Comcast: We’re Delaying, Not Blocking, BitTorrent Traffic

[habernac]

Originally Posted by Flashpoint

So let me get this straight.

I make a video game. I put it in a store. A guy buys it and bit torrents it. I make no money because everyone on bit torrent gets it for free, and doesn't buy it.

So downloading is a victimless crime because the store still has their copy, and could potentially sell it?

like punching someone in the dark, right?

[Bobblehead]

Originally Posted by Flashpoint

So let me get this straight.

I make a video game. I put it in a store. A guy buys it and bit torrents it. I make no money because everyone on bit torrent gets it for free, and doesn't buy it.

So downloading is a victimless crime because the store still has their copy, and could potentially sell it?

Where did anyone say it was victimless?

[MarchHare]

Originally Posted by Flashpoint

So let me get this straight.

I make a video game. I put it in a store. A guy buys it and bit torrents it. I make no money because everyone on bit torrent gets it for free, and doesn't buy it.

So downloading is a victimless crime because the store still has their copy, and could potentially sell it?

You're assuming that everyone who illegally downloaded your game would otherwise have purchased it if it wasn't available on a torrent. That's a very flawed assumption.

I purchase all my software now that I'm working and can afford to pay for it, but during my university years when I was a starving student, I pirated games and other software all the time. The thing is, though, I wouldn't have been a legal paying customer for that software even if internet piracy didn't exist -- I simply couldn't afford it. Whether I pirated it or not, no software publisher would have seen a dime from me. Yes, it was still copyright infringement and yes it was still illegal, but unlike the scenario where someone walks into a brick & mortor store and steals a boxed copy off the shelf, nobody is being deprived of a sale when someone who wouldn't purchase the software anyway decides to pirate it.

[habernac]

LOL! Whatever helps you sleep at night, MarchHare.

[MarchHare]

Explain the bold part to me. How can they expect to sell a product to a market saturated with free versions? Sounds like a loss of "future profits" to me.

This might not be true any longer, but at one time Photoshop was the #1 most pirated piece of software. Adobe still made huge money despite of this. How many people who pirated Photoshop were actually potential customers who would have otherwise paid $600+ for the software if internet piracy wasn't an option?

[photon]

Originally Posted by Flashpoint

I see no difference between going into a store and sticking a DVD under your coat, and torrenting a movie. One, most of the adults on this site wouldn't dream of doing. The other, many of you have probably done without a second thought.

I have yet to encounter anyone who can tell me the difference between them.

One is theft, the other is copyright infringement. Two different parts of the law. EDIT: I'm late it seems

Originally Posted by Flashpoint

Is it as pervasive as bit torrent? I would say no. BT is the pirate ship of choice for every noob out there. Hence it being in the crosshairs.

HTTP is FAR more prevalent than bittorrent. In fact the use of bittorrent to pirate stuff would be impossible without HTTP.

And HTTP is also the protocol of choice to transfer the majority of data that contains things like hate literature, child porn, etc.

If ISPs were serious about stopping it why don't they simply block access to the sites in question? Shaw could simply take a list of the torrent sites and make them all go to a page that says they don't allow access to that site.

Why don't they do that?

Originally Posted by habernac

There is no scarcity when you are talking about intellectual property, so arguments comparing physical property theft and intellectual property theft are misleading and incorrect.

Come on, Bobblehead. If you download a copy of a movie, the company that produced it is getting squat. That's stealing, period. No amount of technological babble is going to change that.

It's a different law, copyright infringement isn't theft. The net result from the point of view of the company may be similar (lost revenue), but in law it's not the same. And that assumes that people are downloading in lieu of purchasing, which isn't always the case.

DRM is collapsing, and CD sales, while up for a while, are going to collapse too because of DRM free distribution. The music industry still needs to evolve a new economic model.

There will always be people who copy, be it tape, CD's, whatever. The masses go with what's most convenient though and the music industry needs to recognize that.

