KODI users may face up to 10 years for copywrite infringement.

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The Digital Economy Act has passed into law, meaning people could now face ten-year prison sentences for illegally streaming copyrighted content. It covers a wide number of areas, including broadband speeds, access to online pornography and government data-sharing. However, amid the rising popularity of Kodi, an increase to the maximum prison term – from two years to ten – for people guilty of copyright infringement is particularly interesting.

For those who don't know what KODI is, it's a program you can load on devices like the Amazon Fire Stick. By itself, it's not something that's illegal or can get to illegal content, but you can load what's called "builds" on it, which can allow you to view things that aren't legal. Like movies that just came out, or neked people doing stuff.

The comments in the article seem to suggest that the end user won't really be the target, but the way this is laid out, it very well could be. Can you imagine getting 10 years in jail for watching Smurfs, the lost village? I think Bank Robbery and Manslaughter have lighter sentences.

Remember, once you see something, you can't unsee it.

Here is an easy way around that...Dont put yourself in scenarios where you could be arrested for whatever you are doing.

When I was younger I did lots of shady things with phones and at a certain point I realized I can actually make a great career out of becoming a high end Collaboration-Telecom engineer or I could keep doing those shady things.

So I made the choice to not do those other things and not have to worry about being arrested for them .

Basically if a person wants to use KODI or Torrents or whatever approach their is to get things for free they normally have to pay for then they give up the right to complain when they have to pay the price for their choice.

a reply to: network dude

Not enough prison space.

a reply to: network dude

Eh.
I'll risk it as always

I doubt the day will come when youre getting arrested for doing the streaming. The article does seem to imply that though.
I do feel there will be a crackdown on those who write the builds, and upload the content. Remember a lil thing called 'napster'?

If this is truly the case.....I will expect to see every YouTube user in prison as well. Streaming data is legal. Hosting is not without permission or some form of way to pay royalties. It has never been about if you or can't do it, it's always about who is going to get PAID!!!

It should be illegal to pass laws that target users.

If they want this to stop then they need to go after people providing the service.

To the more tech savvy, will SSH tunneling and SOCKS proxying be an option?

a reply to: network dude

There's something messed up where you can go to prison for watching a movie or sport for more time than killing someone, beating someone up or robbing someones house.

All this shows is how big corporations are able to easily influence laws in their favour

They're going to need about 10 new prisons a year if they actually jail people for streaming stuff.

And the funny thing is, it's not going to improve the economy (not that it's a good enough excuse for such arcane punishments) because the majority of people who stream all this content do it because they can't afford to pay for it in the first place, I'd wager that maybe 10% would pay for it if there was no "free" alternative, the rest would just go without

originally posted by: eisegesis
To the more tech savvy, will SSH tunneling and SOCKS proxying be an option?

Just use an encrypted VPN and they won't be able to see what you're doing

The Digital Economy Act is a UK thing. Us people in the US are fine.

The U.K. has always been strict and corrupt when it comes to digital media. Hell, you need to pay a TV license to watch TV, use tablets, and or computers with a specific screen size in the U.K.

However, the new law will most likely target individuals and groups making a business out of selling illegal content, FACT CEO Kieron Sharp told the Mirror.

Users are safe at least for now.

They targeted the profiteers.

a reply to: Kuroodo

The Digital Economy Act a UK thing. Us people in the US are fine.

The Digital Economy Act 2017 is an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It is substantially different from, and shorter than, the Digital Economy Act 2010, whose provisions largely ended up not being passed into law. The act addresses policy issues related to electronic communications infrastructure and services, and updates the conditions for and sentencing of criminal copyright infringement. It was introduced to Parliament by culture secretary John Whittingdale on 5 July 2016. Whittingdale was replaced as culture secretary by Karen Bradley on 14 July 2016. The act received Royal Assent on 27 April 2017.[1]

en.wikipedia.org...

My heart skipped for no reason. I was almost devastated.

a reply to: network dude

Good day network dude....as a copyrighted songwriter and published author....Ive seen it go from record labels say "if you dont own the copyright to these great original songs you got...we cant sign you as an artist"...to "Please read my online self-published new book"...at no cost...just stream or download...

Ive since become an advocate of a single "originator-original composer, artist or author" copyrighted works to establish only point of creation and by whom. Once out in the world....it should be readily available to all in multiple forms, both free and for sale.

Corporate - Government collusion as usual. More desperate acts from an industry who refuses to adapt and instead relies on obsolete methods of distribution.

One day they'll see that the writing is on the wall. It's been there for over a decade.

I've heard about this, and have pondered how its tolerated in comparison to the late 90's sort era when hijacked satellite was the big thing. I recall the feds ("Dave") were apparently nuts about busting and locking people up over all that. That was merely intercepting a signal that's already bombarding your house and everywhere else 24/7 anyways. So then there's this "KODI" thing, where they have these constant streams of apparently everything one could go snag off bitorrent. What I dont get is how the 'source' is making loot maintaining all those feeds for people that as far as I know aren't paying a monthly subscription. This one seems stinky to me, because from what I can tell its skipping past the SHARING concept that is about the only thing that has bitorrent still in existence.

