World trade Organization legalizes piracy for Antigua

amazing no one has commented on this yet

Nice... big slap in the face.

i was pleased when i read the news

er, im not like pro piracy or anything but i mean i was pleased to see the WTO actually do something to fuck with the US

yup,totally................

Who cares what the WTO says.

Everyone is too buzy trying to register porntorrents.ag

so is hosting available in Antigua?

holy fucking shit

I'm also happy. If only the UN could have prevented the US invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan and other more serious violations of international law.

The US = credibility on the international scene lost forever. When a US diplomat opens his mouth, it's like listening to Soviets. Lies, lies and lies.

A .ag domain costs $250 wtf?

Fine. I will stay there in April, 2008!

piratebay.ag

Antigua is a pretty island, but where the fuck is the US?

Yeah, because the UN is really credible.

Why .......

You live in Florida and you like seeing the US fucked with. Why are you fucking here then?

wasn't antigua basically founded by pirates way back in the day?

For the Dendrochronologists among us.

not to nitpick but invasion of iraq was legally justified by saddam violating the terms of surrender from the first gulf war. If it had not been france could have demanded and gotten george bush tried for war crimes.

If you want a better example of the US flaunting the law the dispute over soft lumber with Canada, they lost ever step of the way and still refused to pay the full penalty.

The canadian government caved on the demand and let them off the hook because the US threatened sanctions.

should be interesting to see if antiqua replaced the gambling hosting with pirate hosting to recover their losses.

well considering the berne convention (the legal agreement that recognizes copyrights registered in one country to be valid in another )was negotiated thru WTO. And they are basically revoking the US right to this agreement it would represent a very strong motion to dismiss arguement against any suit brought by a US copyright holder.

Put your servers up in antiqua and you can basically say to the MPAA.

Damn... it is funny gideongallery

And... have to say it is, ironically, totally justified and stemming from an action which started around 10 years ago and where the US has still failed to perform.

It's even more absurd that the admin are now trying to sqeeze out of the issue by changing the goalposts and now proposing to rewrite gaming laws and not have them included in trade agreements with the WTO. Basically it's a scenario where a country will not keep follow the spirit of a treaty it signed and wants to behave like a spoilt brat - basically, no cred.

If you take that behavior a step further - why would an offending country seek WTO intervention in it's trading relationships with other countries? Example - China.

Someone needs to get the clue that "cherry picking" parts of treaties you like and ignoring others was never part of the deal

My new tube site is almost ready to go, guess where it's located.

It looks like they are getting back to their roots.

Antigua thinks making itself a criminal haven will be good for business?



Oh well, it's just another caribbean island to cross off my list for vacations.

You got that twisted and wrong as usual DH - the 'criminal' element stems from the admin and not from anyone else

I know things are backward, but does it take longer than ten years to comply with a treaty??

What antigua is doing is generating extra income for themselves which will make their infrastructure better while the bulk of the pirates/criminals will probably never actually step fott in that country....

100% accurate

Know the island well and have biz there - and also know a number of the parties involved in the gaming/WTO dispute. They have tolerated a fair amount of abuse since... around 1997 onwards and have invested amounts of funds into reaching a settlement and obviously have no intention of giving up on this.

These people have been totally above board, transparent and have been guided by serious legal representation. One scenario in the early days involved the production of glossy laminated brochures with pics of their corp officers, their experience and a policy statement etc. The US then used to try and target these individuals - ironic *lol*

Sure, there is a vested interest at govt level in continuing this action since gaming brings considerable revenue to the island. It is basically an offshore jurisdiction performing the usual corp formations, banking and financial services etc. and, least from my - a nice place to live and very few restrictions or red tape.



PS You are right - what happens to 'criminals' is they are escorted to the airport and thrown off the island with very little warning

it is far worse than ignoring the spirit of the treaty but the letter of the law
the ajudication provision is defined to setup a third party court system to handle trade disputes amoung members. The US basically said we don't like the ruling we agreed to abide by so we are taking our ball and going home.

Well WTO is saying if you don't want to live up to your responsibilities then we are taking away all the benefits (berne convention).

well now we can all sue Australia for blocking porn, if they go ahead with it!!!

Sure.. it's exactly that GG.

