[PCWorld]

Post your comments for ISPs Join RIAA's Fight Against Piracy: Is Your ISP One of Them? here

[Deadhacker]

I use BitTorrent to download Linux distros and other perfectly-legitimate packages, and I seed them as well. You can be certain that if my ISP ever makes the mistake of terminating my service because the RIAA claims I'm "illegally sharing files," there's going to be a lawsuit that will see me owning a major ISP, and the RIAA brought up on charges of acting as an organized criminal gang in collusion with my ISP. The RICO act has more teeth than the DMCA.

[Scorpion5005]

Yes, customers of CableOne cable company are being hit with the C&D letters. CableOne disconnects when they send the first letter. The letter advises ISP service will be restored on a probationary basis, and that any further violations are grounds for permanent disconnect.

The letter i saw was sent to the parent of a 12 year old who had installed P2P software on the home computer. The parents weren't even aware the software had been installed, or that it shared files on the computer by default. MediaSentry is being looked at for conducting IT investigations in the state without a license.

According to a close friend who is in the IT dept. at a local university, the RIAA has also been getting cooperation from public schools in having student access terminated for P2P activity. Local users are starting to spread the word about CableOne. The company is already losing customers to Wild Blue and DSL.

I also use Torrents for creative content distribution, and get all my Linux distros thru Bit. When they go after Bit users, their litigation costs are going to skyrocket.

[PlanetAutomatic]

RIAA - Resort to Irritate All Audiophiles.


Music Gestapos
----------------
The RIAA are a bunch of lonely, power mongers who are using their corporate powers to stay in power.They really dont caare about artists rights.They just cant bear the fluidity of music / art on the internet and see every byte transacted on the internet as their god-given right to be paid.

This resort pretty much is snooping on the ISPs roster and trying to initimidate and curfew legitimate internet users .
Sheesh !

[jimble]

At least the article points to the ISP's not being the "aggressor" in this situation; it's still the RIAA and its cronies doing the leg work (and entrapment) with the ISP's just being the messengers. They're not proactive and bumbling in their approach, like comcast and their torrent packet fiasco, so... hooray? Sucks if you're still using archaic junk apps and networks like Limewire and Gnutella, but that's piracy darwinism for you...

[warezeistheshizz]

this is complete bull... cut off enough isps and ur gonna have a national mob! and the isp are dumb cut off and u lose money and i know in this economy every dollar counts!

[geogo3r]

I think AT&T is already slowing down my connection... I have to reset my modem/router every 1-2 days to temporarily fix the speed problem only for it to be slowed down again within a day. The problem is, I never received a warning. I for one am outraged this is happening, I believe in web anonymity.

[case1239]

C&D letters have been going out for a long time. My internet traffic was turned off by Insight (RoadRunner) and redirected to a page telling me to call my ISP. Upon calling, I was told that the ESA had sent my ISP notice of alleged file-sharing identified to my IP address. Funny thing is, Insight only redirected my port 80 traffic to this page. Torrents still worked, online gaming still worked... I was even able to just port-forward http to an unmapped port for a few days until I got irritated enough to call them up.
Insight did not originally want to provide me with a copy of the complaint against my IP address, I had to demand to speak to a supervisor then demand the copy from him. Sounded a bit shady to me.
On another note, OSU has also been forwarding RIAA/ESA/MPAA notices to it's students... I have to process those damn things everyday. meh. Not sure how much cooperation OSU is planning on providing, if any. they're all going to lose in the end anyways.

[shoes54]

Ok why (although it might exist) don`t we start US mailing of files to people we know in a off line network to screw the RIAA bastards. If i have music i want to give or share to a friend to hell with these Nazi`s.
Yeh it will take longer to get what you need or want and cost for postage lets see if those clowns will go sniffing in your USPS mailbox.
To the music industry why are sales down .......you have NO/MINIMAL real talent making music any more

[geogo3r]

I'd be glad to do this with you but it might just be easier to email the files in a well compressed zip format. encrypted if necessary haha.

[johnnykelley]

I really want to see these ISPs start cutting paying customers off, not really good for business.

[Harold3]

ISP should NOT act as a private police force for the RIAA or anyone else for that matter.
Basically, this is wrong for numerous reasons. First, by what right does a the RIAA have the right to demand that the ISP protect their interests? Second, consumers are paying the ISPs to move packets (mail), not to inspect (read) packets. Third, the data stream is being read on the suspicion that it may contain supposedly unauthorized content. Forth, who is to say that if the RIAA asserts some sort of copyright infringement, that it is in fact really infringement.
While the RIAA may believe that it is somehow being hurt by piracy, the RIAA should not be allowed to circumvent due process or to assume police/judicial powers reserved for the government.
As a ludicrous example, (based on assuming that ISPs have an obligation for protecting the RIAA) by extension the ISPs would be obligated to also protect the supposed rights of every special interest group in existence.
Furthermore, (if we extend this insane logic) I believe that a house may contain some of my stolen property. I walk up to you and say by law X that you have to break into that house and see if you can find my supposedly stolen property. Yet this is exactly what the RIAA is demanding. Insane!