KISS MY I.C.E.

Recently I found out about the American Government's ICE has been doing crackdowns on a new breed of "criminal".

It's not border-hoppers or drug cartels from South America. Nope. It's people who give access to streams on the internet for tv shows and movies.

That's right, you heard me. ICE, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency of the U.S. government now plays cybercop if you so much decide to stream videos or even link to those who do.

Brian McCarthy, the 32-year old alleged operator of Channelsurfing.net, had a nice visit from ICE and associates for "Criminal Copyright infringement" even though his site only links to other content (that is, it doesn't host the infringing sports broadcasts itself).

So for the "crime" of linking people to another site and allowing people to look at copyrighted content, he gets the book thrown at him, practically on the same level as your garden variety of crook, like a car thief or a drug dealer.

Ridiculous. Utterly ridiculous.

While I can understand the whole copyright issue (And it is part of my reason I refuse to watch mainstream media of anykind). Is it really ICE's job to be the corporations' little bitch?

This is a ridiculous trial, based on a ridiculous policy pushed by corporate lobbyists.

Of course, there is a solution to the problem. It's pretty similar to the way I solved my "software" problem at home. When I got tired of Microsoft's outlandish prices and policies, I switched to Linux. Why? Because I found freedom in the idea that my computer was mine and I didn't have to answer to some asshole who thought that my machine was their's because of shyster's trick and some licensing.

Well the same can be achieved with media. Creative commons and public domain media are the solution to this "copyright" issue. We got well over 100 years of film history now. Alot of it is released in the public domain.

Same with some music and alot of bands release some songs as creative commons. With these two combined, I was able to watch a multitude of old movies that were released and I discovered bands that were not mainstream but kicked ass.

I mean with the garbage that is released in the theaters and the dime-a-dozen artists that are being peddled by the music labels, do I really want to face prosecution of any kind over mediocrity? The answer is NO!!

So to you big record labels and media moguls, the only thing I have left to say, is this.

KISS MY I.C.E. !!