Hr 4279

[Drum Thumper]

This bill (http://www.dailytech.com/PROIP+Bill+Sails+Through+House+Appoints+Copyright+ Czar/article11762.htm) has the potential to kill not only legitimate music sharing sites, but could also kill off a very large portion of youtube, google videos, and MySpace Videos as well, just to name three potential targets.

As I said in my ROIO jukebox mod, I've taken a sudden interest in Government proceedings.

[Quakken]

From what I saw on the summary of the bill here (http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h110-4279&tab=summary), It would give more power to agencies in the government to combat internet crime and file sharing.

This is the full summary


Prioritizing Resources and Organization for Intellectual Property Act of 2007 - Amends federal copyright law to: (1) provide a safe harbor for copyright registrations that contain inaccurate information; (2) provide that copyright registration requirements apply to civil (not criminal) infringement actions; (3) require courts to issue protective orders to prevent disclosure of seized records relating to copyright infringement; (4) revise standards for civil damages in copyright infringement and counterfeiting cases; and (5) prohibit importing and exporting of infringing copies of copyrighted works.
Amends the federal criminal code with respect to intellectual property to: (1) enhance criminal penalties for infringement of a copyright, for trafficking in counterfeit labels or packaging, and for causing serious bodily harm or death while trafficking in counterfeit goods or services; and (2) enhance civil and criminal forfeiture provisions for copyright infringement and provide for restitution to victims of such infringement.
Establishes within the Executive Office of the President the Office of the United States Intellectual Property Enforcement Representative to formulate a Joint Strategic Plan for combating counterfeiting and piracy of intellectual property and for coordinating national and international enforcement efforts to protect intellectual property rights.
Directs the Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and the Director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) to appoint 10 additional intellectual property attaches to work with foreign countries to combat counterfeiting and piracy of intellectual property.
Establishes within the Department of Justice (DOJ) the Intellectual Property Enforcement Division to be headed by an Intellectual Property Enforcement Officer (IP Officer).
Amends the Computer Crime Enforcement Act to modify grant programs for combating computer crime to include infringement of copyrighted works over the Internet. Directs the Office of Justice Programs of DOJ to make grants to state and local law enforcement agencies to combat intellectual property theft and infringement crimes.
Directs the Attorney General to: (1) review Computer Hacking and Intellectual Property (CHIP) units and provide such units with additional support and resources; (2) direct each U.S. attorney to review policies for accepting or declining prosecutions of criminal cases involving intellectual property theft; (3) deploy five additional Intellectual Property Law Enforcement Coordinators in foreign countries to protect the intellectual property rights of U.S. citizens; and (4) increase DOJ training and assistance to foreign governments to combat counterfeiting and piracy of intellectual property.



It's kind of scary if you are a pirate. It doesn't outline what powers that the people who are going to be given the power are going to have, though. It's scarily open ended, perhaps, although it doesn't say this, they would be given free reign over any computer connected to the internet in america to check if they are doing illegal things, although I doubt it.

I couldn't read the link that drumthumper posted, the website it links to must be down

This quote-



Establishes within the Executive Office of the President the Office of the United States Intellectual Property Enforcement Representative to formulate a Joint Strategic Plan for combating counterfeiting and piracy of intellectual property and for coordinating national and international enforcement efforts to protect intellectual property rights.


scares me kind of, although it still doesn't outline what power this person will have. I want to know more about what this person can do, and how afraid to be that we will have to use hulu and other legitimate video sites to view our copyrighted content (not that there's anything wrong with watching some commercials here or there to get money to the people that it belongs to, I really like hulu, it's very well done.)

If this does end up forcing youtube to actually care about copyright infringement without having someone actually tell them that some of their content is copyrighted, then, well then we see more things hulu springing up. That's not a bad thing at all. It could even, maybe, help to make a legitimate bit-torrent esque application where you pay some money for a movie and you can download it, DRM free because it will be actually a challenge to pirate things.

But that won't happen. The pirates will probably always stay one step ahead of the government in this, and what will a copyright management lord do about it anyway?

[Crimson Sky]

I'm all for this Bill. As someone who breaks his nuts creating original content, I want my work protected online and off.

[Quakken]

I'm all for this Bill. As someone who breaks his nuts creating original content, I want my work protected online and off.

What is it exactly that you do again?


I just hope that if this bill passes senate, that the copyright overlord doesn't go completely overboard, I.E. putting all online video sites off the air until they can prove they own the copyright to every single chunk of intellectual property, or making owning a bittorrent client illegal (not that they would ever have that much power).

I don't think this will be that bad.

[Lord Ned]

It's too broad really.


Personally, I think the work of a private person (Say independant music artist, Crinsom, etc) should be protected, but you know, large cooperate stuff (popular music, tv shows, etc) shouldn't.

Sort of on the basis that private persons could be making their living off of this stuff, while the cooperate stuff has other ways to make their money with the same stuff.

[Drum Thumper]

Say independant music artist

Any musician who tells you that they create music for the money is flat out lying. The true money comes from promoting your work, which in the case of an artist means touring and selling merchandise.

[sirkillalot617]

Is that just for the US

[Drum Thumper]

Is that just for the US

Primarily, yes. In addition to the Copyright Czar position it creates, there's going to be a number of people throughout the world who will report to this person regarding mass copyright infringement in other countries.

[Quakken]

Who will report, meaning that the "czar" still doesn't have any power about what other countries do with america's copyrighted stuff.

[Lord Ned]

Well, any artist should really just make music because they love it... (Or whatever their art is)

[Drum Thumper]

Who will report, meaning that the "czar" still doesn't have any power about what other countries do with america's copyrighted stuff.

A certain torrent tracker got sacked by political influence from the MPAA in 2006--rightfully so I might add. Not too surprising until you realize that the servers for this site are located in Stockholm, Sweeden.

If you give this power to a political figure who reports directly to the President...the sky might be the limit. Possible, yes. Plausible, highly unlikely.

[Quakken]

We'll see if this passes senate.