Piracy is a big problem that the music and movie industry takes very seriously, we hear about how individuals are harassed by these two for infinitesimal small things on a daily basis and now it seems that the USA is prepared to go one step further when punishing pirates. It is namely working on an update for its DMCA (Digital Millenium Copyright Act) where the sentences has been “polished” and we’re not talking about fines or something similar here but prison for up to 10 years, which is of course quite terrifying, but it’s when you compare it to other crimes it gets really troubling. Assaulting a police offcier results in up to 5 years, downloading children pornography up to 7 years and violent assault up to 6 years.
The moral laws are truly unbalanced here and the question is how much of a difference money and lobbyists can make. The Inquirer have tried to make a comical but yet terrifying comparison to much worse moral crimes.
“So in other words if you copy a Disney CD and sell it you will be in the same league as a paedophile who is distributing pictures of sexual attacks on children.
If you copy Craig David’s CD you get ten years, but if you punch him in the face and pummel him into a seven day coma you will only get six. You are more likely to get the respect of the prison population with your six year sentence as well.”
Source: The Inquirer
