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French ‘Three Strikes’ Law Slashes Piracy, But Fails to Boost Sales

torrentfreak.com

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Re: French ‘Three Strikes’ Law Slashes Piracy, But Fails to Boost Sales

#11

Post by bigiain »

citricsquid wrote: post #3

This article is ridiculous. It has cherry picked statistics and misrepresented them. In 2011 digital downloads of music (through legitimate services, eg: itunes, spotify) GREW almost 20%(!!!). The reason that the overall statistics show a drop is because of physical media being included and that has fallen a huge amount: > Internet music growth was insufficient to offset falling sales of music on physical supports, d…

You accuse this article of "being deceitful", when "the industry" claims $250_BILLION_ per year losses to piracy?

http://www.freakonomics.com/2012/01/12/how-much-do-music-and...

'In 2010, the Government Accountability Office released a report noting that these figures “cannot be substantiated or traced back to an underlying data source or methodology,” which is polite government-speak for “these figures were made up out of thin air.”'

I find it _very_ hard to find any sympathy for the music or film industries having numbers and statistics bent or misused against them. These people have been getting laws enacted based on numbers they've just made up - with _clearly_ no possible basis in fact. So this article has turned the tables. About time, in my opinion.

See also: http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110903/00070515801/mpaas-... http://blog.ted.com/2012/03/20/the-numbers-behind-the-copyri...

Re: French ‘Three Strikes’ Law Slashes Piracy, But Fails to Boost Sales

#12

Post by Zirro »

guard-of-terra wrote: post #10
Zirro wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They simply check which IPs are in a certain swarm, for a certain file. This is then reported to issue a strike against the connected IPs.

So they seed files themselves and if you're unlucky enough to download from their seed you're busted? This would probably mean you're reasonably safe if you're downloading niche stuff; private trackers would also help?

I would assume it's enough for them to join a swarm to locate other peers. There are probably automated tools which can do this very quickly, just like I can see the IPs of fellow peers, both seeders and leechers in my torrentclient.

Both of your statements are true, though.

Re: French ‘Three Strikes’ Law Slashes Piracy, But Fails to Boost Sales

#13

Post by guard-of-terra »

Zirro wrote: post #12
guard-of-terra wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So they seed files themselves and if you're unlucky enough to download from their seed you're busted? This would probably mean you're reasonably safe if you're downloading niche stuff; private trackers would also help?

I would assume it's enough for them to join a swarm to locate other peers. There are probably automated tools which can do this very quickly, just like I can see the IPs of fellow peers, both seeders and leechers in my torrentclient. Both of your statements are true, though.

Oww. I didn't think of that.

Re: French ‘Three Strikes’ Law Slashes Piracy, But Fails to Boost Sales

#14

Post by ticks »

citricsquid wrote: post #3

This article is ridiculous. It has cherry picked statistics and misrepresented them. In 2011 digital downloads of music (through legitimate services, eg: itunes, spotify) GREW almost 20%(!!!). The reason that the overall statistics show a drop is because of physical media being included and that has fallen a huge amount: > Internet music growth was insufficient to offset falling sales of music on physical supports, d…

Bear in mind, it's Torrent Freak. Most news sources are skewed one or another, those lot don't like the big copyright guys.

Re: French ‘Three Strikes’ Law Slashes Piracy, But Fails to Boost Sales

#15

Post by drostie »

guard-of-terra wrote: post #13
Zirro wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would assume it's enough for them to join a swarm to locate other peers. There are probably automated tools which can do this very quickly, just like I can see the IPs of fellow peers, both seeders and leechers in my torrentclient. Both of your statements are true, though.

Oww. I didn't think of that.

You can see a prototype of an open system for this sort of thing here: http://www.youhavedownloaded.com/ . (Actually, that site is pretty interesting to visit if you're on a friend's WiFi or at an airport or internet cafe -- I just found out that, from this WiFi point, someone downloaded The Lion King in December 2011.)

But yeah. Pretty much any tracker is constantly disclosing peers; that's how BitTorrent works. It is considered important for a tracker to introduce fake IP addresses into these lists, so that simply being on the list is not enough to prove that someone was actually downloading a given bit of content, and there have now been research groups which have gotten takedown notices delivered to printers and so forth, so that if you're not confirmed to be seeding content it's hard to confirm that you're breaking the law.

