Justice Department Asks To Become Subsidiary To The Entertainment Industry

Overhype

from the meet-the-new-boss dept

As was suggested last week, John Ashcroft has now put out a report talking about how the Department of Justice wants to deal with intellectual property issues and it basically reads like a dream list for the entertainment industry. Basically, they want both the Induce Act and the Pirate Act, as well as “more spending, more FBI agents and more power for prosecutors.” Yes, that’s right, rather than spend on real problems, like stopping terrorists, they want more cash to stop kids from letting a friend hear a song they might like. They apparently feel they need more power to stop casual sharing, defending an increasingly obsolete business model for a single industry who doesn’t want to change with the times or fight their own legal battles alone. As was suggested last week, they’re viewing the “war” against file sharing in a similar light to the war against drugs and corruption — and it’s likely to have about the same level of success. As a lobbyist for Kazaa (bias, noted) says: “They could be proposing here the greatest mass criminalization of conduct by otherwise law-abiding citizens since Prohibition.” You get the feeling that, as law enforcement, the Justice Department feels they’re better off if more people are breaking laws, because it gives them more to do — even if there’s simply no real reason they should be involved.