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Australian Net Filter Dead?

Drew Wilson — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 04:56:11 +0000

Not a lot of news is happening in Australia lately regarding the mandatory web filtering. So we decided to find out if anything has happened lately. Turns out, Australia has had an election with some rather historical results that could see to the demise of the net filtering plan.

Hung parliament. The last time Australia had one of those was 1940. Still, it's a term that Australians will now have to get use to now with no one winning a majority government. The results say that the Labour Party won 72 seats. The coalition, Australia's other major political party also won 72 seats. That left four other representatives to decide which side they choose to support - thus holding the balance of power. Two of those independents decided to support Labour while the other two decided to support Coalition - thus resulting in a dead heat according to ABC news. The Coalition, suggests Electronic Frontier Australia, is against the internet filtering plan, so since the two sides are on equal footing, I would imagine it would require support from both sides to pass such a filter. From EFA:

The upshot of all this is that without The Greens' support, filter legislation would not be passed in the House of Representatives, let alone make it through a hostile Senate where both the Coalition and Greens would vote it down. It therefore looks very unlikely that, even if the country independents were to make internet censorship a high priority, filter legislation could go anywhere.

So it sounds like the Australian internet filter, the one that would filter out "inappropriate content" and the one that could possibly even filter file-sharing content (though this was a matter of debate), is officially dead. It seems that a minority government is one very effective way of blocking legislation like this. Canada knows all about avoiding a Canadian DMCA. An election killed the first full iteration of the Canadian DMCA - known as Bill C-60 in the Liberal party government. Later, the Conservatives version of the Canadian DMCA, Bill C-61, suffered the same fate by dying on the order paper thanks to another election. Successive minority governments, including the current one in Canada, has historically been the number one killer of bad copyright legislation so far. It is entirely possible that the same kind of thing will happen in Australia for now. The news is, no doubt, welcome to human rights groups in Australia who fought long and hard for roughly two years. After Australia delayed the filtering plan, it seems that this was the last decision that would ultimately kill it for now. Have a tip? Want to contact the author? You can do so by sending a PM via the forums or via e-mail at drew@zeropaid.com.

Another Study Finds File-Sharers Are Big Content Spenders

Drew Wilson — Wed, 05 May 2010 04:49:16 +0000

Stop us if you've heard this one... actually don't because you've probably have. A new study shows that file-sharers do, in fact, pay more on content then non-file-sharers.

We've all heard of this. Big content screaming bloody murder saying file-sharers are killing the entertainment industry because they aren't paying for their content. Unfortunately for the entertainment industry, a growing body of evidence points to the exact opposite. A study (PDF) by the University of Amsterdam entitled "Legal, Economic and Cultural Aspects of File Sharing" sought to answer a few interesting questions including the purchasing habits of file-sharers and the results were quite interesting. One interesting finding was file-sharing as it relates to music:

Buying and file sharing turn out to go hand in hand. Music sharers are as equally likely to buy music as other people: 68% of file sharers also purchase music. File sharers buy as much music as non-file sharers. However, file sharers spend more money on merchandise and go to concerts significantly more frequently.

This does go along nicely with the general wisdom that file-sharing either has a negligible effect on the music industry or a positive effect on music. The rule I personally use is this: The biggest users of content are also the biggest spenders of content. File-sharers are often the biggest users of content. Therefore, File-sharers are often the biggest spenders of content. While it sounds like a rather simplistic way of viewing such a complicated matter, it's also very true as well. The study also goes in to other sides of content as well. For instance, movies:

As for films, file sharers turn out to buy significantly more DVDs than nonfile sharers. On average, file sharers and non-file sharers go to the cinema equally often.

For gamers:

Game sharers also buy games, and significantly more frequently too: 67% of file sharers are buyers as well. And if they buy, they buy significantly more games than non-file sharers.

