<incom> DRM and high politics [fwd.]

[Heimo Claasen]

It' not my habit to drown others' mailboxes with newspaper articles
but this DRM issue is really cooking up by now. -hc

=+=+=

Subject: US Government admits to helping the music business

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=32457

US Government admits to helping the music business

War on terror becomes war on software pirates
By Nick Farrell: Friday 16 June 2006, 07:52

THE US government has admitted it is helping the fight against pirates 
by leaning on foreign governments.

According to the Washington Post, the reason Sweden acted against 
thepiratebay.com in an abortive attempt to shut the outfit down was only 
because of US government pressure.

Swedish authorities were hauled into an April meeting in Washington 
between the Swedes and the US government.

The State Department, the Department of Commerce and the US trade 
representative's office told visitors from the Swedish Ministry of 
Justice that it was harbouring one of the world's biggest Web sites for 
enabling the massive and unauthorized distribution of movies, music and 
games. The Swedes carried out a raid which was about as popular in
the country as a tax on sex. The site is still running.

Meanwhile the American government has also been opposing Russia's entry 
to the World Trade Organisation at the request of the anti-piracy 
groups, the Post says.

US government officials told the Post that it was in the national 
interest to work on behalf of Hollywood and other entertainment and 
intellectual property industries.

Assistant US Trade Representative Victoria Espinel said that the United 
States did not dictate on how other nations handle their border controls 
"but they need to have an effective intellectual property system for 
protecting our rights holders abroad."

The trade representative's office maintains a "priority watch list" of 
countries that do not adequately protect intellectual property rights. 
China and Russia top the most recent list.

Apparently the pressure has brought little change in China, home to 
perhaps the world's most prolific DVD and CD pirates.

===================

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/14/AR2006061402071.html

U.S. Joins Industry in Piracy War
Nations Pressed On Copyrights

By Frank Ahrens
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, June 15, 2006; A01

The U.S. government has joined forces with the entertainment industry to 
stop the freewheeling global bazaar in pirated movies and music, 
pressuring foreign governments to crack down or risk incurring trade 
barriers.

Last year, for instance, the movie industry lobby suggested that Sweden 
change its laws to make it a crime to swap copyrighted movies and music 
for free over the Internet. Shortly after, the Swedish government 
complied. Last month, Swedish authorities briefly shut down an illegal 
file-sharing Web site after receiving a briefing on the site's 
activities from U.S. officials in April in Washington. The raid incited 
political and popular backlash in the Scandinavian nation.

In Russia, the government's inability, or reluctance, to shut down 
another unauthorized file-sharing site may prevent that nation's 
entrance into the World Trade Organization, as effective action against 
intellectual property theft tops the U.S. government's list of 
requirements for Russian WTO membership.

As more residents of more nations get high-speed Internet access -- 
making the downloading of movies and music fast and easy -- the stakes 
are higher than ever. The intellectual property industry and law 
enforcement officials estimate U.S. companies lose as much as $250 
billion per year to Internet pirates, who swap digital copies of "The 
DaVinci Code," Chamillionaire's new album and the latest Grand Theft 
Auto video game for free.

Such entertainment and other copyright exports -- worth about $626 
billion annually, or 6 percent of the U.S. gross domestic product -- are 
as important to today's American economy as autos, steel and coal were 
to yesterday's.

More than a decade of hard lobbying by two powerful trade groups, the 
Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and the Recording Industry 
Association of America (RIAA), has convinced U.S. lawmakers and law 
enforcement officials that it's worth using America's muscle to protect 
movie and music interests abroad. Now, lawmakers are calling the trade 
groups, asking what else Congress and the government can do for the 
entertainment industry.

Efforts to stem piracy within the United States by targeting 
peer-to-peer file-sharing networks have produced mixed results. Kazaa -- 
once the most popular of them and a hard target of the music industry -- 
has half as many users as it did at its peak three years ago, thanks in 
part to the music industry's lawsuit and education campaign. At the same 
time, the total number of peer-to-peer users has grown in the past year, 
according to Internet traffic researchers.

Overseas, U.S. government officials say, it is in the national interest 
to work on behalf of Hollywood and other entertainment and intellectual 
property industries.

The United States does not offer specific dictates on how other nations 
handle their border controls, said Assistant U.S. Trade Representative 
Victoria Espinel, "but they need to have an effective intellectual 
property system for protecting our rights holders abroad."

The U.S. trade representative's office maintains a "priority watch list" 
of countries that, in its estimate, do not adequately protect 
intellectual property rights. China and Russia top the most recent list. 
Unlike the case with Sweden, U.S. government pressure has brought little 
change in China, home to perhaps the world's most prolific DVD and CD 
pirates.

An ongoing battle between Swedish authorities and an illegal 
file-sharing service called the Pirate Bay can be traced to an April 
meeting in Washington between the Swedes and the U.S. government.

