Source: http://blog.pff.org/archives/2010/06/
Timestamp: 2019-04-22 02:30:55+00:00

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Said FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski on May 6th, "The [Comcast] opinion therefore creates a serious problem that must be solved so that the Commission can implement important, commonsense broadband policies..."
I'll say. It's a problem, alright. Yet the chutzpah of the ensuing NOI process - in particular, the FCC asking whether its Net Neutrality workaround to reclassify the transmission element of broadband as a Title II service is worth doing / can be done - doesn't make it any better.
Continue reading The FCC Gets Real Schlick . . .
"Again?" That was my reaction when I read the Opinion and Order issued last night by Judge Louis Stanton in Viacom v. YouTube. How ironic that the original YouTube--the "video Grokster" will now force the re-litigation of a minor variation of the same question answered unanimously by the Supreme Court in MGM Studios, Inc. v. Grokster, Ltd.
But so be it. I've seen this movie already. I think I know how its sequel ends.
In MGM Studios, Inc. v. Grokster, Ltd., a federal district judge held that a federal law--in that case, the Supreme Court's 5-4 decision in Universal City Studios v. Sony--created a "safe harbor" that protected from civil liability even corporations that intended to build Internet businesses based on mass piracy by using unprotected consumers as human shields against copyright enforcement so that mass piracy could become "start up capital for their product."
Personally, I never doubted that the district-court decision in Grokster would be overturned. It was absurd. Under then-existing law, corporations that intended to encourage or dupe even one consumer into infringing copyrights were committing federal crimes. See, e.g., 18 U.S.C. secs. 2, 241, 307, 2319. And corporations that intended to induce mass piracy were committing far more serious crimes by operating criminal "racketeering enterprises" within the meaning of the Racketeer-Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO). See id. at secs. 1961-68.
Consequently, even though the meaning of the 5-4 majority opinion in Sony was deliberately obscure, one point seemed inarguable: it made no sense to imagine that Sony could have been intended to provide protection from civil liability to potential criminals or criminal racketeering enterprises. Predictably, in Grokster, every single Justice of the United States Supreme Court agreed that Sony had not created a "safe harbor" for any sort of potentially criminal conduct.
I would also suggest that the Court's unanimous decision in Grokster should have conveyed to federal district judges a message somewhat broader than the Court's actual holding. That message was simple: It is highly improbable that any federal law will ever create some "safe harbor" against civil liability for copyright infringement that protects any potentially criminal conduct. That result makes no sense whatsoever.
Alas, in Viacom Int'l, Inc. v. YouTube, Inc., another federal district judge has now held that another federal law--in this case, the hosting-site "safe harbor" codified in Section 512(c) of the Copyright Act--has created a "safe harbor" that protects from civil liability even corporations that intended to build Internet businesses based on mass piracy by using unprotected consumers as human shields to deter the enforcement of the federal civil rights of artists and mass piracy as "start up capital for their product."
Fortunately, this new decision is even less defensible than the district-court decision in Grokster that inspired the Grokster Defendants to disembowel themselves, (see n.1), when their case reached the Supreme Court. The 5-4 majority opinion in Sony was deliberately vague about the meaning of the rule of law it created. Section 512(c) is not--it is quite specific. For example, it expressly denies protections to any hosting site operator who "is aware of facts and circumstances from which infringing activity is apparent." 17 U.S.C. sec. 512(c)(a)(ii). As a result, in Viacom v. YouTube, Judge Stanton had to conclude that a hosting-site operator can actually know about and "welcome" "ubiquitous" mass piracy, yet be unaware of any "facts and circumstances from which infringing activity is apparent." The English language itself precludes that conclusion--as do all known principles of statutory interpretation.
Judge Stanton needs to certify his most implausible conclusions for immediate interlocutory review. He has accused Congress of speaking in tongues in order to create a civil "safe harbor" that protects even online racketeering enterprises that intend to endanger consumers so mass piracy can act as "start up capital for their products."
That is an extremely serious charge. If an unelected federal judge directs such dire accusations of misfeasance and malfeasance at the elected Members of the other two coordinate Branches of the federal government, immediate appellate review should follow as a matter of course.
I just published a new paper called Punk'd: GAO Celebrates the "Positive Economic Effects" of Counterfeiting and Other Criminal Racketeering ("Punk'd"). It debunks efforts to claim that a recent report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) reasonably concluded that counterfeiting and piracy have important "positive economic effects" and that all copyright-industry estimates of piracy's economic costs are "bogus," "baseless" and "false." A few of the many examples of such nonsense include Content Industry Piracy Claims Are Bogus and GAO Concludes Piracy Stats Are Usually Junk, File Sharing Can Help Sales.
Punk'd explains why these backfiring claims are the real "bogus junk." This post summarizes some of its arguments.
Continue reading Why Copyright Industry Costs-of-Piracy Studies Correctly Ignore the "Positive Economic Effects" of Criminal Racketeering . . .
As I touched on last night, I can't say as I was surprised by today's announcement by the FCC to move toward full-blown Internet regulation. Voting along party lines, the three Democratic FCC Commissioners expressed their wholehearted belief that their regulation of the Internet - not de facto marketplace regulation - was the only way to protect consumers and Americans.
The Comcast v. FCC decision should have rebooted the Commission's discredited Net Neutrality ambitions. Yet instead, the FCC appears moving closer toward questionable new rules, using specious authority to get there. Such an exercise in regulatory hubris is truly confounding, especially in light of the facts and a clear consensus that the Internet must remain free from stultifying regulation.
Make no bones about it, the FCC's NOI today will work to regulate the Internet, and poorly at that. It takes a yellowed, dog-eared page from a 19th Century industrial policy playbook, and seeks to graft that on to the rapidly evolving Internet. Ultimately, it will prove offensive to American consumers, as well as those innovating at the core and edge of America's broadband networks.
Continue reading FCC Seeks to Regulate the Internet...Because It Can . . .
Continue reading Latest Video Game "Essential Facts" Report . . .
event transcript: "What Should the Next Communications Act Look Like?"
TechCast #6: OSTWG Report "Youth Safety on a Living Internet"
News Flash: Parenting is Happening!
- Viacom v. YouTube: Why Are We Re-Litigating Grokster?

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