Germany Accepts Strict Piracy Law 478
A beautiful mind writes "The TimesOnline is reporting that Germany has accepted a new piracy law, currently the toughest in Europe, which comes into effect on January 1, 2007. From the article: 'Germans risk two years in prison if they illegally download films and music for private use under a new law agreed yesterday. Anybody who downloads films for commercial use could be jailed for up to five years.' Many politicians defended the new law, amongst them Günther Krings, the Christian Democrat legal affairs spokesman, who claimed: 'There should be no legal distinction between stealing chewing gum from a shop and performing an illegal download.'"
well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:5, Interesting)
From the Fine Article:
Also from the Fine Article:
So, you can get two years in prison in Germany for stealing chewing gum from a shop? Cool.
This is all rehashing rehashes, but it bears repetition lest we find ourselves slowly and finally boiled in this slowly heating water. It's more heavy-handed power and money grabbing by those who have the money and power (entertainment droids and politicians). I only hope one of the first "caught" with their hands in the downloading cookiejar is some son or daughter of one of the anointed government members. Also from the article (emphasis mine):
First of all, what supports their estimates? Secondly, I've still yet to see causal studies whereby there are directly related losses because of illegal downloads. I have seen some convincing studies showing strong correlation between downloading and sales.
Re:well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:4, Insightful)
Still, those people who do murder someone should be jailed and it costs a lot of money. Thus, cost can't be a factor in prison sentences. If not cost, then what?
Justice. It is why this law in Germany is so bad - because it is not just.
Re:well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:5, Insightful)
The original statement said it costs more to jail someone than the DVD is worth.
It did not say it costs more to jail someone than it costs to DOWNLOAD a DVD.
Punishment should be DIRECTLY related to the cost/impact of he crime.
Re:well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:4, Insightful)
No it shouldn't. That's why we have murder and manslaughter. In both places the victim ends up dead, but the pushisment is different, and rightly so.
Re:well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:4, Insightful)
Someone else has already pointed out the murder/manslaughter distinction, so I'll leave that. There are other distinctions too, where the end result is the same but the exact circumstances of the crime can make a large difference to the punishment.
Even ignoring that, however, there's another factor that can greatly increase the punishment - the perceived ease of commiting the offence and likelyhood of getting away with it. If it's seen as not really being of any consequence, and is hard to detect and prosecute people, you're going to get more people thinking "why not?" and doing it. To help combat that, you make the punishment harsh; the theory being that people will think "I probably won't get caught, but if I do... it's not worth it". That's part of the reason why these laws all have such stupidly high penalties. It's not just the companies lobbying for unrealistic punishments, it's meant to bea deterrent too.
Re:well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:3, Informative)
Re:well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:3, Interesting)
Of course they have because the keyword there is losses. Companies do not experience losses by piracy, meaning it doesn't actually cost them anything. Rather piracy deprives them of potential revenue, meaning all this discussing of losing money to pi
Re:well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:2, Interesting)
copyright infringement is not like stealing an item from a store. It's closer to counterfeiting money. As more and more infringe on a person or company owned copyrighted work, it is devalued over time (less and less people will be willing to pay for it when they can just get it for free from their friend or favorite websi
Re:well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:5, Interesting)
In the US, quick google lookup shows the average supermarket loses around 2.5% of retail sales to shrinkage. However, only half of that is due to external forces. So, if we use the german analogy, perhaps the true loss to the industry is a little more than 1%. A percentage loss is, of course, better than unit sales as the percentage allows us to judge the impact.
What is interesting, according to various articles, is that Germany has about 82 million people, but only 127 million CD sales, a nearly 50% drop over 7 years. So each german is buying 1 maybe 2 cds a year. And you are trying to tell me that a country that is so uninterested in music is going to download the equivelent of 5 CDs a year. I mean at the height of the sales they were only buying 3 or 4 CDs a year. I guess copying music over the internet is so much easier than just copying an album from a friend that it encourages the people to steal that extra CD that they did not even want in the first place.
I guess not that Germany is a completely a western country, they must learn that the best way to grow a bussiness is to supply products the people want. And, of course, if artificial barriers are erected to try to force consumers to buy stuff they don't want, then those consumers will just find another way to get they stuff they do.
