back to article Film studios thrash BT in Newzbin site-block test case

In a landmark test case, the High Court in the UK has ordered BT to block access to the pirate site Newzbin2. The site makes movies, music and applications available and describes itself as "the Google of Usenet". It's a stunning victory for six major Hollywood film studios who brought the case, with counsel from the Motion …

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  1. Ned Fowden
    Stop

    oh dear

    Well, there goes the neighbourhood ...

    I can understand why the judge has come to that ruling, but you know the floodgates are going to open now to every litigious little creep out there

    it's a sad day

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Facepalm

      One word: unenforceable

      This is a poor decision by all parties involved. Does no one understand modern technology or open access? The principle in this judgement will likely be overturned by higher courts in time, BT will lose subscribers if they try to enforce, Newzbin has just received massive free publicity and now alternatives will be offered for and searched by UK users, There are hundreds if not thousands of such sites - after all its just a link. Does the MPA think this will increase sales? That people will stop downloading and go buy a copy instead?

      Even the history of the Internet shows this never works: first websites were shutdown (SupraNova, Mininova), then around the same time, P2P networks appeared (Napster, Limewire) but were ruled against and shutdown, then there was BitTorrent a whole P2P protocol created for just content distribution, now there's thousands of sites like Newzbin.

      How do they expect to enforce this? What about Google? Google provides links to infringing content all the time. So, why is Google not being blocked? Will they block OpenDNS? What about anonymizers? Or VPNs like HideIPVPN.com, Overplay.net, or my-private-network.co.uk? What about anonymity networks like TOR?

      BT's highly controversial "Cleanfeed", originally intentioned only to block a sliver of traffic that relates to child porn that is illegal (illegality due to obvious "supply" reasons), now becomes a high profile target for even the most casual of hackers. Guess when people told BT their product was unnecessary, they should have listened since that any individual ISP-level censorship opens them up to arbitrary responsibilities and accusations they have the tools. You think ISP censorship products will be allowed to operate quietly, hidden, un-circumvented and even unimpeded? They will be attacked, disclosed, opened just like everything else...

      All this just because an industry with more money than sense is willing to spend a fraction of its funds bullying the rest of society by litigation, media campaigns and political means to preserve and increase its incumbent technology instead of recognising how much the world has changed and innovating their delivery system. People will gladly pay out of their ears for a Netflix-like flat-rate service, and yet even today such services are broadly not available in the UK or most of Europe ...

      One cannot talk of human right breaches or Internet censorship in other countries like China and Australia while on the other hand enshrining in law the very right to practice the same in the UK. In fact, even talk of net neutrality and open access starts to lose all meaning if censorship its taken to its logical, slippery slope conclusion.

      What about mission creep, first it was child porn, now piracy, what next? Far right propaganda (Anders Behring Breivik style)? Animal rights campaigners? Political activist sites? "Violent" but consensual porn? "Violent" or sexually graphic animations (hentai, manga)? At what point are you attempting to censor thoughts?

      Internet routes around damage, because life finds a way. Learn to deal with it, properly...

      1. irish donkey
        Stop

        Next step I see is

        blocking unfavorable reviews of their Films/Music as they are 'damaging' the copyholders product.

        Doomed I tell we are all doomed!

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Happy

        Bravo

        Bravo sir / madam (as you were anon)

        You said in a large nutshell what we are all thinking.

        I am getting some popcorn in for when they go after google.

      3. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        I'm ignorant, I know but ...

        What is actually wrong with ".....litigation, media campaigns and political means to preserve and increase its incumbent technology"? Why should they innovate "..their delivery system"?

        This person definitely won't "... gladly pay out of their ears for a Netflix-like flat-rate service" I'm not alone and I guess that is why "...even today such services are broadly not available in the UK or most of Europe".

        It angers me that people who should know better think it is a good idea to copy the works of others and put them on the internet apparently free of charge but making money for themselves in the process. They're no better than Google! and that is a damning statement. Just because you can doesn't mean you should.

        By all means innovate, that is a good thing and I applaud it. But when you've been nailed, as is the case now, STFU and move on - unless you believe a principle is at stake. BT obviously have the dosh and may not care about principle - they brought us Phorm, after all.

        1. G Murphy
          WTF?

          @AC (12:20) I agree

          --> What is actually wrong with ".....litigation, media campaigns and political means to preserve and increase its incumbent technology"? Why should they innovate "..their delivery system"?

          I couldn't agree more, I think we should ban portable players, CDs, cassette tapes, even vinyl. Things were much better when people could only listen to what was played on the radio to them. That'll teach those plebs who want more from the creative arts industry.

          On a more serious note, I think you've entirely missed the point, the writer wasn't asking for sites like NewzBin to innovate, he was asking for the media industry itself to, thus making sites like NewzBin superfluous to all but a marginal section of society (piracy always occurs to some extent)

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Joke

            Radio, Radio?

            Damned subversive things, letting the proles have access to music for almost nothing. Make them dress up in their finest suits and pay through the nose for a concert ticket like the rest of us do.

          2. Murphy's Lawyer
            Joke

            "Things were so much better when people could only listen to what was played on the radio to them"

            You evil advocate of piracy you! Don't you know that radio stations play valuable intellectual property lovingly crafted onto 78 shellac discs that have only been licenced to be played in the home to family members only? The record industry will perish, I tell you, perish...

            Sorry, I've just been told by the Edison company that 78s are in violation of their patented wax cylinders which are obviously the right and proper way to listen to recorded music, so...

            Ah, a telegram from the makers of player pianos pointing out that Edison's wax cylinders are killing their business and that hundreds of poor people paid 50 cents a day to punch out the piano rolls will be thrown onto the streets...

            But what's this? It's eminent composer John Philip Souza proclaiming to all and sundry that the player piano will KILL OFF LIVE MUSIC and NOBODY WILL LISTEN TO AN ORCHESTRA EVER AGAIN!!!1!

            And so the depressingly familiar pattern continues: the entertainment industry continues to prefer to throw more and more money at keeping their cosy little monopoly than they'd ever spend working out how to adapt to a changing world.

            I shed no tears for NewzBin, but I fear for the original small film-makers and musicians who will be hit by big business who regard themselves as the One True Way to sell entertainment to the masses, and have just been handed a large, legal sledgehammer to do the hitting with.

            1. Andrew Orlowski (Written by Reg staff)

              Re: "Things were so much better"

              Souza was talking about phonographs (record players), not player pianos. The part of the story never told is that Souza became a big supporter of the record player once a royalty agreement was reached that rewarded composers.

              See? There's a moral in there somewhere, that even a 'tard can see.

