

Senate Voting to make Unauthorized Streaming a Felony - Urgo
http://www.pcworld.com/article/230532/senate_committee_votes_to_make_illegal_streaming_a_felony.html

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tomp
IANAL and I haven't seen the original text of the bill, I believe this
sensational title omits one crucial piece of information: unauthorized
streaming for commercial purposes (for profit) will become a felony, not
"personal" streaming.

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megamark16
So if you embed a YouTube video on your blog (that you have adwords on, of
course) and it turns out that someone claims copyright infringement, you could
be looking at jail time and a felony records.

IANAL, and I haven't read the original text of the bill either, but I really
don't like the idea of the government playing cop for the media companies. I
think there are probably bigger problems that our government could be focusing
on, that's all.

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mattdeboard
"If passed, the bill will make illegal streaming for commercial purposes a
felony punishable by up to five years in prison -- if the streaming in
question involves ten or more instances of streaming copyrighted works during
a 180-day period, and if the retail value of the stream exceeds $2500, or the
licenses to the material are worth more than $5000."

If you penetrate these limits, odds are pretty good that the copyrighted
material was obviously copyrighted material and you were being pretty wanton
about it.

I'm all about small government and keeping their hands off things they don't
understand, but I'm not sure how anyone can be opposed to them enforcing laws.

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sehugg

      The MPAA claims that it will only target website owners who
      "willfully and knowingly violated a copyright and profited
      from it." The organization says it will not look to
      prosecute those who "stream videos without intending to
      profit".
    

I'd like this sort of promise to come from my government, not an industry
organization.

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lurchpop
Those promises never hold weight though if the letter of the law allows that
prosecution. I remember a certain presidential candidate saying he wouldn't go
after nonviolent pot offenders.

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pygy_
Sentate __Commmitee__ Votes to Make Illegal Streaming a Felony

Please update the title. While the story is worrying, this is misleading and
needlessly sensationalist.

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smogzer
when the government represents the interest of a small group agains the people
that voted for them is time for change:

meta-government + minarquism.

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lurchpop
So if i make a $2500 profit from accidentally embedding a copyrighted youtube
video on my blog, the government (taxpayers) will need to pay $150,000 to jail
me for 5 years. Seems logical.

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int3rnaut
Maybe I'm not fully comprehending the validity of this bill--so is profiting
via illegal streaming a big thing in the United States? Judging from their
reasoning, and not to get ethical, but is this really the answer to this
issue?

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smokeyj
Not to commit thought-crime, but why is this anyone's priority in Washington?

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hugh3
_Not to commit thought-crime_

This kind of rhetoric doesn't really advance the discussion.

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smokeyj
We're all using rhetoric here. Calling a digital pattern "property" doesn't
really advance the discussion either. So long as patterns are a criminal
offense I will continue to be wary of engaging in thought-crime.

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lurchpop
The example always given is a youtube video. Why is Youtube not liable??