If the content creators (shows etc) would just streams new episodes etc right within their website, with commercials, then they could just avoid all this dystopian dinosaur BS because the simple fact is there's an ever growing contingent out that simply WILL NOT EVER go back to cable TV, nor will ever go to the movies to see every movie that comes out, and so on. There's just too much content out there imagine having to pay to rent/theaters/buy every single thing you ever view. It's madness. Then there's the bit where, were it not for the Internet, soooooo much stuff people do end up viewing never would have not ever if they had to pay for it. What good does that do for content creators their stuff all being all rare, archaically unheard of?????

its the idiot pirates who force you to click 'i am not a robot' so you can see their ad. (thank mozes i have adblok!)
i realized those guys are probably making half a cent for each i am not a robot click.

if you watch anime, there are guys fansubbing, even fandubbing the stuff. i always figured they were just psychos who loved anime going thru that work. because who gets paid for fansubbing?

but this 'i am not a robot' clicking is relatively newly enforced on certain movie sites. i assume those guys will be closed down soon.

but like the fansubbers, i think there is a good percentage of pirates who do it just for the sake of rubbing it to the man. so even if they stop the i am not a robot dorks, there will be plenty of pirates running about.

that uk with her draconion laws and THOUGHT CRIMES. it proves what a sh!tbag that queen and her disgusting family are, they have that place on lockdown. a license fee to watch tv???

originally posted by: KnightFire
If this is truly the case.....I will expect to see every YouTube user in prison as well. Streaming data is legal. Hosting is not without permission or some form of way to pay royalties. It has never been about if you or can't do it, it's always about who is going to get PAID!!!

When you work you expect to get PAID, right? You wouldn;t like it if your paycheck were withheld, would you? It's about the right (not write) of the owner of a work to the fruit of his efforts. Nowhere in commerce is it okay for the consumer to decide whether or not he will pay for an item. Had I been actually paid the modest royalty on the software products I produced, I would have been able to make a living from my efforts. As it stands, copyright (not write) infringement made it impossible for me to quit my day job. People seem to think this is all about corporate profits and greed. Is it "greed" to want to buy food for my family? Who is being greedy here? the person who steals from others with impunity and tries to justify it by saying other people do it, too? Or is it the guy who seeks a modest income to allow him to put bread on the table? It's not all about stealing from big, bad corporate Disney, so that somehow makes it morally justifiable because you don't like the owner. And don't tell me you "couldn't afford it." That's an outright lie and you know it. (Can I steal from you if I don't like you?) It's about people like me not being in a position to write more cool stuff because copyright (not write) infringement deprived me from the ability to do so.

originally posted by: opethPA


Basically if a person wants to use KODI or Torrents or whatever approach their is to get things for free they normally have to pay for then they give up the right to complain when they have to pay the price for their choice.

Yea, no. I raised 3 kids, 2 of whom liked to push the envelope whenever possible. When you get a call from the Cable company saying they will shut your signal down due to illegal accessing of Copyrighted material and you didn't do it, but your kids did, I'm not sure where the line is on that. I won't be sending my 12 year old to jail for 10 years, and I'd rather not go in their place, due to the fact that I didn't break the law. Kids are all grown and gone now, but that was a real scenario.

I feel like the penalty is a tiny bit excessive here.

a reply to: schuyler

I can see your point...

Did you ever consider that perhaps something on the order 95% of the people that installed one of you programs would have never bought it otherwise, but that some potentially significant percentage of them did go on to contribute to the fanbase (which could have lead to boosting sales)?

originally posted by: schuyler
Is it "greed" to want to buy food for my family? Who is being greedy here? the person who steals from others with impunity and tries to justify it by saying other people do it, too? Or is it the guy who seeks a modest income to allow him to put bread on the table? It's not all about stealing from big, bad corporate Disney, so that somehow makes it morally justifiable because you don't like the owner.

It's not stealing though is it, you're not without your programs if someone downloads them, you still have them, all they have done is taken a copy.

It's akin to photocopying a book, or taking a picture of a piece of art and printing it out, there is no theft, you have not taken something from someone.

Chances are 90+% of people who do pirate would never have paid had there been no "free" alternative, so where is the loss ?

Don't get me wrong I'm affected by piracy too as I write music, however I simply don't care as nobody is stealing anything from me, if anything, I'm happy they want my music as I write for pleasure not for money.

People make out like if piracy was stopped, everything would be perfect and lots of money would be flowing when in reality it wouldn't make a slightest bit of difference in economic terms, people pirate because they can't afford what it is they want to see and because they're not stealing they don't see it as morally wrong and I have to agree