[MarchHare]

There will always be people who copy, be it tape, CD's, whatever. The masses go with what's most convenient though and the music industry needs to recognize that.

This is a very good point. Remember the "home taping is killing music" advertising campaigns used by the music industry in the 80s? And then remember how they continued to make record profits year after year in spite of this? Remember how the MPAA fought tooth and nail to kill the VCR, taking it all the way to the supreme court (and losing) in the famous Universal Studios vs. Sony Betamax case? And now sales of home videos and DVDs make up a very significant portion of revenues earned by the movie studios, surpassing box office takes in many cases.

Companies that adapt to emerging consumer trends and find a way to capitalize on them will prosper. Companies that refuse to alter their obsolete business models are doomed for failure.

[photon]

http://radar.oreilly.com/archives/20..._industry.html

A perfect example of the cracks starting to show. Once the RIAA and their ilk realize that the current model can't be sustained forever no matter how much they try to technically limit people, the better.

All these technical limitations do is punish your real customers.

[Barnes]

Originally Posted by Flashpoint

I see no difference between going into a store and sticking a DVD under your coat, and torrenting a movie. One, most of the adults on this site wouldn't dream of doing. The other, many of you have probably done without a second thought.

I have yet to encounter anyone who can tell me the difference between them.

I see no difference between going into a store and sticking a book under your coat, and borrowing that book from a friend instead of purchasing it. One, most of the adults on this site wouldn't dream of doing. The other, many of you have probably done without a second thought.

[habernac]

Originally Posted by Barnes

I see no difference between going into a store and sticking a book under your coat, and borrowing that book from a friend instead of purchasing it. One, most of the adults on this site wouldn't dream of doing. The other, many of you have probably done without a second thought.

Better shut down all those public libraries out there.




If they copied the book and bound it, you might have a point.

[Barnes]

Originally Posted by habernac

Better shut down all those public libraries out there.




If they copied the book and bound it, you might have a point.

Why is acceptable to not pay for copyrighted print material? I don't press DVD'd from the mp4s I download, just consume and delete. In a book case you consume and return it to your friend or lend it out again.

[MarchHare]

Originally Posted by habernac

Better shut down all those public libraries out there.

Funny you should mention public libraries...if there was, historically, no such thing as the library system and somebody wanted to start the world's first public library in today's age, do you think the book publishers would allow it? Of course they wouldn't. They'd fight the very concept of a public library, saying that it amounts to widespread copyright infringement and free lending of books would kill their industry and anyone who would even propose such a system must be a communist.

This exact idea was discussed on the Freakonomics blog a few months ago.
http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.co...art-one-today/

Some choice quotes that are relevant to this discussion:

The library bought its copy, of course. But let’s say 50 people will read that copy over the life of the book. If the library copy hadn’t existed, surely not all 50 of those people would have bought the book. But imagine that even 10 people would have. That’s 9 additional book sales lost by the writer and the publisher.

[...]

But here’s the point I’m (finally) getting to: if there was no such thing today as the public library and someone like Bill Gates proposed to establish them in cities and towns across the U.S. (much like Andrew Carnegie once did), what would happen?
I am guessing there would be a huge pushback from book publishers. Given the current state of debate about intellectual property, can you imagine modern publishers being willing to sell one copy of a book and then have the owner let an unlimited number of strangers borrow it?

[metal_geek]

The whole IP/copyright system is flawed.

The whole RIAA argument that the industry lost Billions of dollars in sales, is just a ploy so they can convince politicians, that the gov is losing 100's of millions of dollars in taxes.

The RIAA uses it's political power and the "copyright" laws to profit off the backs of the artists, and maintain its monopoly over the customer base. All the RIAA is doing is using every possible form of legal manipulation to maintain is "Middle Man" status.

Does the RIAA think music will stop when they don't own the rights and 95%/ 5% royalty rights to some artists first 10 "Albums"?? If there was never another album produced again, and artists had to produce thier own CD's and Digital copys of music, and profited 100% from the sales, I'm willing to bet alot more, higher quality music will be produced, with the real talent profiting.