The study goes in to detail about the motives of file-sharers buying content which really seems to go along with what many file-sharers have been saying all along:

Among file sharers, 63% of music downloaders might yet buy the music they first got for free online. Their main reasons for buying are loving the music – a key motive for over 80% – or wishing to support the artist (over 50%). Owning the CD sleeve and booklet are mentioned by a third of eventual buyers, as well as the higher quality of the CD. Forty-eight per cent of film sharers will buy a previously downloaded film at a later date, citing such reasons as liking it a lot or wanting the extra features the DVD offers.

This is more than likely great news for those involved in the scene as well because many NFOs have comments saying things like, "If you like what is being released, go out and buy it. [content producers] need your support too!" or the simple, "Try before you buy!" Those scene notices are, in fact, working if they needed to be used. Is this a one-off incident of a study that just happens to somehow come up with this conclusion or is this part of a growing body of evidence? The answer is the latter. Late last year, a poll in the UK conducted by Ipsos had a similar conclusion saying that file-sharers buy more music. Earlier last year, another study conducted by the BI Norwegian School of Management concluded that music pirates buy ten times more music then they download. In 2007, yet another study conducted by Industry Canada (an arm for the Canadian government) found that file-sharing increases music sales. If four studies were good, how about a fifth. in 2006, a study by Connectus Consulting tried showing that file-sharing has had a significant negative impact on music sales in Canada. When going through the evidence, they ended up showing that the music industry has been steadily growing in the face of file-sharing. So not only is this latest study showing an interesting trend, it appears that the study is a confirmation of a re-confirmation of a re-confirmation of a re-confirmation of a re-confirmation that shows that there is a positive impact to file-sharing. If you ever wanted any further evidence that big content is crying all the way to the bank, this would be it. [Hat Tip] Have a tip? Want to contact the author? You can do so by sending a PM via the forums or via e-mail at drew@zeropaid.com.

Access Copyright – Copyright Debate Will Rob You Of Your Livelihood

Drew Wilson — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 02:14:20 +0000

It seems Access Copyright, the same collective responsible for the Captain Copyright fiasco a few years back, has hit the panic button over the formal copyright debate happening in Canada. You’d think that a collective who watches over written works among other things would be highly adept to reading comments. Unfortunately, a recent press release would have you wondering if they bother getting all of their facts straight first.

Reading through the comments and transcripts, there’s been a lot of insightful comments with regards to the copyright debate being run by the Canadian government. One of the themes throughout the consultation has been allowing uses that are already legal in Canada for copyrighted works even though there is a digital lock on it. Another theme is an expansion on fair dealings, something many commentators and creators of works would more than likely find thrilling because it would allow greater flexibility when it comes to producing content. Another theme, which ties more closely with Access Copyright’s latest comments, is alternative ways creators can get paid in a digital environment.

Unfortunately, if you just read their press release entitled, “Copyright Debate Takes Aim at Your Livelihood”, you’d think that the consultation was nothing more than random people telling the government that people don’t deserve to get paid for their work. If one were to actually read through the consultation, such comments would either be extremely rare or non-existent. Very few, if any, are saying creators don’t get paid for their work in the consultation.

“This is because an important aspect of these consultations is being expressed online,” the press release states, “and that debate is dominated by individuals who do not agree you should get fair compensation for digital and other reproductions of your works.”

This is, unfortunately, either an ignorant statement or an outright lie. What this comment is doing is scaremongering their own members into believing something that is simply not happening. First of all, already, there are people from all walks of life, from scholars, to artists, to software developers to average users to business all commenting on the consultation. Second of all, if one were to actually read the commentary, even just some of it, one would realize that you would be extremely hard pressed to find anyone saying artists don’t deserve to get paid for their work. Already, there is an established consensus that people do deserve to get paid for their works in the consultation.

“It’s a simple fact that users outnumber us. But Canadian users involved in the online debate are so adept at leveraging the internet and social networks to their advantage, there’s a danger that your voices as Canadian creators and publishers will be drowned out by the chatter.” The press release further reads.