              1. Anonymous Coward
                Big Brother

                The Player Piano

                Comments from people like Souza managed to get a specific clause inserted in the US Copyright act of 1908. That clause is still in force today. John (Maddog) Hall (well known FOSS Supporter) was recently threatened for breaching this clasue. why? He wanted to restore some original Player Piano rolls. The Player Piano Company has a monopoly on the production of rolls even though the music they use is out of copyright, they still have copyright on the paper/card rolls after more than 100 years.

                This is why Disney can keep renewing copytight on Mickey M.

                Be careful what you wish for. Things may get out of hand and have consequences long into the future.

            2. camnai

              Why?

              How is this ruling going to affect original small film-makers and musicians who want to put their stuff on the web for people to download? I suppose BT, in order to protect itself, could say that henceforth nobody can download anything, but that doesn't seem likely.

          3. Maurice Shakeshaft

            A thought or two

            Why consider banning portable players, CDs, cassette tapes and vinyl? If I want to make a recording for my own use from the radio or other medium I'm permitted, by law, to do this. If I want to access and download material out of copyright I'm permitted to do this, legally. What I'm not permitted to do is infringe copyright and this case appears to me to be all about that. Two profit making organisations are stealing or aiding and abetting the theft from law abiding citizens.

            What have I missed?

            The music, print and film industry should innovate in their delivery processes. They definitely wont while wholesale thieves are out there. Why should they? Were is their incentive? They innovate and somebody steals their next solution. They cock up the innovation as Sony did with their rooting of PCs and they get screwed. They have the law on their side as has just been shown by this ruling. While they can continue to access and influence feckless politicians and 'civil servant' the law must be applied. What did BT expect??!! Clowns!

            I've no idea how to change the law but that is one strand of the solution. It is certainly not acceptable to condone or support theft by BT, NewzBin or whoever. Show/prove the Media are stealing and then you might have the beginings of a change plan?

        2. Lamont Cranston
          Thumb Down

          Re: I'm ignorant, I know but ...

          My kids like Batman. Series, such as The Batman and Batman Beyond aren't available on DVD in the UK. Given the technology available, why aren't WB making legal downloads available? I'd happily pay for them.

          So long as record labels and film studios continue to push customers into the arms of pirates, their customers will forsake them for the pirates.

      4. Anonymous Coward
        Thumb Up

        Excellently Worded Response

        Bravo Sir.

      5. Asgard
        Big Brother

        So one more act of control, turn the screw, tighten the control a bit more. :(

        This legal ruling means that the film and music industries have finally got what they have always wanted. Unfortunately they now have a legal way to force censorship over the Internet and sadly we all know this is just the beginning.

        @"There are hundreds if not thousands of such sites"

        True there are, but never the less, unfortunately the film and music industries will happily employ rooms of people to scour the Internet and add every site they can to domain black lists and if anyone complains (and they will struggle to have their complaint heard) the rich film and music industries now have the this legal ruling to throw in their face, backed up with an army of highly paid lawyers to drag out any legal battle for years until the already closed down (and therefore censored) sites and companies go out of business.

        So yes it won't stop piracy, but it will add a huge growth industry into Internet censorship which is the real danger. Plus you can bet the governments will secretly be only too happy to support this legal ruling as well. Censorship doesn't stop the determined from finding what they seek, it never has, but in time, it will reduce what the masses can find and whilst the film and music industries say that's good, the undeniable bad is the ability to censor the Internet leading to governments exploiting this ruling as well, allowing them to help keep the majority of people more in the dark about what they are really doing, whilst they pretend its all in our best interests.

        The core problem is we desperately need a free Internet. In decades past we could at least rely on the main newspapers to show some journalistic integrity to show us what our governments were really doing behind our backs. But these days as Murdock's close connections with the politicians shows so completely, we cannot trust the newspapers at all to tell us the truth, so we badly need a free Internet to leak government documents (which should be public documents, but they refuse to show us the truth, as they know we will be pissed off with them if we find out the truth). The problem is governments will happily abuse this legal ruling into a way to add more censorship.

        This legal ruling is so bad its obscene, but sadly its not entirely unexpected. We all know they have always wanted this for years. The question now is what is done about it and you can bet the governments will secretly obstruct any attempt to overthrow this legal ruling in court, as they know they can abuse this legal ruling for themselves as well. So they will want this legal ruling to stick in some way, regardless of the freedom the majority of society wants.

        So its one more act of control, turn the screw, tighten the control a bit more.

        While you're at it, turn the heat up on that boiling frog, it should be almost cooked by now.

        So one more step toward Totalitarian control, all in the name of the media distributors. :(

      6. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        "People will gladly pay out of their ears for a Netflix-like flat-rate service"

        Well put.

        I pay around £40/month for my internet connection and access to a usenet server with 3 years binary retention - that's what I consider to be my flatrate film/tv source, if the tv/movie industry would stop being so amazingly stupid they'd setup a legal, viable alternative and they'd attract more than just the knowledgable internet user, they'd attract the general public which is a much much larger market.

        Sadly I don't think that'll happen, too bad for the tv/movie industry (although I don't feel too sorry when they're too busy trying to punish people instead of trying to make money by offering the people what they want).

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Devil

      MP Ed Vaizey, Culture Secretary, laughing all the way

      Looks like MP Ed Vaizey, Culture Secretary, has just won or at least gained a massive lever for his secret proposal for industry-led Internet censorship by the back door.

      Previously, the Courts effectively ruled that links have no association to content and ISPs. This new judgement may have very costly repercussions for ISPs (large and small) since they can now be sued for NOT censoring *enough*! This could also have a disproportionately costly and chilling effect on smaller ISPs since it opens them up to litigation.

      What a mess!

      1. Andrew Orlowski (Written by Reg staff)

        Re: MP Ed Vaizey, Culture Secretary, laughing all the way

        Er, site blocking is already law. Has been for a year. The ISPs are already exposed to litigation.

        Vaizey wants voluntary industry self-regulation to *replace* the clauses in the Digital Economy Act. This will certainly be cheaper than Hollywood picking them off one by one in the High Court.

        You need to be aware of the facts before ranting.

    3. The Fuzzy Wotnot
      Unhappy

      Hmmm

      I don't agree with internet users being able to rip-off creative content, even the scumbag mega-corps have a right to protect the artists IP, but you are right this will get a little nasty as people sue each other left anf right for the most minor infraction. This will go on for a long time before we see some sense and the whole affair has to be rought to heel. Can't wait for a slew of pathetic cases because someone made a tiny 150x150 PNG icon on a webpage and others have borrowed it without consent.

      Sadly you only have to look at the mess the patent stuff is in to see that common sense may take a very, very long time to come!

    4. TenDollarMan
      Facepalm

      c'mon dude

      The company name behind Newzbin2 is: "Kthxbai Ltd ".

      0.3% of teh content on Newzbin2 was not protected by copyright.

      Seriously. Can this ever have been anything other than illegal?

