The RIAA received some rare “good press” a few months ago when it announced that it would no longer go after individual file sharers. But then, approximately 27 seconds later, we began hating it again when it emerged that, instead of going after individual file shares, it would work with ISPs to weed out file sharers. A distinction without meaning, I say. Anyhow, AT&T is the first big ISP to announce that it’s working with the organization, so now we transfer our angst that-a-way.
AT&T admitted as much at some meeting of the minds, as it were, in Nashville. The ISP has been telling some of its subscribers that, hey, the RIAA has you on its radar, so knock it off, or else! The “or else” could be any number of things, including the threat of legal action.
Anyway, it’s not exactly worth getting freaked out over just yet, since AT&T says its current cooperation with the RIAA is just a trial run. (And I’m the King of Spain!)
CNET makes a good point when it brings up the fact that ISPs have usually shied away from doing the RIAA’s dirty work, as it could be seen as forfeiting their common carrier status. That is, if anything illegal happens over AT&T’s lines it’s not AT&T’s fault, since all it is is a dumb pipe; what people choose to do with that pipe is their own business.
And in the interest of keeping this honest, I type this as I’m seeding hundreds of torrents. What are you gonna do?
you gotta live!!!!!
FREEEEEEEEEEEDOM!!!
And how long until ATT realizes that its a waste of their time and futile ?
Uhh, guess I better look for a new ISP if AT&T is going to go around sleeping with the RIAA. I hope the money is good, you prostitute of an ISP!
How exactly are they cooperating? Are they proactively sniffing in people’s traffic, like a witchhunt, looking for crazy stuff? I would imagine that’d be a fast road to a class action lawsuit…
Or are they just cooperating when the RIAA says “hey, this IP addy, can you fire a letter out to the guy?” That’s still offensive, but much less likely to incur the wrath of the public.
In case anyone’s been under a rock lately, just look at the bailout rage (AIG in particular recently) to see how little tolerance people have for being f***ed with these days. Talk about a wounded animal….
What sucks most for AT&T is they’re the first to do this. I hate Comcast more than the next person, but I’ll go right back to them if I get a letter from AT&T about file sharing. I’ve delt with the sub-par speeds and crappy customer service just out of hatred for Comcast.
ATT ALWAYS bows down to this kinda crap, remember the government wiretaps that were discovered? And they have been known to work with the RIAA before.
Can’t say this is a big surprise to me.