IFPI Takes ISP to Court to Impose Music Piracy Filter
Written by enigmax on March 10, 2008The ‘Big Four’ record labels - EMI, Sony, Universal and Warner have started legal proceedings to force an ISP to end piracy on its network. The action, brought against Irish ISP, Eircom, is the first of its kind.
Eircom is the largest Irish ISP. Today, the Big Four record labels have started legal proceedings which they hope will force Eircom to effectively end music piracy on its network. According to the Ireland.com report, this action is the first against an ISP, rather than individual file-sharers.
Mr Justice Peter Kelly today admitted the proceedings at the court under the Copyright and Related Rights Acts 2000. It appears the labels are trying to get an order to effectively force Eircom to take responsibility for their customer’s actions by saying that it’s the ISP that is doing the ‘making available’ to the public, by facilitating the infringement.
Eircom’s lawyers see if differently. They say that Eircom was “not on notice of specific illegal activity that infringed the rights of the companies”, adding that it was under no legal obligation to monitor traffic on its network.
Willie Kavanagh, Managing Director of EMI records in Ireland said of Eircom: “with the greatest of respect” it was “well aware” that its customers used its networks to infringe copyrights “on a grand scale”.
Previously, Eircom has refused to use any filtering technology to interfere with file-sharers, something the labels wish to address in this case too.
It looks like the IFPI has shifted its focus from the individual filesharer to the ISPs. Last month, the IFPI won a court case in Denmark, and the ISP “Tele2″ was ordered to block all access to The Pirate Bay. Tele2 announced later that it will fight the decision.
Banning illegal filesharing from their network, voluntary or not, is in the best interest of ISPs according to the IFPI: “Illegal P2P file-sharing may have helped drive broadband subscriptions in the past, yet today these activities, particularly in respect of movies, are hogging bandwidth,” they state.
Previously: EMI Stays With IFPI On Condition it Pays Less to Chase Pirates
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93 Responses
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[quote comment="309075"]come on guys! pay for your music. Send a donation to Eircom![/quote]
Send ME your donations. I need it more!
oi,bilko,
better still,u can open up a pirate
stall,download and burn all the latest
movie and sell them on the street,cheap.
tell me about it when u got busted,how it’s like to be arrested for selling pirated dvd in your country.
and what happened to the IRA ?
didnt see them in news for quiet a while…
Listening to ifpi, we can develop their theory to other industries:
Shouldn’t private cars be illegal ? I never charge a friend when I drive him somewhere, or when I shop for my parents and transport their goods. Am I a road pirate ? If I buy a faster car, I’ll even overcome more those transportation or cabs companies !!! I am a danger for the whole Road Economy !
So, I can’t wait to see transportation companies go to court, demanding people to remove their cars from the streets !
Did I mention that traffic jams slow down exchanges ?
IFPI or how to use ridiculous sophisms.
What the RIAA and the MPAA don’t want to realize is that the reason for piracy is that there has been no good music or artist’s out for some time. Just artists trying to copy each other and rip off each others songs and beats. music sales have plummeted because of crappy music, not because of piracy. Remember the days of recording your favorite songs on the radio to a cassette tape and listening to them or giving it to your friends? There is no difference.
As for the MPAA, no one wants to sit through a movie where people are rude, talk on cell phones, act like complete idiots, have young kids running around, screaming, laser pointers, and who can forget the 1/2 hour of commercials and previews.
If any ISP tries to block access to any site from my ISP, that is a lawsuit waiting to happen. Unfortunately in this case, the ISP looses either way.
[quote comment="308756"]I’m going to downgrade my bandwidth if my ISP is forced to block bittorrent access and torrent sites.
I am not paying lot’s of money to check my e-mail and read online news.
This might be the end of several ISPs if they have to block torrent traffic.[/quote]
SAME HERE.
Fuck IFPI! Retards won’t get control over the net.
the bandwith hogging is pure BS. i work for a big (international) ISP that sells bandwith to those that sell end customers. All our customers, and also we, use an estimation and then overbook the cables with all from 50 to 900%.
Unable to steal our freedom all at once they’ve decided to steal it bit by bit. But it will take no less than guns to accomplish this… and then again, if we have to defend our freedom with guns, we will.
i wish i could go back in time and sue Maxell for making blank cassette tapes in the 80s and 90s . . .oh wait a minute, that would be ridiculous . . .. .
[quote comment="308707"]That’s like saying that cell phone companies are responsible for drug deals organized using phones.[/quote]..
THAT’S EXACTLY THE SAME.