      1. David Neil

        The content isn't hosted on Newzbin2

        It's hosted on Usenet servers scattered across the globe, in binary newsgroups. Newzbin2 provide an index.

        Also, Newzbin2 were not even represented in court, this is a case of party a asking the court toforce an ISP to block an overseas site. That precedent has now been set and you can expect everyone from Scientology to the Chiropractors tobe applying for "Newzbin2" orders in the near future.

    5. Gulfie
      WTF?

      Who's next on the block then?

      Google. A search engine that facilitates copyright infringement on a massive scale.

      Blocking is not the answer in much the same way that shutting down the web site is not the answer. Take away the reason for copyright infringement (the over-inflated cost of music and video) and the problem will (largely) go away. Blocking this web site will merely prompt the use of proxies or a proliferation of additional IP address.

  2. Greem
    WTF?

    Whack-a-mole

    Newzbin3? 4? 5? 1337?

    1. Matthew

      Precedent

      But now that a legal precedent has been set, all the IP owners need to do is notify the ISPs of a list of sites serving material they don't like and the onus is on the ISP to prove in court the exceptions. I think that sounds expensive for the ISPs and therefore not in their interests.

      A whole lotta stuff is about to get banned.

  3. stu 4
    Unhappy

    welcome to china

    that is all.

    1. spencer

      worse than China

      You can pretty much stream any film you want in China on youku.

      In this narrow respect the UK is worse than China.

      1. AndrueC Silver badge
        Thumb Down

        I'm not keen..

        ..on our version of Capitalism either. Nor our policy on energy conservation. Environmentally we win because we're smaller but China seems to be more keen to mend its ways so time will tell there. Human rights..hmm. That one's up for debate but I bet the average working Joe(*) goes home and watches TV or goes out to the pub just like I do.

        So I would say this is one of several areas where the UK is worse than China and as time goes on there seem to be more and more of them.

        (*)But only the working Joe. The poor buggers out in the countryside have a raw deal.

  4. Daniel Owen

    www.newzbin3.com

    "It knows that the users of Newzbin2 include BT subscribers; and it knows those users use its service to receive infringing copies of copyright works made available to them by Newzbin2"

    Newzbin2 make no copyright works available, if all the content was removed from newsgroup providers (such as giganews), then what Newzbin2 do wouldn't help with providing content at all.

    Will be interesting how they propose to do the block, like greem says this is probably the birth of newzbin3.

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    willing to bet

    that something as simple as dialectizer breaks this let alone getting technical

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    I wonder what would happen...

    ... if pirates decide not to pirate one certain film, what would the effect on that film's sales be? From the studio's point of view it would help sales, from the pirates point of view it is the lose of free publicity coming from people who won't buy it any way. I real want to know which one of these 2 views is real and which one is wishful thinking.

    I'll confess to this, there are few films that I _might_ have bought, had I not found a rip for them earlier. The only reason I didn't buy those films is because they weren't wroth watching a 2nd time, and few weren't even worth finishing! But again, they are few films that I bought _because_ I watched the rip (while lazying around), and decided that they are worth watching on the big TV screen at home, plus I wanted to see the extras that come on the disc!

    1. Semaj
      Thumb Down

      Same as music

      It's the same as music. Basically no one wants to buy these things because they really aren't worth it. I wouldn't give most modern music / film shelf space, let alone pay for the privilege.

      Only now that DVDs are sold for £1 or so am I thinking of buying a few classics, which I may watch again. If the studios offered an unlimited, free streaming service for a fair price (and given the lack of quality in anything new I'm talking £5 / month here) then I'd consider paying for new stuff but otherwise, no way.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Meh

        Lovefilm streaming

        Lovefilm already offer a streaming service. IIRC the cheapest package with unlimited streaming is £5.99. The bitrate is piss-poor and the catalogue isn't great, although there are some hidden gems in there.

        The real thing I don't get is why they think anyone would pay extra for the latest releases on that service; reduced picture quality, less time to watch *and* no extra features when compared to the blu-ray in the disc based service.

        All in all a mixed bag, middle of the road "could do better" offering. But it is very convenient and I would completely ditch the discs if the issues were addressed. (All of those issues are fixable)

  7. mmiied

    more problesm

    cleen feed may have worked whail it was only blocking child porn there was not meny pepol atacking it but now it has just actratcted a hold swarm of atackers a lot of who have at least tasit public suport how long do you think till somone finds a way round or throught it or even brakes it completley and then there gose all the blocks not just the pirate ones

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      master Bascule

      iz that u?

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Flame

    So how is it not like Royal Mail carrying pirate DVDs by post?

    And can BT be done for piracy in respect of other ISPs' subscribers, since it will at some stage travel over BT cabling? And if it is their duty to moderate content, can they be done for every CP image that has crossed their network?

    1. Tom Wood

      Envelopes

      Royal Mail isn't (ordinarily) legally allowed to open the envelope to find out what it contains or who sent it.

      ISPs, on the other hand, are apparently allowed to look inside your packets to work out what the data is and where it is coming from.

      Presumably it only needs some kind of encrypted tunnel (meaning the ISP couldn't see inside your packets even if it wanted to) to work around a block.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Envelopes

        >Royal Mail isn't (ordinarily) legally allowed to open the envelope to find out what it contains or who sent it

        This isn't what BT are being asked to do. They are being asked to block traffic to a site known mainly for providing links to copyrighted material. They know the provider and they know the likely content they won't be analyzing the actual content, the request will simply be blocked.

        Mail packages do get inspected and some are more likely to be inspected than others. If you were to receive a package from Colombia with a return address of "White Powder Leisure Supplies Inc." then it would be understandable if it was examined by HM Customs and Excise, granted not RM. So consider the BT internet block to be the same as a RM block on packages from this company.

        All the Google analogies are a waste of space, google does not provide mainly links to copyrighted material.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          @Chris

          So you're saying that if Newsbin were to start hosting pages of links to other files/sites in a comparable number to the supposed copyright infringing material they would be safe?

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            @AC Re: @Chris

            If you need further explanation of the difference between sites which primarily provide links to copyrighted material and sites like Google then my time would be wasted on your single brain cell.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Coat

      Re: So how is it not like Royal Mail carrying pirate DVDs by post?

      I know that I'll hated for this, but I'll answer any way: Unless you are using an encrypted connection, then the ISP _can_ know which website you are visiting and which file you are downloading. The same can't be said about the post office, since they are dealing with a sealed package.

      if the above is confusing, you might wish to read a bit about the http protocol and how it works!

      ya, I am leaving

      1. cleidh_mor
        FAIL

        Technically...

        There's nothing to stop the post office opening your parcels and inspecting them either, so they _can_ inspect your postal traffic. The difference here is that they're not legally allowed to, whereas ISPs are _required_ to inspect user's traffic.