The RIAA and other usless relic monopolies are dieing , and person to person, community to community transfer of information and "IP" is the next step for us. "Bit torrent" and other forms of communication are just distrobution tools, no different then CD's, records, books or SCROLLS. Anyone who would condone "limiting" any from of distrubution should be the same people burning books...
________
Cancer - prostate forums

[Azure]

Originally Posted by Flashpoint

Explain the bold part to me. How can they expect to sell a product to a market saturated with free versions? Sounds like a loss of "future profits" to me.

No really...considering that those people who pirate games, movies or music probably wouldn't pay money for it in the first place.

[metal_geek]

Micheal Copland former CEO of Corel said it best when he said "I'd rather people steal my software then buy microsofts"
________
Motorcycle Tires

[flamey_mcflame]

Amazing...I always find it hilarious when people try to justify thier actions...copyright infringement vs. theft..I would have never bought it anyways, so noone else lost money..bottom line its wrong...hey..there is a lot of free audio,video and software out there.. get it and enjoy....whether it's someone's physical or intellectual property does not cause one to be any less unethical.....we may live in a technological age...but individuals or companies who invest time and capital in their ideas and ask for monetary compensation is what drives innovation and capitalism....the truth is ..most people steal from the internet because they know they can get away with it...these same people would have wonderful arguments for why physical theft is ok if they could get away with it too.....its just another fine example of the very fine line between society and anarchy...

[photon]

Originally Posted by flamey_mcflame

Amazing...I always find it hilarious when people try to justify thier actions.

Amazing, I always find it hilarious when people don't read and post about things that never happened.

Who's claimed that the action is justified?

[Regorium]

Originally Posted by mykalberta

They likely prioritize packets and set torrent sites at a lower priority since they are more BW hogs than other normal surfing.

IMO Comcast doesnt have a responsibility to make sure bit torrent works fast, just that the majority of their customers have a fast experience. Its also possible however unlikely they changed the routing scheme to thwart those peer to peer apps.

At UNC especially they are testing peer to peer spider schemes on different routing algorithms. Its a way ISPs can limit their traffic while still adhering to the subscriber contract.

Completely untrue. If, for example, I am advertised a 5Mb/s down and 768kb/s up connection, I should be able to achieve this rated speed at ANY point in the day, regardless of the amount of traffic on the network at that particular time. This is their responsibility. It is not my responsibility to make sure that the other people in my building have good speed as well.

However, since ISP's realize most people are complete idiots and use very very little bandwidth, they oversell their pipe like crazy. Now they have some people actually using what they advertise, and they shut them down. Absolutely ridiculous.

[llama64]

Originally Posted by metal_geek

Micheal Copland former CEO of Corel said it best when he said "I'd rather people steal my software then buy microsofts"

How much of a stake in the software market does Corel have again?

[llama64]

Originally Posted by Regorium

Completely untrue. If, for example, I am advertised a 5Mb/s down and 768kb/s up connection, I should be able to achieve this rated speed at ANY point in the day, regardless of the amount of traffic on the network at that particular time. This is their responsibility. It is not my responsibility to make sure that the other people in my building have good speed as well.

However, since ISP's realize most people are complete idiots and use very very little bandwidth, they oversell their pipe like crazy. Now they have some people actually using what they advertise, and they shut them down. Absolutely ridiculous.

They don't shut people down for using the bandwidth. They shut people down for going over the upper monthly limit. If you read your contract (at least with Shaw), you'll find you agreed to that limit.

That said, bittorrent traffic should not be treated/shaped any differently then any other type of traffic. If Comcast is allowed to continue doing this, we will see further restrictions come in that will actually start harming free commerce and transmission of information. What would stop Comcast from delaying all traffic headed towards rivals?

We must keep the tubes open and free of any tolls!