Does banning the internet work?
So the government have managed to persuade a court to have access to The Pirate bay banned. They were persuaded by Digital Rights owners who managed to lobby the government into thinking that music is on it’s last legs unless the public are stopped from copying and ripping music.
The major ISPs have been told to block access to it. How exactly hasn’t been published, but no matter which method is used there will always be a way round it.
If it’s by IP address then the ISPs will be blocking any other website that is hosted on the same server as the Pirate Bay. AnnaRaccoon.com shares her computer with around 2,500 other websites. Now TPB might be so large that they have their own server, but they are also large enough to have multiple servers in different countries. Will all these IP addresses be stopped?
If it’s by URL then then are they stopping all TPB’s addresses. They don’t just reside on www.thepiratebay.org, they have many others too, like thepiratebay.se.
Either way all TPB has to do is change servers and update it’s DNS records or register a new domain and suddenly they are up and running again. If anything it just provides free publicity for TPB. It becomes a game of cat and mouse. The cat will eventually win but only by controlling access to the internet at levels equivalent to the Chinese.
Virgin have said that they are doing it the same way they handle The Internet Watch takedowns. However TIW have not been very technologically literate either when they managed to cause problems with Wikipedia when it was found that it hosted an album cover that was deemed to be offensive.
What does the ban on TPB lead to? Well it leads to the banning of pornography. Because you have to think of the cheeldren. It’s already happened because on Radio4 John Humphrys asked the ISPs why they weren’t blocking TPB to stop cheeldren seeing porn.
But then what is pornography? Is is hardcore or softcore. Is it extreme porn or just normal sex graphically depicted. Or will it be the easy case of banning paedophilia and zoophilia to start with because they can be easily categorised. Or you would think so. Does a cartoon of an anthropomorphic tiger having sex with a woman count? Do cartoons of little girls with big eyes being molested by tentacles count as both?
The get out phrase for the government is that they say they will make it an opt-in process. So you need to tell someone that you would like to watch porn. Therefore it’s not censorship. But do you really need to tell someone who records such an interest. Watching porn is not naturally something that someone wants everyone to know – though nearly everyone does look at porn to some extent. What about a couple where the man ticks the box to allow porn and the wife finds out. Does he really want her to know what he does in the shed?
The big music and film studies are the ones who are the real Luddites. Luddite means someone who is afraid of change especially technological change, not someone who is anti-tech. Rather than accept change in their market and adept to new technology they would prefer to stifle the Internet. When video came out the studies were all worried about copying but look at the film industry now. Copying still happens but people still like to pay to watch the film. It’s just that they don’t like having to pay to have multiple copies of it nor pay to see if they like it.
The studies think that by stopping copying that all the people who are doing the copying will switch to buying the material. At least that’s what the studies say when they bring out the figures to show how much they are “losing”. However some stats show that this is not the case. For instance in France the new Hadopi law (a three strikes type law which cuts of repeat offenders of copying) has been claimed to have cut down copying because the number of torrents has dropped dramatically. However looking at the big picture, it’s not just copying music which has dropped but actual sales as well. If people can’t try before they buy they might not buy at all.
Copying of music and film should be seen as a marketing practise to garner up interest. Some artists do this already; give away most of their music and make their money from merchandise and live shows and other personal appearances.
SBML
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May 6, 2012 at 12:28 -
Methinks initiating the “blocking” of TPB is but a ‘Trial Run” for implementing general censorship.
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May 6, 2012 at 13:01 -
“But then what is pornography?”
I think the classic answer is ‘You’ll know it when you see it!’..
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May 6, 2012 at 13:14 -
“Now TPB might be so large that they have their own server, but they are also large enough to have multiple servers in different countries. Will all these IP addresses be stopped?”
I’d guess they have dozens, maybe hundreds of servers. Yes, it’s easy to make a list of all the IP addresses and block them all.
“Either way all TPB has to do is change servers and update it’s DNS records or register a new domain and suddenly they are up and running again. ”
Registering a new domain doesn’t help if it’s IP addresses that are blocked. Nor does changing servers. You would have to change IP addresses.
And the world has actually run out of IP addresses, so getting a whole bunch of new ones won’t be easy.
Even if you did, well, here’s what I’d do. Every five minutes, check thepiratebay.org and see what IP address it’s using (a computer does this, of course, not a human). If it’s a new one, email the ISPs to get it blocked, also automated. So the new IP address would last as long as it takes a computer to respond to the request, i.e. anything from a tenth of a second (if done competently) up to a month (if done via a committee).
So piratebay have to get a new domain name. Easily done, but then they have to tell everyone the new domain name, wihch isn’t easy. So the word spreads about the new domain name, slowly. But within a day or so, I know the new domain name, and add that to what the watcher is watching. So now the new address (that most people don’t even know yet) is blocked. And so on.
None of this is exactly rocket science.
