In reply to Anon #12:
The purpose of copyright is to protect the public from big business, not the other way around.

The world has changed, we live in a post-scarcity environment. It’s kind of like like Star Trek: The Next Generation where you hit a button on a replicator and what you ask for materializes. These days we can go to the Internet, click a weblink and the movie/song/book/whatever appears on our hard drive. The problem is humanity has never had to deal with post-scarcity before. We’re groping our way through the darkness without a map and there are plenty of people who are more than willing to take advantage of it.

BEWARE – the copyright eagle is coming to get you!

Second, anyone being honest knows that the sites taken down were, in fact, assisting with the distribution of copyrighted material; to pretend otherwise is just pretend.

Third, it’s not “quasi-legal” if they have a warrant; it’s completely legal.

And fourth, I question whether this was a labor intensive task for DHS to execute. Five minutes on Google shows me a number of viable targets for the next round of seizures, and I’m not clear how a couple phone calls and emails to ICANN would have taken a significant amount of human resources. Even so, if the software, music and movie industries are paying taxes, the government has a vested interest in protecting their ability to turn a profit.

Cory Doctorow’s take on copyright issues are so biased, you can’t really take anything at face value. I’m really getting a little tired of the blatant support for piracy of copyrighted material when there’s plenty of media that has been released to the public domain for free distribution and consumption. If you don’t agree with the laws, don’t support the artists who hide behind them.

- US 5th Amendment.

But seriously, Department of HOMELAND SECURITY involved in going after copyright infringement? That’s just scary…

Terrorism and “intellectual property” are both terms that can be thrown in with “drug crimes” to mean vaguely defined “crimes” that agents of the government can use to bust up anybody they don’t like.

Or was the fact that it is a hoax itself a hoax? The update seems to show it might be legit after all.

Now I’m confused.

This kind of thing will inevitably lead to the splintering of the domain name resolution system.

“During the course of the operation, federal law enforcement agents made undercover purchases from online retailers suspected of selling counterfeit goods. In many instances, the goods were shipped directly into the United States from suppliers in other countries using international express mail. If the goods were confirmed as counterfeit or otherwise illegal, seizure orders for the domain names of the websites that sold the goods were obtained from U.S. magistrate judges. Individuals attempting to access the websites will now find a banner notifying them that the domain name of that website has been seized by federal authorities.”

This shopping tactics of inquiry must have had a cost too, and it makes it even more difficult to understand the seizure of http://torrent-finder.com , which being a meta-search engine for torrents, does not sell anything. The seizure of torrent-finder.com also fits EFF’s remark about inefficiency: torrent-finder still works from http://torrent-finder.info .

Then there is the for-dummies video summary of that press conference released by ICE on Nov. 30, “Operation in Our Sites 2″ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVbZlHLIz0g.

The combination of war-mongering phrases – “This is a long fight. (…) We are in the throes of a heated and pitched battle (…) wage this fight (…) – that echo George W. Bush’s “War against Evil” conferences after 9/11, of the recognition that the operation doesn’t work, and of the ludicrous seizure banner reproduced in this post would be comical if it were not so sinister (like PatrThom in comment 13, I first thought the seizures story was a hoax, because they seemed so ludicrous).

I added the transcript of that ICE video in http://blog.allmend.ch/2010/12/02/us-attacke-auf-das-system-der-domaenen-namen/comment-page-1/#comment-85934 . The main post by Hartwig, in German, explains how the domain seizures were done, technically, and remarks (my translation): “One of the consequences is that normal users must get an understanding of the concepts of IP addresses and domain names (…) Another consequence is that the US have shown the world how cyber war is waged. It is to be feared that the world will prove very good at learning.”

Indeed. The problem is that mainstream media, who could play a crucial role in helping normal users get such an understanding, haven’t done that so far. Let’s hope they will.

But why does ICE call the operation “In Our Sites” if what they seize are sites / domain names of non US citizens?

Is it Quid Pro Quo for spreading propaganda or do corps own the government entirely?

No protection for the US worker but instant seizure without trial to protect the profits of the Owners.

with that established, consider OnSmash as a target. why was an organization dedicated to _promoting_ unknown artists targeted if this is all about “piracy” and counterfeiting?

OnSmash was targeted BECAUSE IT THREATENED THE ALMIGHTY PROFIT STREAM of the major labels and their attempts to control culture. OnSmash was targeted because it worked against the creation of “consumers” that robotically buy whatever crap those majors puke up.

there is only one way to fight back. stop buying. don’t buy their garbage, don’t buy their crappy music, crappy movies, their crippled devices, just stop. take away their almighty profit streams.

…and then go vote for new people who will say “NO” to the next round of bailouts.

The Result of this will be interesting, now U.S.A. Gov will make International Treaties to “Enforce the Law Against People Damaging Industry”.