Richard Branson hates you!

[Fee]

This has been coming for years.
Internet these days is more expensive than it was 10 years ago, and you get less than you did then too.

Of course governments want to regulate the information we have access too, but not nessecarily as a money game. IMO its got alot more to do with the controll on information than who paid who for what, thats just an excuse.

However the modern internet user is also at fault.
With the advent of "web 2.0" everyone wants everything NOW and they want it in ultra high quality.
Too many kids these days who werent around for the beginnings of the "internet" just take for granted the speeds we get today and dont at all apreciate the advances in tecnology over the past 10 years.

Its this attitude of "i want it now" that ties up the internets "tubes" and starts to make these companies ask what they can do to regulate traffic through their servers. To them the answer is simple, charge for traffic / access to your server. You can understand why too.

Say your tracetr goes like this:
Your Home -----  Your ISP ----- Virgins server ---- YouTube
Every time you watch a vid at youtube, your tieing up resources on virgins server.
Why should Virgins paying customers have to suffer because you (who doesnt pay them) are streaming vids through their server?

If anything their model should be CUSTOMER based and not Website based.
That is, a site owner cant pay Virgin to allow their traffic at a faster rate, however any people using Virgins IPS should get priority over people on other ISPs whos traffic is just routed through Virgin.

Id be more worried about governments passing legislation to say what we can view on the internet (Like China for example) than worrying about Virgin trying to keep their users happy.

[Ultra Magnus]

They way I understand it, it's not about us (as consumers/punters/surfers/whatevers) hardly at all.

WARNING: Poorly thought-out metaphor approaching!

It's like Virgin are standing you at a crossroads and saying "you can be driven down this road to get an apple from this place that's paid us, or you can wade through this knee-deep treacle to get an orange from those that haven't."
Most people would just go for the easy option.

Even if they really wanted an orange, an apple will do considering the effort saved.
As a result, hardly anyone is buying oranges, so the orange merchant goes out of business.

Okay, ignore that metaphor for this next bit...

While it's true that "normal" sites like this one (that only transfer a few K at a time) will hardly be affected, as Nik and MrC have said, sites that transfer/stream large files (whether it be mp3s, swfs or more) will potentially be crippled unless they pay the protection money.


It's not about censorship, or making the most of resources, or anything like that.
It's just about money. Nothing more.
If some sites will pay the ISPs for tipping the balance in their favour, the ISPs will gladly accept it.


If this thing happens smoothly for Virgin, I can see it going one of two ways.
1) Every other ISP on the planet will think "hey, that seemed easy enough, we'll do it too". This is bad.
2) A couple of ISPs (such as BT are claiming to do at the moment) will not follow suit, and therefore get a lot more business for providing their service the way it is now. Nothing will really change.

And a possible 3)
Those ISPs that didn't follow suit will wait until they've got all the business, and then do it anyway. This is just cheeky.

I personally think that #2 (possibly #3, but we'll cross that bridge when we get to it) is the more likely, but this is uninformed, uneducated guesswork.


And yes, Virgin was initially a British company, but I think they've gotten so huge and global now that it's kind of a moot point.

[tube]

EDIT: business is business and has nothing to do with morality, or anything at all! sorry! (this is going to tube). Don't confuse different things...

That's a very... American way to look at things. Personally I think every action that affects others has moral implications, be they good or bad. Actions done by businesses for monetary gain do not deserve any special treatment. But this is going way off topic, sorry.

[Pumaman]

It's not about censorship, or making the most of resources, or anything like that.
It's just about money. Nothing more.
If some sites will pay the ISPs for tipping the balance in their favour, the ISPs will gladly accept it.

Of course it's about money. The ISP industry runs on wafer-thin profit margins -- Virgin for example made a loss of £460 million last year. If they're to stand any chance of making any money and not going bust, they have to try and get income from wherever they can find it.

Since the industry is so competitive, they can't raise prices to customers since they'd all change to another ISP. So they've got to explore other ways of making ends meet.

[blueskirt]

This is only the tip of the iceberg. If they go down that road, how long until those "knee-deep treacle" (to use Ultra Magnus' metaphor) turn into road blocks entirely? How long until companies pay ISPs to slow down their competitors' traffic?

Also, I find the "people will just change to another ISP" a magical solution. If a lot of people nowadays forgot the era of dial-up, a lot seems to forget that ISPs aren't grocery stores, rural regions often have only one ISP available, and changing to another one when you aren't happy with yours isn't an option.

If ISPs can't handle nowadays' bandwidth needs, they just have to stop offering services they can't supply and slow down their higher speed services until they can handle it again, but the internet should be left unfiltered and uncensored.