Re:well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:3, Insightful)
These statistics make more sense if you approach them from a CDs per household point of view. Married people very often share things like CDs.
Germany actually used to 'export' CDs from their retail industry: many Swiss and Dutch used to buy CDs in Germany because they are cheaper there. I can imagine thi
Re:well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:3)
unless there is somse kind of copy protection on the content, in this case you are not legally allowed to copy the CD / DVD etc.
So, CSS? Sorry, can't (legally) make a copy.
Levy should be repealed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:5, Interesting)
I found that that around 60% of my respondents felt sharing music should not be illegal, and a similar number felt a lot of people actually ended up buying MORE music after finding new bands or artists by downloading their music.
If you want something more reliable and reputable, the Canadian equivalent of the RIAA released a study very quietly recently that more-or-less says the opposite of everything the industry groups have been saying. It was mentioned on here a week or two ago. Here's a link to the slashdot article: http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/03/18/0
my wages havent increased 12% yearly... (Score:4, Insightful)
Since my wages havent increased 12% yearly over the last 10 years like many govt people, I hereby
like to claim a 'stolen' amount of cash of $100,000 . The corporates who earned massive returns
have the cash, I would like to see them locked up and my cash returned, because in an infaltion economy
everyone DESERVES inflated revenue, even if their business models are crap.
So wheres my tax discounts eh?
Re:well, if that's what you do to gum thieves (Score:3, Insightful)
Tell a man about a new band, he'll know another band. Teach a man how to discover new bands, he'll discover new bands for a lifetime.
Music sharing is also the ability to know what you may want to buy before you actually buy it, it's the ability to make informed choices about buying the first CD of that little band that isn't aired on TV or radio instead of buying the current top album
Considering that... (Score:3, Insightful)
Go ahead, take a ye
Wow (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Wow (Score:4, Insightful)
It just shows how ineffective and out of context the lobbied laws are.
real street crime hurts society, wheras "pirating" is more or less socially acceptable. (at least alot more than shoplifting)
Re:Wow (Score:3, Interesting)
It just shows how ineffective and out of context the lobbied laws are.
For whom? This is going to create great investment opportunities for some. None of these people care whether it's effective or not. This is about cash flow.
Re:Wow (Score:2)
This is against that society's interest as a whole. I'd call it treason by the politicians (does anyone see the majority of constituents advocating this anywhere?), but the politicians do that so often these days I guess it hardly matters.
I wonder if po
Re:Wow (Score:3, Informative)
The problem is that it won't be enforced (Score:5, Insightful)
By sneaking in these laws, they prosecute one or two people in the country every now and then. The laws stay in place, people don't care about them because they figure it "won't happen to them", and the movie/music companies are able to bribe politicians into creating even more ridiculous laws.
If only they would attempt to enforce this law en-masse, they would end up with at least 10% (probably more) of the population in jail. Then people would start caring about this and everything would be set right.
Instead, they're going to slowly introduce even worse laws, but only prosecute a tiny percentage of the population. It is an unfortunate situation.
Re:Wow (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Wow (Score:2)
Re:Wow (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Wow (Score:2)
"There should be no legal distinction between stealing chewing gum from a shop and performing an illegal download."
Re:Wow (Score:2)
In that case, they either need to lower the maximum sentence for illegal downloads, or raise the maximum sentence for stealing the DVD (or chewing gum). After all, a difference in sentencing constituents a legal distinction...
Well... (Score:2)
Two years for stealing gum? (Score:2)
Re:Two years for stealing gum? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Two years for stealing gum? (Score:4, Informative)
Not chewing gum (Score:2, Funny)
Privacy (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Privacy (Score:5, Informative)
This is not justice (Score:2, Interesting)
Correction (Score:3, Insightful)
And dont be suprsied if we dont get those laws here in the US, or worse... Remember the WTO? They will mandate all other members follow suit.
Re:This is not justice (Score:4, Funny)
But that couldn't happen again;
We taught them a lesson in 1918
And they've hardly bothered us since then.
Re:This is not justice (Score:2)
Re:This is not justice (Score:2)
Don't mention the war!
