Australia: US Copyright Colony or Just a Good Friend? | Hacker News Reader

Australia: US Copyright Colony or Just a Good Friend?

torrentfreak.com

70 pointsllambda20 comments

Not just Australia, but NZ too. The US has been angling at free trade agreements with NZ and Australia for a while now. They all contain 'interesting' copyright provisions. The sad thing is that too few people here care or know enough about global politics to even notice what's going on, let alone try to stop it.

Luckily NZ is too small for anyone to care. Hopefully we get to keep our ban on software patents a little longer. Although the recently introduced "3 strikes" law (ISPs are forced to monitor your interent use, and warn you if you get caught on an MPAA honeypot torrent. 3 warnings and your internet connection is cut) is dubious.

3 strikes law: http://www.itnews.com.au/News/254485,new-zealand-passes-thre...

NZ/US FTA: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand%E2%80%93United_Stat...

Interesting side note, the founder of Megaupload was hunted down in New Zealand.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/01/21/idUS17541848922012...

Well living in NZ my view point is America has burned it bridges already. I don't think its so much the US trying to get free trade agreements as rejecting offers or bundling toxic policies in with them.

I don't think many people would disagree the future of NZ lays with China who are currently creating new free trade agreements (without military servitude or protectionist mantra attached), and NZ is becoming a destination for wealthy and middle class Asians to escape the homeland.

So unless the US buck its ideas up about its foreign policies, and China continues its progression away from totalitarianism its going to loose friends fast.

And by friends I mean there is huge anti-US sentiment in NZ already, its really viewed as the "bad guy" in most respects, totally corrupt, and on the point of collapse.

The US copyright lobby tried the same type of maneuvering in Spain. They took it a step further and threatened to put Spain on a list of countries that don't respect intellectual property laws, that is unless Spain passed the desired draconian legislation. This was all done through backroom deals and was all meant to be secret. It was a secret until WikiLeaks leaked the memos.

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/12/how-wikileak...

Okay, but why would Spain enforce the law that's bad for them, that was forced on them?

Why not pass it and then never use?

> Why not pass it and then never use?

Separation of powers makes it difficult in many countries to do that (legislature and judiciary being separate).

Why would judiciary branch wasting their time instead of catching criminals? They (MPAA etc) would have to lobby even single application of the law I guess.

Living in Australia I happen to know a few other people who also live here. Occasionally I'll speak to them. I've you to speak to anyone here who's appreciative of the way our government relates to the US

One of our prime ministers once referred to Australia as "the arse end of the world". Seems more like the US is the arsehole of the world and they've got us (and others like the UK) puckering up

I really detest the way our politicians, from both sides, grovel to and fawn over the US. The reaction of Gillard (our current PM) to Obama's recent visit was just downright embarrassing. But what can we do? I wish we were more like the NZ of old who told the US Navy where to go http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ANZUS#New_Zealand_bans_nuclear_... (very much watered down account. it was a huge political rebuff to the US at the time)

Indeed. And the borderless nature of the web is allowing laws, especially copyright laws, to cross jurisdictions with greater ease than before.

Just to be obvious, I feel like this is a reference to Australia's origins as a penal colony.

As an Australian I don't (and wouldn't expect others to) take it as a specific reference to the penal colony days, but to our British colonial heritage generally, and the modern accusation of the US of colonialism, including of Australia.

It means more SOPAs for the rest of your days...

Spain seems to be a US copyright colony, too, after they pushed copyright laws written by US.

Australia may loom large in the consciousness of the world, but economically, politically and militarily we are a minnow.

The point is that defence is the one area where you are meant to take the very long view. Australia has fastidiously and consistently kept up its end of the ANZUS alliance. We had experience in exercising secondary sovereignty due to our long allegiance to Britain. When the mother country proved to be incapable of defending us in World War II, we started sending our soldiers to fight in American wars instead of British ones.

You think we'd have learned the lesson that empires can be selectively blind when time comes to deliver the serious help.

The one interesting little twist in the Australian defence architecture is that we have a nuclear science organisation that has been maintained since the 1950s. The official reason is for the science, but it just so happens that we have a cadre of several hundred scientists of the kind you'd need to build a bomb in a few years if that seemed necessary. Plus quite a few British scientists who worked on the British weapons program retired here in the 60s and 70s. Perhaps as a thankyou for letting the Brits blow up Maralinga they passed on a few hints.

But really, it all comes back to the central problem that none of our politicians can tell their elbow from their arsehole, or TCP from tea. The guy who was chosen to negotiate the AUSFTA was a farmer who didn't understand the fuss about the IP provisions. We've had a series of Communications ministers who are an exciting mix of different species of arrogant ignorami.

Technology is not taken seriously in this country. That's the bottom line.

If the USA interfered with our footy finals it would be war.

- Technology is not taken seriously in this country. That's the bottom line.

Truth. I have (a surprisingly large amount of) friends who don't have internet to their house and the only website they visit is facebook on their phone.

Our current wired network is patchy and crowded, at best, even in population hubs. Gaps have been tried to be filled with wireless networks but with the proliferation of the smartphone all of the towers are oversold with prohibitive plans ($10/gb at least prepaid). The NBN might help but it will be many years before even 50% of aussies have access to it.

It's an uphill battle with our tiny population density combined with relatively low demand for top tier internet service.

I don't know what makes me more angry, outsiders meddling in my governments affairs, or the fact my government allows it to happen behind closed doors!

Am I missing something here? As far as I know the MPAA is not a U.S. Government institution. It's a trade organization. Although what the MPAA is doing internationally and domestically is disgusting, I don't think that this is a case of the American government meddling in Aussie affairs. It's more like the netizens of America, Australia, and many other countries are being attacked by the MPAA.

Well, the leaked documents talked about in the article are diplomatic cables (I think) so it would seem the MPAA has been getting assistance from the US government to get in the ears of the Aussie government.

From TFA:

“The case was filed by … the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and its international affiliate, the Motion Picture Association (MPA), but does not want that fact to be broadcasted,” the US Embassy, Canberra wrote.

So, not necessarily exactly what I wrote above, but is certainly points to what I was saying.

"America has no better [copyright colony] than Australia."

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