[Ultra Magnus]

More? More! More...

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/virgin-warns-illegal-downloaders-stop-or-face-prosecution-842086.html

I get the feeling that Virgin have stumbled upon some Producers-esque opportunity to make millions of moneys by driving away all of their customers.

'Tis a bit old. Apologies.

[Makeout Patrol]

There are two big misconceptions that people have in this thread.

1) "The ISPs own their infrastructure and should be allowed to do what they want with it." Technically, they do own the infrastructure. However, the innovation that makes a two-tier internet possible is a fiber-optic cable network, which was laid down in the united states with taxpayer money, not ISP money. I don't think it's unreasonable at all to say that everyone should have equal access to a utility that was put in place with public money.

2) "If some ISPs implement a two-tier internet, I can just jump ship to another ISP." You could, but it probably won't do you any good. There are only a few ISPs that own their own infrastructure; most lease it from those few big companies. Therefore, only the big companies need to implement it, and suddenly everybody that's leasing either goes along with the scheme or has to build their own infrastructure (which they certainly do not have the resources to do). The big companies that own all the infrastructure are naturally the companies that are making noise about this.

Unless the leadership of the first world wants to see the Internet devolve into yet another medium that is dominated by massive corporations and upon which it is impossible for small businesses or hobbyists to compete (such as is the case with, for example, television), they need to legislate protection of network neutrality.

[TerranRich]

You have to drill down to what the Internet, essentially, is. It is a network of computers that has NO ownership. So for any ISPs (which in this case is all the major ISPs that control large chunks of the Internet access, the "big guys") to limit traffic by restricting traffic to non-paying poor souls and  grant traffic to big corporations that can afford it, it just plain wrong.

And most people do not have the luxury of choosing various high-speed internet providers. In my old hometown of Westport, MA, the only option was Charter Communications cable internet. Verizon DSL did not reach most of Westport. And Verizon would be in on it, too. As for my current home city of Fall River, Comcast is really the only option with (you guessed it) Verizon being a distant second, only available in certain areas.

Speaking strictly for America, if you have all of the "big guy" ISPs under this deal where they restrict traffic for the non-paying sites, that's probably somewhere near 90-95% of all of the country unable to view their favorite non-corporate sites (like AGS and small-guy sites like fan sites, etc.).

This issue does indeed threaten the "little guy" that just wants to become famous through sheer content and usability. Sure, we'd get unrestricted access to YouTube, Google, and MSN, but what's the Internet if nearly 90% of our options are no longer feasible because of this? That's why the issue of Net Neutrality is a very important one.

[Pumaman]

More? More! More...

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/virgin-warns-illegal-downloaders-stop-or-face-prosecution-842086.html

I get the feeling that Virgin have stumbled upon some Producers-esque opportunity to make millions of moneys by driving away all of their customers.

I'm not sure what to make of this. My first reaction was "this is an outrage, they can't do this!!". But when you think about it some more, does anyone start mounting protests when a high street music shop announces it is to start prosecuting shoplifters?

If anything, sending shoplifters a letter after stealing their first 1000 items warning them not to do it again would be considered a rather light-touch justice system.

Is it just that we've all become so accustomed to getting things for free on the internet, that any attempts to change it are likely to be resisted just because we're used to having them for free?

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

I don't see anything wrong with protecting what is yours  within the limits of common law, but I do see something wrong with any attempts to regulate or otherwise 'control' the internet.  Piracy and the sheer volume of information available are the two largest justifications for the move towards regulation, and realistically regulation always leads to less freedom; historically, regulation leads to more regulation and more regulation until you have little freedom.

[Ultra Magnus]

I'm not sure what to make of this. My first reaction was "this is an outrage, they can't do this!!". But when you think about it some more, does anyone start mounting protests when a high street music shop announces it is to start prosecuting shoplifters?

If anything, sending shoplifters a letter after stealing their first 1000 items warning them not to do it again would be considered a rather light-touch justice system.

This is true.
If it were the record labels or the BPI themselves, then I'd say fair enough.
However, Virgin are pretty much a third party in this case.

It's like driving in to town and stealing stuff from a shop, but being nicked by the car park warden and having them threaten to take your car away. This isn't their beef, so why get involved?

Of course, it's their service and they are entitled to do as they please, but a lot of their customers will probably start using a different car park.

[TerranRich]

That's a very good analogy, Ultra Magnus. I was struggling to find one myself, but that works. Virgin can do what they want, but do they really have legal standing to press charges if one of their customers is doing illegal stuff? Maybe in a distant way they might be able to do that, but it just seems odd... more odd than wrong.

[Ultra Magnus]

That's a very good analogy, Ultra Magnus.

