On Tuesday, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger had signed legislation in California that requires residents that wishes to distribute commercial music or video to more than 10 individuals to disclose their E-mail address and work title. The aim of this is to allow infringing users be traced or contacted for copyright violation and also eliminate the 'anonymous' feel out of file sharing.
Those who do not disclose their E-mail address face penalties of up to $ 2,500 and up to 1 year jail time. Otherwise, minor copyright infringers face a fine of up to $ 250 on the first two offences and then increases to $ 1,000 for the third offence and one year county jail time.
The only exceptions to this law include content distributed to the user's immediate family, over a home network or if the user has got permission to do so. The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) hailed the signing of the law. The EFF was against this as disclosing E-mail addresses would infringe on the consumer's privacy. The MPAA was also sponsoring the new legislation. GristyMcFisty used our news submit to submit the following news:
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Minors can be fined up to $ 250 for their first two offenses, and a minor's third offense can bring a $ 1,000 fine and a year in county jail. The law provides exemptions for people sending works to immediate family members and for the transmission of works inside a home network.
Read other info on this at Digital Silence here. |
This is obviously bad news for Californians that love their peer-to-peer software. If many consumers do end up sharing out their E-mail address even with content they are unsure about, not only does this put them at risk, but can make P2P an ideal tool for spammers what harvest E-mail addresses.
Interestingly, this is the first law I heard of that aims to reduce P2P piracy without actually trying to ban P2P software or add hardware based measures. On the other hand, it makes P2P usage a privacy issue since customers must expose their E-mail address if they plan on sharing content. On the other hand, this law could be subject to abuse if consumers provide bogus or someone else's E-mail address, potentially putting innocent consumers at risk. This is very different on how safe file sharing was considered to be in California previously.
Source: CNET News - Digital Media
Just thought of that myself. 
If P2P software adds this feature, I wonder how many innocent people fall victim of receiving threatening E-mails from the entertainment industry for copyrigtht infringment should others enter made up E-mail addresses with some turning out to be valid E-mail accounts. 
Its basicly saying California doesn't want to spend the money to chase people, so they're trying to make people simply admit who they are while they're doing it.
Does distributing 10 copies mean for all eternity?? This doesn't seem like it would work very well as the number of people passing on to 10 people will be like a pyramid scheme, TONS of people will have it!!
Plus, I don't think I've never give more than 10 copies of anything out ever even when it WAS "legal" 
If I'm not mistaken where you filled in your user details in KaZaA there was space for an email address, of course only a yoghurt would put in the real deal...If an E-mail address is only required for delivery of audio/video content to 10 or more users, then I'm sure that there will be variations of P2P software designed for use in California where the user has two options:
1 - Enter their E-mail address for sharing without any limitations.
2 - Leave the field blank and the software will automatically prevent a file from being shared once it has been delivered 9 times. [edited by rla on 26.09.2004 00:40]
[edited by rla on 26.09.2004 00:42]
Thats my email address Arnie, come on and track me down 
Oh, and here's my email
Terminator@Skynet.net
or
BlowMe@ASTALAVISTA.comTop news
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