Posted 11/03/08 at 01:25:57 PM by Paul Lilly

The World Series might be over (congrats Philly fans), but baseball fever is apparently sweeping through France in the form of a "three strikes" copyright enforcement proposal gaining ground in the country's Senate. The pitch is this: Get caught downloading illegal content a first time and receive an email from the ISP with a warning. A second strike earns a written letter via snail mail, and a third strike means you're out. Of course, in baseball striking out is only temporary until the next at-bat, and for internet surfers caught breaking the law three times, they'd have to wait a year before having their internet connection turned back on.

The controversial legislation is receiving widespread support with a cross-party vote showing 297 in favor of the new law and only 16 voting against. That leaves it up to the French National Assembly to vote on and decide the proposal's fate. If it should pass, the French government could find itself at odds with the European Parliament, who earlier this year shot down the notion of cutting off repeat offenders.

Think this type of legislation could ever fly in the U.S.? Hit the jump and post your thoughts.

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P2P, france, peer to peer, anti-piracy, software piracy, three strikes

Posted 10/23/08 at 03:21:17 PM by Alex Castle

Never ones to shy away from an uphill battle, Microsoft has recently been taking new steps to combat software piracy in China. They’ve launched a program, euphemistically called “Windows Genuine Advantage,” which blacks out users' screens if it discovers that they’re running pirated Microsoft software.

In China, a country where a large majority of computers are running pirated software, this move has, predictably,  caused quite an uproar.

The China Daily quoted Dong Zhengwei, a lawyer, as saying “[Microsoft is] the biggest hacker in China with its intrusion into users’ computer systems without their agreement or any judicial authority … I respect the right of Microsoft to protect its intellectual property, but … They should target producers and sellers of fake software, not users.”

The quote references the fact that in China, a lot of the software sold commercially is actually pirated, meaning that users might be at risk of a blackout without even knowing it.

Is Microsoft just protecting their IP, or have they gone too far? Let us know after the jump.

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windows, microsoft, Software, piracy, china, anti-piracy

Posted 10/21/08 at 01:30:52 PM by Paul Lilly

Piracy continues to be the bane of both software developers/publishers and consumers alike. Electronic Arts caused an uproar among gamers when it decided to use a modified version of SecuROM for Spore, which ultimately ended up punishing paying customers while pirates still got their hands on the game through torrent sites from the outset. Is there a solution?

Microsoft hopes to answer that question by taking the fight against software piracy global. In what Microsoft is calling Global Anti-Piracy Day (not to be confused with the International Talk Like a Pirate Day), the company will use a mishmash of education and enforcement tactics in 49 countries, which includes filing 20 lawsuits against software resellers in the U.S. allegedly selling pirated copies of Office 2007 Enterprise, Windows XP Pro, Office 2003 Pro, and Office 2007 Pro.

"One of the reasons we believe this announcement is important is it consolidates a lot of our activities in connection with our partnerships with governments, our customers and partners,” said Bonnie MacNaughton, Microsoft senior attorney.

Different tactics will be used in different countries. For instance, Microsoft is partnering with the American Chamber of Commerce to launch an anti-piracy educational blog in Brazil, whereas in Italy the company has begun an employee anti-piracy ambassador program. Regardless of specific strategy, it's all part of an effort to reduce the estimated $50 billion pirated software is costing the industry on a global scale.

Hit the jump and let us know if you think Microsoft's approach will work or not.

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microsoft, Software, piracy, anti-piracy