Have followed this dispute for years - after initial hearings at the start and highlighting the specific claims of abuse, the "perp" claimed they had since changed and were complying with the terms of the treaty. Unfortunately, this was totally untrue and Antigua, Canada, the UK and several other countries then again pushed the issue in front of the WTO. A further ruling was made against the US and time was given to perform, and again - this never happened. Then the process was repeated - yet again *lol.

Basically it has been a series of hearings, rulings, reasonable time periods allowed to comply with the treaty/convention and this has ultimately failed. There are no rational "excuses" left to present to the WTO to justify the prohibition of trade "because we don't like it". The Berne Convention never was a pick-and-choose-the-good-bits scenario

Sure, there are ultimate consequences of playing your own ball-game and ignoring ratified treaties and no reason to expect the international community to jump up and defend US interests if the US can't even abide by the treaty itself.

It's like appearing before a judge and claiming you don't like the law you agreed to, so we'll just ignore it and continue our criminal ways

Pretty amazing precedent

a few daisy cutters and the problem solved lol

Pirates weren't always outlaws; a lot of them worked for their governments. It's tradition.

i don't get it how does cricket solve this problem.

Copyright infringement/piracy costs the U.S. economy $58.0 billion in total output and costs American workers 373,375 jobs*

I wonder how Hollywood feels about this?


*These figures taken from Institute for Policy Innovation.

the problem is that "piracy" as defined by the IPI includes a lot of fair use (like downloading a tv show you paid for but misplaced/missed)

defendfairuse.org

The report is available here.

basically give the mpaa/etc the level of protection they want and you sacrifice 2.2 trillion dollars in currently legal income to gain 58 billion.

You put 11 million people out of work to save 373,375.

I hope this helps you understand why i am such a strong supporter of fair use

(like downloading a tv show you paid for but misplaced/missed)

So if I lose a hammer I can walk into a hardware store and pick up another for free. Extreme example but the same net effect. A consumer should be responsible for his purchase. Storage drives are so cheap now that no back ups should mean tough shit. Copyrights shouldn't be restricted because of careless consumers.

As for the people currently making their living off fair use "Times change, adapt!" Isn't that what copyright holders are being told. Technology has changed how copyrighted products can be illegally distributed. Fair use users must understand they are the users of someone else's product and share in policing their respected industries.

Return on investment is the first rule in business. Period. If there isn't future return there's no future product. The fact that the money is being sucked out of the US economy increasing our deficit hurts us all.

FUck yeas!

your example is bogus because the copyright act grants you your exclusive rights conditionally on you respecting fair use.

What the WTO is doing to US is an exact parallel to your arguement
you demanding the protection of copyright (US demanding Berne convention protection) without fulfilling your fair use responsibilites (US not honoring the decision of the WTO regarding gambling).

The law that give you the protection you are asking for DEMANDS you respect fair use. You have to remember that when i make a copy of a show I HAVE ALREADY PAID FOR, i am not denying you any income you are ENTITLED TO, but in your hammer example the product is gone and unavailable for sale.

copyright law was designed to grant protection to the licience of use of content. You don't buy the content you are given the content for free and you BUY a licience to use. Re aquiring the content to fullfill your licience to use is legal. And you have a legal obligation to honor those rights for your your copyright to be valid.

The copy of a show you have already paid for should be obtained from the source you purchased it from. That is the entity that received your money. How many downloads from a torrent site are to replace purchased copyrighted material? There is the problem with any argument.

well i only have the research done for tv shows

both neilson and gartner did research this summer regarding the impact of downloadable tv vs broadcast tv.

according to those studies 2.5 million people have stopped watching tv on tv and instead download all their shows commercial free ( assuming all of them gave up their cable service these people are stealing content)

another 22.5 million people are using downloads to get tv shows they are missing (either because they missed a show, failed to tape it or were only informed about it after it had successfully aired for weeks).(fair use because they still pay for cable otherwise they would not able to consume that product on tv.)

that a 9-1 ratio

which is the point those that use torrent (at least for tv shows) are using it for a legitimate purpose.

demanding that only get it from the source you originally got it from it unfair extension of the monopoly (as defined by the beta max case law- like disabling the record button on the VCR).

