It is now all over the news that state that they are now beginning to crack down on people downloading Music and Films illegally.
How will they do this because if they track how much you download, say a 700MB program what is being downloaded legally and a film what is 700MB being downloaded illegally and they see you have downloaded a product what is 700mb big and they expect you have been downloading illegally but the product you have downloaded was a legal download how would they know if you have been downloading illegally or downloading legally, I have tried to explain what I mean to the best of my ability, when it comes to explaining something in words I find it a little difficult.

So how will they know this because they couldn't track what you are looking at because a server wouldn't be able to handle the information and it goes againt protection/privacy laws and they wouldn't be able to say you have been downloading illegally from the idea I have thought of above.

I know I haven't proberly explained this very well but I hope you can gather what I mean.

Looks to me like they're cracking down on sharers/seeders, not downloaders. Unless you're sharing stuff yourself, it doesn't look like it's going to impact you much/at all. Prolly be less seeds around, but bittorrents are icky anyway.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7522334.stm

Quote from SamH :

Looks to me like they're cracking down on sharers/seeders, not downloaders. Unless you're sharing stuff yourself, it doesn't look like it's going to impact you much/at all. Prolly be less seeds around, but bittorrents are icky anyway.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7522334.stm

Think I understand what you mean. So they can only track you if your seeding not leeching?
When you say sharing do you mean sharing files on a P2P/Torrent program or sharing files in general because I sometimes turn file sharing on Winamp so I can listen to my music in school and when away from home etc...

Edit: Some game sites have an option to download using a torrent as this is legal as the actual game maker is providing the torrent will ISP's still believe that you are downloading illegally.

Quote from sam93 :

Think I understand what you mean. So they can only track you if your seeding not leeching?
When you say sharing do you mean sharing files on a P2P/Torrent program or sharing files in general because I sometimes turn file sharing on Winamp so I can listen to my music in school and when away from home etc...

Edit: Some game sites have an option to download using a torrent as this is legal as the actual game maker is providing the torrent will ISP's still believe that you are downloading illegally.

Exactly, how do they know that you're doing something illegal?

Yes many file-sharing is illegal. But what they need to realize is that torrents are also an effective way to transfer files legally.

This is me back to my MMORPGs but this genre of video games is a very good example of legally downloading through torrents.

Take a game like Rappelz which is about 1.6 Gigs alone. Because the rappelz installation file is so huge that torrents are the only reasonable way to download and share that file. However, if seeders of this file are "targeted" then the MMORPG community would be greatly burdened.

And this is not only in Rappelz, those who have an account for World of Warcraft but lost their CDs can download through torrent the massive 8 gigs file.

MMORPGs are always massive whether it's f2p or p2p and Rappelz/WoW's massive size isn't just an isolated occurance:

Archlord Online: 1.4 Gigs
AirRivals: 1.37 Gigs
Perfect World: 2.24 Gigs
RF Online: 995 MB
Shaiya: 943 MB
Cabal Online: 845 MB

And what about freeware games like Warsow, Combat Arms, Psi-Ops?

How in the world do they expect us to download all these massive games? Especially for a MMORPG gamer like myself that downloads 3-4 of these games to play?

Quote from sam93 :

Edit: Some game sites have an option to download using a torrent as this is legal as the actual game maker is providing the torrent will ISP's still believe that you are downloading illegally.

No. Currently all that seems to be happening is the seeders of particular (illegal) torrents (music only atm it seems) are being traced and given warnings.

Quote from lizardfolk :

But see, the thing is how do they know that you're doing something illegal?

Yes many file-sharing is illegal. But what they need to realize is that torrents are also an effective way to transfer files legally.

This is me back to my MMORPGs but this genre of video games is a very good example of legally downloading through torrents.

Take a game like Rappelz which is about 1.6 Gigs alone. Because the rappelz installation file is so huge that torrents are the only reasonable way to download and share that file. However, if seeders of this file are "targeted" then the MMORPG community would be greatly burdened.

And this is not only in Rappelz, those who have an account for World of Warcraft but lost their CDs can download through torrent the massive 8 gigs file.

MMORPGs are always massive whether it's f2p or p2p and Rappelz/WoW's massive size isn't just an isolated occurance:

Archlord Online: 1.4 Gigs
AirRivals: 1.37 Gigs
Perfect World: 2.24 Gigs
RF Online: 995 MB
Shaiya: 943 MB
Cabal Online: 845 MB

And what about freeware games like Warsow, Combat Arms, Psi-Ops?

Just what I was thinking. I think they should get the publics views first, they may be doing it for music and films but they need to see it from gamers points of views and people who file share using torrent legally.

It's not all p2p/bit torrent traffic that they are concerned with.

What basically happens is that the BPI or whoever set about leeching torrents. They then take note of any UK IPs in the swarm and contact the ISP. By being in the swarm, you are filesharing (uploading).

The ISP then sends a letter to its user saying something along the lines of 'Warez are bad, mmmkay'. The BPI or whoever do not know any more than an IP addy at this time.

If they get a court order, the ISP then surrenders names/addresses, and does not inform the user concerned.

Talk of throttling etc is just conjecture for the moment, but the ISPs will most likely have to punish the users somehow to prevent legislation to the same effect.

Solution? Download all your pirated stuff from places like RS and Mageupload! Loads of stuff there that can be well hiden with a password and all. Direct download is the future!

Quote from Riders Motion :

Direct download is the future!