    3. Velv
      Big Brother

      Shoot yourself in the foot with the Royal Mail argument

      On a one off "connection", Royal Mail will deliver your pirate DVD.

      But when they suddenly get a bulk delivery into a depot, they are required to consult the authorities if they suspect illegal activity. It's about what flies below the RADAR - if a user/customer starts sending 1,000 packages a day, they get suspicious. Might be legit, might not. But they do investigate.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Devil

        Mail Systems

        Once things are inside the mail system there are two people who can open it, Her majesty the queen and yourself.

        The police etc can only intercept post if it is sat in customs.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    Pfft

    So newzbin2 didn’t see this coming, haven’t already put plan B in place and there is not already a FireFox plugin available then?

    Welcome to the internets we haz teknolowgy

    Fail – next drama please

  10. Giddy Kipper
    Meh

    proxydust.com

    That is all.

  11. Pete 2 Silver badge

    Bad news for water companies, too

    Since they must know that their product kills people I can't see how they can now be permitted to keep supplying customers with a lethal product. Merely arguing that they have no knowledge of what "their" water is used for after it comes out the tap is obviously no excuse.

    It's deadly and must be stopped.

    Or is an unproven theory that some entertainment companies may, possibly, be losing an unknowable amount of money a more important factor than actual people drowning or dying in other water-related ways?

    1. John G Imrie

      See this

      http://www.dhmo.org/facts.html

      for why water companies should be stopped.

    2. Sir Runcible Spoon

      Sir

      Damn, are they still legally allowed to supply di-hydrogen oxide?

      1. Someone Else Silver badge
        Coat

        @Sir

        My inorganic chemistry is weak, due to years of neglect, but I always thought it was hydrogen hydroxide...

      2. nyelvmark
        Boffin

        di-hydrogen oxide?

        Hydrogen Peroxide (H2O2)? Certainly - it's a powerful bleaching agent, also used in rocketry as the oxidising agent. It's obviously nasty stuff, though, unlike its insidious cousin, DHMO, which as everyone with a clue knows by now, is responsible for uncountable deaths annually in various scarcely-reported ways - sometimes, perplexingly, by its absence and sometimes by its presence.

        Scientists have not yet explained this paradox, which may be the reason that scientific papers on the properties of DHMO are rarely to be found.

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Big Brother

    Big Society ?

    Bollox

    Big Government that rules with an iron heel.

    Looks like News Corps (20th Century Fox) cosy little chats with Cameron and co paid off.

  13. Stuart Ball

    Making way for Phorm?

    Does this not give BT ammunition for authorising DPI for its subscribers to ensure they are not copyright infringing?

    Seems a lot of weak (short?) planks in the defence...

    Did it rollover for a greater purpose?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Making way for Phorm

      When did BT rollover? They fought the case in court and the judgement went against them.

      Site blocking does not provide ammunition for authorising DPI, if that were the case then all the sites that are already blocked would provide a far greater argument. But why let reasoning get in the way of paranoia.

  14. Dazed and Confused
    Black Helicopters

    Now they have a taste of it

    how long till some judge decides to extend a super injunction to blocking - say twitter and then say google and Oh look you can still find out the big secret of who kissed who (like anyone gives a s*1t) and blocks the whole damn network.

    ring ring... Support here, can I help you?

    *&^%*(()

    Sorry, did you say your network connection does work?

    )^%£$^&*&%^

    I'm very sorry but I'm not allowed to tell you why

  15. g e
    Stop

    Buy second hand and close the roads too

    Newzbin2, well yeah, we do know what it's primarily USED for, but it's a very poor judgement and sets and horrifying precedent going forwards. The MAFIAA must be getting emergency surgery to stop the laughter.

    Anyway, I propose to buy all entertainment second hand from now on. Stuff 'em. Then they'll try to make second hand purchases of movies & music illegal too, and that WILL be partly Royal Mail's problem...

    Oh and UK.gov has knowledge of criminals and that criminals move around and that some of them drive so close all the roads...

    1. dotdavid
      Thumb Up

      Second-hand

      Exactly what I started doing when the RIAA started suing college students all those years ago. Second-hand CDs sound just as good as the originals.

      Of course since then someone invented Spotify so I'm back to supporting their evil empire, albeit probably less.

      But you'd think the Movie people would have, I dunno, learnt from the music industry's mistakes...

      1. g e
        Thumb Up

        Learnt?

        Doubt it.

        Organisations like those don't learn anything while it's cheaper not to change. If we make it expensive for them to do business how they're doing it now then they will change.

        So yup, a second hand movement is a good and legal start to that

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Of course they haven't learnt

          They still insist that if they can eliminate all piracy, their revenues will increase by 20%.

          Hollywood really is the land of make believe.

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    > makes rights-holders look like

    > makes rights-holders look like they're keener on legislation than on creating new markets for content

    Until you have reasonable protection against being ripped off by the pirates then the motivation for creating new markets looks kinda thin...

    1. noboard
      Stop

      Errrm

      A couple of points

      1. Both the movie and music industries are convicted cartels in the US and have cases pending over here (amazingly this case has been with the EU for years and doesn't seem like it will ever finish. If they were innocent surely they'd want the case finished)

      2. They haven't stopped making content, so they're happily spending their money and generally making record profits, so there's no lack of motivation from the studios

      Both the music and film industry want to rip the consumer off. They have no desire to give value for money, or live by the same rules as most other businesses; adapt or go bankrupt. They're also quite happy to screw over the content creators. A friend of mine has been told "This is the deal and if you don't accept we'll make minimal changes and you'll not get a penny".

      By all means condone piracy, but defending illegal corporations isn't a great idea.

    2. Jason Hall

      @AC

      No actually.

      Your content *WILL* be ripped off no matter what you do. No matter what markets you make.

      It's still up to the rights-holders to have something people actually *want* to spend money on.

      Try to look at it this way...

      People will constantly download all sorts of crap they never have any real intent on actually watching/listening to as long as it costs them nothing (ie Eastenders/etc on 'normal' TV, or pop music on the radio).

      *BUT* if every person had to start paying - for every TV show/song on the radio then TV sets and radios would suddenly be turned-off a lot more than they are now.

      This is what I find amongst my filesharing friends. If they had no option but to pay for stuff - they wouldn't be watching it/listening to it. Since it's free - they get it anyway, and quite often never actually use it.

      Now to say that each and every download they make is a lost sale is nothing short of preposterous. Anyone thinking that is a complete idiot.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Stop

        re: @ac / @ Jason Hall

        "It's ... up to the rights-holders to have something people actually *want* to spend money on."

        All you've done at core is say that the only economic model you'll accept is the honesty-box method. There's so much wrong with this I can't even be bothered to go through it, beyond just reflecting back to you what you've said, per my previous sentence.

