7 ms·

And for that you believe he should be put in prison for 15 months? At most this should be a civil issue between 2 private parties where monetary damages are aw

by syshum 9y ago

And for that you believe he should be put in prison for 15 months? At most this should be a civil issue between 2 private parties where monetary damages are awarded, not a criminal case where a person faces prison times.

DanBC 9y ago
He shouldn't be in prison, but it's a well established bit of law that copyright infringement as a business is a criminal offence, and not just a civil tort. This is present is several jurisdictions.
- syshum 9y ago
  The fact that something is "well established" does not make it ethical, moral or right. I personally find it abhorrent when people use the justification of "well it is well established law" as if the law is written in stone, unchangeable, the word of a god and we just have to accept it. No the law is wrong, the law should be changed, and this is an example if why it should be changed. Copyright law need to be massively reformed and curbed. Intellectual Privilege is no longer with in its constitutional remit, i.e to Promote useful Arts and Sciences, and instead used to destroy those very things ---Edit: thanks for the downvotes I love how every day HN becomes more and more of a echo Chamber where anyone that disagrees with the popular (generally Pro Large Tech Company) narrative gets downvotes and has their voice suppressed since once a post get negative votes the "You are posting to fast" throttle kicks in and prevents the person from responding
  - aje403 9y ago
    Blah blah blah, okay, but yes he should be in jail. He can choose not to counterfeit when he gets out if he wants to stay out
    - syshum 9y ago
      Prison should be reserved only for those that are a Physical Danger to others, not to punish people that may harm Corporate profits
      - shmed 9y ago
        What about thieves? If I break into a bank or a jewelry store and leave with million dollars worth of gold, then get caught. Should I just "restitute" the stolen goods and go back home? My only crime was to harm corporate profits, I didn't put anyone under physical danger. What about if I steal someone's car (not a corporation)? Does it change based on who you target (rather than based on the crime itself)? And if the only punishment is monetary, rather than jail time, does that mean committing a crime becomes a question of "can I afford to commit the crime and simply pay the fine?". Let's say I'm a millionaire that get its thrill from breaking into museum and stealing valuable art pieces. Are we just gonna ask him to give them back (if he ever get caught) and pay a "stealing" fee?
      - aje403 9y ago
        The lazy entitled pseudologic neckbeard hivemind of this site is painful sometimes. Please stop. What if I decide to be a polite burglar who doesn't have any intention of hurting you? Can you leave me out of jail too? I think it's great that our country has strong deterrents against people clearly and deliberately going out of their way to make a living off copyright infringement. Why is it so hard to avoid jail by going through life and not deliberately stealing IP from another company that they've literally systematically invested in for 30 years? Now we just need to do a better job of it abroad.
        syshum 9y ago
        >>I think it's great that our country has strong deterrents against people clearly and deliberately going out of their way to make a living off copyright infringement. and I think copyright itself is unethical and should be abolished completely, I am willing to accept/comprise and support a copyright of extreme limited duration covering an very small subset of useful arts and sciences for a duration of no more than 14 years to the original creator only (no corporations) >The lazy entitled pseudologic neckbeard hivemind of this site is painful sometimes. Please stop. I am a clean shaven libertarian that has never had a beard or any facial hair let alone a neckbeard. >What if I decide to be a polite burglar who doesn't have any intention of hurting you? Can you leave me out of jail too? Yes, if a person steals property that property can be replaced / victim made hole via restitution, it holds no value to society or the victim to place that person in a cage, a cage that also must be paid for by taking property of others in the form of taxation. If someone takes $1,000 from me, I would much rather have $1,500 in restitution than $0 and the person go to jail
  - djsumdog 9y ago
    Please don't comment on downvotes. It is what it is, and it can change if you wait. In response, yes laws change. It was once well established that separate but equal was equal; and blacks could have their own bathrooms and drinking fountains. It was once legal to employee 13 year old boys as factory workers. Disney's big items are well past their trademark expiration dates. Mickey Mouse should be public domain soon, but Disney is large enough they keep lobbying for laws that extend their IP well beyond what it should be. We do need copyright reform, especially in cases like this where the physical disks aren't even made anymore.
    - retrogradeorbit 9y ago
      People should be allowed to comment on down votes. Wait, let me guess, its 'well established'.