+1
I think we all really miss the point here. Sure its not right to pirate software in any way or deprive the artist and developers of thier due credit. However the problem is that these people have classified P2P Technologies as a whole as an acitivty purely associated with software and media piracy. That is not the case, Blocking P2P traffic and torrent traffic exclusively on a tier 1 or 2 provider can remove access to a variety of legal software and services that are regualarly used, if not mission critical components of some economic structures.
Im really scared if they filter stuff im fucked i really hope they dont my life will be ruined if they do im going to spam emi
@ 58:
I had this same thought. Slowly but surely, Americans are losing their freedom to … well be free! The internet is free and should always remain free. I may not live in Ireland but I would be getting in touch with that provider and letting them know exactly what you’d do if they succumbed to the will of the evil 4. I for one would be right there beside you if it came down to “Them are fightin’ words there”.
I strongly believe there will be another civil war in America before my life is over. The governments and law officials have, for too long, controlled it’s citizens with an iron clad fists, eating away at our freedom little by little until finally we all end up in uniforms which are color coded to show our citizen status. Hell I wouldn’t be suprised if they didn’t pull a starship troopers where they made it to where you couldn’t be a ‘citizen’ until you served your country in war. I was declined by our our military(all 4 branches) because of a juvenile record I had. This was all before 9/11.
So now i get solicitations from each branch saying “join the military, fight terrorism”… FUCK YOU! I don’t have terrorism where I live. I also believe that it’s the governments fault we got attacked on 9/11. Them ‘other people’ over in the desert only hate americans because of what our government does! Most of our citizens DO NOT agree with what our government does nor do we condone our presidents actions. /sigh… it’s no use…I give up
This is so fucking ridiculous. Why are these lads taking action against Ireland, a tiny fucking island which the majority consists of countryside, sheep and fields.
All I can say is, I’m happy I’m on BT.
Article 8 of the european human rights convention stands against this.
If this court case is lost another should be launched using this as a base against the Big Media economic terrorists.
I have no idea what the Irish equivalent of the “interception of communications” act is but I,m sure it can be leveraged for use in this case also as voip users would be protected under its descriptive definition.
Dont run and hide folks call “Liberty” in Ireland and get something set up to back Eircomm in their fight, perhaps formulate an “Amicus brief” as the EFF do in the US cases that affect privacy and public rights.
Dont let apathy win.
[quote comment="309410"]
If this court case is lost another should be launched using this as a base against the Big Media economic terrorists.
[quote]
Only *economic* terrorists? You’re going too easy on them. The IFPI, RIAA, and MPAA are *all around* terrorists, by the definition of very the word itself.
[quote comment="309372"]
there will be another civil war in America before my life is over.[/quote]
Heh, no way.
The collective American people are in too deep of a coma for anything like that to ever happen. The fact that there aren’t mass protests rioting in the streets, demanding the abolishment of the Electoral College, is proof alone that most Americans would rather sit on their asses watching the latest “reality” TV bullshit and reading tabloids, then even think about faulting their own government. For anything.
The closest you’re ever - EVER - gonna see to a second civil war, is minor paradigm shifts in the status quo.
The same holds true for every First World country, and essentially most Second World countries, too, I’d say.
Customers hogging bandwidth? What a moron, those same customers PAY to use that bandwidth! That gives a customer the legal right to use that bandwidth, and anything done through that bandwidth is the customer’s own responsibility.
It’s sad to see that the IFPI try to censor the internet, simply because they are UNABLE to adapt their own business-model to a dynamic and changing world.
Congratelations IFPI, Himmler would’ve been proud…
” ‘Illegal P2P file-sharing may have helped drive broadband subscriptions in the past, yet today these activities, particularly in respect of movies, are hogging bandwidth,’ they state.”
The IFPI has no control or membership from film studios, why are they trying to argue this point. Ditto with regards to ISP’s bandwidth. What do they care about how anyone is using their own bandwidth. The IFPI is not in the ISP business or the movie business. Its like asking someone why they are doing carwheels and them answering “because I like ice cream.”
stop children sharing sweets because the other kids didn’t make them.
shoot your mum for making her own illegal cookies, instead of buying ones from wall mart
If IPS ban “pirate” sites in my coutry, i will disconnect my internet! hope IFPI fail.
So they said that piracy has driven broadband sales? So piracy has paid for the advancement of technology.
ITS OFFICIAL!!! They just admitted piracy is a good thing!
Why are the links and stuff here pink!?
Makes me feel kinda funny.
http://fakesteveballmer.blogspot.com
look like ifpi smarter than riaa
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