Re:This is not justice (Score:2)
Re:This is not justice (Score:2, Insightful)
Is entertainment a necessary good and/or service in your mind?
Is this 'group of thieves' (who produces and sells entertainment, that apparently you believe is a necessity) morally worse than people who infringe upon their rights? Is this infringement done in the name of good in your mind?
What is just about taking the results of someone's hard labor and giving them nothing in return for it?
I anxiously await your answers.
Re:This is not justice (Score:2)
i agree completely, recording contracts have become quite unconcionable, artists earning MILLIONS for their owners *ahem* labels ending up with little or nothing at the end, and not because they blew it on coke and hookers.
Re:This is not justice (Score:2)
its true!
What ever happened to the God-given American RIGHT to blow all your rockstar money on coke and hookers? what is happening to this country??? Isn't this a violation of the constitution or something??
VW Commercials (Score:2, Funny)
no legal distinction (Score:5, Informative)
Must be nice to have enough power to go buy your own laws when you feel like it.
Re:no legal distinction (Score:2)
</devil's advocate>
Prohibition? (Score:3, Insightful)
If you overstep your bounds against the populace, you'll find that, while they might stretch at first, they will soon 'spring back' and you'll find yourself in a worse position than before.
Re:Prohibition? (Score:2)
Wouldn't that be copyright infringement also? Would you get jailtime for that as well?
I don't know, but the more I hear about Intellectual Property and laws like this, the more I wonder if in a hundred years, that the governments of the world will force every born child to have a version of the "V-chip" implanted within them -
Same as stealing chewing gum? (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm sorry, but I just don't think they're quite the same. An illegal download doesn't prevent the 'owner' from benefiting from the origninal. Whereas when you steal a physical object, it does. If I steal a loaf of bread from you, you no longer have that loaf of bread to eat. If I copy the recipie for making that bread without your permission, it does you no harm (unless, possibly, you're the proprieter of a bakery.) I'm not claiming that illegal downloads are morally ok, just that its not quite the same thing as stealing a physical object.
Re:Same as stealing chewing gum? (Score:2)
Fair enough (Score:2)
I see your point here, and although I do hold in contempt the entire recording industry, just to play devils advocate here, they do in the strictest sense have a point. Not about the chewing gum thing, thats just idiocy, but about their property. They have posession of something. Whether its music or a stick of gum is irrelevant. You want what they have. So they can ask you for money, and then you (and only you) can have what they have.
Downloading stuff from P2P networks means that you have taken what i
Re:Same as stealing chewing gum? (Score:3, Informative)
There's a word for something like that: it's called a public good [wikipedia.org], by definition a non-market item, and the recording industry has spent the last ce
Re:Same as stealing chewing gum? (Score:2)
Actually, it's not true - yet (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Actually, it's not true - yet (Score:3, Interesting)
Or am I missing something?
Re:Actually, it's not true - yet (Score:2)
Re:Actually, it's not true - yet (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Actually, it's not true - yet (Score:2)
A copyright reform is currentlys in discussion, but I am pretty sure it has not yet been voted on
in fact this article with todays date says the reform is not yet throught the parliament:
http://www.taz.de/pt/2006/03/25/a0113.1/text [www.taz.de]
Other crimes? (Score:2)
While they're at it, can they make breaking into a server the same as breaking into an office? While breaking copyright seems to have been ignored compared to other petty crimes, all the other digital offenses seem to carry far harsher punishments than their real life equivalents :-/
Re: (Score:2)
WWIII Soon? (Score:3, Funny)
germany's copyright laws have been privatized (Score:5, Insightful)
Many people believe that this is due to corruption, it can no longer be attributed to "goodwill" towards the industry and stupidity alone. In any case, it goes way beyond being irresponsible and neglecting the government's duty to take care of its citizens and the long-term effect of this will be civil disobedience and loss of respect for laws in general.
When lawmakers suffer from future shock (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:When lawmakers suffer from future shock (Score:2)
Unless, of course, you have written permission from Walt Disney Inc to copy those picture. You do always get written permission before you download any web page, don't you?
The NASA picture is probably safe, since they give permission to use their images for noncommercial purposes.
