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Luke Styer
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 20 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 1515
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| Posted: 04 February 2012 at 9:08am | IP Logged | 1
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Matt Reed wrote:
| And the dry cleaners down the block with a backroom drug trade or the restaurant with a bookie room are also doing legit business. Just because there's a front making the appearance of a legal entity doesn't mean that the owners are unaware of the illegal activities being conducted on their property, real or virtual. |
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Vinny Valenti said he wasn't against the indictment; he was troubled because legitimate users "have been locked out of possibly important personal or business-related files[.]"
To adopt your dry-cleaner analogy, it sucks to be a legitimate customer of the drycleaner who can't pick up his suits because the cops have cordoned off the building.
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Stuart Vandal
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 02 July 2008
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 143
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| Posted: 04 February 2012 at 9:35am | IP Logged | 2
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"To adopt your dry-cleaner analogy, it sucks to be a legitimate customer of the drycleaner who can't pick up his suits because the cops have cordoned off the building."
True, but do you blame the cops or the dry cleaner who was happy to have illegal stuff going on in his back room? And if you knew the cleaner was doing illegal stuff, you also knew there were risks involved in using even just his legitimate business, such as one day being unable to access it because the law finally came down on him. Plus, you also knowingly chose to support a crook, so frankly I'd have little sympathy for you now being inconvenienced by that poor choice of association.
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Luke Styer
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 20 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 1515
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| Posted: 04 February 2012 at 10:26am | IP Logged | 3
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Stuart Vandal wrote:
| True, but do you blame the cops or the dry cleaner who was happy to have illegal stuff going on in his back room? |
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Why can't I blame both? I'd blame only the dry cleaner if we were talking about a temporary loss of access to my clothes. I'd add some blame for the police if they don't take steps to make it right in a reasonable amount of time.
QUOTE:
| And if you knew the cleaner was doing illegal stuff, you also knew there were risks involved in using even just his legitimate business, such as one day being unable to access it because the law finally came down on him. Plus, you also knowingly chose to support a crook, so frankly I'd have little sympathy for you now being inconvenienced by that poor choice of association. |
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I'm sure there were any number of RapidShare users who didn't know it was (allegedly) being used to facilitate piracy. That wasn't its advertised function, like the Pirate Bay.
Edited by Luke Styer on 04 February 2012 at 10:27am
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Stuart Vandal
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 02 July 2008
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 143
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| Posted: 04 February 2012 at 10:55am | IP Logged | 4
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"Why can't I blame both?" Because the police are only doing their job, stopping criminals from committing crimes. If the crooks are using a legitimate front to hide their business, the police are not obligated to reopen that front.
"I'm sure there were any number of RapidShare users who didn't know it was (allegedly) being used to facilitate piracy. That wasn't its advertised function, like the Pirate Bay."
And for the ones who genuinely didn't know, I feel some sympathy. But none whatsoever for those who knew and tacitly agreed with the piracy by using the site anyway.
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Matt Reed
Byrne Robotics Security
Robotmod
Joined: 16 April 2004
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| Posted: 04 February 2012 at 11:33am | IP Logged | 5
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Luke Styer wrote:
| Why can't I blame both? I'd blame only the dry cleaner if we were talking about a temporary loss of access to my clothes. I'd add some blame for the police if they don't take steps to make it right in a reasonable amount of time. |
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That's not the job of the police, Luke. "Making it right" means going through the court system. You certainly can't hold police accountable for doing their job based on the information that they have.
In any event, I still posit that my analogy makes sense. No matter how many legal activities were being conducted at the site in question, ultimately they were shut down for their many illegal activities. That people unaware of those illegal activities lost the ability to conduct their business is an unfortunate side effect, but ire should be directed solely at the owners who chose to run their operations in the manner in which they did.
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Luke Styer
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 20 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 1515
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| Posted: 04 February 2012 at 5:10pm | IP Logged | 6
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Stuart Vandal wrote:
| Because the police are only doing their job, stopping criminals from committing crimes. If the crooks are using a legitimate front to hide their business, the police are not obligated to reopen that front. |
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I didn't say they were obligated to reopen the front business. I do think they have a moral (though likely no legal) obligation to return non-criminal property to its rightful non-criminal owners.
QUOTE:
| And for the ones who genuinely didn't know, I feel some sympathy. But none whatsoever for those who knew and tacitly agreed with the piracy by using the site anyway. |
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I'm basically fine with that.
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Luke Styer
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 20 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 1515
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| Posted: 04 February 2012 at 5:24pm | IP Logged | 7
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Matt Reed wrote:
| That's not the job of the police, Luke. |
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I'd argue that minimizing the harm to innocent third parties caused by police action should be considered part of the job of the police, Matt.
