Australian Internet Filter (Yet another proposal)

[Brendeth]

 

The Abbott government is considering a major crackdown on online piracy, including forcing internet service providers to block websites that allow users to illegally stream or download movies, music and television shows.

The federal government is also considering implementing a "graduated response scheme" that could lead to consumers' internet accounts being temporarily suspended if they ignore notifications to stop downloading illegal content.

If implemented, the reforms could see popular file sharing sites such as The Pirate Bay blocked by some internet service providers.

Attorney-General George Brandis flagged the changes in a major speech to the Australian Digital Alliance forum on Friday.

 

"The government will be considering possible mechanisms to provide a legal incentive for an internet service provider to cooperate with copyright owners in preventing infringement on their systems and networks," Mr Brandis said.

"This may include looking carefully at the merits of a scheme whereby ISPs are required to issue graduated warnings to consumers who are using websites to facilitate piracy. This is a complex reform proposal, and how it is paid for is one of the principal unresolved issues."

He continued: "Another option that some stakeholders have raised with me is to provide the Federal Court with explicit powers to provide for third party injunctions against ISPs, which will ultimately require ISPs to take down websites hosting infringing content."

Such measures would be welcomed by entertainment companies and sections of the artistic community, but are likely to prove controversial among internet users and providers.

 

Australians are among the most avid users of pirating websites in the world. For example, Australians accounted for 16 per cent of all illegal downloads of television program Breaking Bad.

In his speech Mr Brandis said he stood firmly on the side of content creators in the copyright debate.

"I firmly believe the fundamental principles of copyright law, the protection of rights of creators and owners did not change with the advent of the internet and they will not change with the invention of new technologies."

He described the Copyright Act as "overly long, unnecessarily complex, often comically outdated and all too often, in its administration, pointlessly bureaucratic".

Source: http://www.smh.com.au/it-pro/government-it/george-brandis-signals-internet-filter-rebirth-20140214-hvchm.html

Here we go again. Personally I believe that Australia has such high rates of piracy due to a few major reason.

- Time delay in getting that media. Cinema releases are generally a few months behind and while rare we will sometimes have DVD releases hit the US before we even get a Cinema screening.

- Exclusive rights to content on our one cable company Foxtel, owned by Rupert Murdoch. e.g. Having exclusive broadcast rights to Game of Thrones, with iTunes Season Passes and other legal providers denied the right to supply until the full season is complete.

- Geoblocking limits our access to more legal ways of accessing that content (e.g. Netflix, Hulu)

- Pricing of media can be much more expensive as well. (e.g. TesseracT's latest album Altered State on iTunes is currently AU$8.82 on the US store, but costs AU$24.99 on the Australian store)

I personally believe that after addressing the above points, we will see more people looking to the legal way to obtain media and until then this Internet Filter will just serve as a way to enforce archaic views and further Rupert Murdoch's media monopoly over here.

Thoughts?

 

[DarkyDan]

Abbott is just plain retarded, it's all about power.  Things need to be done for the good of the country..  The NBN was a fantastic idea but my idiot fellow voters binned it.

 

All I hear about is legitimate spending being cut, and moronic climate change denial, sky fairy worshiping opinions of his being floated.  Surely the smarter folk in the Liberal party have proper ideas and policies somewhere than meets the eye.

[simplezz]

The fact that so many countries are implementing the exact same anti-piracy measures clearly indicates what many of us have known all along; that laws are written by the corporations, and representative democracy is open to the highest bidder. At least we know for certain that the whole system is corrupt now.

[The_Decryptor Veteran]

The biggest problem with piracy in Australia is that the legal means of getting the content are often being fought harder by companies than the illegal means. They complain about people downloading Game of Thrones, then go and sign an agreement stopping it from being available on services like iTunes for months, it's counter productive (Especially because an awful large portion of people don't actually see downloading movies or TV shows as being bad, if they can watch it on TV for free then why is it bad to watch it on their PC for free? etc.)

If they spent the same money on providing this content as they did on trying to stop us from seeing it, they'd cut into piracy rates by a lot, and see more income for it.

Edit: Netflix would make a killing over here.

[morebaker]

I always wonder why they try to implement this stuff when it is usually bypassed without to much trouble.

[Brendeth]

The biggest problem with piracy in Australia is that the legal means of getting the content are often being fought harder by companies than the illegal means. They complain about people downloading Game of Thrones, then go and sign an agreement stopping it from being available on services like iTunes for months, it's counter productive (Especially because an awful large portion of people don't actually see downloading movies or TV shows as being bad, if they can watch it on TV for free then why is it bad to watch it on their PC for free? etc.)

If they spent the same money on providing this content as they did on trying to stop us from seeing it, they'd cut into piracy rates by a lot, and see more income for it.

Edit: Netflix would make a killing over here.

 

Completely in agreement here, I started using Netflix a few months back (Via Unblock.us) and my piracy rates have dropped exponentially, I only tend to download the newest episodes of TV shows nowadays, and that is because I generally don't want the internet to spoil them for me.

