Piracy, in strictest sense of the term, is defined as “copyright violation”. It is strictly the realm of law to define the various provisions and it’s literal meaning. The purpose of this post is not to go in the legalese but to define the reason behind this “growing phenomenon”: Broadband.

I remember the days of pathetic 56 kbps access on the telephone modem. The dial up access was atrociously expensive, the lines faced frequent disconnections and the overall experience was laced with frustrations. I writhed my hands in despair when I heard about Napster allowing unrestricted exchange of music residing on the hard drives. While I don’t condone this (for legal reasons) but it allowed unrestricted exchange of music one never knew ever existed! Napster died a horrible death due to unrelenting legal challenges by MPAA.

MPAA is a quasi union to protect the interests of the content creators. US has been a test bed of the way this contentious issue has evolved over the years. The MPAA has garnered a lot of bad press from the people who fuel the peer to peer networks. There has been a dissent generated from the ISP’s who claim that this kind of traffic chokes their network and cite FUD campaigns to announce the imminent breakdown of Internet; that the bandwidth would soon run out with the kind of content that is being shared.

In the Web 2.0 arena, interestingly, none of the players are making serious money but follow the basic “Christy” method of “harvesting of souls“. Content is created to dumb down the masses in name of entertainment and people hooked on to the “opium of masses” (based on the loose misrepresentation of Marx). Frankly, content creation involves mega budgets and creators look for perpetual “evergreening” of “copyright” in order to milk whatever is worth it.

In this scenario, it is a double pronged attack on the people who share something that is inaccessible or content that has been blocked because of complex copyright issues. For example, a movie having a theatrical release in US quickly goes through it’s DVD sales and then released “worldwide”. Peer to peer networks (Torrents or it’s variants) has changed the game altogether. The moment a DVD is released, it is “ripped” and uploaded for all. The “seeders” abound for the “leechers” and the cycle continues.

The speeds are an issue worldwide. Primarily, the governments have encouraged faster speeds by tax breaks and other incentives to promote digital lifestyles and the positive spinoffs from that. Asian countries like Singapore, South Korea and Japan have lead the way. Recently, Australia announced it”s grand plan to push rural broadband impetus. US has had an acrimonious debate about the role of FCC (their version of TRAI) and the paltry definition of broadband access at 256kbps. Despite the intensive lobbying, nothing really has come out of it.

Piracy has kept pace with the “increasing” speeds so as to say. Legislation has not kept pace with the attempts to thwart this growth. Europe has seen some activity which led to confiscation of Pirate Bay servers and as a result the public rose in revolt against this “misstep” and formed a “Pirate party”. Interestingly, it even managed to win at the hustings and got a seat in the parliament.

I feel that “rooting” out the piracy is impossible. If Governments find means to thwart Internet access or even “slow down speeds”, there are people to bypass these issues in the name of unfettered access.

I don’t endorse piracy in the present form (to be on the right side of law) but there is an inherent need for people to share. This basic impulse cannot be wished away for times to come.

Broadband is going to change the equations in the way we connect. I don’t have any teary eyed dreams of a “global connected village” though but it’s a good feeling that resources can be shared by one and all.

Tags: Broadband, Broadband access, Digital Divide, DTH, DVD, DVD Rips, FCC, FCC sucks, File Sharing, Globalisation, Indian ISP's, Internet, ISP's, Peer to peer, Piracy, Pirate, Telecommunications India, Torrents, TRAI, TRAI sucks

Why would a company choose it’s name as “Virgin”; I have no clue. The unholy alliance between Tatas and Virgin came through and got a sanction from Department of Telecom. They are legally bound to stay together; unless Virgin decides to act funny and kick Tatas below the belt, literally.

I am opposed to the deal because it means that the telecom companies are entering the country via “brand tie ups”. What avoids AT&T or for that matter any other company buying undisclosed stock and shares and entering in the country in the name of brand building?

I have never liked the limeys and been always fearful of their intentions. This is reverse colonisation in the garb of globalisation. Instead of hailing this as the next big thing in Telecom industry, Tatas ought to be ashamed to have sold their “assets” for a fistful of pounds.

Virgin sucks. Their PR disasters are well known. They have not been able to issue a denial nor actively court the media. It wouldn’t be out of place to mention that unless they actively engage the bloggers (who are potential customers), they wouldn’t get their dues. Further, most of the Gen X generation would probably search Internet before they settle in for this service.

A company that cannot clarify it’s intentions before the launch cannot be relied on providing decent after sales service.

Tags: Department of Telecom, Funny, Globalisation, India, Internet, Media, Mobile, Tata, Tata Teleservices, Tatas, Telecommunications India, Virgin, Virgin India, Virgin India Mobile, Virgin India sucks, Virgin Sucks

Someone forwarded me an interesting book. It deals with the various conspiracy theories; about the neoliberal cabal that is out to defraud the millions.

I would have dismissed the whole book as another conspiracy theory; however, backed by proper historical references it does make a lot of sense. I quote specifically from the text which does have relevance to what I have been asserting. It would help you to understand the issues better. Like for that matter, the attempts to obsfuscate the issues. This is from the preface: (emphasis is mine)

I know that sounds fantastic, but if the human race lifted its eyes from the latest soap opera or game show for long enough to engage its brain, it would see that these events
are not just going to happen – they are happening. The momentum for the centralised
control of global politics, business, banking, military and media is gathering pace by the hour. The microchipping of people is already being suggested and, in many cases,
underway.

Whenever a hidden agenda is about to be implemented there is always the
period when the hidden has to break the surface for the final push into physical reality.
This is what we are seeing now in the explosion of mergers between global banking and
business empires, and the speed at which political and economic control is being
centralised through the European Union, the United Nations, the World Trade
Organisation, the Multilateral Agreement on Investment, and the stream of other
globalising bodies like the World Bank, International Monetary Fund and the G-7/G-8
summits.

Behind this constant and coordinated centralisation is a tribe of interbreeding
bloodlines which can be traced to the ancient Middle and Near East. They emerged from there to become the royalty, aristocracy and priesthood of Europe before expanding their
power across the world, largely through the Great British Empire.This allowed the tribe
to export its bloodlines to all the countries the British and European powers occupied,
including the United States where they continue to run the show to this day. There have
been just over 40 Presidents of the United States and 33 of them have been genetically
related to two people(Imagine), England’s King Alfred the Great and Charlemagne, the famous monarch in 9th century France. Throughout this whole period the agenda of this bloodline has been gradually implemented until we have reached the point today where centralised global control is possible.

Further the book asserts:

Like I say, ignorance is bliss – but only for so long. We create our own reality by our thoughts and actions. For every action or non-action there is a consequence. When we give our minds and our responsibility away, we give our lives away. If enough of us do it, we give the world away and that is precisely what we have been doing throughout known human history. This is why the few have always controlled the masses. The only difference today is that the few are now manipulating the entire planet because of the globalisation of business, banking and communications. The foundation of that control has always been the same: keep the people in ignorance, fear and at war with themselves. Divide, rule and conquer while keeping the most important knowledge to yourself…

The whole book is in pdf format; anyone who wishes to recieve this (The World’s best kept Secrets)can email me at drapuri (at) gmail dot com. I shall be glad to foward this to anyone. Infact, this has been scanned an converted to a pdf format to be shared with one and all.

Tags: DoT, EDGE, fraud, Globalisation, Media, Opera, Piracy, Politics, Telecommunications India, United States