That's fucking stupid

James Murdoch has been blathering on about piracy like he knows something about it.

He’s made that classic mistake of saying that piracy is like

going into a store and stealing Pringles or a handbag.

Of course that’s largely because he’s an idiot. Let’s clear things up shall we?

Piracy is nothing like walking into a store and stealing a handbag or some pringles, it’s more like studying a handbag then buying your own leather and making an exact replica; or in the case of pringles buying your own cocaine and rubbing it on crisps.

Sharing music online is more like taking those aforementioned home made copies and making more copies to give away to your friends for free.

Where you would be crossing the line was if you sold those handbags or crisps to others, and profited from the similarity to the original. This is like downloading a movie and then selling it on DVD down at your local laundrette.

So really, the law has kinda got it licked. They don’t stop you making your own handbags/crisps but they do try to stop people selling counterfeit handbags, although I don’t think there have been many cases of counterfeit pringles.

Can we end this bullshit piracy debate now that we’ve got that cleared up?

From today’s news headlines:

OMG KIDS TAKING MORE DRUGS. EVERYBODY IS ALARMED!!!

Let’s take a look at that a bit more closely, shall we? Here’s the text from the actual report:

Police recorded drug offences increased by six per cent compared with 2007/08, following an increase of 18 per cent between 2006/07 and 2007/08. Increases in recent years have been largely attributable to increases in the recording of possession of cannabis offences… In 2008/09 possession of cannabis increased by six per cent compared with 2007/08. This increase continues an upward trend in recent years, with possession of cannabis offences recorded by the police rising by 90 per cent since 2004/05. This rise has been largely associated with the increased use of powers to issue cannabis warnings.

and

The [British Crime Survey] is also used to monitor trends in drug use and the figures are published annually. The BCS shows that overall illicit drug use among 16 to 59 year olds decreased from 11.1 per cent in 1996 to 9.3 per cent in 2007/08 and it is now at its lowest level since the BCS started measurement. This decrease is mainly due to successive declines in use of cannabis since 2003/04… This suggests the increase seen in recent years in police recorded drug offences is likely to be due to increase in police activity rather than in drug use.

Just thought I should highlight that. Once again: usage hasn’t risen: police have just been reporting it more.

I received this by email today, it would appear it’s doing the rounds again:

Spot the Odd Man Out …. WHO IS THE ODD MAN OUT – and more importantly – WHY?? Lord Stevenson: former chairman, HBOS Sir Fred Goodwin: former chief executive, RBS Andy Hornby: former chief executive, HBOS Sir Tom McKillop: former chairman, RBS John McFall MP: chairman of Treasury Select Committee Alastair Darling: Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown: Prime Minister and former Chancellor Sir Terry Wogan: ex-presenter of Radio 2’s Breakfast Show You’re probably thinking Terry Wogan. You’re right. However, the reason may surprise you……….. Terry Wogan is the only one out of this motley crew who actually holds any formal banking qualification!

What, pray tell, is a banking qualification? As far as I know the only qualifications on offer are for advisory roles (mortgage advisor, insurance advisor etc) and most of them are specific to a particular bank and their particular product set. How does that make someone better at the sort of macro economic roles that are listed above? Sure you can join the Chartered Institute of Banking in Scotland and do one of their courses but will that make you better at running RBS, will it bollocks.

How about we leave running companies to people who have a track record of running companies and leave counting change and stamping paying in slips to people who’ve done an NVQ in banking.

Microsoft has agreed to put the following choice screen into Windows so that people have another reason to ring the PC World support desk, or their 19 year old nephew that ‘does a bit of web design’ to ask stupid and pointless questions.

I download copyright material using the Internet, mainly films. I’m happy for the world to know this and if any of the movie companies want to get in touch they are welcome to do so via the usual channels. I’m happy to talk to them about it and listen to why they think I should stop doing what I’m doing.

I suppose I had better clarify what I do though, so you can get a picture of what a typical copyright infringing criminal is like.

I love movies. I go to the cinema regularly, I own a lot of DVDs and I have a Love Film subscription. I also have the full Sky Movies package and sometimes rent movies through xbox live of by visiting my local Blockbuster.

That’s why I also torrent movies.

You see the last movie I torrented was an obscure movie I couldn’t get hold of any other way. I really really did try to pay for it.

Prior to that the last movie I torrented was Zombieland. It’s not theft because I have not deprived the cinema of any earnings, I had already seen it once when it was in the cinema and shall be buying the DVD as soon as it comes out (March 15th, guys, it’s an excellent movie). I downloaded the torrent because I wanted to watch it again in the gap between cinema run closing and DVD release. Most of the movies I have torrented have either been because I’ve already paid several times to see them, or because I intend to do so as soon as the movie is available again.

So here’s my thrown down gauntlet for the movie industry: quite your whining at people like me. Go after the gangs who download movies and then sell them, not me. If you do hassle me with threats of disconnection then I will stop buying your product completely.