The picture of the statue of Walt and Mickey is probably copyright by who
That is outrageous! (Score:3, Insightful)
Most popular music out today isn't even worth a stick of chewing gum!
Mission Impossible (Score:5, Interesting)
1. It's incredibly easy to copy digital media.
2. It's done privately.
3. It harms no one directly and immediately.
No law in the world will stop this people downloading digital media, unless the power of the police is extended to the point that the download behaviour of every individual is monitored.
Unfortunately and utterly unbeliveably and to my utter, inexpressible disgust and revulsion, the law has in fact taken that step, with the new European Data Retention Act.
Welcome to the Police State.
Ask a librarian. (Score:3, Funny)
Ask your public librarian. She's that shady little wench down on the street corner handing out free copies of copyrighted works. Books, movies, music... she's ur hook up!
Re:Ask a librarian. (Score:3, Insightful)
Let me counter-propose another VERY common scenario:
What we don't realize, is that his kid found th
Intimidatory law (Score:2)
It will be Sony, or Disney, or AOL-TimeWarner, who can grant or deny permission; and they will not be footing the bill for the jail time.
It will be interesting to see what kind of evidence of permission is acceptable, and what happens if so
Consumers have the power... (Score:2)
Where whould that put the movie industry?
Need movie entertainment? look for used tapes and dvds that you don't pay the industry for.
Two years !?!?!?! (Score:2)
Many politicians defended the new law, amongst them Günther Krings, the Christian Democrat legal affairs spokesman, who claimed: "There should be no legal distinction between stealing chewing gum from a shop and performing an illegal download".
Does that mean in Germany you can be sent to prison for two years for stealing a pack of gum? Now I understand how they managed to start two world wars. Yikes!
'Stealing' software (Score:2)
Re:'Stealing' software (Score:2)
Note that this is pretty much a description of how "Free Software" works. And lots of commercial operations work this way. Thus, you can download Adobe's Acrobat reader for free. But if you want to get the version with all the bells and whistles (i.e., a full PDF editor), you'll have to pay.
It's traditionally known as a "loss leader".
Re:'Stealing' software (Score:2)
IBM doesn't really sell software. IBM sells professional services.
Two Years? (Score:2)
So, you'd get two years for stealing gum?
2 years in prison for a stick of chewing gum? (Score:2)
What about if I leave the gum in the shop and make a magic clone of it? Still two years? Even though, at best the shop is out a *potential* sale, rather than losing actual stock?
What if I invent a replicator, like they have in Star Trek and I replicate a 90's CD in a time travel episode on a Holodeck. Is that like 2 years in Real-Jail or Holo-Jail? Why does the computer never tell Riker that he can't have Jazz played because its copy
Not really defending the behavior, but (Score:2)
Having a law that is so strict without giving the population time to become aware of the same protocols and same methods being used for both legal and illegal activity
Insanitiy and Stupidity and the lawmaking process (Score:3, Insightful)
Brigitte Zypries said it right there though: She can't be bothered bugging the decision boards with such minor details as seperating IP control and access/market control and thus doesn't care about the effects. Politicians have other things to worry about - like the deficit. When asked if it where a proactive DRM circumvention if copying a CD on PC Linux (where current DRM is unaffective) she said something like "Well, in that case I would say, sort of, that if DRM is unaffective it's not there so it's no circumvention in this case."
It boils down to the courtroom again, where it's up to the judge to introduce sanity into the process again. I understand there are some US judges that have ruled the DMCA as unapplicable in some cases, as it's against the american constitution.
Goes to show what we all should never forget: Laws are made by humans and should be subject to perpetual scrunity.
Star Trek Replicator Thing Defense (Score:3, Interesting)
So now Mr Picard can duplicate a million sticks of gum and steal them all... _then_ it's just like stealing a million sticks of gum from a shop... right? Well at least it's more like performing an illegal download.
The materialized steak was someone's idea of a steak... at the very least you may be stealing the idea, not the steak itself.
Re:Star Trek Replicator Thing Defense (Score:2, Interesting)
Of course, nothing is truly free, as someone earned some credits building and selling the replicators used on the Enterprise, just as many people benefit from movie/music downloading such as hard-drive and blank-cd manufacturers.