 

[IsItPluggedIn]

As above, the cause of the large amounts of piracy in Australia is our ability to get content and the price of what is available. 

 

As we have few stations, shows will be cut half way through and new seasons will not be picked up. Then when you try to buy the content, it costs to much for it to be worth it.

 

The distribution service is broken, which is the cause of most of the piracy. 

 

TV stations get most of their revenue from AD's, put the content online with local AD's for free like its played on TV, with decent ability to connect to it and nobody will go through the effort to pirate stuff.

[Nashy]

So he said no to Labors, and proposes this?  ###### this.  Turnbull has shown he knows absolutely nothing about the Internet (except selling an ISP before it hits its prime) by the NBN joke.  Neither of them care what their constituents have to say on the matter.

They touch it, they will lose the election. 

[Raa]

:(

[compl3x]

I always wonder why they try to implement this stuff when it is usually bypassed without to much trouble.

 

Because they are technologically clueless & trying to prove their loyalty to their corporate sponsors.

 

Kicking alleged pirates off of the internet doesn't address the issues the OP so very clearly stated. Geoblocking, time delays, exclusivity deals, and absurdly high pricing are the real issues here.

[-T- Member]

Yet another Abbot wonder idea!! He's been remarkable in the 5 months since he was voted in, he's actually messing things up at a spectacular rate. Labor must love him as they'll get right back in power in an instant

[+Anarkii Subscriber²]

Every post here is valid. 
Australia is behind the times when it comes to internet. 
Hell, people do it only because shows don't make it to Australian TV until literally 6 months to a year later.
By that time, the show is spoiled and there is no legal way to download the shows as they air on American TV.
That leaves torrents. If I could get Hulu and Netflix legit, great, I would subscribe to them
Even the Aussie version "QuikFlix" has content that isnt new (by new im talkin within the month).

Until then, whether laws come in or not, ill continue to do what im doing now, and ill simply use a proxy to get to my current sites. 

[He's Dead Jim]

These law maker types are all egotistic morons, they are thinking that God is a Corp, and will give them everlasting immortality if they kiss the the corp arz, they forget that they will get booted out as soon as the next smartarz politician comes along with the next population control shyte,

 

C'mon law makers, serve us, not the corps, I challenge you.

[Xerxes]

So the "Great Firewall of Australia" is trying to make a come back eh? it won't work, they'll just drive people underground and make it even harder to track/catch them. It's a cat and mouse game and the gov will always lose in the end OR the gov will manage to win but the people will revolt (which means they still lose). Hope this gets shot down too....

[Brendeth]

Great to see people who understand that this doesn't address the problem of piracy, it just shows the futility of the Liberal Government to understand a changing landscape of technology. I also find it funny that they were quick to deny a rumor last year about introducing a filter, now we get this.

I don't want to get too political but It's just a shame that we could have had a truly amazing future with the NBN, and yet we ended up with some Frankenstein amalgamation of networks. I feel that the Liberal slogan this time should have just been - "Fix it for cheap now, and let the other guys pay for it later"

[xpablo]

Just increase the use of VPN services, Basically this should be done everywhere regardless. When will governments learn that there is always a work around  censorship.

[compl3x]

When will governments learn that there is always a work around  censorship.

 

When they appreciate why law abiding citizens hate censorship? So, never. All sides of politics love the idea of censorship. Controlling the flow of information controls how informed a population is. Governments of all stripes want a poorly informed population.

 

 

 I feel that the Liberal slogan this time should have just been - "Fix it for cheap now, and let the other guys pay for it later"

 

 

Then, in the future, complain about how much the infrastructure sucks and how badly it is lagging behind the rest of the world.

[simplezz]

Just increase the use of VPN services, Basically this should be done everywhere regardless. When will governments learn that there is always a work around  censorship.

 

VPN's aren't a long term strategy though. Once the MAFIAA have paid off every country's politicians, which will happen eventually, they'll be no more countries to reroute traffic through. Even now the copyright lobby isn't stopping at three strikes and website censorship. France has just started introducing automatic fines. It's only going to get worse as long as a country's laws are dictated by the rich, powerful, and corporate; which basically means as long as we have career politicians representing the will of the people instead of the people representing the people.

[compl3x]

Lobby pushing for Australian piracy crackdown donates millions
Summary: When Australian Attorney-General George Brandis provided an example of a film that was a victim of online copyright infringement, it happened to be one produced by a major donor to the Liberal Party.

http://www.zdnet.com/au/lobby-pushing-for-australian-piracy-crackdown-donates-millions-7000026421/

 

also worth reading:

 

Three strikes doesn't deter copyright infringement

Summary: Ahead of what could be a crackdown on copyright infringement by a new Australian Coalition government, a study suggests that graduated response schemes to deter online copyright infringement don't work.
 

http://www.zdnet.com/three-strikes-doesnt-deter-copyright-infringement-7000020447/