UK ISP's loose legal battle

[astral]

BT and Talk Talk have lost an appeal over controversial measures to tackle copyright infringement online.

The internet service providers (ISPs) had argued the UK's Digital Economy Act was incompatible with EU law.

The Act will mean ISPs will have to send warning letters to alleged illegal file downloaders, as well as potentially cutting users off.

Possibly the end of the source of UK TV programmes for expats

Discussion:

http://bolt.cd/board/uploader-downloader-support/723436-bt-talktalk-lose-file-sharing-appeal.html

News item:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-17270817

[astral]

Just to clarify my personal opinion here.

I am not in favour of piracy and will willingly pay for a good alternative.

I do not consider BBC Entertainment, with it antique array of programmes and endless repeats to be viable.

Nor is streaming, with my limited internet connection

[sumrit]

Just to clarify my personal opinion here.

I am not in favour of piracy and will willingly pay for a good alternative.

I do not consider BBC Entertainment, with it antique array of programmes and endless repeats to be viable.

Nor is streaming, with my limited internet connection

I think most, if not all, of us who stream TV, or download UK television from P2P sites do so because this is the only way we can continue to watch UK television while abroad. If we could buy a UK TV licence and download directly from the UK stations then I for one would.

But unfortunately the powers that be in the UK refuse to give us that option so long live the P2P sites.

Edited March 8, 2012 by sumrit

[bangkockney]

Just to clarify my personal opinion here.

I am not in favour of piracy and will willingly pay for a good alternative.

I do not consider BBC Entertainment, with it antique array of programmes and endless repeats to be viable.

Nor is streaming, with my limited internet connection

I think most, if not all, of us who stream TV, or download UK television from P2P sites do so because this is the only way we can continue to watch UK television while abroad. If we could buy a UK TV licence and download directly from the UK stations then I for one would.

But unfortunately the powers that be in the UK refuse to give us that option so long live the P2P sites.

It's not a TV licensing issue but a rights agreement issue. You do not need a TV licence to watch catch-up BBC iplayer programmes, for example, but you do if you stream a live broadcast.

With some know-how or simply knowing how to search google you can download and watch BBC iplayer programmes anywhere in the world.

[Baxer]

A vpn server will sort this out,then your isp can't see what you are doing. But i would guess the copyright mafia will make vpn's illegal to.

[SourPunk]

Possibly the end of the source of UK TV programmes for expats

Not going to have any affect on expats whatsoever. Only people in the UK and almost certainly only a tiny percentage of the very low hanging fruit - i.e. people using public trackers with no VPN etc.

[somchai69]

Possibly the end of the source of UK TV programmes for expats

Not going to have any affect on expats whatsoever.

Not so.

Who is going to record and seed the UK programmes, if they face disconnection??

[SourPunk]

^TV programs aren't recorded (capped) by the kind of noobs who are going to be affected by this. They're either scene releases or they're capped by teams on private trackers (like the box in the case of UK TV) who are seeding from very fast connections behind offshore seedboxes.

Even if the DMCA/EUCD trolls did get into the swarm on a private tracker like the box (never seen this happen - they simply can't be bothered when there's oceans of IP addresses to be harvested from public trackers), the fastest seeders are on seedboxes hosted by companies that don't give a stuff about takedown notices.

As I've already stated, it's the low-hanging fruit that is at risk, not the people who have even half a clue what they're doing.

[sumrit]

Just to clarify my personal opinion here.

I am not in favour of piracy and will willingly pay for a good alternative.

I do not consider BBC Entertainment, with it antique array of programmes and endless repeats to be viable.

Nor is streaming, with my limited internet connection

I think most, if not all, of us who stream TV, or download UK television from P2P sites do so because this is the only way we can continue to watch UK television while abroad. If we could buy a UK TV licence and download directly from the UK stations then I for one would.

But unfortunately the powers that be in the UK refuse to give us that option so long live the P2P sites.

It's not a TV licensing issue but a rights agreement issue. You do not need a TV licence to watch catch-up BBC iplayer programmes, for example, but you do if you stream a live broadcast.

With some know-how or simply knowing how to search google you can download and watch BBC iplayer programmes anywhere in the world.

I do understand it's not a licencing issue, and I do know how to get to watch iplayer, itvplayer, etc, etc, while here in Thailand.

The point I was trying to make was that what we are doing is technically illegal and what the people supplying us with the programming are doing is also illegal (and If the penalties are severe enough those people uploading for our benefit will disappear).

We do it because there is no other option.

I wasn't suggesting we pay an actual TV licence but if there was a system in place where we could pay something similar to a UK licence and download/stream UK programs legally a lot of us would be more than happy to use that legal route.

[sumrit]

Just a thought, I've been downloading from various P2P sites for several years now whilst living in Thailand. I think we all appreciate how storing programs on our laptops/PC's means we can watch what we want when we want, whatever the time of day or night. We're not tied to any program schedules. And it even makes life more bearable when we go back to the village and all the family are glued to their channel three/seven crap.

Nearly three years ago we had to go to the UK for a while. I quickly realized I preferred the flexibility of downloading and watching what/when I wanted to so that's what I carried on doing. Now I had a valid TV licence and only ever downloaded UK TV from P2P sites such as the box and UKnova. So I was living in the UK, watching only UK television programs (that I could have got via iplayers) and had a valid TV licence.

Was I breaking the law because I downloaded those programs from P2P sites?

Edited March 9, 2012 by sumrit

[SourPunk]

Was I breaking the law because I downloaded those programs from P2P sites?

Yes, since you were part of a network that was distributing infringing content.

[MrMuddle]

Going slightly off topic, one of the main reasons friends of mine, (in the UK), download TV programmes from various internet sites, is to be able to watch programmes without the annoying interruptions from adverts.

Purely out of curiousity, (I DO have a life), I watched an hour of TV on Truevisions, (Fox channel), and there was 24 minutes of adverts, (mostly for their own upcoming shows). Who needs that ?

I also find it annoying that when one is watching a movie here, they keep interrupting it with on-screen adverts, usually for things I'd never dream of watching anyway.