      - djsumdog 9y ago
        No, it's in the guidelines: > Please don't comment about the voting on comments. It never does any good, and it makes boring reading. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- amelius 9y ago
  > it's a well established bit of law that copyright infringement as a business is a criminal offence, and not just a civil tort Can we have this kind of law for privacy infringement too, please?
  - hedora 9y ago
    We do have criminal laws protecting privacy, and they are enforced as long as the victim is a corporation or the government.
- dredmorbius 9y ago
  Who writes that law?
  - DanBC 9y ago
    You shouldn't be downvoted for stating something that's obviously true: the IP industry has huge amounts of influence and they've been sucessful at driving legal change. This includes making commercial copyright violation a criminal, rather than civil, offence. It also includes things like making circumvention of technical protection measure illegal. It's wide ranging, it removes freedoms, it causes economic harm.
    - zeusk 9y ago
      > This includes making commercial copyright violation a criminal, rather than civil, offence. It also includes things like making circumvention of technical protection measure illegal. > It's wide ranging, it removes freedoms, it causes economic harm. And how exactly is that? The government didn't go after him because he was distributing pirated media or software to his friends but he set up a manufacturing unit, deceived customs to profit off the operations. Not to "recycle and reduce waste", not to help you or me.
      - DanBC 9y ago
        You want to carrier-unlock your phone? Might be illegal where you are. You want to back-up DVD or bluray discs? Might be illegal where you are. You want to format shift CD to MP3? Might be illegal where you are. You bought thousands of CDs, and want to pay a service to format shift them to MP3? Probably illegal. etc etc etc.
        zeusk 9y ago
        For most jurisdictions, an act is "criminal" if you have mens rea (malicious intent) and actus reus (malicious act). You never see someone getting locked up or fined for copying discs for personal use. All of the cases that I'm aware of involved distribution and profiting. The measures were intended to deter those profiting off the work of others like in this case. Although, I agree that the legal approach sets a bad precedent and unfortunate collateral damage to people who genuinely buy something and face the same deterrence when they really don't have any malicious intent.
- retrogradeorbit 9y ago
  It was once civil, but corporations successfully externalised their enforcement costs on the tax payer by lobbying and rewriting the law to make it criminal.
ThoAppelsin 9y ago
It is not useful to discuss about the law on a forum on the internet, at least not yet. Still... Counterfeiting is an act that is similar to theft, apparent from the fact that this guy has succeeded in making money from what Microsoft gave birth to, and therefore owned [1]. The relation between the guy and Microsoft is clearly a parasitic one. Microsoft would be compensated justly if they were simply just awarding the monetary damage back by the damaging parties, here Eric Lundgren and his co-defendants. However, it would not be just against the community* (which includes Microsoft, but also everyone else) to let the damaging parties go away without deterring them from doing such actions further. Otherwise, the damaging parties may continue living off their lives through damaging, simply because it is almost certain that there will be cases where they will make profit without being detected and required to award the damages back. Another way to explain the situation is this: If they are not made to pay more than the damage they have caused, their worst-case (for them, not us/community) profit is 0, and for all the other cases they will be making profit. Should this really be the justice cast upon the individuals causing monetary damage? [1]: Declaring creators as the (copyright) owners benefits the community, hence we do. The relevant example Windows is a product of Microsoft that benefits the community, evident from the fact that it has a userbase. Microsoft would not create and offer Windows to the public, if the law allowed everyone to freely redistribute their products, and compete with Microsoft using their creation, as it would render their novel efforts meaningless against the much simpler effort of copying products created by the others. [*]: Edited from "robbery".
- jake_the_third 9y ago
  With all due respect, your view is biased to the point of delusion. Counterfeiting never was and never will be similar to robbery. Robbery results in someone being deprived of their property. No one has been deprived of their property. In fact, as information, the victim in this case couldn't deprive Microsoft and OEMs of their property unless he deleted every single copy of the software. Furthermore, the "counterfeit" software is an exact replica of what is provided by OEMs. There was no harm done to society. I agree with others here: Any prison time is too long, let alone 15 months. Our society needs to take a long hard look at our laws because frankly, we're well on our way within the realm of the absurd.

