The U.K. government has made new proposals that would see Internet users disconnected if they are suspected of illicit file-sharing.
The proposals (PDF) were announced on Tuesday by Lord Mandelson's Department of Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS). They arrive in the middle of the department's own public consultation on legislation on the misuse of peer-to-peer (P2P) technology, which is scheduled to end in September.
"Our thinking on the process supporting the objectives and the obligations [of the consultation] has developed, and we thought it would be helpful to share these thoughts with stakeholders at this point, so that they can take them into account when responding to the consultation," the government said in a statement.
The new proposals make two major additions to the initial plans. The first is a new sanction against illicit file sharers, which calls on the ISP to suspend the suspected subscriber's account. Lord Carter discounted this measure as unnecessarily harsh in his Digital Britain report, which kicked off the P2P consultation in June. However, the government now says it is "considering the case for adding suspension of accounts into the list of measures that could be imposed."
The second addresses the amount of time it will take for the ISP industry to start cracking down on file sharers. The original consultation set out a year-long trial of a scheme under which ISPs send letters to suspected file sharers, asking them to stop their activities. At the end of the trial, if at least 70 percent of these people had not complied, technical measures would be introduced.
The government said on Tuesday, referring to the year-long trial, that "the previous proposals, whilst robust, would take an unacceptable amount of time to complete in a situation that calls for urgent action."
A spokesperson for BIS said that responses to its consultation indicated that "rights holders, ISPs and consumer groups" are among the many respondents who had found the trial period to be unacceptable.
However, the ISP Association (ISPA) said in a statement that it was "concerned that amendments have been proposed without consultation with the Internet Industry and that the decision was made to publish changes to the consultation before stakeholders had been given the opportunity to respond."
"ISPA intends to raise these concerns with the Government and is currently considering the appropriate action," the industry body added.
BIS's spokesperson denied that the government was pre-empting the results of the department's consultation, which was initially scheduled to end on Sept. 15, but has now been extended to Sept. 29 to allow for response to the new proposals. The government is bringing out new proposals because it wants "those who didn't think of these ideas" to have a chance to consider them before they submit a response to the consultation, the department's spokesperson said.
In the Digital Britain report, Lord Carter put forward a variety of technical measures, such as bandwidth throttling and protocol blocking, that could be used to address piracy. In its statement on Tuesday, the government said that "since the issue of the consultation, some stakeholders have argued strongly that none of those technical measures is powerful enough to have a significant deterrent effect on infringing behavior."
Asked to identify the stakeholders in question, the BIS spokesperson said it was "safe to assume they would be rights-holders."
The government acknowledged the need to make sure that innocent people, such as those sharing an Internet connection with suspected copyright infringers, were not affected by any technical sanctions. If disconnection is introduced, for example, "it would be important to ensure as far as possible that innocent people... would retain access to the Internet services they need, including online public services," BIS said in its statement.
Asked how this could be done, BIS's spokesperson declined to give details, but said the government "wouldn't put something in the statement unless we knew it was possible."
The government also said it wanted to make accommodation for any developments in P2P, such as when one file-sharing site is closed down and another automatically replaces it. "We cannot know how P2P technology might develop in the short to medium term, and we want to ensure that [the regulator] Ofcom has a full tool-kit from which to select the most appropriate measure should technical measures be deemed necessary," BIS said in its statement.
"It's very possible the technology will change again," the BIS spokesperson said.
David Meyer of ZDNet UK reported from London.
Google trikes will traverse the footpaths of the U.K. this summer, capturing images for Street View.
(Credit: Google )To advance its Street View service this summer, Google is poised to unleash the unstoppable power of human legs.
Traditionally, the average road car finds it problematic to traverse the terrain of the British footpath. But bicycles do not. So this summer, Google will deploy bikes mounted with its 360-degree Street View cameras to map areas of Britain inaccessible by its fleet of Street View cars.
The so-called Google Trike, which the company describes as "a mechanical masterpiece comprising 3 bicycle wheels, a mounted Street View camera and a very athletic cyclist in customized Google apparel," will arrive in the U.K. to make some "special image collections."
It's up to the public, however, to tell Google--via a vote--which locations should be photographed. There are five categories to choose from, picked by VisitBritain: castles, coastal paths, natural wonders, historic buildings and monuments, and stadiums.
"Users will be able to virtually tour castles or monuments before visiting, or check out which side of a football stadium they need to be on before leaving the house," a Google spokeswoman told CNET UK. "They will be added to the Street View tool in the same way as existing images."
It comes as little surprise that Google is turning to pedal power to advance its controversial mapping agenda. History has shown that the human leg is an often untapped behemoth of energy, having in the past powered generators, submarines, and, of course, deep-space hair dryers aboard Red Dwarf.
The Gtrike will hit Italy's inaccessible areas first, before hitting U.K. footpaths later this summer.
Nate Lanxon of CNET UK reported from London.
Updated at 1:25 p.m. PDT.
Google-owned video-sharing site YouTube is silencing music videos in the U.K. after negotiations with the country's Performing Right Society (PRS for Music), which collects licensing fees for artists and labels, failed.