In America, they have the DMCA, and to get pirated content removed from the web, you send an email identifying the content, make an oath that it’s infringing, and tell them. In my experience, it’s removed quite quickly.
Maybe companies should let people try before they buy. But that’s up to them.
Maybe they should give away their product and make money on merchandise. But that’s up to them. Maybe beer should be free; give it away and make money on the t-shirts. But that’s up to the brewers.“What does the ban on TPB lead to? Well it leads to the banning of pornography.”
Uh, no it doesn’t. Banning porn is a completely different problem technically, and as of now, I can’t see a way to do it. There’s a huge difference between banning one site, and banning a million sites. It’s also a different problem socially.
Footnote: I used to write and sell antivirus software; even before most people used the internet, we had a problem with piracy, and we dealt with it as best we could.
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May 6, 2012 at 14:33 -
And the world has actually run out of IP addresses, so getting a whole bunch of new ones won’t be easy.
That should be are running out of IPV4 addresses but with IPV6 it’s going to be a rather long time for that to happen.The actual blocking depends on what they are blocking be it IP or DNS listing, either way a VPN is very helpful.
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May 6, 2012 at 16:24
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May 6, 2012 at 13:30 -
“The cat will eventually win but only by controlling access to the internet at levels equivalent to the Chinese.”
At which time it will be: Real Mission Accomplished
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May 6, 2012 at 18:18 -
I do find it curious for example, that radio stations have to pay record companies in order to play their music, when transmission over the airwaves is the best publicity you can get for a new release.
Whereas I am enthusiastic about the idea that composers, musicians (and others) get paid for their musical output, I do find the aggressive attitude towards file sharing to be unimaginative. Myself, I’d put out a low quality MP3 version of whatever I wanted to promote, on to as many file sharing services as possible, and charge for the studio quality version. And sue the pants off anyone who copied and distributed that.
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May 6, 2012 at 21:58 -
Lol…I don’t see anyone in the p2p world losing any sleep over this non event…
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May 6, 2012 at 22:47 -
When somebody produces some music that is worth listening to (or downloading) , please advise me.
Until then we are dealing with Mary Whitehouse (and david camoron) types trying to decide what is good for me-no thanks, I will self-censor, just I have done with the TV which I totally ignore these days.
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May 6, 2012 at 22:55 -
I am on Virgin Media and until a few days ago had no desire to visit TPB. Now it’s blocked, I find it pretty trivial to get to. Not a problem, I’m no freetard, but there is such a thing as the Streisand Effect…
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May 7, 2012 at 00:52 -
There are lots of images that upset some people. Gollywogs , images from Islam and pictures of UK policemen. To name a few.
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May 7, 2012 at 09:04
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May 7, 2012 at 08:22 -
I don’t know much but how do children see porn on Pirate Bay. All I ever see are lists of torrent files. Strikes me that when these cases are brought before the courts, the judge never ever tests the burden of proof. Imagine if a judge actually asked the plaintiff to show him how to access the porn on Pirate Bay…he’d chuck the case out in a minute.
And as for “artists’ losing money…that’s just bollocks. I know George Michael has a penchant for park benches but he’s hardly homeless.
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May 7, 2012 at 14:16 -
Gosh. Feels awful to be so counter-libertarian, but the issue is quite simply one of stealing.
Sure, the workings of the internet are technically way beyond the government (and me) and will undoubtedly be immediately circumvented by techy clever-clogs, but that isn’t the point. The point is: why is it considered acceptable to download for free the fuits of someone else’s labour?
A libertarian issue, if you will, since that philosophy relies upon the fair-dealing of all involved (since, ideally, the law ain’t).
In essence then: those anxious to continue benefitting without any quid pro quo, do not offer a Libertarian ideal, but an argument against the ideal itself, proof by their views and actions that it don’t work: people will always steal rather than barter or pay if the law isn’t involved.
Can’t quite follow the argument that the “banning of Pirate Bay ‘cos they are thieves” means that porn will be banned. It’s a non-sequitur both logically and politically – an attempt to conflate the nicking of someone else’s property with the right to freedom of expression. Not the same. Not even distantly related.
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May 7, 2012 at 19:33 -
Ahh, but I’m not saying that downloading copyright material is totally OK. What I’m saying is that if people do it, don’t stop it by stopping everyone. And rather than use the state to keep your out of date marketing system going well beyond it’s natural end, accept change and work towards using it. So let copying occur as Jeremy shows with the Grateful Dead example.
How banning TPB leads to the banning of porn is not because it’s the same technically. It’s because once the state has managed to have something banned and the population accept it, it’s a lot easier to work on the next thing. The method is to ban something that no one could rightly say should be allowed. Porn is the starting point. Once it’s banned, then you start changing the definition to encompass more and more. You also use the procedures to ban the next thing, working your way through a list of items of decreasing ease of banning. I mean you wouldn’t start with banning page 3 and then ban hardcore porn.
