Well it’s official: yesterday (Wednesday) the UK government announced its intention to pass a law that will sever the internet connections of anyone suspected of illegally sharing files.

Through the medium of the “Queen’s Speech” (an archaic tradition by which the Queen announces the government’s legislative plans for the coming year) it was revealed that file-sharers’ broadband links will be disconnected without trial.

As the current government’s term is nearing its end, there’s a chance that they may run out of time before the “Digital Economy” bill is passed. But it doesn’t really matter: the opposition Conservative party supports this proposal too. Which shouldn’t come as a surprise: both the Tories and Labour have long been in love with big business. This proposed law is a sop to the music and film industries, who claim that “copyright theft” costs them hundreds of millions of pounds a year – they claim that they lost £486 million in 2007, and that an estimated 6.5 million Brits illegally downloaded music and films last year. Of course that’s nonsense: their calculations are based on the lie that every album or movie illegally downloaded represents a direct loss of revenue, completely ignoring the fact that most file-sharers would not have bought the records or videos they downloaded. But the industry can’t let the truth get in the way.

The government refuses to admit that innocent people may fall foul of the new law, despite the fact that wireless networks can be used by unauthorized downloaders and that multi-occupancy residences can contain more than one computer using the same IP address. I’m interested to see how the rights-owners or ISPs will be able to identify which downloads are illegal. Peer-to-peer protocols like bittorrent are used extensively for perfectly above-board downloads too. There’s been mention of using “phishing” techniques and “honeypot sites” to detect illegal transactions; hopefully this will all become clearer soon.

Many commentators believe that the film and music industries are just using file-sharers as scapegoats for their falling profits. Content providers need to come up with new business models that accommodate consumers’ changing habits.

Mark Schmid, from TalkTalk, said: “There’s been a real split among content owners when it comes to readjusting to the new digital landscape. Some – such as computer games companies – have been clever and come up with innovative ways to discourage piracy and maintain customer loyalty, for instance through adding extra levels to computer games that you only get if you’ve bought the product. But other content sectors – most notably the music industry – have failed to innovate and have blamed the internet for spoiling their old ways of doing business. We think this is extremely complacent. The internet is now a fact of life and we believe new business models need to be introduced if they want to survive and thrive in the digital world.”

Illegal downloading is not responsible for the film industry’s woes. Today’s widely-available fast broadband connections have made online streaming much more popular. There are legal free services, like BBC iPlayer, Channel 4’s 4OD service, and the US-based Hulu (set to come to Britain in 2010). And there are a great many ad-supported streaming sites like Youku and Megavideo. The film and TV content providers need to change their business model. But why should they, when governments are willing to make us reward their ineptitude?

Watch out, world: it’s happening in the UK now, and in France; but soon it’ll be in the USA, Australia, the rest of Europe… hell, everywhere. No one’s safe from the internet police.

If you don’t want this crazy plan to become law, you need to act!!  Visit the Open Rights Group web site to learn how you can help campaign against the internet disconnection bill!

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There are all these torrents and file-sharing services that everyone uses nowadays. I’m not going to tell you about them, in fact I don’t know very much about them. Never used them in my life. No, I use a much more sinister, arcane method to find music to download, for free, on the internet.

Google Is Your Friend(tm)

I’m being absolutely serious about this. If you use the search method I’m about to explain, you will likely find music files that you want, all for free. Illegal of course, but I won’t tell if you don’t

Okay, let’s assume that you’re an Arctic Monkeys fan and you want to get hold of their album Brianstorm – but you don’t want to buy the CD, and the idea of paying for downloads is just too unnatural to you. Well, fire up Google (it’s at www.google.com, just in case you’ve never used it!), and in the search terms field type the following:

intitle:index.of mp3 arctic monkeys brianstorm

You’ll get a whole heap of search results – as is the Google way, alas – but if you sift through them you will be sure to find a site where some kind soul has posted all the tracks off Brianstorm. I know this, you see, because that’s how I got the album.

Unfortunately it can be a little difficult finding recent music – the mp3s are often out there, but raking through the Google results can be disspiriting. But if you’re like me – a fan of “old” music, like from the ’60s and ’70s, you’re laughing. I found every album ever released by The Doors – loads of Janis Joplin/Big Brother and the Holding Company including tracks that I don’t think were ever officially released – reggae reggae reggae, by Bob Marley of course, and Lee “Scratch” Perry, and hundreds of bands and singers I’d never heard of before. If you’ve got an eclectic, adventurous taste in music, Google will introduce you to stuff that you’ll love til the day you die!

I used to have a half-decent collection of Red Hot Chilli Peppers CDs and cassettes, but they mysteriously disappeared when I moved house. I was gutted… then Google came to the rescue, and now I can keep the neighbours up all night with that heavy funk.

So just remember the simple formula. If you wanted Beatles tracks, you’d search for

intitle:index.of mp3 beatles

If you wanted reggae, no particular artist in mind, you’d type

intitle:index.of mp3 reggae

It’s a real simple formula – takes moments to learn, and will serve you well for years. So go on – fire up Google – see how much royalty money you can scam those stinking-rich rockstars for!!

PS:  I’ve amassed a good collection of tunes thanks to Google, and the many kindly souls who have posted their mp3 collections on the net.  So, one of these days, I swear to the Goddess, I’m gonna stick all my music files on a website so fellow musical adventurers can benefit from the internet’s bounty.  It needn’t cost me anything – there are loads of companies that do free hosting – and if the Recording Artistes Cartel lean on my host to shut me down, I’ll just move my mp3s to another site.  Music, like knowledge, wants to be free!  Let’s make it happen!

PPS: Just in case some droid from the music industry is reading this and planning to do me in court for piracy or copyright violation or whatever they call it – I’ve made it all up!  It’s just a pipe dream, a bit of fiction!  I’d never steal from the poor, impoverished record companies! 

Check this out at Om Malik’s GigaOm blog! (I would have done a trackback but I haven’t figured out how to yet)

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How To Get $200 Back If You Just Got An iPhone

Written by Om Malik
Wednesday, September 5, 2007 at 12:25 PM PT | 73 comments

Did you just buy an 8GB iPhone and paid full price? And are you feeling upset over the $200 dollar price drop that Apple (AAPL) just announced? Well there is a way you can help yourself and get $200 back. Apple’s store return policy states:

Should Apple reduce its price on any Apple-branded product within fourteen (14) calendar days of the date of purchase, you may request a refund of the difference between the price paid and the current selling price. An original purchase receipt is required, and you must request your refund within fourteen (14) calendar days of the price reduction.

Just to clarify, if you bought the phone from Apple store, then you can get the refund from Apple. Otherwise visit the AT&T Store to request a refund.

http://gigaom.com/2007/09/05/how-to-get-200-back-if-you-just-got-an-iphone/————–

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Om presents this as a straight bit of good news reporting – if you bought an iPhone full-price, you may be able to get $200 back. Sweet! But looking through the comments to his post, there are lots of folk saying how Apple have done good, or done bad, they will reap the whirlwind, or they will be feted as Gods… and some people actually accuse Om as being a pro- or anti-Apple poster!

Weird!!!