by syshum 9y ago

DanBC 9y ago

He shouldn't be in prison, but it's a well established bit of law that copyright infringement as a business is a criminal offence, and not just a civil tort. This is present is several jurisdictions.

syshum 9y ago
The fact that something is "well established" does not make it ethical, moral or right. I personally find it abhorrent when people use the justification of "well it is well established law" as if the law is written in stone, unchangeable, the word of a god and we just have to accept it. No the law is wrong, the law should be changed, and this is an example if why it should be changed. Copyright law need to be massively reformed and curbed. Intellectual Privilege is no longer with in its constitutional remit, i.e to Promote useful Arts and Sciences, and instead used to destroy those very things ---Edit: thanks for the downvotes I love how every day HN becomes more and more of a echo Chamber where anyone that disagrees with the popular (generally Pro Large Tech Company) narrative gets downvotes and has their voice suppressed since once a post get negative votes the "You are posting to fast" throttle kicks in and prevents the person from responding
- aje403 9y ago
  Blah blah blah, okay, but yes he should be in jail. He can choose not to counterfeit when he gets out if he wants to stay out
  - syshum 9y ago
    Prison should be reserved only for those that are a Physical Danger to others, not to punish people that may harm Corporate profits
    - shmed 9y ago
      What about thieves? If I break into a bank or a jewelry store and leave with million dollars worth of gold, then get caught. Should I just "restitute" the stolen goods and go back home? My only crime was to harm corporate profits, I didn't put anyone under physical danger. What about if I steal someone's car (not a corporation)? Does it change based on who you target (rather than based on the crime itself)? And if the only punishment is monetary, rather than jail time, does that mean committing a crime becomes a question of "can I afford to commit the crime and simply pay the fine?". Let's say I'm a millionaire that get its thrill from breaking into museum and stealing valuable art pieces. Are we just gonna ask him to give them back (if he ever get caught) and pay a "stealing" fee?
    - aje403 9y ago
      The lazy entitled pseudologic neckbeard hivemind of this site is painful sometimes. Please stop. What if I decide to be a polite burglar who doesn't have any intention of hurting you? Can you leave me out of jail too? I think it's great that our country has strong deterrents against people clearly and deliberately going out of their way to make a living off copyright infringement. Why is it so hard to avoid jail by going through life and not deliberately stealing IP from another company that they've literally systematically invested in for 30 years? Now we just need to do a better job of it abroad.
      - syshum 9y ago
        >>I think it's great that our country has strong deterrents against people clearly and deliberately going out of their way to make a living off copyright infringement. and I think copyright itself is unethical and should be abolished completely, I am willing to accept/comprise and support a copyright of extreme limited duration covering an very small subset of useful arts and sciences for a duration of no more than 14 years to the original creator only (no corporations) >The lazy entitled pseudologic neckbeard hivemind of this site is painful sometimes. Please stop. I am a clean shaven libertarian that has never had a beard or any facial hair let alone a neckbeard. >What if I decide to be a polite burglar who doesn't have any intention of hurting you? Can you leave me out of jail too? Yes, if a person steals property that property can be replaced / victim made hole via restitution, it holds no value to society or the victim to place that person in a cage, a cage that also must be paid for by taking property of others in the form of taxation. If someone takes $1,000 from me, I would much rather have $1,500 in restitution than $0 and the person go to jail
- djsumdog 9y ago
  Please don't comment on downvotes. It is what it is, and it can change if you wait. In response, yes laws change. It was once well established that separate but equal was equal; and blacks could have their own bathrooms and drinking fountains. It was once legal to employee 13 year old boys as factory workers. Disney's big items are well past their trademark expiration dates. Mickey Mouse should be public domain soon, but Disney is large enough they keep lobbying for laws that extend their IP well beyond what it should be. We do need copyright reform, especially in cases like this where the physical disks aren't even made anymore.
  - retrogradeorbit 9y ago
    People should be allowed to comment on down votes. Wait, let me guess, its 'well established'.
    - djsumdog 9y ago
      No, it's in the guidelines: > Please don't comment about the voting on comments. It never does any good, and it makes boring reading. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
amelius 9y ago
> it's a well established bit of law that copyright infringement as a business is a criminal offence, and not just a civil tort Can we have this kind of law for privacy infringement too, please?
- hedora 9y ago
  We do have criminal laws protecting privacy, and they are enforced as long as the victim is a corporation or the government.
dredmorbius 9y ago
Who writes that law?
- DanBC 9y ago
  You shouldn't be downvoted for stating something that's obviously true: the IP industry has huge amounts of influence and they've been sucessful at driving legal change. This includes making commercial copyright violation a criminal, rather than civil, offence. It also includes things like making circumvention of technical protection measure illegal. It's wide ranging, it removes freedoms, it causes economic harm.
  - zeusk 9y ago
    > This includes making commercial copyright violation a criminal, rather than civil, offence. It also includes things like making circumvention of technical protection measure illegal. > It's wide ranging, it removes freedoms, it causes economic harm. And how exactly is that? The government didn't go after him because he was distributing pirated media or software to his friends but he set up a manufacturing unit, deceived customs to profit off the operations. Not to "recycle and reduce waste", not to help you or me.
    - DanBC 9y ago
      You want to carrier-unlock your phone? Might be illegal where you are. You want to back-up DVD or bluray discs? Might be illegal where you are. You want to format shift CD to MP3? Might be illegal where you are. You bought thousands of CDs, and want to pay a service to format shift them to MP3? Probably illegal. etc etc etc.
      - zeusk 9y ago
        For most jurisdictions, an act is "criminal" if you have mens rea (malicious intent) and actus reus (malicious act). You never see someone getting locked up or fined for copying discs for personal use. All of the cases that I'm aware of involved distribution and profiting. The measures were intended to deter those profiting off the work of others like in this case. Although, I agree that the legal approach sets a bad precedent and unfortunate collateral damage to people who genuinely buy something and face the same deterrence when they really don't have any malicious intent.
retrogradeorbit 9y ago
It was once civil, but corporations successfully externalised their enforcement costs on the tax payer by lobbying and rewriting the law to make it criminal.