Unfortunately, those two sentences is also misleading to their own members. While a number of people at the consultation are average consumers, numerous content creators are also there expressing their opinions. In reality, content creators are a large part of the consultation and are in no danger of being completely drowned out by any one other single stakeholder. The reality of the consultation is also the fact that there are several large stakeholders involved including businesses, software developers, game developers, musicians, librarians, museum people, educators, the government (crown copyrights being a hot topic), novelists, publishers, record labels, consumers, critics, distributors, pharmaceutical companies, telecommunication companies, essayists, photographers, poets, and scholars to name a portion of them. It’s not a small consultation and it’s not just about one or two stakeholders. It’s a large number of stakeholders involved and no one stakeholder, so far, has been necessarily singled out in the whole process either positively or negatively.

“Your interests need to be expressed as forcefully as possible, and it’s up to you to get involved to make that happen.” The press release continues.

Probably the only positive thing in this press release is the fact that Access Copyright is letting their voice be heard and encouraging individual members to do the same. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. However, misleading their members in such a manner and saying that its members needs to have their points of views “as forcefully as possible” is wrongheaded. Whatever happened to having your point of view being voiced in a civil and polite manner? Certainly, at the end of the first round table, Minister Tony Clement noted, “as I anticipated, there, you know, we’re all polite, Canada is a polite society so I did have to read between the lines a little bit as to see there was some slight disagreements around the table.”

The question is, is Access Copyright trying to get their members to try and polarize the debate and dumb it down to, “Your stealing our work”? Is Access Copyright trying to upset the civility of the debate thus far? It’s one thing to voice your opinion, question someone else’s comments or even encourage other observers to voice a similar opinion, it’s quite another to use misleading or false information and encourage combative behaviour in an otherwise civilized debate. For those reasons, Access Copyright’s language was uncalled for.

Have a tip? Want to contact the author? You can do so by sending a PM via the forums or via e-mail at drew@zeropaid.com.

Tor2Web – Anonymizing Content and File-Sharing

Jorge Gonzalez — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 03:30:58 +0000

Ever wanted to post something online anonymously for all to see? Tor2Web might be an application for you.

Wired’s Threat Level has made an interesting find today – Tor2Web. The concept comes from the anonymizing concept of the Tor network (AKA the Union Router) which anonymizes web surfers and prevents information about them from being recorded. More from the report:

Aaron Swartz, one of the founders of Reddit, and Virgil Griffith, creator of WikiScanner have teamed up to provide users with a new service that gives them access to anonymized content posted through the Tor network.

The article says that the concept of anonymously posting content through the TOR network has been on the back-burner for years, but recently brought back to life over the fact that Wikileaks, a website devoted to people who either want to publish suppressed information or want to access suppressed information (often reporters), was facing legal pressure to take content down.

Since it’s based off of Tor technology, chances are, the content would be difficult to trace back to the source since it’s obfuscated through different routers. It’s unclear whether or not the content would be hosted on multiple servers as is the case with ThePirateBay after they got raided.

An interesting part was located further down the article:

The service is new, so there are a few drawbacks. There are only a couple hundred hidden sites currently available to peruse (many of them are file-sharing and storage services) but Swartz hopes that number will grow as more users become aware that they can publish information anonymously through Tor.

So it appears as though that not only is file-sharing possible, but is already being used as such. Anonymizing file-sharing has been an extremely difficult task since it’s either slow or not popular enough to hold many sought after files to become popular in the first place. Still, with the MPAA hoping to enact world-wide surveillance on the internet, such a system may ultimately prove popular. Here’s hoping that the founders don’t wind up on the wrong end of a lawsuit as a result of all of this.

In the mean time, with the advent of BitTorrent, eMule and MegaUpload/Rapidshare, there’s plenty of users happily file-sharing through other means, so it’s unlikely that Tor2Web will become a popular file-sharing means.

Tor2Web Homepage