Four more large Internet service providers told the US Supreme Court this week that ISPs shouldn’t be forced to aggressively police copyright infringement on broadband networks.
While the ISPs worry about financial liability from lawsuits filed by major record labels and other copyright holders, they also argue that mass terminations of Internet users accused of piracy “would harm innocent people by depriving households, schools, hospitals, and businesses of Internet access.” The legal question presented by the case “is exceptionally important to the future of the Internet,” they wrote in a brief filed with the Supreme Court on Monday.
Why don’t they start with OpenAI and other LLM vendors, because they are the biggest copyright infringement abusers of all time?
Because they’re also rich. Laws are for the poors.
ISPs are rich too?
Which is why the Supreme Court is hearing the case. Two wealthy industries fighting out who gets to extract the most wealth.
Wow, unusual for them but based
They’re ensuring their money keeps flowing. This isn’t about altruism - it’s just their Greed incidentally benefits us.
ISPs are trying to mitigate exposure to lawsuits, prevent costly tracking and tracing responsibilities, and make sure customers can keep paying instead of losing their internet privileges (and their internet bills!)
That peasants like us find this favorable is an unintended bonus.
Exactly. ISPs want to do as little work as possible and collect as much as possible. If they have to monitor for torrents, track which customers they’ve warned, etc, that’s extra cost that, ultimately, could take away paying customers. So there are no benefits for them unless the piracy is causing problems for other users (i.e. could result in more customers cancelling service).
Not really unusual. They don’t care if you pirate stuff, they just want you to pay for internet access. They only sent notices and such to keep the rights holders happy.
Sony can’t have your electricity cut off if you pirate. Because electricity is a utility.
ISPs want it both ways. They want the legal protections of a utility without the obligations.
The solution is to give them the legal protection they want by declaring them a utility.
Those moments when you can’t decide if someone’s username means they’re a science nerd or a Venture Bros. fan.
Me_irl:
Who in their right Minds would want to be a nerd but not a venture brothers fan?
I’m not certain but there’s a high probability that that Venn diagram is just a circle
Go Team Venture!
It’s like the other side of the diagram has disappeared from the mateeeeeriiiiiaal plaaaaannneeeeee!
I wonder if would you get your electricity cut off if you plugged in a 750kW industrial oil drill in your backyard
The people who sell electricity are surprisingly happy to sell you electricity. If you happen to do something horribly wrong and don’t burn your house down, an electrician will be happy to do the repairs. If you have 200 Amp service and draw the full 200 all year long, the most significant reaction would probably be getting a personalized Christmas card.
The 200A main breaker on most homes would trip a little above 50kW. Could you even start up 1000hp without 3 phase?
I wanted to exaggerate for comedic purposes, I had 500MW written initially 😄
I like the end result that ISPs are pushing back on this, but don’t mistake this for altruism on their part.
Their businesses make money selling internet service. Were they to support cutting off those accused of piracy, they would be losing paying customers. Further, the business processes and support needed for this to function would be massively expensive and complicated. They’d have to hired teams of people and write whole new software applications for maintaining databases of banned users, customer service staff to address and resolve disputes, and so much more.
Lastly, as soon as all of that process would be in place to ban users for piracy accusations, then the next requests would come in for ban criteria in a classic slippery slope:
- pornography
- discussions of drugs
- discussions of politics the party in power doesn’t like
- speaking out against the state
- communication about assembling
- discussion on how to emigrate
All the machinery would be in place once the very first ban is approved.
I think it is also the user they disconnect for piracy tend to pay more. They tend to be more premium customers also why should they enforce what happens on their lines. It is an illegal search and seizure. Let the government get a warrant prove something is illegal then the ISP can disconnect them.
Yeah who else is going to pay for 1GB speeds knowing the most they’ll ever get is 400MB
Plus, you aren’t disconnecting a person, but a whole family or business.
And since many areas in the US only have one provider, you force that family to cancel all streaming services they might have. It’s a lose-lose-lose situation.
I think a big problem we don’t want to address is now that we’re so interconnected, internet access is a necessity that should be classified as a utility. You can’t just cut off someone’s electricity without notification or process because they did something bad with it and it should apply here too
Absolutely
Not if they get their universal digital ID system in place. It is the wet dream of tyrants of all kinds.
What. Is this something that’s been on the horizon?
Shared devices would still be a problem no?
Sharing? Communism. Straight to jail.
I agree with all this, but I think it is all to say: ISPs support Net Neutrality when it behooves them.
Yeah but that’s capitalism in a nutshell, isn’t it?
