The return of s92A
The Dom Post reports that the Government’s review of s92A has been restricted to finding a better process to terminate Internet accounts of copyright infringers, rather than allow a debate on whether termination of Internet access should be a legislated penalty.
It is distressing that the Government is pushing on with such a controversial provision, when the rest of the world is rejecting it. The French Constitutional Court just threw out a similiar French law as unconstitutional.
Child pornography is a far more henious problem than copyright infrngement, but Parliament does not have a law stating that people convicted of child pornography must lose their Internet account.
Run an online fraud, and you will not lose your Internet account – you will just be punished for the actual offending.
Telecommunications Carriers Forum independent chair Richard Westlake says it is disappointed a promised review of the law and its implications has not occurred. “There’s been nothing said or seen which would imply that level of broader consultation and re- thinking has taken place or is in place. There is a working group but we’re concerned the issue has been pre-judged.”
Richard Westlake is correct. The review has been given narrow terms of reference – to come up with a termination model. It is not allowed to come up with a model that does not include termination of Internet access.
Labour’s Clare Curran says:
Terminating internet accounts is a major point of contention. Financial penalties would likely be more effective, she says.
And Clare is correct on this point. No one at all is advocating there should be no penalty for copyright infringers. But the penalty should be a fine that matches or exceeds the value of the infringed material.
Judith Tizard was rightfully blamed for the original s92A. If the Government comes up with a new version that is not much of an improvement, then they will be the ones blamed.
What would be useful is for the Government to clearly state that they are open to solutions that do not involved termination of Internet accounts.
June 16th, 2009 at 9:25 am
Anything Judith Tizard has been involved with will be a disaster.
The woman is one of the more out-there loonies .
June 16th, 2009 at 9:48 am
Where is our General debate thread DPF?
June 16th, 2009 at 9:51 am
What would be useful is for the Government to clearly state that they are open to solutions that do not involved termination of Internet accounts.
hear hear.
if the net connection is terminated, what about the phone?
It is illegal to send kiddie porn through the mail, yet no one has ever suggested that offenders should lose their mail service.
June 16th, 2009 at 10:10 am
It is illegal to write dud cheques, but offenders do not lose access to banking.
It is illegal to erect a garage without resource consent, but offenders do not lose their land.
It is illegal to drive an unregistered vehicle, but offenders do not lose their car.
plus more sense from Ben Goldacre -
http://www.badscience.net/2009/06/home-taping-didnt-kill-music/
Not too, that the people driving this law are also curently attempting to raise licence fees for music used in public places from a few dollars a year to thousands, per venue.
June 16th, 2009 at 11:22 am
InternetNZ came out firmly against termination this week.
The French threw out termination as an option.
Get the message – termination should not be an option. Will you terminate power supplies – can’t run a PC without electricity? Cut off the phone too?
Rightsholder process should be to gather admissible evidence, get a court order (or go through Small Claims) and have the ISP act on a confirmed violation. Why should I have to prop up someone else’s business model that can’t or won’t adapt to changing conditions?
June 16th, 2009 at 12:29 pm
Stu flemming brings up the other major aspect to this. Above the draconian provision to cut off access to the internet, the most offensive part of section 92A was that the account could be terminated based soley on innuendo. There was no presentation of evidence, no trial, indeed no assumption of innocence. The copyright holders got to be judge and jury – the ISPs were forced to be executioner. Before even addressing the punishment, I certainly hope the process for conviction is addressed.
As to the punishment, internet is rapidly becoming an essential to modern life. The government obviously believes this as they are spending alot of our money on the provision of faster internet. That being the case, it seems inconsistent to consider cutting off internet as a punishment.
June 16th, 2009 at 2:24 pm
This National Government is starting to remind me of the one we voted out in 1999. they have stoped listening on too many iissues.
June 16th, 2009 at 5:31 pm
To level the playing field I suggest the same draconian remedy for false accusations from the same company – $1000 for a first offence adding a zero for each subsequent one – by strike 6 there fucked.
June 16th, 2009 at 10:48 pm
The politicians envy the freewheeling, vigorous internet world. They can’t tame it as they have the MSM with calls to the local editors, stroking press gallery egos, and foreign junket trips.
They will try to harness the net’s freedom of comment next. The hundreds of PR manipulators that politicians and bureaucrats have imposed on the taxpayer can’t steer the internet as they do state TV, state radio, and the rest of the MSM.
In reprisal for encroachments on net freedom let us all at least demand politicians lose the privilege that allows them to speak in the House free of any constraints of libel or copyight. Why should they be exempt when the man and woman in the street are not?