Boards.ie and Copyright
Since our inception, Boards has had a policy against copyright breaching Bittorrent links. We've been here for 12 years now and that's been our policy long before anyone came and made us adopt it.
We do not support piracy.
We also do not support bad law.
More than 2 million different people use Boards.ie every month. We reach a lot of people and a lot of people use us to communicate with each other. We employ two full-time staff to respond to take down notices. That is a cost we bear to protect other people's copyright. A cost we do not see recouped from the rights holders. We are not slack about this issue.
Proposed New Law
Minister Seán Sherlock has proposed a new law which is best explained here. It will be enacted by a single stroke of his pen.
Why are we opposed to this law?
- It is vague in the extreme. There are no details of what is considered a transgression. It isn't clear if the site targeted will even be informed of the proceedings.
- The mere threat that allowing a user to post content could land the service in court will ensure that no service allows it. The implications are no more social media for Ireland, who the hell is going to take that risk?? This scares us greatly but will TERRIFY the likes of Google, Twitter, Facebook. Of course we have to stay here and live with it. They and their thousands of jobs, don't.
- Its not fair. This is akin to letting Bank of Ireland take proceedings against the National Toll Roads Ltd when a getaway-driver uses the M50. Pretty soon, no one will want to build roads.
- It kills innovation and scares away foreign investment. Boards might have the clout and money to fight some of these injunctions. Smaller operators simply won't.
- This wont even work. This will take the pirates 10 minutes to circumvent and I can demonstrate that easily if anyone wants to see.
Bad Law
This is the very definition of bad law. It punishes those who are trying to do what is right while doing nothing to stop the criminals. It seems to follow the headless chicken logic of "Something must be done!!! This is something, therefore we must do this!!"
Why is this being pushed through on the signature of one man without proper consultation with the industry and with the people of Ireland (over 45,000 of whom have already signed a petition against this)?
It won't work, its vastly over powered and punishes the wrong people. It's bad law and I'm asking Minister Sherlock to reconsider it.
Tom Murphy
Founder. Director.
tom@boards.ie
@devore
If you wish to contact Minister Sherlock yourself, you can do so via his website
If you wish to discuss this letter on Boards here.