ThoAppelsin 9y ago

It is not useful to discuss about the law on a forum on the internet, at least not yet. Still... Counterfeiting is an act that is similar to theft, apparent from the fact that this guy has succeeded in making money from what Microsoft gave birth to, and therefore owned [1]. The relation between the guy and Microsoft is clearly a parasitic one. Microsoft would be compensated justly if they were simply just awarding the monetary damage back by the damaging parties, here Eric Lundgren and his co-defendants. However, it would not be just against the community* (which includes Microsoft, but also everyone else) to let the damaging parties go away without deterring them from doing such actions further. Otherwise, the damaging parties may continue living off their lives through damaging, simply because it is almost certain that there will be cases where they will make profit without being detected and required to award the damages back. Another way to explain the situation is this: If they are not made to pay more than the damage they have caused, their worst-case (for them, not us/community) profit is 0, and for all the other cases they will be making profit. Should this really be the justice cast upon the individuals causing monetary damage? [1]: Declaring creators as the (copyright) owners benefits the community, hence we do. The relevant example Windows is a product of Microsoft that benefits the community, evident from the fact that it has a userbase. Microsoft would not create and offer Windows to the public, if the law allowed everyone to freely redistribute their products, and compete with Microsoft using their creation, as it would render their novel efforts meaningless against the much simpler effort of copying products created by the others. [*]: Edited from "robbery".

jake_the_third 9y ago
With all due respect, your view is biased to the point of delusion. Counterfeiting never was and never will be similar to robbery. Robbery results in someone being deprived of their property. No one has been deprived of their property. In fact, as information, the victim in this case couldn't deprive Microsoft and OEMs of their property unless he deleted every single copy of the software. Furthermore, the "counterfeit" software is an exact replica of what is provided by OEMs. There was no harm done to society. I agree with others here: Any prison time is too long, let alone 15 months. Our society needs to take a long hard look at our laws because frankly, we're well on our way within the realm of the absurd.