QUOTE:
| You certainly can't hold police accountable for doing their job based on the information that they have. |
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Why can't I?
I'll agree that I shouldn't hold police accountable for most "side-effects" of police properly doing their job based on reasonably reliable information. But police make mistakes in the manner in which they act on information, and police act on information that is unreliable. Mistakes are a part of all human endeavors. Why should police, in particular, be free from accountability?
QUOTE:
| No matter how many legal activities were being conducted at the site in question, ultimately they were shut down for their many illegal activities. |
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Well, no, they were shut down for their many alleged criminal activities. Last I heard they had not been convicted of anything yet. I have no problem with their being shut down for the alleged criminal activities, but lets not just forget about adjudicating the allegations.
QUOTE:
| That people unaware of those illegal activities lost the ability to conduct their business is an unfortunate side effect, but ire should be directed solely at the owners who chose to run their operations in the manner in which they did. |
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I'm not so much worried about people losing "the ability to conduct business," I'm talking about people losing their property. Their files in the case of Rapid Share, or their clothes dropped off at the cleaner's in your example.
I don't care that the users can no longer store their files on Rapid Share's computers, even if they already paid for "more time" than they've used. I care that they can't get their files back. I don't care whether the customers' clothes get cleaned, even if the customers already paid for the service when they dropped their clothes off. I care whether the customers get their clothes back.
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Stuart Vandal
Byrne Robotics Member
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Location: United Kingdom
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| Posted: 04 February 2012 at 5:53pm | IP Logged | 8
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"I didn't say they were obligated to reopen the front business. I do think they have a moral (though likely no legal) obligation to return non-criminal property to its rightful non-criminal owners."
And I would agree with you on that. That said, while the police need to return it (and, I believe, do have an obligation to do so, if someone can prove it's not connected to the alleged criminal copyright breaches), one problem will be sifting through all the stuff that's there to pick out the legal from the illegal. Another problem will be that though anyone who has had legal property seized will consider the top priority to be the return of said property, I suspect the police will consider that lower down than looking for the evidence they need - and sadly I think the police will be right on that. A potential third problem I can envisage is, ironically, one of the excuses the illegal downloaders frequently use - "it's not theft, it's just copying" - if the police have that mindset, then digital files aren't property, and the police therefore haven't seized any property and so don't need to return it.
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Luke Styer
Byrne Robotics Member
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| Posted: 04 February 2012 at 6:05pm | IP Logged | 9
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Stuart Vandal wrote:
| A potential third problem I can envisage is, ironically, one of the excuses the illegal downloaders frequently use - "it's not theft, it's just copying" - if the police have that mindset, then digital files aren't property, and the police therefore haven't seized any property and so don't need to return it. |
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The police have seized and/or blocked access to the physical media on which the data is stored. That's more analogous to running off with the physical DVD than it is to copying the movie.
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Vinny Valenti
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 17 April 2004
Location: United States
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| Posted: 05 February 2012 at 6:23pm | IP Logged | 10
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Interesting Forbes article about the futility of anti-piracy legislation: LINK
(I don't necessarily agree with everything he says, but he certainly seems to get it more than the *AA does)
Also, an article about how Louis CK sold his latest concert video in a completely DRM-free, easily piratable format, yet was still able to rake in over $1 Million in sales in less than 2 weeks - LINK
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Monte Gruhlke
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 03 May 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 3303
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| Posted: 05 February 2012 at 8:25pm | IP Logged | 11
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Why should police, in particular, be free from accountability?
Seriously? They are not. You act as though mistakes and unreliability are the status quo for the police. Like any enforcement agency, they act on the information they have. The police make every attempt to validate their sources to build the strongest case possible before taking on the risks of following through.
Whether or not you knowingly knew about the bookie operation at the cleaners, it doesn't matter. After the bust, go down to the station, present your i.d. and fill out paperwork to get your clothes back. There are procedures about everything.
Honestly, determine who the backers are behind SOPA and see how this bill benefits them the most and who it actually excludes. Lately, any legislation attempted (to protect people from... <whatever>) will benefit the backers behind the bill, and not the average person as such bills are alleged to do.
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Luke Styer
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 20 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 1515
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| Posted: 05 February 2012 at 8:59pm | IP Logged | 12
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I never said they are. Matt Reed said that "You certainly can't hold police accountable for doing their job based on the information that they have." I'm disagreeing with the suggestion that they certainly can't be held accountable.
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| The police make every attempt to validate their sources to build the strongest case possible before taking on the risks of following through. |
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Most of the time, perhaps, they make a good faith effort to validate sources of information, but do you honestly believe that police invariably "make every effort"? Police departments are institutions made up of humans, and there is no large-scale human institution without at least some members who cut corners.
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Topic Closed)