Obviously you have never seen the bill .. (Score:3, Funny)
I heard you go to a prison planet if you replicate using a blueprint for which you did not pay the license fees.
toughest in Europe? (Score:3, Funny)
In Germany, you beat piracy,
In Soviet Russia, a pirate beats you!!
sorry.
and, yeah I know the russian dude won the fight.
i'll go now.
one sided article (Score:2, Interesting)
but the second half only mentions the music industry not making as much money
as they used to?
well, the german movie industry has their own association with a web site at
http://www.bvv-medien.de/ [bvv-medien.de], and despide a very, very aggressive anti-consumer
anti piracy campain, they still more than doubled their revenue in the last
five years: 860 mio euro in 1999 vs. 1747 mio in 2004.
I guess noone of the german movie industry will read this, but
Just an observation... (Score:2)
Justice is not served by enacting laws that would punish the very naive among us to the extent that physically violent criminals are punished less for much more damaging crimes. My prognostication is that this will end violently at some point, cops shooting pirating criminals in their homes, or beat
Global warming! (Score:2)
http://www.venganza.org/ [venganza.org] has more information on how the decreasing number of pirates in the world is affecting global average temperature, and will tell you what you can do to help.
Why Two years sentence? (Score:2)
Anybody knows if the two years of maximum penalty was chosen to allow for the police to use wiretapping and other means of force?
Revolutions started for less oppresive laws... (Score:2)
I mean, these are the laws to support some lesser businesspeople from across the Atlantic, that give nothing to the economy of EU.
Remind me, why were those pesky laws on Copyright enacted? I distinctly remember the United States of America ignoring them for the better part of the century, until it had the positive balance on the so called Intelectual Property.
I had a dream, that India, China, Russia and EU could return to the original shape of IP,
Anonymous filesharing (Score:2)
Is that really what the RIAA want?
The law is NOT accepted (Score:5, Informative)
Overkill (Score:3, Insightful)
Even from the other side of the equation it makes no sense at all. I've spent the last couple of years or so working on some games [eveparadox.com]. This is my baby, the result of me working my ass off. The thought of someone depriving me of potential income by downloading a cracked copy does make my blood boil. An appropriate consequence of them getting busted with it? Compensation for the loss, yes. Some sort of fine or community service, yes. But jail time? For duplication of an entertainment product!? You can't be freaking serious.
This is greed, pure and simple. Perhaps a demonstration of a massively overinflated sense of self importance (defy our will eh?.. off to jail with you, consumer!). It is also a demonstration of the very, very dangerous consequences of letting a powerful lobbying organisation get their way with the laws. I hope this doesn't remain on the books for long.
PS. Copyright infringement has never been, and will never be, theft. The former deprives someone of potential future income, and the latter deprives someone of something material immediately. Equating copyright infringement with the forced boarding, theft and murder of a ship at sea is an arrogant and flawed analogy.
Rant off.
Re:AAAaaarrrghh! (Score:2, Insightful)
Why would I "pirate" something, you couldn't PAY me to see!
Re:AAAaaarrrghh! (Score:3, Insightful)
That's the whole problem - people feel that a lot of the stuff out there isn't worth the asking price. The "asking price", for a couple, is a LOT more than the ticket price ... and it doesn't help that the theatres don't make any money on the screening itself, so they have to gouge on the food concessions.
Lower the price to $5 a head, give half to the theatre so they can charge reasonable prices for eats, and make it up in volume. So Jim Carey
Re:Criminalizing _down_loading (Score:2)
The "crucial change" is that it will be a criminal offense instead of just a civil one, and it will be punishable by a prison sentence instead of just a fin
Re:woah.. (Score:3, Funny)
Bienvenidos a Mexico! Disfruten su estancia
Re:not a law - yet (Score:2)
The first involves national sovereignty; if a country's laws, or the law a country decides on decree that a man changing his religion should be executed, then it is not the business of the rest of the world to critique. If citizens of that nation dislike the law they can work within their framework as determined by law to change that law...or chose other paths, or leave.
The second thought involves the German character: Anyone standing at a light to cross a street in Dubl