Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Sody]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Counterfeiting_Trade_Agreement

The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) is a proposed plurilateral trade agreement that would impose strict enforcement of intellectual property rights related to Internet activity and trade in information-based goods. The agreement is being secretly negotiated by the governments of the United States, the European Commission, Japan, Switzerland, Australia, New Zealand, South Korea, Canada, and Mexico. If adopted at the 34th G8 summit in July 2008, the treaty would establish an international coalition against copyright infringement, imposing a strong, top-down enforcement regime of copyright laws in developed nations. The proposed agreement would allow border officials to search laptops, MP3 players, and cellular phones for copyright-infringing content. It would also impose new cooperation requirements upon internet service providers (ISPs), including perfunctory disclosure of customer information, and restrict the use of online privacy tools. The proposal specifies a plan to encourage developing nations to accept the legal regime.

The European Commission, the Office of the United States Trade Representative, the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, and other government agencies have acknowledged participating in ACTA negotiations, but they have not released documents relating to the proposed agreement. Public interest advocates in Canada filed an access to information request but received only a document stating the title of the agreement, with everything else blacked out. On May 22, 2008, a discussion paper about the proposed agreement was uploaded to Wikileaks, and newspaper reports about the secret negotiations quickly followed.

Border searches

Newspaper reports indicate that the proposed agreement would empower security officials at airports and other international borders to conduct random searches of laptops, MP3 players, and cellular phones for illegally downloaded or "ripped" music and movies. Travelers with infringing content would be subject to a fine and may have their devices confiscated or destroyed.

ISP cooperation

The leaked document includes a provision to force internet service providers to provide information about suspected copyright infringers without a warrant, making it easier for the record industry to sue music file sharers and for officials to shut down non-commercial BitTorrent websites such as The Pirate Bay.

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This may be nothing to worry about, but it's definitely better to be warned and to be aware. Not sure how this could possibly be policed in South Korea but I do know that my backup MP3s could pose a problem at the airport. How the hell are they suppose to know if you have the original CD way back in your native country? I already miss torrentspy.com, I'll certainly miss the Pirate Bay if it goes.

[Young FRANKenstein]

[thematrixiam]

That would suck a bunch.

So what would happen to the new taxes canadian's pay on any copying devices then?

and Switzerland joining up too? Lame.

If that's the case there's probably gonna be a serious loss of money. I wouldn't see the point in paying for internet solely for emails.

Cable is just stupid, because you have to wait for what you watch.

Sounds to me instead of me wasting money to upgrade my computer, I'll now be just going back to old video games.

Say good bye to cable, dvd/cd sales, ipods, computers. Say hello to simple archaic modes of fun.

Also. sounds like a great ploy to take away our privacy. You could easily assume that if a person has the internet they pirate. Even in some small degree. Even the people that claim they are 100% against it. There's probably still an 80% chance they are pirating.

[ttompatz]

Enacting the treaty is one thing, enacting the legislation in the respective countries is another and ENFORCEMENT is virtually impossible for any multitude of reasons.

They may hassle people with laptops, mp3 player and cell phones as they cross from one country to another but really... a 16 gigabyte USB thumb drive is small enough to fit anywhere and has less metal than the necklace I wear on my neck. Heck, they can't stop drugs - they plan to stop illegal data?

MICRO memory chips for modern cameras are smaller than a single coin with capacities of 4+ gigabytes. Your computer sees them as just another external drive so they can also hold any other digital data you care to put on them (like mp3s and movies).

Then you always have the option of forwarding your songs by e-mail. With 128 bit encryption as standard there is NO HOPE of detection.

The rules won't even keep honest people honest... they have 0% chance of catching the bad guys.

And as a side note:

Heck, this is Korea. As an example, brothels and prostitution are also illegal and yet they operate openly and compromise 4.5% of this nation's GDP (a higher ratio than the power and utility companies).

They can't even effectively enforce their own labor laws. Do you realistically expect enforcement on this?

About the only place anyone would have to worry would be in the States where there is no protection from unwarranted searches of this nature and the following litigation would bankrupt you long before it was ever found to be unconstitutional.

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[lucas_p]

Yeah, I say BS on this too. There is no way to tell where an MP3 came from. I have MP3s of my CDs on my computer. There is no way they can possibly do this. You could have backups of movies, music, etc.

As far as games, they see a game file, how do they know the person doesn't own the accompanying CD/DVD?

Right. Plus you have to count enforcement. It just...it is not possible.

Besides, if you are moving your stuff to another country, just put some stuff on an encrypting HD or DVD-Rs or whatever.

[thematrixiam]

if this actually does become a hassle I'll just get a server is some obscure country to host all my files.

Woohoo sealand.

Or any other country geared for piracy.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/01/12/pirate_bay_buys_island/

[toong tao daeng]

I'm not sure how practical this type of enforcement would be, but all the same I really hope this doesn't come to pass.

[squexx]

[thematrixiam]

On a side note... it would be cool to see a group form against this thing passing.

A pro piracy group for instance.

People join and publicly make statements. Then if things don't go their way everyone in the group gives up going to movies, buying cd's, games, etc. protests out in front of movie theatres and concerts.

Doubt it would ever get the numbers to be effective. but it would be cool if people could actually do that. Make them loose even more money. That big summer block buster comes out and makes record sales of the movie that lost the most money.

'The MAN' people spend how much money to make these things. If protesters were good enough, with size and being organized, they could easily make these companies think twice about trying to control our ways on the internet.

They make enough money as it is. Piracy is a fact of life. And it has many benefits. Limiting piracy and our privacy is just going backwards and controlling the masses.

NWO (new world order) is not cool.