Warning!! World Wide Web Shutting Down!!

A landmark legal case on behalf of the Recording Industry Association of America and other global trade organizations seeks to criminalize all Internet file sharing of any kind as copyright infringement, effectively shutting down the world wide web - and their argument is supported by the U.S. government.

Good God! No more internet? It could also mean..

An outcome more likely to happen if this ruling is accepted is that it would further pave the way for government regulation and tracking of the Internet, namely "Internet 2," a completely controlled, surveilled and autocratic cyber police state similar to the Chinese model, whereby website owners have to obtain government permission to run a blog, be approved by a biometric thumb scan just to turn their computer on, and immediately get their Internet access shut off if they misbehave.

That's preposterous! This could actually be a cover and a license for comprehensive snooping by the US Government on us!!

Welcome to the brave new world!!!

Here…

Well actualy they could only do that on the american servers. The rest of the world would still have access. Thats why they call it the World Wide Web lots of computers make it up so it would be very difficult to shut it down.

And besides if they did manage it there are thousands of cyber geeks out there that woud probably start an underground web.

Also shuting down the web for the recording industry? why would the government care? They already monitor and police the web as it is, you get caught DL pirated music you face a fine. That way the government gets there cut. I seriously doubt that the government would want to do away with one of their little cash cows.

i doubt this very much, american servers shutting down? think of all the money major companies would be losing... just no... it will never happen...
and as for underground servers/websites, how'd you think servers and the internet started

x

1) Freely distributing copyrighted material that is not your intellectual property is indeed illegal unless you've been licensed to do so.

2) Stopping file sharing will not shut down the web no matter what you read on a highly alarmist article.

I have no idea how someone has projected action against file sharing to equate to a shutting down of the entire web.

This simply is not possible.

Even if an international policy was drawn up, exactly how would it be policed??

There was some time ago a plan to monitor access in the uk. Essentially a law was passed that said that all ISP's had to hand over logs on request by the authorities.

However, since speed increases have meant terabytes of information transfer each and every day through the servers of ISP's they cannot keep the logs for any length of time.

In China the way they censor the web is not as advanced as you might think. It is through the simple use of keyword blocking at the main multiplex installation, the heart of the comms infrastructure.. the Hubs.

However, there is a type of encryption to get past the censor. Simply put, it takes a site scrambles it through a 3rd party server then re compiles it at the users pc.

You might find this interesting... it certainly gives the people that believe 2012 is the end something to think about....

Deal signed on .com domain future

The US government has given its blessing to a controversial deal over the future of the lucrative .com net domain.
The deal gives .com administrator Verisign control over the domain until 2012.

Source: BBC News

There is only one way any organisation or Govt could shut down the internet. Cut the power to the entire world.

And that isn't going to happen, if it did, you wouldn't be worried about not getting access to the web.

The Net is here to Stay... And it's a good job too or I think I would go into withdrawal from lack of ATS

All the best people,

NeoN HaZe.

[edit on 4-12-2006 by Neon Haze]

Okay I admit to being gullible...

Talk about giving a person a panic attack but thankfully I believe in the reassuring replies more, so I'm guessing the web is here to stay.

But imagine... what would we do without WWW...

Originally posted by Gypsy_Rose
But imagine... what would we do without WWW...

Hmmm... Read books... spend ages on the telephone... watch TV again... gosh if it wasn't for Lost I think I could easily do without a TV tuner.

Seriously though, The net is now so much a part of the way the world works, it's almost unthinkable to think to a time before it existed.

I have fond memories of writing letters to pen friends when I was a teen. Now messenger / skype / etc....

The internet has to be the 8th wonder of the world, if not then certainly is one of the greatest of mankind’s achievements.

NeoN HaZe.

There's another thread with identical topic here

I posted my "prophecy for the web" there LOL...

The end of illegal filing sharing is an overdue regulation IMO. It's not the end of the web...just the beginning of a new version...

Originally posted by justgeneric
The end of illegal filing sharing is an overdue regulation IMO. It's not the end of the web...just the beginning of a new version...

It isn't possible to shut down ANY part of the net.

The whole point of peer-to-peer is that it is its own network of machines and doesn't require a static server to work.

There are machines that hold an index of files, and it is possible to attempt to locate these machines, but the truth is it is not possible as they are scattered across the globe.

Not only is the Net here to stay but so is peer-to-peer networking.

Everyone else in the business world has felt the squeeze of profit margins, why not these massive media organisations??

If it means they cut down on the volume of rubbish they produce as a result then it has to be a good thing.

Rather than criminalising this tech, what should happen is the media organisations should embrace it and seek finance through some other revenue stream.

All the best,

NeoN HaZe.

The internet used to be private back when it was DARPANET/ARPANET, it was the first generation of "hackers" and "crackers" that made it what it is today. It was originally created for universities to share research information, the students started going into withdrawl when they got out of school and could no longer access it.