People need to come into contact with the Internet that isn’t based on streaming asap. We need laws worldwide that prevent blocking access to knowledge - the most basic and guaranteed by constitutions worldwide right. Books, music, films and games. People should have at least some access to them. I can’t imagine a world where I’m licensed to my books by Amazon. It’s just awful. Something needs to be brought together before publishers make this a crime.
it’s a nice argument from the users point of view, but it won’t be allowed
copyright holders will need to be thrown a bone, and given some level of enforcement, else, copyright law is meaningless
celebrate all you want, this won’t pass muster
~ signed, a jolly roger
copyright holders will need to be thrown a bone,
Is there a law to support this position?
If so, where is limit? Deep packet inspection of VPN traffic? At whose expense?
We have to accept that there is a way to break the capacity of pirating, which has been tolerated by companies by decades. VPNs can be banned, the US defense department deeply knows about Tor. So, if there is political incentive, those capacities can be banned at any time.
I think the fight needs to be a legal one. It needed to be a legal one since the inception of piracy. It just has its flaws that can be exploited by politically invested institutions.
There is a limit on how much the state will abuse the plebs on behalf of corpos… they still. need us paying taxes and consuming.
piracy itself is a minor form of civil disobedience, the fun part is seeing these clowns triggered. people should not be paying for the engagement slop propganda owned by some mega corp rights holder anyway. fuck 'em
Not everyday i agree with ISPs but here we are. Guilty of and accused of are two very different things. Innocent until proven guilty.
Not for potato supreme. I’m sure labels and sony bought vacations for those sub human coup supporting shits
I am not familiar with that, I’m guessing potato supreme is a username or something?
It’s an Idaho-exclusive new dish at Taco Bell.
Well it sounds delicious, and definitely not guilty of piracy
No, of course not. Piracy would sour the cream.
Never dehumanize fascists or fascist-sympathizers (redundant but ok), it’s always important to remember that bad faith actors or their stooges are human and cannot be entirely eliminated from society, which is why people that fight for positive change have to set the rules such that bad faith actors’ actions are either quickly recognized and mitigated, or have society structured such that even those motivated solely by unempathetic selfishness can only achieve status by masking and contributing positively anyway.
Hell, I don’t even want to ban users guilty of piracy. Oh no! Sony and it’s BILLIONS of dollars will surely be affected by pirating their dvd of a movie! Heavens to betsy!
You joke but that’s how Sony feels when you buy a used DVD… They just can’t admit it publicly
They must HATE me…There’s a thrift shop just up the street from me. I bought Deadpool on DVD/Bluray combo pack. Still sealed new from factory, for $2.50.
I buy lots of DVDs there. My sisters say my collection is rediculous. She means it in a bad way, like I need to get rid of some stuff. But hell, when it’s $2.50, why NOT buy like 20 movies in an afternoon? And why NOT do that same thing several times a year? Although I will admit I’m running out of room…help! My apartment is filled with DVDs, and I can’t see the walls anymore!
I aspire to be like you! I finally am going to have a DVD player and I am absolutely THRILLED. No joke. It’s going to be fantastic.
Not as fantastic as an old VCR since it’s like 2% harder to fast forward through the ads. But pretty close!
…you wanna come over and watch ghostbusters?
Absolutely!
Next step: rip them all to a NAS and install something like Jellyfin. That way you can enjoy all of that content, but without having to swap discs.
That’s what I did, and now everything sits in a box hidden away somewhere in case my NAS dies or something.
Hell, I don’t even want to ban users guilty of piracy.
Yeah, if someone shoplifts from a store, the punishment/penalty should not involve confiscating the car they drove to the store, lol.
imagine getting banned from the one monopoly ISP available to you in your entire city. what do you do after that? sell your house?
I actually just use my phone for internet and haven’t had a landline ISP for 2 years now.
Visible, $25/month has saved me so much money and they even sent me a free phone.
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puts on fake moustache “Hello I am new to the area and would like to procure one internet please.”
It’s insane that people (okay, mostly corporations) try to argue internet access is not a utility. What happens then? Does your home value decrease? Or does the next purchaser have to petition the ISP to convince them they are a different, non-infringing customer and hope they reverse the ban??
I’m guessing it would be tied to your name. the new tenants would have service, but you might have to move to a different state or something.
Yup, but in our case, I think it’s my phone number (at least that’s what they use for my account number). So I could probably sign up again if I change my number.
This happened in the apartment I just moved into. I had to call to verify my identity and they had to unblock something on their side due to the previous tenant ostensibly not paying.
