Music and movie piracy are "detrimental to the public health"
Posted by: in General NewsI don’t have much sympathy for music, movie, and video game pirates who get caught and punished, but the entertainment industry’s draconian response to the problem doesn’t exactly make them the good guys.
According to Wired, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors isn’t exactly on the side of the angels, either:
In an ordinance just adopted, the five-member board is declaring that piracy “substantially interferes with the interest of the public in the quality of life and community peace, lawful commerce in the county, property values, and is detrimental to the public health, safety, and welfare of the county’s citizens, its businesses and its visitors.”
The regulation was crafted at the urging of the Motion Picture Association of America and the Recording Industry Association of America.
Now citizens in the county who violate the ruling can have their houses and businesses shuttered, and be fined $1000 for each copyright violation.
If this measure is designed to combat large-scale criminal enterprises churning out thousands of bootleg copies of music and movies, fine. But I suspect the vast majority of those digital mobs are based in Asia or Eastern Europe somewhere, and this ruling will most likely punish teenagers torrenting warez via their parents’ PCs.
I bet mom and dad will be thrilled to learn they’ve been evicted because Junior downloaded a copy of Iron Man.
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