        1. Jason Hall

          @AC

          "All you've done at core is say that the only economic model you'll accept is the honesty-box method."

          Where? No I didn't. Show me where in my post did I say that?

          I am willing to pay for content. I'm sure you'll find most people are willing to pay for content.

          There are probably a lot of people who aren't willing, or can't afford to pay for that content.

          And? For those people there isn't much you can do to stop them really is there?

          The current way is to threaten them with prison time and huge fines. How's that working for you?

          I don't know anyone in my group of friends who pirate stuff that is remotely scared by this prospect, so will continue to find ways around whatever is implemented.

          I'll say it again - please listen carefully:

          If you can make content that's worth having, then people will pay for it. Maybe not everyone will pay for it. And? It will never happen. I'm not saying just give up - like you seem to think (bad reading comprehension?)

          *BUT* overpriced tat is not going to work when compared with free downloadable content.

  17. Lee Dowling Silver badge

    Holdon

    So, hypothetically, if an image, document, or any other type of file with MY copyright is found somewhere, I can force BT to block that site?

    What about if, purely hypothetically here and not encouraging anything, a big band's website was hacked and content was inserted into it which allowed people to download my copyright. Can I ask BT to block that website for all of its subscribers, in theory?

    What about if I notice that, say, bittorrent is used to download lots of infringing copyright material - can I ask that BT block access to that software, website downloads of it, etc. or just every torrent?

    It seems far too far-reaching a judgement to stand as it is. What about if, for instance, someone like Anonymous or Lulzsec decided to file several thousand copyright complaints against the website of the big record labels with regards to images, text, CMS software, etc. and they couldn't answer them in time via their lawyers... could someone then force BT to block their websites until they do?

    And how, exactly, should this blocking be mandated? DNS? IP? Application traffic type? It seems an incredibly stupid and out-of-place judgement that just leaves more room for mischief than it does for common sense.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Happy

      +1

      "...someone like Anonymous or Lulzsec decided to file several thousand copyright complaints against the website of the big record labels..."

      That sounds as though it really could be for the Lulz - might be worth persuing this idea further :-)

  18. Scott Mckenzie

    High Profile

    I think it's because Newzbin was so high profile and to be honest so good - Giganews are being investigated and lets be honest that's the root of the issue, Newzbin are in trouble because of how easy it makes it to find the stuff, sub categories of films, in HD, with DTS audio, over 10Gb in size - you don't get that from Giganews, that's the provider doing the work and charging for the service.

    It's pointless blocking Newzbin or any of the others as they'll keep popping up.... they need to go after Usenet itself on this one or they're just wasting time and money.

    1. heyrick Silver badge
      Unhappy

      Go after Usenet?

      Bloody hell... Some of us actually use Usenet for its intended purpose y'know! It's bad enough that comp.sys.nyaa is blocked on my phone without imagining it being blocked at ISP level...

      1. Scott Mckenzie

        Clarification

        Re-reading my post... i'd like to clarify that in no way to i agree with what's going and am against blocks, but there are cases currently against Giganews, obviously Usenet isn't exactly something that can just be blocked anyway and as such providers that offer services to legit aswell as illegal (unknown to them they'll claim) may be ok.

        I was merely saying that there is no point going after the sites like Newzbin for what they're trying to do.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      @Scott Mckenzie

      Giganews under investigation? First I've heard of it. Any links to back that up?

      1. Scott Mckenzie

        Tricky

        Not that I can post with direct access, read on other nzb distributor forums.... lots of issues with films not completing and certain broadcasters material not appearing through them.

        It may have been a red herring but there was and still is a lot of talk surrounding the issue.

        I don't use them as they're expensive though so can't personally comment.

  19. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    Easy to get around, but incredibly worrying

    Where this is used to block access to a site that everybody already knows about (Newzbin - everyone knows *now*) it's trivially easy to circumvent, leaving this as an ineffective tactic for the stated purpose, but in doing so creates a terribly dangerous precedent. We're left with the assumption that it's fine to block "unsavoury" or "a little bit iffy" or simply "the wrong [political] colour" sites. The fact that it's only ever the people with piles of cash who get to define "iffy" is just a cherry on top.

    The MPA are causing a lot of collateral damage to society with their completely ineffectual attempts to prop up their broken businesses. Arguments about the right/wrong of piracy take valuable attention away from the big issues of erosion of longstanding freedoms in the name of business.

    Mine's the one with Martin Niemöller's "They Thought They Were Free" in the pocket

  20. Alex 14

    Words

    "It's fascinating to hear arguments such as BT's contention that it is not an internet service provider, or that Newzbin2 members were passive recipients, and just happened to have anime and pirate movies pop onto their PCs ... or that after notification from a copyright-holder, an ISP could claim that it hadn't been notified."

    Why tease? Why not share some quotes in context to demonstrate how BT supposedly claimed dogs are cats? I bet it WOULD be fascinating.

    1. TenDollarMan

      +1

      Paragraph 98 of teh judgement:

      "BT accepts that it is a "service provider" within the meaning of section 97A of the CDPA 1988..."

  21. Nigel Brown
    FAIL

    Tish, bah and humbug

    Factions are letting it be known that workarounds are already in place. The studios are merely tilting at windmills.

  22. Anonymous Coward
    Black Helicopters

    Why would BT fight this ?

    Surely BT is happy to ban newsbin2, even with the bad publicity it will bring.

    Think of it like this, users that use newsbin2 are likely to be downloading large quantities of SSL encrypted traffic from the likes of giganews or other usenet providers. If BT can shed a few of these high usage customers, its a better experience for everyone else ?

    I'm sure once the marketing department have got hold of this, it'll come out smelling of flowers.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Thumb Down

      Because saying "no" stops people asking

      Think of it like the boss who always says "no" to any requests for new gadgets etc (adjust example for your own situation). People stop asking for anything at all.

      BT have been saying "no" up to now for requests like this because if you say yes once, that's it, everyone is going to ask and your time will be taken up entirely with weighing up pros/cons of each request because you can't dismiss them out of hand any more.

      Admittedly, that's a massive oversimplification - another important factor is that not blocking anything at all (or having just a voluntary list for blocking stuff that everyone agrees with) means you have more of a defence when questionable content does travel over your network. Looks like the days of "well I didn't know ______ was going on" are numbered now though anyway.

      Regarding traffic, I doubt it'll make much difference. Newzbin/Usenet downloading isn't the simplest method by far, so a large proportion of the users will be technically savvy enough to simply bypass the blocks and carry on

  23. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    It amazes me...

    That even after Napster\iTunes the movie industry really hasn't cottoned on how the internet works, that downloads can and should be nurtured, not beaten with a stick.

    The way I see it, and probably the way everyone reading this with any piece of intelligence sees it, music downloaders can be split into three groups as below.

