January 27th, 2010
Charles Dunstone, the chief executive of Carphone Warehouse, has said he could be prepared to fight the Government in court should the anti-piracy clauses of the Digital Economy Bill become legislation.
Speaking to The Telegraph, Mr Dunstone, whose company owns and operates the internet and telephony provider TalkTalk, said he refused to send his customers [...]
Posted in Industry news
January 26th, 2010
‘Robin Hood’ developers will neuter Bill with new applications and tools
The Digital Economy Bill will have precisely the opposite of its desired effect. The Bill will ignite the development of tools that make it easier for people to access music, films and other copyright-protected material for free and undetected, defeating any attempt to protect copyright.
That [...]
Tags: copyright, Digital Economy Bill, P2P, stephen fry, TalkTalk
Posted in Our news
January 22nd, 2010
The reverberations from Bono’s sermon about filesharing earlier in the month continue to be felt. Following our own broadside (interpretted by some as a bitchslap) and a whole host of bloggers and Twitter users airing their views on the U2 frontman, a music entrepreneur has written a guest opinion piece on The Register that shows [...]
Tags: bitchslap, Bono, Dan Mangan, Digital Economy Bill, filesharing, Paul Sanders, Steve Lawson
Posted in Our news
January 18th, 2010
By Charles Dunstone, featured today as the Daily Mail’s Monday View.
The Digital Economy Bill is one of the few pieces of legislation the government is actively pushing through parliament before an election is called.
Its aim is to build Britain’s telecommunications backbone and to pave the way for a world-beating digital economy – an admirable objective [...]
Tags: Charles Dunstone, Daily Mail, Digital Economy Bill, Monday View, peer-to-peer, petition
Posted in Industry news
January 16th, 2010
A computer programmer who ran one of the world’s biggest pirate music websites from his bedroom was cleared of defrauding thousands of pounds from artists yesterday, writes Murray Wardrop for the Telegraph.
Alan Ellis, 26, was accused of “ripping off” record labels and musicians on a “large scale” by running Oink, a music file sharing website he [...]
Tags: Alan Ellis, BPI, fraud case, Oink, Telegraph
Posted in Industry news
January 5th, 2010
TalkTalk has branded U2 windbag Bono’s intervention in the debate over illegal filesharing “outrageous”, after he said efforts to block child pornography showed ISPs should be doing more to protect intellectual property, writes Chris Williams in the Register. You can read Williams’ full analysis on the Register.
Meanwhile, our blog post earlier has been reported on pcadvisor.co.uk, [...]
Tags: Bono, Digital Economy Bill, filesharing, The Register, U2
Posted in Industry news
January 5th, 2010
Bono has accused ISPs of profiting from illegal filesharing and has suggested that ISPs curb copyright infringement in the same way they tackle child pornography.
Tags: Andrew Heaney, Bono, Digital Economy Bill, filesharing, number 10 petition, TalkTalk, U2
Posted in Our news
January 4th, 2010
The disconnection plans set out in the Digital Economy Bill will cost consumers £500 million, according to admissions by the ministers.
Proposals to suspend the internet connections of those who repeatedly share music and films online will leave consumers with a bill for £500 million, ministers have admitted.
The Digital Economy Bill would force internet service providers [...]
Tags: Digital Britain, Digital Economy Bill, filesharing, internet piracy, lord mandelson, online piracy, Three Strikes
Posted in Industry news
December 21st, 2009
“The government’s proposed ‘Three-Strike’ Copyright Protection Law is ill-conceived, constitutionally outrageous, morally unfair and epically foolish.” – Stephen Fry.
Stephen Fry has agreed to judge a competition to create a protest song, poem or other form of artistic expression against the proposed ‘Three Strikes’ law.
The law is designed to protect the music and film industry against copyright [...]
Tags: Andrew Heaney, dan bull, number 10 petition, protest, sing our petition, stephen fry, TalkTalk, Three Strikes
Posted in Our news
December 19th, 2009
Levels of online music piracy have remained unchanged in spite of the rise of legal digital services and the threat of tougher sanctions against downloaders, a music industry survey has found, reports Tim Bradshaw.
Research by Harris Interactive for the BPI, which represents record labels in the UK, found that 23 per cent of consumers [...]
Tags: BPI, music piracy, online piracy
Posted in Industry news