If someone is using municipal water in their meth lab, the whole city block shouldn’t have their water shut off
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Also need to stop the “oil burner” trade
If someone is using meth in prison, the whole prison should be shut down.
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If internet companies want to make an argument like that, then internet should be treated as a utility.
This
If internet companies want to make an argument like that, theninternet should be treated as a utility.Fair nuff
There would be no more internet access for anyone anymore if that were allowed.
Soooo many insecure networks out there ripe for the picking if you know what you’re doing and have the tools available. And the tools are often free, not costing any money. From there, those networks are the places people will go to commit their “piracy”.
And what exactly is piracy? If I purchase an album on iTunes but choose to download it on ThePirateBay, is that really piracy? Because I have done that when the music THAT I FUCKING PAID FOR is no longer available for me to download off of iTunes and Apple won’t give me a refund for said music purchase. People do it for games that include shitty DRM and don’t allow them to easily install on another device like Linux too.
I know people really hate to hear this. You have a good reason to feel like you’re not doing anything wrong in some cases. But buying songs is a misnomer. These people running digital media stores know what they’re doing and the Terms of Use you click straight through without reading lays it all out in a way that you’re meant to understand. You don’t own the music, you have a license to enjoy the music under certain terms, including the ability of the owner to retract your license for a number of reasons beyond your control.
I’m not here to convince you to change your ways, nor to make a value judgment of you. Rather to simply answer your question: yes, that is piracy.
Heartbreaking: Worst Corporation(s) you know, just made a good stand
Even a stopped clock is right twice a day.
Unless it’s a 24 hour clock.
So an average of 1.5 times?
A broken digital clock is never right.
The supremes: oh! Yes! We are on your side ISPs! The MPAA and RIAA will now be allowed to sue individual users directly bypassing courts.
Have fun! You got them boys! You got that 98 year old grandma! Get her house! And that minority girl trying to download the new Beyonce songs? Deathrow! 1 per song! All the single ladies our ass! You wouldn’t download a car! We’re the Supremes! Watch us! But first Trump is president starting now, and poor kids shall get no food in school! They wouldn’t be poor if they got food! Oh and women…we did the abortion thing already darn!..no vote for women! Marriage age 6 now, overruling all states laws.
Let’s get you back to your room Mr. Thomas.
How can you hold a company responsible for someone else’s actions? When someone hits someone with a car we don’t go after the manufacturer. I think ISPs should only be held accountable for their own actions.
I think they’re trying to apply the same logic that’s applied to internet platforms like YouTube, Twitter, etc., where the platform is only non-liable for copyright violations on their platform if they have a good-faith system in place for preventing copyright infringement and responding to DMCA requests. I don’t think this logic should apply to ISPs, frankly the entire internet is far too large of a place to be monitored by any one company for copyright infringement, and I’d rather ISPs be nationalized and treated as public utilities than try to fit them into the same legal framework as social media companies.
That being said, even if the courts decide they should be forced into that same legal framework, ISPs could easily satisfy their legal obligations by simply blocking access to copyrighted content via their DNS service (which can easily be worked around by using an alternative DNS). There’s no legal reason why ISPs would be expected to block individual users from their network, and even if there were, ISPs shouldn’t be allowed to exist anyway, the state (and therefore the people) paid the lion’s-share of the cost to lay all that fiber-optic and copper cable across the country, so the state should own that infrastructure and operate it in the interest of the people (Internet access would be considered a human right and publicly owned ISPs would only have prices high enough to break even, not generate a profit).
A private business should remain private. If the government an take a business away because of public importance, then there is no incentive for a business to grow.
China, North Korea. They siezed businesses, including internet.
I think that’s the only point we disagree on.
I do think ISPs should have much more competition. Exponentially more.
That would be a fair point if we were talking about like, small businesses in markets that are well-suited to competition, but that is not mpdern ISPs.
Iirc, much of the backbone of the US’s fiber optic cable network is publicly owned anyway, it’s just the “last mile” that’s privately owned, which is the local lengths of fiber that run through neighborhoods to individual residences. But most of this infrastructure was also heavily subsidized by the state, so the way I see it, ISPs are essentially leaches that extract rent from a system paid for by the people and (directly or indirectly) built by the state. Why should we let them collect profit from a network they didn’t build when we could own the entire network publicly and set monthly rates to break even, rather than generate a profit (which would keep prices very low, as seen in Every Other Country with mainly state/municipally owned ISPs).
Looks like an old-politician idea to me; a generation late. Nowadays, cutting internet is as bad as cutting electricity.
Terminating service over allegations of piracy. Kicking someone off the internet because an automated copyright system accused them of piracy. That’s crazy.