    Legal downloaders that buy any old tripe. These are the folk that put singles and albums to their designated position in the charts.

    Try before you buy downloaders. They'll download illegally then if they like it, seek out the original, probably in hard format as apposed to digital.

    Downloaders who never have and never will purchase music. These folk will download whatever they can get their hands on, or maybe just something they heard on the radio. They have no intention of forking out for goods. They probably used to purchase CD's, copy them then take the original back and earlier to that, use a tape cassette to do their dodgy deeds.

    None of the above parties hurt the industry. FACT. If anything they all help the industry as downloaders will tell their friends/family about great tracks/albums they’ve heard and so group 1 will toddle off and buy it.

    I myself fall into the second category having being burnt by purchasing Gorrilaz album without listening to it (what a load of shit). My CD collection contains more unopened albums than it does opened.

    Now let’s step to the movie industry. We have no services allowing us to apply the same rule, any movies we buy are either in hard format (DVD/Blu-ray) or shitty quality DRM movies such as the XBOX Zune player.

    For this reason of course more people are encouraged to download illegally, or rather there are no discouraging arguments to not download. I am a movie pirate. I will not download a HD movie unless it meets specific requirements, requirements Zune fails to meet. I will not buy Blu-ray because quite frankly I have no confidence this media will be around in 5 years, I've already spent a fortune replacing my Simpsons collection from VHS to DVD, I won't be doing the same for Blu-ray only for x264 to become the dominant format in the coming years.

    The MPAA really need to wake up and smell the coffee. Throwing money at lawsuits such as this will not stop people downloading content, there will always be a way, a new technology, or just very determined people, people will download. Embrace this technology. Offer a service that allows us to download high quality movies transferable between devices, you will see a difference, iTunes is proof of that.

    Sigh. Never mind, if newzbin2 does fall over there are far better alternative services out there already.

    Oh, and one more thing, I do so love this article. Cracking film by the way...

    http://moreintelligentlife.com/story/internet-piracy-is-good-for-films-1

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Pirate

      Star Wars is the perfect, but obvious, example

      I was born in 1968. Like most boys of my generation, I queued at the cinema to see Star Wars several times. I queued for the two sequels. I bought some stickers and computer games. I watched the adverts from the TV channel that bought the rights to show the films.

      George Lucas made that first film probably hoping he would make that enough money to make some more. That economic model (cinema, some merchandising, tv revenue) was sufficient for him to obtain funding for his 'artistic' endeavour and make him a millionaire many times over.

      However, with new technology, I ended up renting the VHS videos, buying the videos, then buying the DVDs. All this has made George Lucas a fat, lazy billionaire and provided him with billions to waste on useless wooden prequels and special effects technology with which he has tried to obliterate and ruin the original films.

      I, like many technology literate people I know, refuse to pay yet again for ***the same content*** in a superior format to make people far removed from the original artistic endeavours rich again. I won't spend a fortune again on stuff I've already paid for. I've had cash ripped out of me with the VHS to DVD and vinyl to CD transitions and won't do it again - which is why I've refused to play the physical media game and not purchased a Blu-Ray player. I suspect a lot of people feel the same way. The film studios were happy to sell me DVDs at high prices but now they want me to buy expensive Blu-Rays when I'm lucky to get 50 pence for old DVDs at a car boot sale. Stuff the bastards.

  24. Anonymous Coward
    Boffin

    never heard of TOR?

    obviously the courts have never heard of Tor (or similar services) the block is in vain if people want to download pirate copies they will find a way ( as the saying goes where their is a will their is a way)

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Stop

      Doing nothing is not a solution to there not being a solution

      In the legal world, making "a reasonable effort" is often key. The ISPs know and <rosetintedglasses>the courts should make an effort to research</rosetintedglasses> and certainly the MPA and their gang know the methods that may circumvent any blocking.

      They will block it anyway, safe in the knowledge that just the fact it makes it slightly harder for you or I to access it is the best legal defence they have.

      See Tort law for lots of examples of "reasonableness". Some precedent comes from a case about someone wanting nets put up around a cricket pitch and having it denied due to expense and reasonable expectations of harm. I don't remember the case name though.

  25. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    (Untitled)

    I get the impression that this is another example of a judge that has no idea of the real world, and so has made themselves look foolish. Obvious enough that the site can move elsewhere, one can not chase forever all such sites. But worse, it has made BT, who are a provider of data comms, act as if it were a law enforcement agency. Slippery slope that, usually only expected of countries with controlling governments. Yet here we see the legal profession making the decision. I don't think this is the path we should wish to travel down.

  26. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    And so the dawn of the Internet censorship era begins

    Or should that be censorship war begins... because how exactly are the ISPs going to block this site?

    Since Newzbin was already shutdown by a previous court order - that lasted approximately 2 weeks before it became newzbin2 followed by another year for the this case to block it.

    So, how then?

    Block it at BT's DNS servers - that's hardly going to work, just change your DNS servers, OpenDNS etc.

    Block the IP - they'll change it, mirror it etc etc.

    DPI - what exactly do you DPI for to ensure it is that site or incarnation of and not something else?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Pint

      Whatever it is, it'll be far from bulletproof

      Even DPI is no good - HTTPS negates that.

      All they can do is try and keep up with the changing names, IPs, whatever, but it's hardly in their financial interest to put too much effort into it. The MPA will have to keep gently "reminding" them.

      "The internet sees censorship as damage and routes around it" - that applies both to the technologies and the culture. The MPA are forcing BT to try and play tennis with jelly - it ain't gonna work.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        tell that to the [insert vile description here] that deploy bluecoat, etc.

        While it does require that they install an SSL cert into your browser; once that is done, they can proxy HTTPS traffic. Do you bank online? Do you examine every certificate presented to verify that it was issued to the site you're visiting? My browsers (ff, ch, ie) only contain the CA's that I have to trust to do what I need to do. All of the rest have been removed.

        On the other hand, I manage a couple of web application firewalls, and I have to be very careful configuring them so that no sensitive data (re: PCI DSS) gets logged. When it does, on testing sites with ONLY fictitious data, people have to be notified, passwords changed, etc. I think I'm more of a stickler for testing/corner cases than the QA guy, because I don't want allow any such exposure in the production environment.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Alert

          Certificates

          There's no need to verify every HTTPS certificate. Browsers are good at picking up mismatches between cert issued for and hostname - they're even good at telling you that the certificate has changed "since last time"

          As you mention, removing all the CAs except those you need is a good idea. Certainly, voluntarily installing a cert from your ISP as trusted is a bad idea.

          SSL is there to prevent MITM attacks, which is essentially what your ISP is doing in that scenario. Use it right and you're golden.

  27. Anonymous Coward
    Big Brother

    What worries me ...

    is the slow, but methodical joining of the dots we have here ...

    "the man" doesn't like a website

    invents law to justify dislike

    ISPs now have to "obey the law".