Why thank you, sir.
It's better than the treacle metaphor, at least.

Virgin can do what they want, but do they really have legal standing to press charges if one of their customers is doing illegal stuff?

I think it's like trespassing, in a way.
Like those stories of kids being arrested for wearing offensive T-shirts in malls that cropped up 10 years or so ago.
Of course, you can't arrest someone for wearing a T-shirt, but as long as it's your property (you being the head of security, or whatever) you can tell them to leave. If they don't leave when you say so then you can nab them for trespassing, regardless of the situation.
And as long as there's a sign somewhere saying "we reserve the right to refuse entry to anyone for any reason" (as there always is), then you've legally already given them fair warning.

Virgin probably can't touch you for downloading per se, but they can get you for violating their terms of service, which can include any stipulation they feel like throwing in.

[Pumaman]

This isn't something Virgin randomly decided to do as a third party -- it's not in their interest to lose customers.

It all comes from the UK government threatening to change the law unless ISP's take a more active role in stopping piracy... Virgin are just the first ISP to actually do so.

[DanielH]

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/virgin-warns-illegal-downloaders-stop-or-face-prosecution-842086.html

Oh Snap! :o It's the po-po! Gotta bounce! *Runs away and changes ISP*.

Seriously, how do they plan on implementing that? How can they tell legitimate files and illegal files apart? And with the 'estimated 6.5 million customers whose accounts are used for regular criminal activity' possibly being disconnected, where is all the ISP's buisness going to go? Down the toilet is where. I don't think this system will ever work, at least not for several years, as even though the government is promising a part in this, I don't think they realise what kind of work needs to be taken.

[Ultra Magnus]

This isn't something Virgin randomly decided to do as a third party -- it's not in their interest to lose customers.

I doubt they actually will lose that many customers.
Sure, they'll lose a few, but most people will weigh up the hassle of finding a way around the problem against the hassle of switching ISPs and choose the former, especially as most of them probably get their internet, phone, TV and whatever else all in a handy package these days.

Burnham has repeated government threats to legislate against ISPs if they don't voluntarily agree a system...

Ah yes, in the same way that you voluntarily hand over your wallet when someone's got a knife to your throat. :

[Makeout Patrol]

More? More! More...

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/virgin-warns-illegal-downloaders-stop-or-face-prosecution-842086.html

I get the feeling that Virgin have stumbled upon some Producers-esque opportunity to make millions of moneys by driving away all of their customers.

I'm not sure what to make of this. My first reaction was "this is an outrage, they can't do this!!". But when you think about it some more, does anyone start mounting protests when a high street music shop announces it is to start prosecuting shoplifters?

If anything, sending shoplifters a letter after stealing their first 1000 items warning them not to do it again would be considered a rather light-touch justice system.

Is it just that we've all become so accustomed to getting things for free on the internet, that any attempts to change it are likely to be resisted just because we're used to having them for free?

If you consider illegal downloading to be an articulation of consumer discontent with the value that's being offered by publishers (and record labels in particular), no, not at all. Sure, people do like having them for free, but the vast majority of people will pay for it. They just don't want to have to pay between 18 and 30 bucks (Canadian, probably different elsewhere) for it.

I know a web site that will print CDs with jewel cases and full-colour jackets for $1.75US on demand. Considering the inflated price of on-demand manufacturing and the doubtlessly large percentage of that $1.75 going toward profits, walking into a high-street music shop and being expected to spend $13+tax on a CD single is absolutely asinine.

[TerranRich]

Try USD $20 per CD, when most services let you download them legally for $9.99... and not-so-legally from those Russian sites for $0.09 per song.

[EldKatt]

I know a web site that will print CDs with jewel cases and full-colour jackets for $1.75US on demand. Considering the inflated price of on-demand manufacturing and the doubtlessly large percentage of that $1.75 going toward profits, walking into a high-street music shop and being expected to spend $13+tax on a CD single is absolutely asinine.

I hope you realize, though, that pressing the discs is not the only cost involved in music production. Time in a high-quality recording studio (and access to the millions of dollars worth of equipment therein) is neither free nor cheap, and musicians and engineers also like getting paid, understandably. And then there's marketing, which I have somewhat less insight into myself, but which is far more costly than the average person might realize. I'm not saying that this is enough to explain and dismiss the issue, but building your entire case on the fact that producing physical CDs is cheap is futile and ignorant.

[Becky]

I'm more concerned about whether ISPs are going to violate any data privacy laws to work out whether I've been downloading illegally or not.

They are well within their rights to prosecute people for abuse of their service (as according to their TOS), I don't have a quarrel with that.  But I'm just concerned about how they might accumulate the evidence.