Internet Censorship Not the Answer to Online Piracy
I’m getting incredibly tired of the Brein Foundation director, Tim Kuik, who clearly suffers from megalomania and thinks that he and his organization will make the internet “much better” for artists. This is a quote by the Brein Foundation: “UPC and other Dutch internet service providers (ISPs) also need to place a blockade on Pirate Bay. A good sentence for innovation and creation.” Well Mr. Kuik, I don’t know how you think about it, but in my book limiting opportunities and freedom is anti-innovation per definition.
The fight against piracy is not something you can win by just placing a blockade on a torrent site. Restructuring the entertainment industry and investing in alternative ways for consumers to spend their money on products are the way to stop downloading. The point is that you need to remove the urge from the internet user to download pirated movies, music, games and software from the internet. This is not something you accomplish by blandly placing a blockade on one single torrent website. By doing this you anger a lot of internet users, who will then find an alternative website to get their torrents or use proxy servers to regain access to the blocked website.
Basically what happens right now is that the entertainment industry tries to hold on to the old ways, hiring a bunch of lawyers to sue torrent sites and downloaders, and funding organizations like the Brein Foundation. Instead, the industry should be using this money for innovation and thus creating a system where downloading internet users are transformed into loyal and paying customers. Creating new 20-second long piracy warnings and placing them on every DVD and Blu-Ray disc isn’t going to stop piracy either. Just look at the success of services like Hulu and Netflix. Not only does this show that consumers are happy to pay for content when the price is reasonable, it also shows that services like these can be an answer to reduce global piracy. Again, the industry needs to invest less time and money lobbying for new regulations, and instead start creating innovative services that make piracy less attractive for potential customers.
I agree with you. They don’t accomplish anything with this, they just upset people. Those people will find a way to avoid the blocks anyway.
I definitely agree. BREIN reacting like that shows that they are a corrupt organization. They’re rejecting anything that goes against their definitions, and “copyright” and “intellectual property” are nowadays used as only an excuse for something that is usually bigger (and grants more power over the subject in question)
Here is a statement that somewhat indicates how BREIN is corrupt:
BREIN is an organization that claims to want to protect copyright-holders. Copyright, as the name states, is a human right. More loosely taken, this means BREIN poses as an organization that wants to improve people’s lives, help them.
But from the way they interact with the people who try to reach them – people who are not part of the higher ladder (Hollywood, governments, for example) – you can see that they do not care. They seem to simply care about one thing: Money.
Their lawsuits – and the lawsuits in America by similiar organizations – are a great profit for the “copyright-protection” corporations and those that support them. Their eyes are clearly focused on profit.
The bills in the USA, such as SOPA and PIPA, are also using “copyright”, “intellectual property”, and “piracy” as an excuse for invading people’s privacy and controlling what they may and may not search for, read, or watch.
I think they’re just both partners playing the same game – using fear, references to human rights, and the promise of exceptional security – they try to get more and more control over the people each day.