonment etc, or to protect them from work done as part of their job (the host country might consider it spying).

Responsible countries either waive the diplomatic immunity, or prosecute the offender in their own courts. The USA has done neither.

In 2002, a Colombian diplomat had his immunity waived, allowing the UK to prosecute him for manslaughter. [1]

[1] http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/2284320.stm

Re: UK national extradited to US for film/TV piracy

#12

Post by ssklash »

It is insane to me that someone can get up to 5 years or more for using one of the fundamental mechanisms of digital technology. If you put out a product on a medium whose design is fundamentally based on copying bits, I don't know how you can expect anything else to happen. Instead of accepting the reality of digital communications, the MPAA, RIAA, and the like lobby to have the law protect their outdated but favorable business model instead.

I will never buy the idea that once they have sold a digital product, the seller somehow maintains a claim on its existence. Doubleday doesn't own the pages of the books they sell me. Lionsgate doesn't own the the bits that make up the DVDs they sell me either, even if that fact is rather detrimental to their bottom line.

Re: UK national extradited to US for film/TV piracy

#14

Post by rebelos »

ssklash wrote: post #12

It is insane to me that someone can get up to 5 years or more for using one of the fundamental mechanisms of digital technology. If you put out a product on a medium whose design is fundamentally based on copying bits , I don't know how you can expect anything else to happen. Instead of accepting the reality of digital communications, the MPAA, RIAA, and the like lobby to have the law protect their outdated but favor…

It's not hard to see how piracy threatens the entire business model. You can have rampant piracy or you can have financially sustainable content production. You cannot have both.

There is some critical mass of piracy that would in fact destroy the economics of the content production model. The industry has to work to deter that by periodically making examples of people.

The timing is likely not coincidental either. Expect to see more of this as content once again fragments across providers, reanimating the traditional package TV structure in fresh form.

Re: UK national extradited to US for film/TV piracy

#15

Post by foota »

rebelos wrote: post #14
ssklash wrote: post #12

It is insane to me that someone can get up to 5 years or more for using one of the fundamental mechanisms of digital technology. If you put out a product on a medium whose design is fundamentally based on copying bits , I don't know how you can expect anything else to happen. Instead of accepting the reality of digital communications, the MPAA, RIAA, and the like lobby to have the law protect their outdated but favor…

It's not hard to see how piracy threatens the entire business model. You can have rampant piracy or you can have financially sustainable content production. You cannot have both. There is some critical mass of piracy that would in fact destroy the economics of the content production model. The industry has to work to deter that by periodically making examples of people. The timing is likely not coincidental either. E…

In fairness, crowd funding and or altruistic consumers could theoretically sustain content production.

Re: UK national extradited to US for film/TV piracy

#16

Post by chongli »

rebelos wrote: post #14
ssklash wrote: post #12

It is insane to me that someone can get up to 5 years or more for using one of the fundamental mechanisms of digital technology. If you put out a product on a medium whose design is fundamentally based on copying bits , I don't know how you can expect anything else to happen. Instead of accepting the reality of digital communications, the MPAA, RIAA, and the like lobby to have the law protect their outdated but favor…

It's not hard to see how piracy threatens the entire business model. You can have rampant piracy or you can have financially sustainable content production. You cannot have both. There is some critical mass of piracy that would in fact destroy the economics of the content production model. The industry has to work to deter that by periodically making examples of people. The timing is likely not coincidental either. E…

That may be the case for Hollywood blockbuster movies but it’s not true for TV shows, YouTube videos, or Twitch streams. People would much rather pay Netflix a small monthly fee for unlimited access to all the TV shows they watch than hunt them down online. Nobody at all bothers to download YouTube videos or Twitch streams since the content is free anyway.

Honestly I think even movies could work similarly if the content creators actually made them available. People go crazy for Disney+ because everything is on there for one monthly fee.

Re: UK national extradited to US for film/TV piracy

#19

Post by Retric »

prima-facie wrote: post #13

The extradition treaty is a disgrace for the UK, completely imbalanced in favour of the US. - https://blog.6kbw.com/posts/this-lopsided-treaty-is-the-us-u... - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UK%E2%80%93US_extradition_trea...

They where extradited from Cyprus not the UK. As Cyprus gained it’s independence from the United Kingdom in 1960, recent UK/US treaties are irrelevant to this case.

Re: UK national extradited to US for film/TV piracy

#20

Post by brokenmachine »

chongli wrote: post #16
rebelos wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not hard to see how piracy threatens the entire business model. You can have rampant piracy or you can have financially sustainable content production. You cannot have both. There is some critical mass of piracy that would in fact destroy the economics of the content production model. The industry has to work to deter that by periodically making examples of people. The timing is likely not coincidental either. E…

That may be the case for Hollywood blockbuster movies but it’s not true for TV shows, YouTube videos, or Twitch streams. People would much rather pay Netflix a small monthly fee for unlimited access to all the TV shows they watch than hunt them down online. Nobody at all bothers to download YouTube videos or Twitch streams since the content is free anyway. Honestly I think even movies could work similarly if the cont…

>Nobody at all bothers to download YouTube videos or Twitch streams since the content is free anyway.

I download every single video on youtube that I think there's any chance I'll want to watch again.

When I look at my playlists, so many of the videos have been deleted. Even if I paid for youtube I wouldn't be able to watch them again.

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