"Our previous license from PRS for Music has expired, and we've been unable so far to come to an agreement to renew it on terms that are economically sustainable for us," a statement from YouTube read. "There are two obstacles in these negotiations: prohibitive licensing fees and lack of transparency. We value the creativity of musicians and songwriters and have worked hard with rights-holders to generate significant online revenue for them and to respect copyright. But PRS is now asking us to pay many, many times more for our license than before."
The YouTube statement continued: "The costs are simply prohibitive for us--under PRS' proposed terms we would lose significant amounts of money with every playback. In addition, PRS is unwilling to tell us what songs are included in the license they can provide so that we can identify those works on YouTube--that's like asking a consumer to buy a blank CD without knowing what musicians are on it."
But a statement from PRS for Music claimed that Google doesn't want to pay enough for licensing fees.
"PRS for Music is outraged on behalf of consumers and songwriters that Google has chosen to close down access to music videos on YouTube in the U.K.," read a statement from the industry group, which noted that Google rakes in billions of dollars in revenue. "Google has told us they are taking this step because they wish to pay significantly less than at present to the writers of the music on which their service relies, despite the massive increase in YouTube viewing."
A report from the BBC suggests that the change will take effect later on Monday.
Royalty fees in the U.K. reportedly caused streaming music service Pandora to pull out of the country (along with other non-U.S. markets) two years ago, and many smaller players in digital media are currently feeling the pain. PRS for Music has also targeted small businesses in the U.K. for playing radios publicly, which the group says is a form of piracy.
Since it only pertains to music videos, this won't affect, say, Queen Elizabeth's royal YouTube channel. But U.S. digital media companies, particularly when it comes to music, have repeatedly encountered rough seas abroad.
One of the most high-profile has been Apple's iTunes, which several years ago came under scrutiny from one European government after another, typically concerning digital rights management restrictions in its iTunes Store. But music videos have been contentious both in and outside the U.S., with labels apparently unclear as to whether the best strategy would be to ink deals with YouTube--where they have less control--or go at it on their own. Much of the controversy comes from the fact that the music industry says it just doesn't profit much from having its videos on YouTube.
Sources told CNET News earlier this month that YouTube was working with Universal Music Group to create a standalone site "closely linked" to YouTube, a shadowy project that has been described as a Hulu for music videos. And Viacom has created its own hub, MTVMusic.com. It's complicated enough in the U.S.; bringing overseas players and viewers into account opens many new cans of worms.
A British man, suspected of brutally killing a former girlfriend, was found hanged in Manchester, various U.K. newspapers reported.
The body of George Appleton, 40, who was dubbed the "Facebook fugitive" among other nicknames by the British press, was discovered Thursday. The nickname is related to police warnings regarding his use of social-networking sites, including Facebook, to meet women.
Police had been searching for Appleton since his former girlfriend, Clare Wood, was found strangled and burned on February 6, according to the Manchester Evening News. She had recently accused him of sexual assault. He was out on bail.
After her body was found, police issued a list of sites frequented by and computer usernames associated with Appleton and warned women not to meet him, according to The Independent.
Appleton, who had a criminal history related to stalking and violence against women, had served three years earlier this decade for harassment with fear of violence related to another woman and had served six months after breaching a restraining order related to a different woman, according to The Sun.
The chilling details of crimes, both those alleged and ones he was convicted of, can be found here, here and here in the Manchester Evening News.
The next time you feel your boss is driving you like a heartless task master, you might want to ponder the alleged plight of some poor lads in England.
Temporary workers at Amazon.com's U.K. fulfillment centers risk being terminated if they call in sick and are required to work seven days a week, according to a report published Sunday in The Times of London. Employees reportedly get only two short breaks for an eight-hour shift and must request permission to use the toilet. The temporary employees hired to handle the seasonal increase in business earn the equivalent of $10.40 an hour but must pay $13 a day to take a bus to the warehouse if they can't arrange their own transportation, the newspaper reported.
Employees are also penalized for not achieving what one manager called "ridiculous" packing quotas and are often required to walk up to 14 miles during the course of a shift to retrieve items for shipping, according to a Times reporter who went undercover at Amazon's Bedfordshire warehouse.
Amazon does not deny the report. llan Lyall, vice president of European operations for Amazon, responded to the report in a statement printed with the story:
Every single member of the Amazon.co.uk workforce... is currently working flat out to ensure that our millions of customers receive the products that they have ordered on time this Christmas. Our number one focus is our customers and everyone at Amazon works hard on their behalf.
Apparently, it's also well known that being a holiday temp is the only way to get a full-time job with the company and that competition is fierce.
Demand for permanent roles from our temporary employees is at such a high level that we no longer need to recruit externally for permanent positions. Indeed, we have already seen well over 100 temporary employees become permanent this year alone. During 2008, we have taken on over 4,000 temporary fulfillment center associates in the U.K. and are benefiting from the lowest level of employees leaving the company that we have experienced over all our 11 Christmases.
Representatives for the company in the U.S. did not immediately respond to requests for comment, but spokeswoman Patty Smith told the Seattle Press Intelligencer that there were "inaccuracies" in The Times report.
"Don't believe everything you read!" Smith said via e-mail. "There were many inaccuracies in the U.K. article. Case in point: We don't allow FC (fulfillment center) associates to work more than 6 days a week in any location--they must have at least one day off."
- prev
- 1
- next