It is also considered best practice with BitTorrent to use an IP blocklist with your client, but those are probably not too hard for a dedicated attacker to get around -- if you share illegal material and use an IP blocklist, you are basically saying "I will hope that you pick the low-lying fruit first, before you pick me."

Re: French ‘Three Strikes’ Law Slashes Piracy, But Fails to Boost Sales

#16

Post by Fargren »

bigiain wrote: post #11
citricsquid wrote: post #3

This article is ridiculous. It has cherry picked statistics and misrepresented them. In 2011 digital downloads of music (through legitimate services, eg: itunes, spotify) GREW almost 20%(!!!). The reason that the overall statistics show a drop is because of physical media being included and that has fallen a huge amount: > Internet music growth was insufficient to offset falling sales of music on physical supports, d…

You accuse this article of "being deceitful", when "the industry" claims $250_BILLION_ per year losses to piracy? http://www.freakonomics.com/2012/01/12/how-much-do-music-and... 'In 2010, the Government Accountability Office released a report noting that these figures “cannot be substantiated or traced back to an underlying data source or methodology,” which is polite government-speak for “these figures were made up…

That's and ad hominem fallacy right there. The fact that the industry are making ridiculous numbers out of crappy statistics doesn't mean an argument that does the same thing is a justified argument against them. I think the point of the OP is very valid: the article looks at the wrong numbers, and it does it intentionally.

Re: French ‘Three Strikes’ Law Slashes Piracy, But Fails to Boost Sales

#17

Post by i_cannot_hack »

citricsquid wrote: post #3

This article is ridiculous. It has cherry picked statistics and misrepresented them. In 2011 digital downloads of music (through legitimate services, eg: itunes, spotify) GREW almost 20%(!!!). The reason that the overall statistics show a drop is because of physical media being included and that has fallen a huge amount: > Internet music growth was insufficient to offset falling sales of music on physical supports, d…

Yes, the digital sales "GREW almost 20%(!!!)", as you enthusiastically put it. But you behave as if this is somehow extraordinary, and on top of it all automatically[0] assume that this is due to the reduction in piracy.

In UK digital sales grew by 27% in 2011 alone, and they have no similar laws.[1]

The truth is that the digital sales are increasing drastically all over the world, not just in France. This does not have anything to do with any reduction in piracy, but is due to a wider selection of products and more accessible market.

[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post_hoc_ergo_propter_hoc [1] http://www.bpi.co.uk/assets/files/music%20sales%20slip%20in%...

Re: French ‘Three Strikes’ Law Slashes Piracy, But Fails to Boost Sales

#18

Post by Zirro »

drostie wrote: post #15
guard-of-terra wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oww. I didn't think of that.

You can see a prototype of an open system for this sort of thing here: http://www.youhavedownloaded.com/ . (Actually, that site is pretty interesting to visit if you're on a friend's WiFi or at an airport or internet cafe -- I just found out that, from this WiFi point, someone downloaded The Lion King in December 2011.) But yeah. Pretty much any tracker is constantly disclosing peers; that's how BitTorrent works. It…

The best thing to do today if you want to be on the safe side is to use a VPN-service which doesn't keep logs. It's likely only a question of time before the anti-piracy organizations start going after them instead, though. Blocklists are, as you state, not very effective and often tend to contain false positives which gives you fewer peers.

Re: French ‘Three Strikes’ Law Slashes Piracy, But Fails to Boost Sales

#20

Post by guard-of-terra »

drostie wrote: post #15
guard-of-terra wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oww. I didn't think of that.

You can see a prototype of an open system for this sort of thing here: http://www.youhavedownloaded.com/ . (Actually, that site is pretty interesting to visit if you're on a friend's WiFi or at an airport or internet cafe -- I just found out that, from this WiFi point, someone downloaded The Lion King in December 2011.) But yeah. Pretty much any tracker is constantly disclosing peers; that's how BitTorrent works. It…

This prototype always tells me they have no records on me :-/
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