Agree + it's even legal in some countries, like movies and music here (I'm not sure about ebooks).

Quote from lizardfolk :

Exactly, how do they know that you're doing something illegal?

Yes many file-sharing is illegal. But what they need to realize is that torrents are also an effective way to transfer files legally.

Even EA GAMES sometimes uses torrents to spread theirs NFS game demos and many other game demos online (and I need to say, its a lot faster than direct download because EA is seeding the torrents).

I think those things are only for films and music, and they aren't really effective IMO. But I really don't know, in Brazil we don't have the state trying to trick us that way.

Quote from Velociround :

in Brazil we don't have the state trying to trick us that way.

We neither. They just make mega hyped case about DC users (who uses that crap anyway?) or uploader of Czech CAM rip from time to time.

So they're only sending out warnings to involved pirates? Seems a bit harmless to be honest. Kinda like the download cap my ISP has. If you break it, they send you a letter saying that's naughty and you can't do that any more. Yet month after month they'll keep sending warning letters, and no-one's actually had sanctions yet

Glad to be Irish for once, our gov couldn't give a crap about piracy, they're too busy with the big recession and what-not

Quote from dougie-lampkin :

Glad to be Irish for once, our gov couldn't give a crap about piracy, they're too busy with the big recession and what-not

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055341884

No complaints, so long as they don't start charging too much for the legal music and film downloads its fine.

Quote from ATC Quicksilver :

No complaints, so long as they don't start charging too much for the legal music and film downloads its fine.

Too late, imho.

Quote from niall09 :

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055341884

Eircom couldn't give two shiney shites about what their customers download, they don't even attempt to throttle even the heaviest downloaders. Some people have been known to download 3 or 4 times their cap every months consistently, yet no consequences...

I think we're safe enough for a while anyway

Quote from ATC Quicksilver :

No complaints, so long as they don't start charging too much for the legal music and film downloads its fine.

As soon as they start offering music downloads that can be freely shared and put on different devices without copy protection I'll start buying downloads. For now I just buy a CD if I like the artist because apart from being something physical it is so much easier to rip them to a digital format. I think people should be able to share legal music downloads with friends like people do with CDs and the illegal files they download, sure it wouldn't technically be legal but if music is shared round locally the record companies still get their money.

All I know is I spend a day a month taking the ruddy copy protection off my legally purchased music so that I get to use them the way I want them.

I want to buy my music legally and I do, I just dont agree with the limitation on the licence agreement and chose to ignore them and purposefully remove the copy protection in the files on the grounds that I dont want to reach a limit without realising and have it effect me - I do it - just in case.

Morally I feel fine, legally i'm on shaky ground, I spend around £50 a month on music if the music industry wants me in court I think i'd actually end up in the dock for assault... !

Anyway conclusion is DRM dont work and gives me less rights than a pirate, so I take it off... So what does it do again?

As for ISP's reporting users, well, to be honest guys if your pirating stuff then they are facilitating a crime. Can't really argue the case can you?

I mean if you cant do the time, dont do the crime...

It annoys me how big artists and record company bosses are billionaires, but they still want our money, they make it sound like through piracy we are driving them into poverty, we are the ones that need more money, not them!

It's not like they don't make enough money through touring, tickets to any large show cost an arm and a leg.

It's just greedy money grabbing really, I can understand upcoming artists needing money, but big artists have enough money to retire on already.

I hope that if there is a massive crackdown on music downloading, that the number of people buying music will not increase at all, the people who download music do it because they can't afford to pay for music artist's multi million pound mansions.

High street CD sales are falling, but this is mostly due to pay-to-download services such as iTunes, and also the cheap e-tailers such as play.com.

I think that most pirated downloads are not in fact lost sales, as the person probably would not have bought the game/app/movie/album anyways.

Well Napster gave the music industry a huge boost didnt it, by exposing more artists to people who would not have otherwise have heard some stuff who then went on to buy some of their music legally. Piracy boosts sales.

None the less it's illegal because your £0 download apparently funds terrorism, so there's a punishment and if you dont want that punishment then dont do the crime... Really its that simple.

The music industry is a load of tosh lately. Do they really think they are going to go bankrupt from a few people downloading a £7.99 cd. Since a single song on itunes is 79p they aren't really getting much.

See, speaking as a performing and recording musician myself, I have mixed opinions about the whole thing.

Firstly, DRM-free music is great for publicity. You give it away for free, someone likes it, gives it to their friends, etc. Viral marketing. It means you can get more people in to gigs and stuff.
Of course the flipside is that there's a lot more profit to be made from selling a £10 album that cost 50p to burn than a £5 concert ticket when we pay travel costs to get there. And for us struggling artists (and bollocks to those sitting on millions), that's our living.

It used to be that bands would lose money doing tours but then make it back on album sales. These days you lose money making the recordings and have to hope that you make it back at gigs and on merchandise, which is why gig tickets for a lot of bands are stupidly expensive.

It just feels a little hollow, knowing that you're spending time and money on a good studio production that has absolutely no value other than promotional.

Daj, gimme some of your viral marketting ?

Quote from Becky Rose :

None the less it's illegal because your £0 download apparently funds terrorism, so there's a punishment and if you dont want that punishment then dont do the crime... Really its that simple.

One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter, so it may not be that bad depending on who gets the funds.

Nelson Mandela was considered a terrorist by some, we've just put a statue of him up.