US Senate Aligns with RIAA Against File Sharers
By a 14 to 4 vote, the Senate Judiciary Committee has approved a bill backed by the RIAA - the Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights Act - that would give federal prosecutors the power to file civil lawsuits against file-sharers who violate copyright laws. The bill will create stricter IP laws and toughen civil and criminal laws against counterfeiting and piracy. The act also expands the power of the White House by creating an IP Enforcement Coordinator (IPEC) position within the executive branch, and the IPEC will direct other agencies in a coordinated strategy to fight counterfeiting and piracy.
“We all know that intellectual property makes up some of the most valuable, and most vulnerable, property we have,” said Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT), according to CNet News. “We need to do more to protect it from theft and abuse if we hope to continue being a world leader in innovation.”
Leahy added an amendment to the bill that expanded mandatory, court-issued protective orders to cover any records seized by law enforcement, in order to protect potentially confidential or private information. Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) also added two successful amendments to the bill. One adds the Department of Agriculture as a member of the interagency intellectual property enforcement advisory committee, and the other ensures a transition of power from the government’s current IP efforts to a new IP coordinator, once he or she is confirmed by Congress.
Mitch Bainwol, Chairman/CEO of the RIAA, commented, “Intellectual property is widely recognized as an important economic engine for this country. Real, bipartisan efforts to protect this national resource with new, meaningful tools are necessary to energize the economy and maintain our global competitiveness. This legislation is a welcome verse in a great song.”
Well whole thing is “against file-sharers who violate copyright laws”, at least planned this way, but what’s missing here is user education. Making new laws not making any changes in this particular case. First of all most of the users are stupid enough to think that that’s it no more file sharing and even afraid to install torrent client or whatever, and this entirely idiotic because many big software development firms and recording studios redistribute their digital content exactly via p2p. Law doesn’t say that you are not allowed to install torrent, emule or any other crap for p2p, law is “against file-sharers who violate copyright laws”, so as long as you don’t do stupid things, you are fine. But governors forgot that they need to explain simple things to end users.
Second, does anyone really think that this law will work? It is the same showoff as this Digital Millennium Act. p2p are mature enough to provide unrestricted access to digital assets without being tracked, filtered or monitored. So all this crap about making new law that won’t work is just money waste.
Comment by Evi Skitsanos — September 13, 2008 @ 1:11 am
Most countries in the third world never respects intellectual property rights. piracy is so rampant in asian countries.~~-
Comment by Layla Collins — May 25, 2010 @ 11:08 am
intellectual property is not really respected in most countries in asia where piracy is so rampant.”:;
Comment by Allison Hill — July 23, 2010 @ 8:26 am