The results of this evaluation, the most elaborate that has been published to date, was published this week in a 61-page article. Talking to TorrentFreak, Giblin says that the goal of the paper was to evaluate the effectiveness of graduated response schemes on three measures that are closely aligned with the purpose of copyright law.

What’s the evidence that these policies reduce infringement? What’s the evidence that they increase the size of the legitimate market? What evidence is there to show that they encourage the creation and dissemination of a wide range of content?

The paper shows that the graduated response schemes fail on all accounts.

“Rightsholders make big claims that graduated responses are ‘successful’ and ‘effective’ to argue for their continued adoption, but the evidence doesn’t back them up. The paper finds little to no evidence that any form of graduated response reduces infringement or increases the size of the legitimate market,” Giblin tells TorrentFreak.

The paper mentions, for example, that all of the studies that claim to have found a reduction in P2P usage are biased towards copyright holders and not peer-reviewed. In addition, they consistently ignore that people may have switched to other forms of piracy, through streaming websites and cyberlockers.

Similarly, a study suggesting that iTunes sales went up in France after Hadopi was announced, is criticized as the effect may very well be explained by third factors such as the surge in iPhone sales. The results are further put into doubt as revenues in the French music industry as a whole decreased, while there was a clear uptick in nine of the top 20 markets over the same period.

The third measure of effectiveness, whether the “strike” schemes improve access to and the creation of content, doesn’t pass the test either.

“Regarding the third aim, it finds that France is the only jurisdiction to really require rightholders to provide greater access to content in exchange for their new enforcement rights. However, it finds that many existing graduated responses have structural biases in favour of so-called ‘Big Content’,” Giblin tells us.

Giblin says that not all copyright holders are treated equally under the graduated response schemes. The major music labels and movie companies often have more influence, if smaller parties are allowed to participate at all.

Despite this, the major industry players may not see an increase in production either, since there is no solid evidence that fewer people are pirating.

“In reality graduated responses are unlikely to actually result in greater production even of that type because they don’t actually reduce infringement or increase the size of legitimate markets; but this demonstrates a level of structural capture in the lawmaking process that is deeply troubling,” Giblin says.

On the upside Giblin notes that the movie and music industries are breaking revenue records year after year. However, there’s no evidence any of these are the result of graduated response schemes.

In fact, the expensive anti-piracy policies may be a losing strategy which policy makers have to reconsider.

“International policymakers considering adoption need to carefully consider the policy aims they wish to achieve, and evaluate whether a graduated response would actually help them to do so. They cannot simply accept rightholders’ claims of ‘success’ or ‘effectiveness’ at face value,” Giblin says.

“Regulators who already have graduated responses should also do a cost/benefit analysis in light of the evidence, and decide whether it’s desirable to keep them,” she adds.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

The mechanism preferred by the big recording and movie studios is the so-called ‘graduated response’ scheme, whereby Internet users are subjected to ever increasing punishments for their infringing behaviors.

Now, having faced resistance for so long, it seems that the MPAA and RIAA will get their way in the United States.

According to CNET, some of the country’s largest ISPs including AT&T, Comcast, and Verizon are close to striking a deal with Hollywood and Big Music to put in a framework of measures to progressively punish errant subscribers.

Although a final agreement is yet to be signed, plans are said to be “on track” and could be officially unveiled next month. The deal is believed to be structured as follows:

- Rightsholders track infringing Internet users and send notices to ISPs
- ISPs used this data to send warnings, called “Copyright Alerts”, to subscribers
- If subscribers fail to improve their behavior, further warnings will be issued

Eventually though, ISPs have agreed to get tough with customers who don’t heed warnings.

Sources quoted by CNET say that ISPs will be a given flexibility to select from a “menu” of sanctions, including throttling a subscriber’s connection through to limiting web browsing. One scenario would see the web almost completely removed, with access granted only to the top 200 websites. Other more gentle measures include copyright-awareness programs.

However, unlike the legislative changes already implemented in the UK, the range of sanctions in the US will not include the dreaded “3rd strike”, i.e complete termination of the subscriber’s account. Currently there is no mention of temporary suspensions either; they could prove a deal-breaker in this sensitive environment.

The agreements between the MPAA, RIAA and ISPs in the United States will be completely voluntary. The ISPs will insist that they are completely within their rights to amend their Terms of Service to accommodate such an agreement and will almost certainly do so quickly.

In March, during the House Judiciary Subcommittee hearing on Intellectual Property, Competition, and the Internet, it became increasingly clear that the US government would be backing voluntary agreements to deal with the subscriber end of infringement, rather than the legislative change approach favored for dealing with file-sharing and streaming websites.

“Voluntary cooperative solutions are a priority focus and we believe that, in combination with law enforcement action, voluntary actions by the private sector have the potential to dramatically reduce online infringement and change the enforcement paradigm,” said U.S. Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator Victoria Espinel.

“We will continue to push forward to encourage voluntary cooperative actions on multiple fronts. Our ultimate goal is to reduce infringement online so we will continue to assess our approach to ensure that it is as effective as possible.”

The costs of the ‘graduated response’ will be shared between the entertainment industries and ISPs, meaning that regular Internet subscribers will, as always, pick up the enforcement tab.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.