Computer viruses started as a game where you chose one of two "bots" which would destroy physical memory spaces until one bot eliminated it's opponent.

The governemnt hardly knows how to use the internet without subcontracting to a bunch of private sector geeks anyways.

Anyone reading this reply to this post right now I would like to bet something. I bet that when you read the name of this thread the first subconciuos thought you had was. "! Where will I get p0rn then?!?!?!!!" then getting back to ATS you next thought was "Maybe the United States is up to something", But you thought of the porn first! admit it!

On the other thread with identical topic my view is expressed more in depth.

To correct your statement, yes...technically it is quite possible for any or all of the net to be shut down. It is a not an endless cyclical entity. It has a beginning and an end and can be controlled as such.



[edit on 12/4/2006 by justgeneric]

But the "Net" isn't some amorphic mysterious ethereal thing. It's just the TCP/IP protocol and the ability for computers to communicate with eachother over a shared network. Maybe you can shut down what we know as "the net" but you can also make your own "Net", ever been to an office with an intranet? Same deal.

You can set up a network in less than an hour. Network a few networks and you have a baby "net"

Originally posted by dunkindonuts
Anyone reading this reply to this post right now I would like to bet something. I bet that when you read the name of this thread the first subconciuos thought you had was. "! Where will I get p0rn then?!?!?!!!" then getting back to ATS you next thought was "Maybe the United States is up to something", But you thought of the porn first! admit it!

Your post speaks volumes about your personality....

Originally posted by Shadowflux

You can set up a network in less than an hour. Network a few networks and you have a baby "net"

Exactly

Saying THEY can shut down the net is like saying THEY can stop people talking to each other.

Even with functionality being diluted in future iterations of The NET, what is to stop any of us building a pc and connecting it to an entirely new standard or IP??

This is where Peer-To-Peer comes into it's own and why it can't be stopped. You might be able to take a company to court that built a p2p client but even if you managed to get them it's too late.

The only way the media organisations have been able to fight p2p is by flooding it with incorrect file names and corrupt files.

All the best,

NeoN HaZe.


[edit on 4-12-2006 by Neon Haze]

Exactly, and on top of that when you're using a P2P you're not even really using the "net" as people think of it.

P2P pretty much means that you're connected directly to this person's computer (or the server if it's a warez site). This is akin to taking your laptop to your friend's house, connecting to his desktop, and downloading his music.

Lol, I guess people still don't understand computers like they should. They still think you have to pay for an internet connection.

So I currently have some space on a web server somewhere in Texas. I have ripped 7 or 8 CDs that I legally purchased to mp3s and uploaded them on the server so that I can listen to them through any browser on any computer I am on.

What it seems like this article is suggesting is that I can get busted for copyright infringement solely because the music I have ripped is available to others (even though someone would have to know the IP address of my server, and it is not searchable in google). What about the owners of the servers who are allowing me to have this material? Now if I put a login/pass on the site THEN it becomes legal? I would think so because it is at that point no longer "freely" available to the public.

I've noticed that almost all of the RIAA suits were against people using P2P networks. Has anyone noticed any suits that were against people who had files up on a web site? How about torrent sites? I vaguely remember something of that sort a few years back.

Getting back to the original topic, a suit of that nature would NOT shut down the internet, nor completely create an "internet 2" scenario. However I can see stricter guidelines being set and more control being given to the government to go after people who they think are illlegally sharing music. Guidelines that would (hrm) allow even more invasions of privacy (although anyone that is reading this right now and thinks that their activity on the internet is private needs to read up on how things work).

I think people have missed an important part of the quote

criminalize all Internet file sharing of any kind as copyright infringement

Internet file sharing does not only include file sharing in the best known sense i.e. bittorrent & p2p programs but just about any form of communication with anything. you visit a website for example you automatically download the web page and images that is file sharing.

and because they want it to extend to any sort of file sharing that means that even downloading legal material even if the copyright allows it would be illegal.

Not that it can work as mentioned in previous posts you cant shut down the net.

Hmmm... Read books... spend ages on the telephone... watch TV again... gosh if it wasn't for Lost I think I could easily do without a TV tuner.

Perhaps we have merely taken the web for granted, and who knows maybe that is why such stories are coming out. Not to shut down the web, but merely to get us to appreciate it more. Hmmm, conspiracy... (Tongue in cheek comment )

Whoot! Another Lost fan. I cannot wait for season 3 to start here.

Cheers

Whew! The title had me worried for a second there.

I thought I would actually have to get a life.

Hey, wait a minute; that could be a good thing.

I honestly could never see this happening, atleast for a very long time. So many companies and business' would love a lot of money and not to mention it would shut down internet providing corperations.

All because of file sharing?