Officials from the State Department, the Department of Commerce and the 
U.S. trade representative's office told visitors from the Swedish 
Ministry of Justice in April that Sweden was harboring one of the 
world's biggest Web sites for enabling the massive and unauthorized 
distribution of movies, music and games. It uses a file-swapping 
technology known as BitTorrent that is tougher to contain than earlier 
systems such as the original Napster, which the U.S. government shut 
down in 2001, and popular current peer-to-peer services, such as LimeWire.

A little more than a month later, Swedish police hit the headquarters of 
the Pirate Bay and closed the site. The MPAA crowed, saying it had 
helped the effort by filing a criminal complaint against the site.

The raid prompted a backlash of criticism in the Swedish press and from 
some members of government. Politicians and editorialists wanted to know 
why America was meddling in Swedish affairs.

Claes Hammar, Swedish minister for trade and economic affairs, said U.S. 
authorities noted that copyrighted Swedish material, as well as U.S. 
movies and music, was being stolen on the Pirate Bay.

"We don't like to be seen as negligent and losing out rather than 
cooperating with the U.S. and other markets," Hammar said.

In the aftermath of the raid, members of the Left and Moderate parties 
in Sweden have proposed scrapping last year's law that criminalized 
illegal file-sharing, reported the Local, an English-language newspaper 
in Sweden.

At the same time, hundreds of demonstrators have gathered in Stockholm 
and Goteborg in recent days, hoisting pirate flags and demanding that 
the government return the Pirate Bay's seized servers, according to reports.

Several attempts to reach Pirate Bay administrators through the Web site 
were unsuccessful. They did, however, post a defiant manifesto on a 
related Web site.

Shut down on May 31, the Pirate Bay moved to the Netherlands and was 
back up and running three days later, sporting a logo of a pirate ship 
sinking the word "Hollywood" with a fusillade of cannon fire and 
demonstrating how difficult it is to stop anything on the Internet.

Dan Glickman, president of the MPAA, confirmed that his group had asked 
Sweden to toughen its laws on intellectual property theft.

"What we do is look around the world to look if laws need to be 
improved, then we make suggestions," Glickman said. He emphasized that 
the MPAA respects the sovereign rights of foreign nations. As for the 
backlash, Glickman said, "Yes, I'm sure the pirates in Sweden are upset."

Russia's pirates may cost their country more than domestic unrest.

Entrance into the World Trade Organization would grant the country 
numerous trading benefits. Each of the WTO's 149 members has veto power 
over accession and each has key demands of applicants.

For the United States, the focus is on intellectual property. And the 
U.S. wants to make sure the mistake of China is not repeated.

"We let China in and China has not fully complied with the WTO 
requirements" for protecting intellectual property, Glickman said. The 
MPAA has an enforcement division in Hong Kong whose members accompany 
local law enforcement officials on raids. "The time to get action is 
now, rather than after they get in," Glickman said.

In Russia, CD and DVD pirates have established manufacturing plants on 
abandoned Soviet military bases, Glickman and RIAA President Mitch 
Bainwol said. A Web site called Allofmp3.com is selling millions of 
songs without authorization from copyright holders. The site looks as 
professional and legal as Apple Computer Inc.'s popular iTunes online 
music store. It claims to be licensed by a Russian agency to sell music, 
but U.S. trade groups aren't satisfied. None of the revenue generated 
from the 10-cent song downloads on the site goes to the artists, Bainwol 
said.

Moscow began an investigation of Allofmp3.com, dropped it, then picked 
it back up again after U.S. pressure was applied, said RIAA Executive 
Vice President Neil Turkowitz, who has traveled several times to Russia 
and filed criminal complaints with prosecutors there about the site.

"The Russian government is aware of all really existing problems in the 
[intellectual property] sphere and makes active efforts to solve them 
step-by-step," the Russian Ministry of Economic Development and Trade 
wrote in an April paper translated into English. "We will undertake a 
complex of additional measures in [the intellectual property] sphere in 
the nearest future with the intention to speed up the work in this sphere."

Two e-mails to the site administrator of Allofmp3.com went unanswered.

Assistant U.S. Trade Representative Espinel said shutting down 
Allofmp3.com "is right at the top of the agenda. This is a top-priority 
issue in terms of our discussion with Russia and the WTO."

As the bilateral talks with Russia continue, congressional leaders are 
bringing pressure to bear on President Bush, who has vowed to speed that 
nation's entry into the WTO. Working against Russia, the lawmakers say, 
are its plans to make intellectual property rights violators subject to 
civil, rather than criminal, penalties.

The U.S. government and the entertainment industry have a right to raise 
such issues with foreign nations, the RIAA's Turkowitz said. Movie and 
music piracy, he said, "is a problem that really doesn't know any borders."

© 2006 The Washington Post Company