By Jon Newton - p2pnet.net

Hollywood has come up with a new way to suborn consumers' hearts, minds and wallets.

It's called the Piracy Deterrence and Education Act of 2003 which, if it gets by the US congress, will have the FBI working for the entertainment industry against file-sharers, among others.

HR 2517 is designed to, "To enhance criminal enforcement of the copyright laws, educate the public about the application of copyright law to the Internet, and clarify the authority to seize unauthorized copyrighted works."

Fronting it are Hollywood stalwarts Howard Berman and Lamar Smith.

Under Section 3, Deterrence and Coordination, the director of the FBI would develop a program to, "deter members of the public from committing acts of copyright infringement by--

(A) offering on the Internet copies of copyrighted works, or
(B) making copies of copyrighted works from the Internet, without the authorization of the copyright owners; and,
(2) facilitate the sharing among law enforcement agencies, Internet service providers, and copyright owners of information concerning activities described in subparagraphs (A) and (B) of paragraph (1)."

And by an amazing coincidence, Senator Orrin 'Terminator Four' Hatch (R-Utah) is attempting to revive Berman's failed plan to allow copyright holders to remotely destroy music pirates' systems.

Could these two events be components of yet another Hollywood orchestrated attempt to not merely dominate, but totally control, the on- and offline international entertainment market?

In the meanwhile, under "DESIGNATION OF AGENTS IN CHIPS UNITS", HR 2517 also calls for the US attorney general to:

"... ensure that any unit in the Department of Justice responsible for investigating computer hacking or responsible for investigating intellectual property crimes is assigned at least one agent to support such unit for the purpose of investigating crimes relating to the theft of intellectual property".

and, under TRAINING, the US attorney general would:

"... ensure that each agent assigned under subsection (a) has received training in the investigation and enforcement of intellectual property crimes."

CHIPS are, of course, members of Computer Hacking and Intellectual Property units.

nnnnnnnnnnnnnnooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

Well this sucks, I'll just have to download more, just to piss off the RIAA!

Given my observations on geopolitics as it relates to all this, all I will add here is that if this latest Orwellian-Stalinist initiative from the uber-paranoid government-media-entertainment complex were to be enacted, we as a nation will have effectively forfeited any right whatsoever to criticize any other country that engages in the same kinds of tactics against their populaces for their own, differing reasons. Especially since, if the U.S. government were to open its mouth about, say, China's or Cuba's abuses of human rights in this way, these countries could come right back and cite something like this as proof of "U.S. hypocrisy" or something like that.

The same FBI that lost over 200 laptops and firearms?
Same FBI that was infiltrated by Russian spies?
Same FBI that so successfully prevented 9/11 ?
Same FBI that employs retarded sleazeheads and old farts, who know less about technology than my grandmother?

Bring it on, ho.

oh, it's just the same old spiel as before. ooops. carry on.

My thoughts on the FBI getting involved in this are: Filsharing is too big to police, when are most ppl going to see this. illegal File sharing is a world problem with too many followers, and i personally doubt the FBI has the man power to stop it.

Dear FBI, please arrest US Senator Orrin Hatch for copyright infringement of Milonic Software's Javascript. These pirates must be stopped at all costs!
Perhaps if the FBI was in charge of this "horrible crime" of filesharing they would stop the RIAA from making a true mess of things.
FBI: shall we chase down internet pirates or forgein terorists?
RIAA: shall we sue pirates or rip off artists?
Seriously, if the FBI thought that filesharing was a real problem they would be busting people allready. Perhaps they think that $150,000 fines are outragous and attacking college kids isnt worth it?

This is the same FBI that hung up on me when I tried to talk to them about legal issues involving music last month.

They said they had far more important things to worry about, like terrorism. If the FBI gets involved, it's not because it was their idea or they even give a shit.

I just emailed my representative in New Jersey, and my future representative in Texas (oddly enough, my NJ rep is a Republican and my Texas rep is a Democrat... anyway...)

Anyway, I wrote a long message, much of which you can probably guess the content of. But I closed it off with this line...

"The times are becoming increasingly frightening for freedom-loving Americans. So much so that many of us are thinking about becoming freedom-loving Canadians."

-- Funksaw

Funksaw, You and I think alike. I have been seriously contemplating going to Cherokee, NC. and claiming my heritage
...and assylum! Things are getting pretty bad when people would even consider giving up our citizenship.

Support local and independent music!

The FBI hasn't been doing too well lately, I expect a few people there would like to see some easy targets to up their publicity a little. Just threaten a few people on the internet and suddenly youve busted an international piracy ring causeing $15,000,000 of damage every year. So much less work than going after those terrorists.

Im still waiting for someone to start touring schools with presentations on the evils of the internet and how piracy destroys the economy. We have them lectureing on drugs and safe sex, why not piracy? Because theres no government anti-piracy program. This looks like the US is getting one, through theres still no sign of one in the UK.

Hey Funksaw:

"... many of us are thinking about becoming freedom-loving Canadians."

You think? I'm Canadian (Vancouver Island).

Check this out: http://www.p2pnet.net/issue01/news4.html

Cheers!
Jon

I'm with Funksaw and Indie. If much more of this crap gets passed I'm moving to the Netherlands and claiming my heritage. I don't care if I have to learn to speak Dutch first.

And while the FBI is hunting down us awful file sharers, September 11 part 2 will happen right under their noses...again. Making them and the RIAA more despicable.

Relax guys. The government can't even pave fucking roads. If you want to know how "in control" they are, look at the road conditions. I hope the next hijacked plane hits their headquarters. Retards.

The FBI was worried about Clinton's penis and cum stains while America was slowly losing ground on intelligence that would stop those who would perpetrate Sept. 11.

It's funny, America, once the bastion of freedom and independence, now has members that want to move out to Europe, Britain and Canada!!! It's ironic that escaping the "tyranny" of Britain 200+ years ago results in returning to the "motherland" of sorts!

Sweet Jesus irony.

Canadians welcome all with open arms! We still have lots of natural resources here for now...

Is there an organized effort to oppose the Privacy Deterrence and Eradication Act?

I believe the following measures are necessary:

- Create a top 10 list of Congressmen opposed to individual freedom, clearly purchased by Corporations.

- Put 90% of effort and funds into ensuring that they lose their next election.

- Put remaining 10% of effort and funds into dethroning others in the next election.

- Boycott the RIAA. Create an official list of media companies that are or aren't members. Encourage current members to leave the RIAA to renew their business.

- Help to support alternative business models, promoting artists that don't stand a chance of success through the oligopy.

No way Funksaw and crew! We're having enough trouble trying to maintain our own freedoms without you guys coming up here attracting more attention to Canada from your agencies of Bullshit! The U.S.-led drug war and hyper-law-enforcement that has come from it are things that America created, but Canada has to deal with. No chance are we going to let everyone who's not happy with it come up here so they have reason to bug us more. Even now, every time an issue comes up, they're still whining, "well remember when all those draft-dodgers came up here and blah, blah..." Not this time dude- you've got to fight your own government from the inside, just like us.

P.S. we'll help however we can but you gotta dig in.