Sponsor's Message

If a group of criminals plot an evil scheme over the phone to break the law and then use mobile phones to help them carry out their heist, the phone company doesn't face any liability.

If someone commits murder using a knife, gun or other weapon, the manufacturer of the weapon doesn't face any sanction as a result.

So why is the law so hell-bent on punishing those who run file-sharing networks?

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Of course those in favour of closing down file-trading networks would level the accusation that they're little more than a mechanism for trading copyrighted material such as music and movies; others however, would argue against that claim.

Many of those using these networks are quick to point out that they're actually a natural (and often more efficient) evolution of the age-old file-transfer operation previously performed by email attachments, FTP, HTTP downloads etc.

Perhaps it's the anonymity aspect of many such networks that get the control-freaks into a tiz. Well I've got news for them -- the Net has long been a fairly anonymous medium.

Even good old FTP has (for as long as I can remember) usually offered an anonymous login facility. Email, usenet and most other forms of communications allow the use of unauthenticated identifiers and in this regard file trading networks are little different.

Don't get me wrong -- as someone who produces a snot-load of copyrighted material I'm certainly not suggesting that the free trading of such material is in any way a good thing. However, I am rather concerned that we're blaming P2P companies for the sins of their users.

The ultimate and logical extension of such an attitude is to ban pre-pay cellphones, and legislate against the use of pseudonyms or anonymous activities on the Net.

Likewise, anyone found operating (knowingly or otherwise) a publicly accessible anonymous proxy should be thrown in jail and huge teams of "ID police" should be set up to enforce these rules.

And while we're at it -- let's throw Sony's execs in jail for promoting the piracy of music by way of their Mini-Disc players, CD and DVD burners.

Some how, this whole thing smacks of hypocrisy -- but then again, that's nothing new in the music/movie industry is it?

Lighten Up
Time for a bit of frivolity to round out the week.

For those of you who don't know what a redneck is, go Google it. For the rest of you, here's a taste of what America would look like If Rednecks Ruled.

If you've ever wondered what you'd do were you unfortunate enough to become unemployed then here's some inspiration.

Keep those lighten-up links flowing folks.

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