La Libre: La Sabam obtient raison

Yesterday, the Sabam, the Belgian equivalent of the RIAA won a court case against the Belgian branch of internet service provider Tiscali. The court has upheld the charge by Sabam that Tiscali encouraged music piracy by failing to block access to peer-to-peer networks.

That is one of the most ridiculous legal decisions I’ve heard of. Let’s shut down the railways while we’re at it as some people bring back drugs from the Netherlands by train. Strangely enough, they also went for a small player and not the incumbent with a 15 times larger user base and probably with a legal team to match.

Now, they’re going to appoint experts to see if it’s technically feasible, so nothing may come of it. It all depends how clued-in these “experts” are. For all I know, it may end up with some random port being blocked somewhere affecting Skype users instead of the target. This is Belgium after all, home of the “enact a law, think about the consequences or enforceability later” system.

Disclaimer: my employer just bought Tiscali Belgium. I’ve no idea how that affects the outcome, but this is my opinion and not that of my employer, bla bla bla.... etc…