- EU - Electronic piracy must be stamped out to protect Europe's competitiveness +/-
(RAPID) Protecting Europe's fast-growing electronic pay-services (paid for services provided via TV, radio and internet) against piracy will be an important contribution to making the EU more competitive as 21st century knowledge-based economies are expected to rely increasingly on electronic pay services, says a report by the European Commission. Piracy is far from a victimless crime: legitimate users end up paying higher prices, operators can go bankrupt and governments are deprived of tax revenue. see On the legal protection of electronic pay services. Report from the Commission to the Council, the European Parliament and the European Economic and Social Committee on the implementation of Directive 98/84/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 November 1998 on the legal protection of services based on, and consisting of, conditional access COM(2003)198.
- RIAA to file swappers: Let's chat +/-
(CNET News.com) The recording industry is turning file-swappers' own tools against them with a new campaign to send warnings to people who are offering copyrighted materials online. Tapping into the chat functions built into software programs such as Kazaa and Grokster, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) started sending automatic messages to people who are providing copyrighted songs online, warning them that they're breaking the law.
- US - Students face download damages +/-
(BBC) Four US students have agreed to pay damages after the American music industry's trade group sued them for making money from illegal downloading. The four students will pay between $12,000 (£7,500) and $17,500 (£11,000) each to the RIAA, although the industry body had originally sought damages for $150,000 (£93,000) per song.
- US - Virginia Blocks Bulk E-Mailers +/-
(Washington Post) Virginia launched a crackdown on unsolicited bulk e-mail yesterday with a new anti-spam statute that enables prosecutors to seize the profits, computers and other assets of high-volume offenders. Gov. Mark R. Warner traveled to the Dulles headquarters of America Online, the world's largest Internet service provider, to ceremonially sign recently enacted legislation that establishes five-year prison terms and other criminal penalties against chronic, large-scale senders.
- Net heavyweights unite to KO spam +/-
(CNET News.com) The top three e-mail service providers are pooling their resources and technical expertise to reduce unwanted commercial solicitations, or spam, that is inundating their systems. America Online, Yahoo and Microsoft sketched a broad outline that calls for technical changes to e-mail to make it more difficult to send the widely reviled messages. Among the steps are plans to hinder spammers from creating multiple fraudulent e-mail accounts in bulk and to determine the real identity of the senders.
- US - A modest proposal to end spam +/-
(CNET News.com) It's not every day people bet their jobs on the effectiveness of a law--let alone an antispam law. Many U.S. states have already enacted such e-mail laws, and spam keeps flooding in. But that's exactly what Larry Lessig, a Stanford University law professor and one of the most prominent liberal voices online, has done. A few months ago, Lessig made an unusual wager: If Congress enacts an antispam law that offers bounties for the reporting of spammers, and the law fails to "substantially reduce the level of spam," he will resign from his dream job at a top law school.
- US - Even Tough Laws May Not Kill Spam +/-
(IDG News Service) Two proposals aiming to curb unwanted commercial e-mail being considered by Congress don't go far enough to eliminate spam, say some antispam advocates. The country needs federal antispam legislation, agreed most of the group of eight panelists at the Federal Trade Commission's recent Spam Forum. But all disagreed with a proposal recently offered by Representative Zoe Lofgren, and most said they didn't support a bill offered by Senators Conrad Burns and Ron Wyden. Spam and a Case of Dyspepsia (Washington Post) Spam e-mail problem worse than imagined and Conference concludes spam is here to stay ... for now (AP)