Aussie ISP: We Won't Be Hollywood's Copyright Cops If Hollywood Won't Fix Its Own Business Model

from the hollywood,-heal-thyself dept

A broken record The conversation has failed to move on. The rights holders are still insisting ISP's should perform work on their behalf instead of addressing what we have always said is the root cause of the infringements – the limited accessibility to desirable content and the discriminatory and high cost of content in Australia. Infringements are a symptom – access is the problem. Data retention proposals iiNet won't support any scheme that forces ISPs to retain data in order to allow for the tracking of customer behaviour and the status of any alleged infringements against them. Collecting and retaining additional customer data at this level is inappropriate, expensive and most importantly, not our responsibility. It's not iiNet's job to play online police We've been over this before. The High Court spoke loud and clear in their verdict when they ruled categorically that ISPs have no obligation to protect the rights of third parties, and we're not prepared to harass our customers when the industry has no clear obligation to do so. It's time to find a new way We believe that timely, affordable access to legitimate content is the best option for reducing unauthorised sharing.

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You may remember iiNet, the Australian ISP that Hollywood attacked (with support of US State Department officials) after they decided that it was too small to fight back, but big enough that people would notice. They guessed incorrectly, and iiNet not only fought back by taking a strong pro-consumer view , but won in convincing fashion. Even more importantly, as we noted, the courts made it clear why it's silly to expect third party service providers like ISPs to be copyright cops , since establishing infringement "is not a straight 'yes' or 'no' question," but rather involves going through a lot of evidence and evaluating it.Since then, Hollwyood has continued (via the Australian government) to pressure ISPs to step up to become copyright cops anyway, and iiNet has participated in those discussions. But late last week it walked away from the discussions after Hollywood folks kept demanding a system similar to the US's in which ISPs would send along notices to people they accused of infringement. iiNet gave a bunch of good reasons for walking away, but the basic message was that piracy is a problem that the entertainment industry could solve itself by making. Until it does that, it's silly to rope in third parties to try to hold back the tide.The problem, of course, is that the entertainment industry still doesn't understand what's happening. They flat out reject the idea that piracy might be due to their own unwillingness to embrace the internet and provide more content, in more convenient ways at better prices. So, instead, they believe that everyone else should be responsible for fixing the entertainment industry's own mistakes. It's nice to see iiNet call them out so directly.

Filed Under: australia, copyright, isps, liability

Companies: iinet