Be Excellent To Each Other

Yep. Given equivalency of functionality, I'd always go the legitimate route.

If anything, I think sales will go down initially by blocking piracy completely. When looking for new bands I'll download their albums to see if they're any good. If I like it then I'll pay for it, if not it gets deleted (no point taking up HDD space with shit I won't listen to).

Although I'm probably not the average internet user's blueprint, I'll admit.

I'd say £1 a TV show is too much.

I currently pay £60ish for Sky and £10 for Usenet. Plus I buy series on DVD. I'd definitely save money paying a quid an ep for whatever I wanted.

If they put out epic stuff at 1p per download, and made it just as easy for me to get stuff from the Internets to my TV as it is now, I still wouldn't pay them the 1p, because I can get it for free. And I suspect lots of people are the same.

This is actually so frustrating - the full series is already available on iTunes US, as are series 2 and 3. I am willing to pay for them now but I can't until they have been broadcast over here, which at current rate is two years after their original US airing.

It is tactics like that that turn people to the dark side.

A couple of important questions, and a couple of important answers:

1: Is this going to stop, prevent or significantly curtail piracy in any wy, shape or form?

A: Is it fuck.


2: Will this inconvenience 'legitimate' Newsbin users?

A: Yes.

Not really - the ban on foxhunting makes foxhunting illegal. There is nothing in this court action that makes downloading legitimate non-infringing material from NZB sites illegal.

It would be the equivalent of enforcing the ban on foxhunting by making horses illegal.

it was a half formed thought.

A couple of important questions, and a couple of important answers:

1: Is this going to stop, prevent or significantly curtail piracy in any wy, shape or form?

A: Is it fuck.

2: Will this inconvenience 'legitimate' Newsbin users?

A: Yes.

OK - but what's the ongoing process? Who vets the requests from the MPAA or other bodies to ensure that they all refer to copyright infringing internet locations? Will a lawsuit be required in every case, or the equivalent of a takedown notice?

Pay a monthly fee, watch as much as you want, when you want, just like normal TV.

The only real downloading I do is TV series. Even though all the TV I download is/was on SKY already, I prefer to download them because it is convenient. I dont want to have to mess about with series links, making sure programs dont clash, making sure I dont miss the first episode or two because I did not know the date it started. It is much easier to press add program using Sickbeard and watch at my leisure.

All this is is a preliminary injunction against Newzbin; it's not like the judge just created an ad-hoc ban list that the *AA can add to at till. It's the first step on a worrying road, to be sure, but that's all it is: one step.

To be fair, Netflix and Hulu from the US have the "massive menu of stuff you can watch whenever you want" model, which is (he claims) clearly the model that's going to win out in the end. We're a bit behind the curve in the UK though.

+1. To be fair, Netflix and Hulu from the US have the "massive menu of stuff you can watch whenever you want" model, which is (he claims) clearly the model that's going to win out in the end. We're a bit behind the curve in the UK though.

Unless you cut Sky out of the mix entirely though (and good luck with that), you can bet we'll end up with the "massive menu of stuff you can watch whenever you want, as long as it's already been aired in the UK on Sky" model. Which is shit.

Unless you cut Sky out of the mix entirely though (and good luck with that)

Hmm, because the main driver for this stuff in the UK is inevitably going to be the BBC, then they are going to struggle to make it any kind of payment model aren't they?

Why would BT ever choose to fight any future similar request though? All it would get them would be court costs.

Which was also a reason for them not to fight this one, but they did.

The premium content we're talking about here (i.e. the stuff people pirate) is mostly Hollywood movies and American TV shows, and Sky pretty much own all that right now. The BBC don't really figure in that picture much. They'll always have iPlayer, but iPlayer isn't going to have the new season of (say) Glee on it.

I'd anticipate 2 pricing streams, one costing less with adverts in the stream (to be shown when you'd normally expect to see adverts), the other costing more, without the adverts.

I have used, sky's, bbc's itv's and C4's streaming services, all of them are free to me watch the on demand stuff (for sky I guess I am paying as part of my subscription).

From memory bbc and C4 don't have adverts and ITV and sky, have 1 or 2 ads (at the begining and perhaps in the middle), I don't have a problem with any of those methods.

A version of Hulu showing US shows but made available in the UK would be the stuff of my dreams, it must be said.

The problem isn't with the pricing model, it's with getting every content producer to agree to a distribution deal. HBO, for example, have locked themselves in with Sky for some ludicrous amount of time.

The BBC don't really figure in that picture much. They'll always have iPlayer, but iPlayer isn't going to have the new season of (say) Glee on it.

That is, of course, not really any more legal than just downloading the stuff in the first place.

I'm not convinced it is illegal either. What law am I breaking by using Netflix in the UK?

It said that using blocking technology designed to protect the public from images of child abuse, was inappropriate.

"Currently CleanFeed is dealing with a small, rural road in Scotland," ISPA council member James Blessing told BBC Radio 4's PM programme.

"Trying to put Newzbin and other sites into the same blocking technology would be a bit like shutting down the M1. It is not designed to do that."

Digital rights organisation the Open Rights Group said the result could set a "dangerous" precedent.

"Website blocking is pointless and dangerous. These judgements won't work to stop infringement or boost creative industries.

"And there are serious risks of legitimate content being blocked and service slowdown. If the goal is boosting creators' ability to make money from their work then we need to abandon these technologically naive measures, focus on genuine market reforms, and satisfy unmet consumer demand," said ORG campaigner Peter Bradwell.

He said more scrutiny needed to be paid to the content of such sites.

"What will qualify a site to be worthy of blocking? Who makes the decisions about what people people are allowed to see online?" he asked.

I'm not convinced it is illegal either. What law am I breaking by using Netflix in the UK?

It's copyright infringement.

Oil rigs can play DVDs now?

What an odd marketing decision.

However, the creative industries claim website blocking could save them hundreds of millions of pounds in illegal downloads.

The MPA said that Newzbin2 makes unlawful copies of television programmes and films, and receives in excess of £1m a year from its 700,000 users.

What I don't understand:



Sooo... this site makes 1 million. Now that they've stopped, these people think they'll suddenly make hundreds of millions.

How? It's pretty clear that people were willing to pay only that much. They're not going to suddenly start paying hundreds of times more just because the people they're not willing to pay that much to in the first place have cut them off from the cheaper option. Where is this magical pile of money coming from, exactly?

And that's without even considering the fact that heavy pirates will simply find a way around this (probably already have one, to be honest), or the censorship aspect. Ugh.

Also what the fuck is (sigh) "newzbin"? Am I the only one who'd never heard of it?

3: Will it curtail Newzbin's ability to profit from piracy?

A: Yes.