Music industry watch

More biased P2P laws on the way

Just as the good folks from the EFF are making some headway, congress slings more crappy laws our way. The dubious senators Hatch and Leahy are introducing the "Protecting Intellectual Rights Against Theft and Expropriation Act of 2004". Wired news reports about this bill and another bill in the house judiciary committee:

In defending the Pirate Act, Hatch said the operators of P2P networks are running a conspiracy in which they lure children and young people with free music, movies and pornography. With these "human shields," the P2P companies are trying to blackmail the entertainment industries into accepting their networks as a distribution channel and source of revenue.

FUD! Pure FUD. Nothing else.

The house bill "would seek penalties of fines and prison time of up to ten years for file sharing."

Talk about the punishment not fitting the crime! This continues to be utterly ridicilous! And given that there are now reports that the music industry is bouncing back and doing better then ever, the argument that P2P hurts the music industry is complete crap!

This is not a representative government, I'm sorry. It's farce at best.

Posted by Mayhem at March 29, 2004 03:03 PM