Each year the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) publishes a new update of its Special 301 Report, highlighting countries that fail to live up to U.S copyright protection standards. The annual overview is meant to urge foreign governments to improve policy and legislation in favor of U.S. copyright holders. The process has shown itself to be an effective diplomatic tool and has helped to kick-start copyright reforms around the globe. Not all governments are equally susceptible to critique and Canada once described the process as flawed. Still, no country wants to be includ ..read more

In a world where there’s always someone telling people what to do, Garry’s Mod is a breath of fresh air. Launched in 2006, the sandbox game has no goals; just hand over $9.99 to Steam, jump in, and do whatever you like. With the benefit of hindsight, some fans may have taken that a little too literally. At the time of writing, Garry’s Mod workshop content uploaded by users over many years, is being systematically taken down in response to takedown notices filed by Nintendo. “This is an ongoing process, as we have 20 years of uploads to go through. If you want to help us by deleting your Ninten ..read more

It’s long been the case that access to certain services, whether on or offline, will only be granted when customers prove their identity. Often linked to financial products but in many cases basic money/goods transactions carried out online, handing over a name, address, date of birth and similar details, can increase confidence that a deal will more likely than not go according to plan. In some cases, especially when buying restricted products, proving identity can be a condition of sale. Yet, for many years, companies operating in the online space have been happy to do business with customer ..read more

Twenty-five years ago, peer-to-peer file-sharing took the Internet by storm. The ability to search for and share content with complete strangers was nothing short of a revolution. In the years that followed, media consumption swiftly moved online. This usually involved content shared without permission, but pirate pioneers ultimately paved the way for new business models. The original ‘pirate’ ethos has long since gone. There are still plenty of unauthorized sites and services, but few today concern themselves with decentralization and similar technical advances; centralized streaming is the n ..read more

The joint press release issued Monday by the Premier League and Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment (ACE) was unusual right from the start. Published early on Monday, even the timing was a break from the norm, but the content was even more surprising. Following criminal referrals by the Premier League and ACE, an operator of BestBuyIPTV – a platform that has appeared on the USTR’s Notorious Markets report for the past five years – had been convicted at the People’s Court of Hanoi. For a country where criminal referrals have traditionally disappeared into the ether, that could be a very b ..read more

For online media consumers, things have improved significantly over the years. More content is being made available on-demand than ever before. Netflix set the tone a decade ago by offering movies and TV series online as a convenient alternative to piracy. This worked well, so well that more than a dozen other streaming services were launched, all with their own exclusive releases. While this may sound positive, in some ways it made things worse for consumers. As it turns out, it’s quite costly to have more than a handful of subscriptions and fees may rise to the point where people feel justif ..read more

The non-profit Internet Archive (IA) aims to preserve digital history for generations to come. The organization literally archives key parts of the Internet, copying older versions of websites to preserve them for future generations. This information becomes more and more valuable as time passes by. IA has plenty of other archive projects too. For example, it operates a library that offers a broad collection of digital media, including books, which patrons can borrow upon request. Thousands of libraries have digital lending services but IA’s approach is different. The organization doesn’t lice ..read more

Since its launch early February, Italy’s Piracy Shield system and its operators have been at the center of a series of controversies. From blocking innocent platforms and bizarre public denials claiming that never actually happened, to the leaking of Piracy Shield source code online and claims that didn’t happen either, a more difficult debut would be hard to imagine. Yet with legitimate complaints from negatively-affected members of the public being given short shrift, and access to information requests pushed aside, the groundwork is in place for additional controversy further down the line ..read more

In recent years, copyright holders have paid close attention to a growing number of large piracy services with connections to Vietnam. Popular brands including Fmovies, AniWave, 123movies, BestBuyIPTV, 2embed, and Y2mate are all linked to the Asian country, which was recently branded a ‘piracy haven’. BestBuyIPTV Conviction To curb this trend, western rightsholders have been working with local authorities to bring local investigations and enforcement efforts up to par. While this process takes time, there was a breakthrough last week. The People’s Court of Hanoi handed BestBuyIPTV operator Le ..read more

Spain found itself at the center of a worldwide controversy last month when it was revealed that various rightsholders had somehow managed to convince a local judge to block Telegram in its entirety. Under intense pressure, the judge quickly rolled back the decision after an advisor concluded that the planned measure was massively disproportionate. Just weeks later, a row over an app that’s no longer available from any official app store, seems to be heading towards another controversy and yet more debate on what constitutes a proportionate response to online piracy. This time top-tier footbal ..read more