It's About Time for Congress to Improves [sic] the Copyright Office

"In the pecking order of Washington organizations, the Copyright Office is close to last. The head of the Copyright Office does not report to the president. He reports to the Librarian of Congress. That’s right: the Librarian of Congress, who in turn reports to various members of Congress.

H.R. 1695 is a great start to remedy that situation, but it could be improved. For example, under the current bill, the Librarian of Congress would still select the Associate Registers of Copyrights. An improved bill would remove the Librarian of Congress from all responsibilities with respect to the Office of Copyright.

An astute observer might suggest that the obscurity of the Copyright Office and benign neglect in Washington have benefitted the copyright industries. Perhaps. The copyright industries have done quite well economically for decades without a forceful voice in government to advocate for them or to look after their interests. Have they done well because of neglect, or despite neglect?"

Thursday, May 20, 2010

Axis of P2P Evil? Congress, RIAA call out six worst websites in the world; Ars Technica, 5/19/10

Nate Anderson, Ars Technica; Axis of P2P Evil? Congress, RIAA call out six worst websites in the world:

"This morning, the Congressional International Anti-Piracy Caucus held a press conference along with RIAA CEO Mitch Bainwol to call out the six worst websites in the world. Think of them as an "Axis of P2P Evil."

Who made the cut? The Pirate Bay, naturally. Canada's IsoHunt was no surprise. One-click download service RapidShare was less expected, as a German court ruled only two weeks ago that the site was not responsible for infringement by its users and that it had no duty to preemptively censor uploaded content.

More surprising were the last three sites: Ukraine's MP3fiesta, which operates like the now-shuttered allofmp3.com; Luxembourg's RMX4U.com, which bills itself as "the biggest community for black music in world!"; and Baidu, the Chinese search engine so popular, Google couldn't even make a dent in its ratings.

The IAPC is a bipartisan group of 11 senators and a huge number of representatives, and they are concerned that America's copyright industries are suffering at the hands of "lax or nonexistent enforcement by many foreign governments." That's why, they wrote in a recent letter (PDF), the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) is so important.

But look at that list of websites and services for a moment. What's missing? Grokster, Demonoid, Oink, Allofmp3, LimeWire, Napster, Newzbin, Mininova...

That's because the copyright industries have in fact been remarkably successful in court within the existing legal frameworks of both the US and foreign countries over the last few years.

Newzbin announced its own closure this week after a long legal fight, while LimeWire lost in a US federal court last week. Even the Pirate Bay's ISP had to stop hosting the site this week, and a Swedish court has already ruled against The Pirate Bay's administrators.

Hold your children close

Still, even with such tremendous victories behind it, the RIAA can't resist a spot of over-the-top rhetoric.

"The global challenge in the years to come will be to win the battle for a civilized Internet that respects property, privacy and security," said Bainwol. "An Internet of chaos may meet a utopian vision but surely undermines the societal values of safe and secure families and job and revenue-creating commerce. Shining the spotlight on these websites sends a vital message to users, advertisers, payment processors and governments around the world."

Yes, that's right: a Ukrainian website called "mp3fiesta" is threatening the safety and security of your family. And a good chunk of Congress wants to do something about it."

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/05/axis-of-p2p-evil-congress-riaa-call-out-six-worst-websites-in-the-world.ars