    As a concrete example - I like to read about growing cannabis (it's relaxing an theraputic). I frequent a .com site hosted well out of the UK.

    With this reasoning, the government can said "you shouldn't be reading that", and get ISPs to block it.

    Or wikileaks ....

  28. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    One word...

    Proxies.

  29. Jan Hargreaves
    FAIL

    revenue

    i think the issue here could be that newsbin makes a rather large sum of money for this "service". most of the sites i have seen that link to content (you can include google) do not charge you for the privilege. profiteering off selling access to copyrighted material... well what did they expect?

  30. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    Oh Good

    This will also do away with the calls for FUP and other unlimited download schemes. With usenet and P2P taken out of the loop, there wil be no need for 500 GB download caps, and more. Even if you buy a new game every month, what are you going to do with the remaining 490 GB ? Watch youporn ?

    1. Richard 12 Silver badge

      Erm, Steam, iPlayer, ITV Player, 4OD et al?

      It doesn't take any questionable content for you to wind up downloading 500GB in a month.

      I already stream iPlayer on my TV set-top box as well as my computers, and I expect I'll soon be doing the same with ITV Player, 4OD and other catch-up services. as they roll out.

      A lot of new TVs have some/all of these services built-in already - how many TVs in the average home?

  31. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    So what would happen?

    If the whole of the interwebs was encrypted? Is that possible? Would it make all these legal arguments pointless?

    1. Galidron
      Boffin

      IPv6

      With IPv6 Point-to-Point encryption is a built in option. All you would have to do is say yes please.

  32. Gulfie
    Coat

    "BT has actual knowledge of other persons using its service to infringe copyright"

    Bugger. Better turn of the entire internet right now then!

  33. Anonymous Coward
    Big Brother

    Next for the chopping block - Google

    The internet will not be safe until typing filetype:torrent into Google gives you an automatic fine and prison sentence

  34. Mad Mike
    FAIL

    Idiot Judge

    This judge obviously has no concept of modern technology or enforcement. Firstly, whether it's against the law or not, they won't stop it. No way. It's a self-inflicted wound caused by the music and film industries prior practices that the same governments and courts failed to act against.

    As the site is simply giving the location of content, they are not actually breaking copyright as he suggests. That's rubbish. At best they are aiding and abetting. The breaking of copyright is being carried out by the person downloading from the target website. Also, if you take the logical argument to it's conclusion, any indexing service is now liable for the actions of the entities they target. So, if yellow pages points you in the direction of a tradesman who commits a crime against you, aren't yellow pages guilty as well? After all, they indexed the tradesman and made his contact details (effectively his URL) available!! Same difference.

    The argument about whether a person or company makes money out of the link isn't relevant as nowhere does it say you don't commit a crime if you don't make money at it. So, this argument is irrelevant. Google is just as guilty as anyone else as they are the ultimate in indexing all sorts of illegal content. Every search site would be the same.

    In essence, they are introducing a legal precedent which they will enforce at THEIR choosing, against people and companies THEY choose to. Other people and companies will be allowed to keep doing the same thing because they're too big or too important or too whatever. So, they will be breaking the law just as much, but they won't be touched. Google will be amongst them.

    And what will this result in? The rise of more and more encrypted networks and sites doing this underground where nobody can see them. They will spend millions (if not billions) simply chasing around after these people. As soon as they take one down, another ten will be created. It's a war they can't win, even if they have won the first battle. And in the meantime, you can bet a lot of innocents will get hit in the crossfire.

  35. Anonymous Coward
    Mushroom

    Meaningless waste of time

    While I'm sure the MPA are happily patting themselves on the back the whole exercise is utterly pointless...

    Even if BT do comply and block access to "newzbin2" or whatever its fairly simple for them to change domain names and IP's outside the scope of the existing block. So then is the MPA going to go to court every time to keep adding new sites to this?

    Let alone the hundreds or other newsbin sites and providers that are outside the block. So the MPA are going to go to court to get every site blocked? By every ISP ??

    Not feasible.

    That's before we even get into encrypted connections, p2p, or even just ripping straight from disk and you don't exactly have to buy them to get hold of the physical media.

    Sure illegal downloading and copying is taking money away from the industry, maybe Tom Cruise will have to take a bit of a pay cut! But the lesson to be learned is the public want a high quality fast access to this stuff at a reasonable price point, which is something they don't seem to want to provide...

  36. Anonymous Coward
    Terminator

    Next time some of my *real* property is pilfered

    by a perp already known to the local police, I'll sue Ford for making the getaway car and B&Q for supplying the crowbar.

  37. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    It won't get blocked by IP or DNS

    It'll be the same thing that happened with Wikipedia and various filehosts. They'll transparently proxy everything on the same host, fail to pass X-Forwarded-For and forge error messages.

  38. Field Marshal Von Krakenfart
    FAIL

    The EU has an opinion on this

    Court of Justice of the European Union

    PRESS RELEASE No 37/11

    Luxembourg, 14 April 2011

    Press and Information

    Advocate General’s Opinion in Case C-70/10

    "the Advocate General proposes that the Court of Justice should declare that EU law precludes a national court from making an order, on the basis of the Belgian statutory provision, requiring an internet service provider to install, in respect of all its customers, in abstracto and as a preventive measure, entirely at the expense of the internet service provider and for an unlimited period, a system for filtering all electronic communications passing via its services (in particular, those involving the use of peer-to-peer software) in order to identify on its network the sharing of electronic files containing a musical, cinematographic or audio-visual work in respect of which a third party claims rights, and subsequently to block the transfer of such files, either at the point at which they are requested or at the point at which they are sent."

    http://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2011-04/cp110037en.pdf

    Added to this is the idea that blocking a single site is going to actually achieve anything, there are so many ways around this that the legal case taken by the copyright mafiaa makes it clear that the mafiaa haven't a fucking clue what they are doing. They are a latter day king Canute (or Cnut which I think is the correct spelling, so more than one similarity with the mafiaa) trying to hold back the tide.

    The claim that newzbin has earned "millions" from its activities would seem to point at the fact that some people are willing to pay extra above the cost of their internet connection for "free" content, but that also points to the fact that these people may also be willing to pay for good proxies and seed boxes as well!!!! Blocking avoided.

    Sadly the mafiaa will view this as a victory and proof that they are doing the correct thing. I’m inclined to say this is just the mafiaa rearranging the deck chairs on the titanic, no, its more like rearranging the deck chairs on the Hindenburg

    As a slight aside to all this, does anybody know by how much CD sales increased when oink was shut down?….. anybody??…… anybody????

  39. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    Anyway ...

    going back a few years, it was Kazaa ... then that got borked, and torrents took off. Then Piratebay was attacked, and loads of "salted" torrents (i.e. you don't realise till you have downloaded the whole 350Mb that it's either crap, or "needs" a new codec) ..

    as far as I can see the current channel of choice, is Rapidshare, et al.

