UK Digital Economy Bill Passes

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/04/digital-economy-bill-passes-in-the-uk.ars?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=rss

The UK's Labour government, partnering with the Conservatives, yesterday pushed through the controversial Digital Economy bill over opposition from Liberal Democrats and some in its own party. The bill allows the UK courts to order complete blocks on websites, it requires ISPs to start sending P2P warning letters from copyright holders, and it opens the door to throttling and Internet disconnection for repeat infringement.

Someone in the comment posted a quote that someone else commented on a different website, which sums it up pretty nicely:

This comment by ThinkOfTheChildren on guardian.co.uk puts it nicely:

Quote:
So the music 'industry', a tiny fraction of the British economy with few fans has managed to push through a bill which contains the following provision to shut down ...

"a location on the internet which the court is satisfied has been, is being or is likely to be used for or in connection with an activity that infringes copyright"

When are we going to realise how serious this is?

This is so wide ranging that you could use it to shut down Google (try searching for 'film-name filetype:torrent'), YouTube , Facebook, pretty much everything that contains user generated content.

Of course they won't use it against those sites, just the next innovative or politically awkward website.

Meanwhile, we'll have families without internet connections because their children have file shared a copy of Bono's latest dreary pop trump.

=/

Aren't there even studies that suggest that pirates consume more than non-pirates? Hell, I buy albums, movies and games all of the time that I've downloaded at one point or another. I even double buy some things.
Hooray for overbearing governments.

Although I especially like the last sentence in the last quote.