The six ways you can appeal new copyright "mitigation measures"
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2...yright-alerts/
The ars senior editor likes this situation. I have some questions.
"Independent"? The corporations who are claiming your actions are violating some law pay some folks to set in judgement on you? Can you bring a lawyer along to insure that your constitutional and other legal rights are being protected?
Why would anyone want to appeal an "educational" alert? Oh, off hand I'd say that having more than one would be used to "prove" a pattern of (what word do I use here?) "criminal" - "illegal" ... behavior when you have your "hearing". Maybe they read a posting on some blog that you wrote criticized their service or policies and they decided to "teach you a lesson" and sent you an "alert" based on nothing at all.
Guilty until you prove your innocence.
And, you can't use just any proof to defend yourself. Only the ones the RIAA & the ISPs have agreed to before hand are "acceptable" defenses.
So, what if you fail their six rules? Is it even possible that six rules can cover all possible contingencies?
So, you think you'll just cancel the ISP that, in your opinion (or because they reject your proof of innocence -- it makes one appreciate a jury of your peers) was unfair, and sign up with another ISP? Sorry, when you try to open an account at another ISP (assuming there is one in your neck of the woods) you'll be politely informed that your application will be rejected for the next 12 months because you are on the ISP black list.Take them to court and sue? (IF you could afford to). The ToS you clicked through to get Internet access through your ISP (or any ISP) has a clause about you giving up your rights to sue and instead agree to binding arbitration. Probably with the same "independent" body.
All in all it is a nice Kangaroo court they are setting up. It's cheap for them, cheaper for you than going to court to defend yourself, and they get to control everything. Are you prepared to sign an NDA so they can keep their "court" proceedings secret?
Under the new voluntary antipiracy regime agreed to this week by Internet providers, users who receive a first "alert" regarding copyright infringement on their account won't be able to challenge that alert. Nor can they challenge the second alert, or the third, or the fourth. They can only challenge the alerts when they move from "education" to "mitigation"—after the fifth or sixth alert, depending on the Internet provider.(RIAA head Cary Sherman told me yesterday that this was because the first "educational" alerts are like traffic warnings rather than traffic tickets; there's no penalty, so who would want to challenge them?)At that point, before a user's Internet connection is throttled, curtailed, or otherwise hobbled, the account subscriber can pay $35 and appeal to a new independent body funded by the ISPs and the content owners. But the appeals process won't accept just any defense; indeed, the official memorandum of understanding (MoU) governing this whole process describes the six possible defenses the independent reviewer will even consider (they are incorrectly numbered in the MoU and so run up to "vii," but only six items are listed). Here they are:
The ars senior editor likes this situation. I have some questions.
"Independent"? The corporations who are claiming your actions are violating some law pay some folks to set in judgement on you? Can you bring a lawyer along to insure that your constitutional and other legal rights are being protected?
Why would anyone want to appeal an "educational" alert? Oh, off hand I'd say that having more than one would be used to "prove" a pattern of (what word do I use here?) "criminal" - "illegal" ... behavior when you have your "hearing". Maybe they read a posting on some blog that you wrote criticized their service or policies and they decided to "teach you a lesson" and sent you an "alert" based on nothing at all.
Guilty until you prove your innocence.
And, you can't use just any proof to defend yourself. Only the ones the RIAA & the ISPs have agreed to before hand are "acceptable" defenses.
So, what if you fail their six rules? Is it even possible that six rules can cover all possible contingencies?
If you fail here, prepare to be mitigated with extreme prejudice. ISPs can basically pick their preferred punishment, but the MoU offers a few tasty ideas, including:
So, you think you'll just cancel the ISP that, in your opinion (or because they reject your proof of innocence -- it makes one appreciate a jury of your peers) was unfair, and sign up with another ISP? Sorry, when you try to open an account at another ISP (assuming there is one in your neck of the woods) you'll be politely informed that your application will be rejected for the next 12 months because you are on the ISP black list.Take them to court and sue? (IF you could afford to). The ToS you clicked through to get Internet access through your ISP (or any ISP) has a clause about you giving up your rights to sue and instead agree to binding arbitration. Probably with the same "independent" body.
All in all it is a nice Kangaroo court they are setting up. It's cheap for them, cheaper for you than going to court to defend yourself, and they get to control everything. Are you prepared to sign an NDA so they can keep their "court" proceedings secret?