Nicolas Sarkozy Caught Mass 'Pirating' DVDs; Time To Kick Him Off The Internet

from the see-ya-later-nicky dept

Why is it always the adamant defenders of silly policies like kicking people off the internet for copyright infringement who are later found to be mass infringers themselves? French President Nicolas Sarkozy, of course, was the first major politician to support the concept of kicking people off the internet for copyright infringement (more commonly called a "three strikes" rule). He took credit for coming up with the idea originally nearly two years ago, and pushed very hard for the law -- which eventually passed but was then tossed out as unconstitutional in France. Sarkozy still stood by it and helped bring back a revised version.

Of course, in the middle of all this, there was a bit of irony in that Sarkozy was caught using music without authorization in some online videos, for which he paid a €30,000 fine. Of course, it now appears that may have just been the tip of the iceberg. Boing Boing points us to the news that Sarkozy's administration has been caught mass "pirating" DVDs of a documentary about Sarkozy. The publisher of the documentary only made 50 copies. Sarkozy's "audiovisual services" group happened to make itself another 400 without permission -- even replacing the name of the original publisher on the cover.

Once again, this should be a "teachable moment," to point out to Sarkozy and other supporters of such plans to kick people off the internet that the issue isn't quite so simple after all. When you're on the other side, sometimes it seems perfectly natural to make a copy of something, without even realizing it's potentially infringing. Unfortunately, why do I get the feeling that Sarkozy won't change his stance one bit -- or even recognize the irony of the situation?

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Sarkozy Talks About 3 Strikes As Defending Freedom, But Only Freedom For The Industry

from the individuals-need-not-apply dept

It appears that French President Nicolas Sarkozy still cannot understand why so many people are opposed to a "three strikes" rule for cutting people off the internet. Despite it just being ruled unconstitutional in France, Sarkozy is still standing by the law fully, promising to "go all the way" in getting it implemented. His reasoning, however, is quite bizarre, and shows a very narrow view of creativity these days:

"By defending copyright I do not just defend artistic creation, I also defend my idea of a free society where everyone's freedom is based on respect for the rights of others. I am also defending the future of our culture. It is the future of creation."

That shows a massive misunderstanding of creativity, expression and freedom these days. He's basically saying that freedom of expression shall only apply to "professional" creators, who get rights. Everyone else's rights get trampled. I don't quite see how that's a "free society" at all. It sounds like a corporately owned society, where the rights of certain "professionals" outweigh the rights of individuals.

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French Constitutional Council Guts 'Three Strikes' As Unconstitutional

from the sorry-Sarkozy dept

Well, that didn't last long at all... After some back and forth (and tremendous pressure from French President -- and known copyright infringer -- Nicolas Sarkozy), France passed a three strikes law that would kick people off the internet for three accusations of unauthorized file sharing. However, it looks like the law may be going nowhere fast. France's Constitutional Council has gutted the law, after finding significant constitutional problems with it. The Council specifically barred the heart of the law: the cutting people off the internet part, noting:

communication and liberty of expression are fundamental rights that only a judge can rule on.

Indeed. The council said that it could be okay to cut off internet users... but only with a judge's permission. It's expected that the law may be adjusted to push these issues in front of a judge -- but that's a much better (though still not perfect) situation, since a judge should at least require evidence rather than simple accusations. Either way, it's yet another defeat for an industry that continues to insist that somehow kicking people offline is going to "save" the industry.

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France Strikes Out: Approves Cutting People Off The Internet

from the this-will-end-badly dept

It was quite a surprise when French politicians rejected a "three strikes" (or, as Bill Patry calls it: "the digital guillotine") law that would have ISPs disconnect file sharers from the internet on three accusations (not convictions). However, seeing as French president Nicolas Sarkozy was a huge supporter of this idea (despite the fact that he had no problems infringing copyrights himself), you knew it would come back. And, indeed, it's back. France's National Assembly has now approved a three strikes law by a vote of 296 to 233. It's expected that the upper house of the French Parliament will approve it tomorrow.

Of course, there are significant questions about the legality of the law. Considering that the EU just said that such a three strikes policy is not allowed, you have to imagine that we haven't heard the last about whether or not this new law is considered legitimate.

Still, the thing that is most amusing about this is how supporters of such three strikes rules somehow seem to think that this will suddenly make people buy again. There's no evidence that this is true, whatsoever. But the main backer of this bill in France claims that this is:

"an important step toward preserving cultural diversity and the industries threatened by piracy."

How? By kicking fans of the work offline? The most telling part of this statement is that it's about preserving the industries "threatened" by piracy, not the actual creators of content. That's because this is a law to protect legacy industries, not content creators.

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French Three Strikes Law Rides Again, EU Rules Be Damned

from the liberte,-egalite,-we-make-you-pay dept

It was a bit of a surprise when the French parliament rejected the country's proposed three-strikes law against file-sharers a few weeks ago. The bill had gotten a lot of support from President Nicolas Sarkozy (who is something of a pirate himself) and many musicians, but it was able to get defeated by a little bit of clever chicanery from the opposition. But the proposal lives on, and has been revived in parliament. This legislation continues, even though there isn't agreement on whether the proposal is okay with the EU's new draft of rules on three-strikes laws. Previous stories on the EU rules seemed to indicate that France had shaped the European rules so that this law would be acceptable, but Billboard says the proposal is in conflict with EU telecom law. One fantastic new detail of the revived bill: the BBC says two members of Sarkozy's party have joined the opposition to the bill, because it features an amendment that would make users who were banned under the law continue to pay their ISP bills. It just gets better and better...

Carlo Longino is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Carlo Longino and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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As Sarkozy Pushes Three Strikes, He Pays Up For His Own Copyright Violations

from the funny-how-that-works dept

We found it rather ironic that, just as French President Nicolas Sarkozy was so adamant about passing a three strikes law to kick file sharers off the internet, he was being accused of copyright infringement himself, specifically for using music from the US band MGMT at an event and in two online videos without securing a license. Now, you might hope that this would cause Sarkozy to rethink his stance on copyright infringement. Instead, it looks like his political party has simply agreed to pay up and make the issue go away, while still pushing for the three strikes law. It sounds like they paid about 30,000 euros, which is a lot more than the single euro that Sarkozy's party initially offered (yes, seriously). No word on whether or not this counts towards the number of strikes on Sarkozy's internet connection.

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