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[cowofdoom78963]

Nice try but the law is always above the law!

[Muz]

Well, like all laws, it's most likely there just so someone can use it when they need to. It's not going to be 100% enforced. You have people running red traffic lights and driving without wearing a seatbelt not getting caught. Similarly, there's going to be thousands of copyright violations out there not being prosecuted. You can't prosecute Myspace or YouTube either, but this law gives the right for a person posting a copyright violation to be banned from those sites.

It's more to bringing down a large corporation that's breaking copyright laws, rather than taking down individuals. There's just no gain in taking down multiple individuals. It's not really about whether or not it's enforcable, it's more that you give them a tool to enforce it if they need to.

Big companies do break a lot of laws. That wireless LAN you have on your laptop.. that's unauthorized use of a patent. The company you bought your laptop from has probably been sued, but there's thousands of other unauthorized patents that have not been sued because it's just not worth the money.

[cowofdoom78963]

There's just no gain in taking down multiple individuals.

Except for the money to be made leeching off them if you can get enough off of lawsuit.

Its like people who give you free money for no reason!

[dragnar]

This treaty would end up just like all other anti-piracy attempts have- benefiting no one except for the pirates, who continue on as if nothing had changed. All a new method of stopping pirates does is reduce piracy for a few weeks, then hackers break through it and give pirates the same programs they were getting.

Ex: I bought Spore. I can install it only three times before I have to but it again. A pirate can install spore as many times as he/she wants, faster and easier than I can.

[Muz]

There's just no gain in taking down multiple individuals.

Except for the money to be made leeching off them if you can get enough off of lawsuit.

Its like people who give you free money for no reason!

You do know that lawyers are very expensive? You can only get like $1-10K from an individual pirating your stuff at best, and have to pay a lawyer $20K for it. Not to mention that you're wasting valuable time, which costs way more than suing individuals.

Your best case is to try to get an individual for sharing files with others, but even that won't net you more than a few thousand. You can't sue a guy with a $40K annual salary for very much, and the higher you aim, the more likely you are to lose the case, and still have to pay your lawyer.

[Earthquake Damage]

You do know that lawyers are very expensive? ...

But you don't have to pay for a full lawsuit.  Most individuals can't afford to defend themselves.  They'll settle out of court since it's probably cheaper.  If the defendant loses, they pay legal fees plus damages.  If they win, they pay legal fees.  If they settle, they pay damages, but probably at a discount since the offendant (so to speak ) won't have to go through a costly (in time and money) court battle to get their money, so they'll demand less. 

[Tack]

This treaty would end up just like all other anti-piracy attempts have- benefiting no one except for the pirates, who continue on as if nothing had changed. All a new method of stopping pirates does is reduce piracy for a few weeks, then hackers break through it and give pirates the same programs they were getting.

Ex: I bought Spore. I can install it only three times before I have to but it again. A pirate can install spore as many times as he/she wants, faster and easier than I can.

Yeah, the accepted way to deal with is to buy it to show support, then download a DRM free version. It's only right.

[PTTG??]

So, here's what we must pledge: if anyone is sued by a large corporation for piracy, do not settle out of court. Take them on and cost them as much as possible, even if you loose. Why? Because you can declare bankruptcy and only pay what you can, then start clean (ish. You might want to talk to someone who knows what he's talking about before trying this). The big corporations, however, must pay all of their considerable legal fees. And occasionally, a sympathetic judge or jury and a little bit of luck will get the case thrown out of court as trivial, or even better, you could counter-sue them.

A lot of people seem to think that it's impossible for the government to make such a catastrophic mistake. I am not so sure.

[sneakey pete]

Read it carefully; ISP's have to cut off internet to anyone who is accused of violating copyright immediately. If this treaty passes, i can accuse The NASA site of violating copyright, and NASA's ISP is duty bound by law to shut the site down right then and there.

Read what carefully? what proof at all is ther eof this yet? and after a week? i think that's all i need to say...

[Jude]

Who's gonna do the enforcing? The ISP's certainly aren't going to pay a shitload of money to enforce a law that will lose them customers. If it did pass, they would do it in name only, because anything more would be suicide.

Also, has anybody considered how this bill would fare in a body like the US congress?

This story is such an obvious hoax it's not even funny.

[Neruz]

Well the US has tried to impose US law on the rest of the world in the past.

It didn't work out so well for them then either.

[LegoLord]

I swear, if this is real, and it gets passed, there will probably be some sort of revoution.  Even if it's only protests.  If it's protests, you can bet I'd be a part of them.  Not sure about other sorts of revolutions, though . . .

And I'd happily post this on SA were I a member.  They have funny ways when it comes to people saying "if x then I'll y".

[PTTG??]

Who's gonna do the enforcing? The ISP's certainly aren't going to pay a shitload of money to enforce a law that will lose them customers. If it did pass, they would do it in name only, because anything more would be suicide.
Also, has anybody considered how this bill would fare in a body like the US congress?
This story is such an obvious hoax it's not even funny.

What, American congress? Who are they going to vote to support? Champions of industry or a bunch of criminals and cyberterrorists? Frankly there's not enough people who know what would happen if/when this treaty gets passed to be a major constituency, even in the member countries that are democratic. Congratulations, my friends. We are being legislated into a new Illuminati. Just without any political power.

I'm almost certain about how this would be inforced; there would be no new international agency created that treaty violations would be reported to. Rather, the treaty would ensure that the laws are shared amoungst the countries and that criminal investigations would be allowed to cross national borders.

The investigating bodies WOULD NOT be some external force, but rather the countries' own police forces. The only difference would be that it would be possible for an American investigation to reach into Saudi servers.

[Aqizzar]

Two things about that which strike me as completely backwards.

A) American Congressmen, especially Republicans, vehemently oppose any concept of "international law" treaties.  We still haven't signed onto the fucking International Court system yet, what makes you think any of those knuckleheads would agree to a law where all you have to do is accuse someone of piracy (and again, accuse them TO WHOM?) and your ISP has to shut your Internet off for a year.

B) They also represent the actual law-enforcing people in a country, who will also vehemently oppose being told what to do by some foreign non-governmental think tank, because they already have their own shit to worry about.  Any such system of "Report and Automatic Lockdown No Trial Ever" will carry mountains of paperwork to keep them from getting their asses sued for false accusal.

C) There is no such thing as international laws being enforced at a local level.  If this "treaty" were to be incorporated into American law, it would be by writing our own new laws that would comply with the treaty in some way.  And ergo, would either have to allow for actual fucking due process or the Supreme Court would strike it down in a matter of weeks.

And D) Why does everyone assume that every government everywhere will always do whatever "Big Business, man" wants?  The EPA exists doesn't it?  And even so, ISPs aren't going to want a law like this, because they sure as Hell don't want to be shedding customers left and right.

[PTTG??]

Well... Perhaps. I know as well as anyone it's easy to get worked up over trivial things over the internet, and I realize it's entirely possible that this is a hoax, or at least the Orwellian internet security thing is a hoax. But I'm still concerned. That's the worst part of this, is simply the fact that we aren't given enough information to know how bad this is. Anyway, found some more info:

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/10/these-42-people-are-shaping-us-internet-enforcement-policy.ars
http://lists.essential.org/pipermail/a2k/2009-February/003923.html

EDIT: This one's much better, it clears up a few things:
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/11/the-acta-internet-provisions-dmca-goes-worldwide.ars