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May 8, 2012 at 14:35 -
So nicking copyrighted material isn’t OK, but it ought not to be stopped because lots of people do it? Can’t follow. Your argument would seem to suggest that because there’s so much burglary around my area and the police can’t cope the solution is to accept it and pile my possessions upon the pavement outside my house. But perhaps you mean that file-sharing is OK if it’s legal and we should only ban the illegal? (In which case, no argument.) As for the Grateful Dead – special case. Old-time hippies offer their stuff for free secure in the knowledge that their marketing base is so enormous that the cost to them is minimal. And the small individual – owner of something so desirable that consumers find it irresistable, and whose ‘marketing system’ is entirely personal and amateur? Sacrificed upon the altar of a philosphy that extends responsibilty-free IP freedom to his customers. (Sorry to sound over-the-top, but, as pehaps you’ve guessed, there’s a personal dimension to this).
Porn: your argument boils down to “because something illegitime has been banned, that power to ban means that the state will use such a ban to move on to legitimate activity. Well, sure, they will (they always will), but what has that to do with the banning of illegitimate activity? It simply means that arguments must be presented against overwhelming state incursions into private, legal areas.
Sorry, in all this to argue as if the state were the be-all and end-all (the statement that “that government is best which governs least” pretty well defines my beliefs), but in the case of TPB I simply cannot see that any other form of regulation defends those whose intellectual property is so easily stolen (out-dated marketing system or no).
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May 8, 2012 at 15:02 -
Nicking copyrighted material is one of those gray cases. Blatent copyright theft and profitering from it is a definate no-no. Copying the occasional item, especially if you already have a version in a different format is still technically illegal. But because it’s one of those impossible to police cases and it happens the best thing to do is acknowledge that it happens and use it to your advantage rather than bash everyone over the head to stop it from happening. It’s acknowledged as such in that you can record on your ancient VCR videos to use for timeshifting and no one will bother you for it. Ripping music off a CD to put on your MP3 player is a similar action.
It’s not just the GD who allow free sharing of their stuff and profit in other ways. Start up bands do it to make their presence known without having to go to a record label. Maybe they don’t get signed up because they’re shit, or maybe they’re good but they don’t get signed up because the record label doesn’t think it matches what they want to produce. Either way the market can decide if they’re successful or not by the simple fact that the more their music get copied the more succesful they are.
The thing is they aren’t blocking something illegal. They’re blocking a legitimate business which only provides links to actual material. Exactly like Google. So what they are doing is shooting the messenger, not the real criminals. Now if they went for the blatent copyright thieves then it could be argued that TPB might not exist, but who knows, they could switch to something else. This they can do because they are a legitimate business.
The connection with porn is that it is also legitmate. But like TPB it’s on the edge of what certain groups of people think is right, but well within the law and totally legal.
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May 8, 2012 at 17:08 -
OK, I guess we disagree, but I can’t let this go:
“The thing is they aren’t blocking something illegal. They’re blocking a legitimate business which only provides links to actual material. ”
So if I offer a portal I’m free of responsibilty? And if my portal links to child pornography? “Roll up, roll up, child porno this way…”
You’ll leave me free because I’m just the messenger?
OK, I know the classic Libertarian answer, but it leaves me decidedly unsettled, and child pornographers free to carry on. Simply cannot be right, philosophies regardless. And, ramping back, the argument holds for those who facilitate the ripping off of my IP.
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May 7, 2012 at 16:10 -
Oddly, doyen of all hippy bands, the Grateful Dead, both allow the sharing of their live music, and indeed, encouraged people to tape their shows, setting aside a “taper’s area” by the soundboard for this purpose. I have hundreds of GD shows, downloaded perfectly legally using P2P.
Yet – the Dead continue to release mastered copies of their shows on a regular basis, with a bumper box set each year; this years being the full set of 22 shows that comprised their epie European tour of 1972. 7200 copies produced, $450, they sold out in less than 24 hours, even though almost all the shows have been available for some years.
They can do this because they are fine musicians. As could any other band/singer do so. However, if you are crap then I can understand that filesharing is irksome.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Marketing-Lessons-Grateful-Dead-Business/dp/0470900520
“Marketing Lessons from the Grateful Dead: What Every Business Can Learn from the Most Iconic Band in History”
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May 7, 2012 at 16:57 -
Piracy & Porn are two separate issues.
Piracy exists because content is a) too expensive b) not easily available.
Children viewing porn is more complicated. The central problem with porn is that most parents are newbies on the internet and inappropriately allow their children on the internet without adequate supervision. Porn is irrelevant as there is plenty of content on the internet which is not child friendly (autopsy/accident photographs as an example). Creating a child friendly version of the internet is impossible.
What I find most shocking is British parents dont accept personal responsibility in raising their children, and instead want “nanny” to raise their children.
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