    Encrypt file (optional)

    ZIP and break into 100Mb chunks

    upload with randomised filenames, and no indexing link

    post links on favourite forum of choice. Of course this could be a members only, encrypted website, so it's pretty hard to keep up with things ...

    what the dozy judge failed to see, is that there is no problem with *storing* the illegal content. Storage is dirt cheap - and getting cheaper. It's just indexing it. And as long as the indexing (which is an insignificant amount compared to the payload) can be controlled on a buddy-buddy basis, then the rights holders will *always* be one step behind.

    If the big labels had put a 100th the time and effort they have put into chasing smoke, into devising a fair and equitable licensing system, they would be much the better off for it. I can't help but feel these antics are really the last - dangerous - but last thrashings of a mortally wounded beast.

  40. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    LOL

    Newsbin is just a HTTP front end to Usenet servers. There are plenty of commercial providers (with SSL too) and you'll get much better download speeds plus anonymised posting.

    They can shut down a website but are they going to ban usenet?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      FAIL

      Lack of research

      I think you need to do a bit more reading before you comment. Just a quick scan of the Wikipedia page for Newzbin would tell you that they are an indexer, not a front-end. This is by far the most important fact (the article here is pretty misleading on that point unfortunately). They do not make any content available to anyone except for .nzb files (just some XML) which contain Usenet article IDs. You pass the .nzb file to your newsreader which goes and fetches them from your "commercial provider (with SSL too)".

      It's the fact that an indexing service is drawing all this heat that's the "LOL" part - but in the sense of "LOL, who next? Google?"

  41. Anonymous Coward
    Black Helicopters

    It's a trap!

    They **want** dodgy downloaders to go on this site, then they track your ip to the other sites they go on and build up a nice picture of where all the pirates really get their stuff from.

  42. Anonymous Coward
    Pirate

    more fodder

    newzbin ??? never heard of them.. until now that is. Think I might have a look and see if there's anything worthwhile - though probably not. I have always bought my own music/movies/whatever. Very occasionally I'll "pirate" stuff to see if it's any good before buying- usually it isn't. But it's stories like this that make me go off and download something just to spite these sharks. I would pay for movies via Netflix (can't US only, requires Silverlight), so the easiest option is just to download.

  43. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    @Krakenfart

    Canute didn't actually want to hold back the tide. His subjects thought he was pretty much God- he wanted to prove to them that he *couldn't* hold back the tide.

  44. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    Poor decision - unenforceable

    High Court in Northern Ireland, Titanic Quarter Limited -v- Neil Rowe [2010] NICH 14.

    The Plaintiff had put down a deposit on an apartment in Belfast but after losing his job and being forced to sell his home, could no longer afford to pay the apartment asking price.The developers, Titanic Quarter Ltd, sought summary judgment for specific performance to compel the Plaintiff to complete the purchase. Deeny J refused to make such an order, finding that a Court should not make an order "that will beat upon the air".

    TL;DR

    A court shouldn't order something that can't be done and there's precedent

  45. Anonymous Coward
    Facepalm

    Miss the point though really?

    Regardless of your views on the copyright infringement, does anyone seem to think that the motion picture crowd have gone after the roads rather than the smugglers?

    Newzbin indexes USENET. The infringing content is on USENET. To some extent NB2 is just facilitating easier downloads. But nothing is going to stop a usenet client that supports binaries from downloading stuff.

    Will we start shutting roads because we know people commit crimes and use roads?

    Before to long NB2 will be resurrected and hosted using tor and shutting it down will involve shutting down large chunks of the internet.

  46. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    You mean

    the judge made a sensible decision in a stupid case? Hat duly eaten.

  47. dephormation.org.uk
    Unhappy

    BT - The Biggest UK Copyright Infringers

    BT - who infringed the copyright protect works of tens of thousands of web sites and the people who created them using Phorm - is forced to block access to an alleged copyright infringing web site?

    And they have the cheek to claim 'mere conduit' as a defence?

    Its no wonder they lost... it is a tragedy of their own making sadly.

  48. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    With regards to Royal Mail

    My Dad has problems with mail workers stealing his mail, so I wouldn't put it past them when it comes to opening mail.

    Heck, some of my grandfathers had been tampered with...

  49. Levente Szileszky
    FAIL

    Seriously: just how did this mesuge Richard Arnold become a justice?

    "In throwing this out, Arnold pointed out that European law rejected ISPs' claims that they were not "intermediaries", nor "service providers". He also rejected the proposition that "operators of Newzbin2 do not use the service to infringe copyright".

    Actually, dear Judge Mesuge, relevant EU papers SPECIFICALLY STATE THAT ORDERING FILTERING IS ILLEGAL - of course, since you are High Court judge I'm sure it isn't expected from you to follow EU laws like this: http://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2011-04/cp110037en.pdf

    Actually mesuge is too soft here - since apparenetly not only both of you are Arnolds but both of you have roughly the same knowledge of current EU law hereby you shall be called Judge Schwartzenegger, period.

    "Judge Arnold said he believed site-blocking was proportionate, with the Human Rights Act's Article 1 – which protects the property rights of creators – outweighing Article 10's rights of free expression claimed on behalf of Newsbinz2 members, and BT"

    So let me get this clear, dear Judge Schwartzenegger: copyrights "outweigh" free speech?

    Amazing, just amazin how far a judge can crawl up in the movie industry's ass... are you really this stupid or it's just your stupid niece needed that job?

    For a COMPLETELY OPPOSITE STANCE by EU Advocate General Cruz Villalon please see my link above. Cannot wait to see when EU courts strike down your inane junk, Judge Schwartzenegger.

    "The Studios have made it clear that this is a test case: if they are successful in obtaining an order against BT, then they intend to seek similar orders against all the other significant ISPs in the UK. The other ISPs were invited to intervene in the present application if they so wished, but have not done so."

    Oh well... all ISPs have heard you, all eyes on you, right, Judge Schwartzenegger?

    Once again, this is the type of garbage you can expect when you let idiots like this to rule about things dear to their heart: http://jiplp.oxfordjournals.org/content/4/3/224.extract

  50. Tony Paulazzo
    Alien

    It would be better

    if North America just shut out the rest of the world and we ignored her. They can just carry on picking on Canada and the south, and the rest of the world could get on with their lives. Seriously, fuck Hollywood and all who sail in her. Fnord.

  51. Anonymous Coward
    Mushroom

    Newzbin 3?

    As soon as a way round the block is found, news of it will spread faster than Ryan Giggs' identity, rendering all future blocking attempts futile. Sadly, this knowledge will also let perverts access disgusting sites. But it's either that or go down the road to censorship.

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