Ugggg…..

Can you really be this dense? You seem to be purposely misconstruing the argument (straw man anyone?) and then argue that in your interpretation of the argument, Mike is wrong.

I would like to apologize in advance to Mike. Hopefully, this is for the benefit of those reading this, including Darryl;

Censorship does not equal copyright. No one’s ever said that they were (at least in this conversation so far) except Darryl. Censorship is the keeping of information away from people usually by some one or some organization with power. It may of may not be backed by a system (like Movie ratings) or by various laws.

Copyright is an idea, backed by law, that the government can increase the production and availability of public domain works by giving a government monopoly over certain uses of a work (book, photo, painting, etc.) to their authors.

Currently copyright is causing more harm than good. Copyright has passed from the hands of authors (and in this group I am including songwriters, artists, sculptors and other creators of copyrightable items) to third parties, such as publishers and others. The term of copyright has been extended to such a degree, that contrary to its intended purpose, it actually starving the public domain. It is being forced upon everyone, such that it applies even to those that don’t want it’s protection. This further starves the public domain and introduces the tragedy of orphaned works.

On order for copyright to be legal under the freedoms granted to the people under the first amendment of the Constitution it can’t protect and idea, only the particular structure of that idea and it has to allow for “fair use”. Fair Use are those uses the public wishes to make of a protected work regardless of the wishes of the copyright holder. Fair Use is a complicated legal matter that can only be decided by a judge after reviewing the particular facts of a particular use.

Currently, under the much maligned DMCA, there is a process by which a copyright holder can attempt to have a particular use of copyrighted material removed from the internet. It involves the copyright holder notifying the publisher that they hold the copyright to the item in questions and they believe that the use is unauthorized. The publisher then removes the work from the web page/ftp site/whatever is under their control and notifies the person who posted it. They then have the ability to contest the notice of the first person and have the item restored. After that, if both parties are still in disagreement, the copyright holder can file a civil suit against the poster of said item.

The _current_ problem is that copyright holders aren’t satisfied with the process. The government, at their urging, has decided to remove entire domains from the internet based on the mere accusation of a copyright holder that some item(s) under that domain are infringing on their copyrights.

This is an accusation, not a finding of law. This doesn’t, in fact it can’t, take into account any fair use of the item(s) in question.

Finally, and here we get back to the censorship issue, it’s not a fine grained approach. Everything else at that domain gets removed from the internet because there is a _claim_ that something there is infringing.

There are two major forms of censorship going on here _because_ of the way copyright holders are trying to ‘protect’ their copyrights.

The first is the innocent bystander. If you happen to express anything on a domain that is summarily removed from the internet this way, your message has been _censored_.

The second is the malicious accusation. If you disagree with something someone’s written. Be it a review, or a religious or political viewpoint. You can accuse the domain itself of violating “a” (it doesn’t even have to be yours) copyright, and potentially the entire domain will get seized.

There is no notice, no chance to go before the judge and argue your case. Copyright enforcement (or business plan protectionism) trumps everything else. No rights, no appeal, no nothing.

Darryl wrote:

“Copyright law is applied, and the tools to enable the crime to be commited [sic] are conficated [sic].”

Copyright law isn’t applied. An idealized version of how monied interests think copyright _should_be_ is applied.

Darryl also asked:

“So do you think if they raided a CD burning house, making pirate copies of a movie or music, would they only confiscate the CD that are allready [sic] burned ? or would they take the blank DVD’s and CD, the label printers, the burners, the computers, the master copies ?”

Well Darryl, if they raided a newsroom, they are _not_ allowed to shut it down. They can get copies of certain files, machines, etc. Precisely because of the concern about improperly censoring things. Also, if the police, with a proper search warrant, raid a “CD burning house” the accused has the right to face their accuser, to go before a judge and argue their case, to get their stuff back.

To apply your “CD burning house” analogy to what’s actually happening would be:

Someone claims that you are making illegal copies of a movie or music. The police _do_not_ get a warrant and raid your house. What they do is contact the owners of the apartment complex that you are living in. The apartment owners then throw everyone in the _entire_ apartment building out on the street and change all the locks. They then give the keys to the government.

The accused “CD burners” are locked out, sure, but so are the room that’s used for the knitting circle. So is the free weekly newspaper two floors down. So is the quaint little bar on the first floor that aspiring young musicians go to play. So is every individual that lives in that building, from young single mom to elderly grandfather.

That _wouldn’t_ happen in real life, not even in the case of suspected drug dealers, so why should it be allowed to happen on the internet?

So Darryl, censorship isn’t copyright, but that latter can be used as a tool to commit the former.