That case authorized the aquiring of copyright material that i bought a right to from friends ( ie tape loaning for free). So when a torrent seeder gives me the content i paid for it falls in the same boat.

As a copyright holder in less than 15 minutes you can get all the ip address of the peers in a swarm, identify the isp that owns that ip address and send C&D letter out to them. Those that have a legitimate right to download (90%) will be able to defend their fair use with a copy of the law, relevant court cases, and their cable bill (just like i did already) those that do not (10%) will have their internet cut off. Forcing them to buy cable again because their illegal source of content would be gone.

You don't need to take away the rights of the majority (90%) to protect your income for the minority of copyright violators (10%).

I'm betting this is the first time Dendrochronologists has been used in a sentence at GFY.

Pick a product that people pay for right up front with a direct purchase, music, movie, photos, etc.

Run these thru your torrent justification analysis machine. These are what the sites exist for, were designed for and profit from. Stealing.

just digg it..
i hope ill do the frontpage with this:-)

In Trade Ruling, Antigua Wins a Right to Piracy
By JAMES KANTER and GARY RIVLIN
Published: December 22, 2007

PARIS — In an unusual ruling on Friday at the World Trade Organization, the Caribbean nation of Antigua won the right to violate copyright protections on goods like films and music from the United States — an award worth up to $21 million — as part of a dispute between the countries over online gambling.
Skip to next paragraph
Fred Merz for The New York Times

Mark Mendel, representing Antigua, urges new approaches.
Managing Globalization Blog
Managing Globalization

Two wrongs don’t make a right.
Go to Blog »

The award follows a W.T.O. ruling that Washington had wrongly blocked online gambling operators on the island from the American market at the same time it allowed online wagering on horse racing.

Antigua and Barbuda had claimed damages of $3.44 billion a year. That makes the relatively small amount awarded Friday, $21 million, something of a setback for Antigua, which had been struggling to preserve its gambling industry.

The United States argued that its behavior had caused $500,000 damage.

Yet the ruling is significant in that it grants a rare form of compensation: the right of one country, in this case Antigua, to violate intellectual property laws of another — the United States — by allowing it to distribute copies of American music, movie and software products.

“That has only been done once before and is, I believe, a very potent weapon,” said Mark Mendel, a lawyer representing Antigua, after the ruling. “I hope that the United States government will now see the wisdom in reaching some accommodation with Antigua over this dispute.”

Though Antigua is best known for its pristine beaches and tourist attractions, the dozens of online casinos based there are important to the island’s economy as its second-largest employer.

By pressing its claim, trade lawyers said, Antigua could set a precedent for other countries to sue the United States for unfair trade practices, potentially opening the door to electronic piracy and other dubious practices around the world.

Still, carrying out the ruling will prove difficult, the lawyers say.

“Even if Antigua goes ahead with an act of piracy or the refusal to allow the registration of a trademark, the question still remains of how much that act is worth,” said Brendan McGivern, a trade lawyer with White & Case in Geneva.

“The Antiguans could say that’s worth $50,000, and then the U.S. might say that’s worth $5 million.” He predicted that “the U.S. is going to dog them on every step of the way.”

The United States has aggressively fought Antigua’s claims.

A W.T.O. panel first ruled against the United States in 2004, and its appellate body upheld that decision a year later. In April 2005, the trade body gave the United States a year to comply with its ruling.

That deadline passed with little more than a statement from Washington that it had decided it was in compliance.

From the start, the United States asserted that it had never intended to allow free cross-border gambling or betting. Those activities are restricted in the United States, though some form of gambling is legal in 48 states.

In May, the United States said it was rewriting its trade rules to remove gambling from the jurisdiction of the W.T.O.

Washington has agreed on deals with the European Union, Canada and Japan to change the treaty but not with several other nations, including Antigua.

On Friday, the United States trade representative issued a stern warning to Antigua to avoid acts of piracy, counterfeiting or violations of intellectual property rights while talks continue.

The trade office said such behavior would “undermine Antigua’s claimed intentions of becoming a leader in legitimate electronic commerce, and would severely discourage foreign investment” in the country.

James Kanter reported from Paris, and Gary Rivlin from New York.

i've post the complete text before the link turn member only!!