Last week, I wondered about Green or Pirate Party Membership and got some good comments. Thanks to all for those. There seemed a slim leaning towards the Greens and a good point made that “Pirate Party” is a very bad name in a coastal area like mine. I’ve ranted before about the abuse of “piracy” to mean “unauthorised copying”.
This week, Lord Mandelson forced three-strikes up the priorities (something we avoided in parliament, except for the KangKaroo Court ISP). Please go answer the consultation if you haven’t already and make some comments against increasing the already-unfair and excessive influence of foreign media corporations on UK law enforcement.
On that theme, the BBC reported on Somerset’s own excessive filesharing arrest. Over seven hours detainment without a phone call for suspicion of breach of the Copyright and Patents Act – how is that reasonable?
One interesting phrase in the report:
“the downloading of any copyrighted item, without the owners consent, was a crimnal offence and not a civil one …first I knew of it!”
I’ve encountered everything from disbelief to outright abuse when I’ve told people about this. Did you know copyright and trademark infringements are criminal offences these days?
Finally, why is it that the Federation Against Copyright Theft (urgh, another abused word) can get Avon and Somerset Police to work for them, but when my co-op reports a high-tech crime to ASPolice, we don’t even get a reply? Wouldn’t the population prefer the police to raid spammers and attackers?