GBP 500m Anti-piracy Bill grins at the UK Broadband Users
It has been reported that the United Kingdom government’s dedicated effort to tackle the menace of illegal online filesharers, using certain proposals in the Digital Economy Bill could leave the customers in the country footing a GBP 500 million bill.
The Digital Economy Bill is understood to be asking the broadband internet service providers to issue warning letters to those customers that were suspected of illegally downloading copyrighted content quite frequently. Further, the ignoring customer would be throttled to sluggish speeds or a total disconnection. It has been estimated that such measures would add GBP 25 per year to a broadband subscription in the UK.
Ministers have reveled through the breaking down of the total price, the fact that an additional GBP 1.40 would be added by the warning letters alone. This is a significant point which could witness 40,000 homes across the United Kingdom sacrificing their broadband internet connections.
On the other hand, as a result of more stringent anti-piracy steps, the bill has predicted the raising of a GBP 17 billion through additional sales for the music and film industry over the coming ten years. It is also interesting that the government was also expecting to glean a neat GBP 350 million in extra VAT.
A spokesman for the Business, Innovations and Skill department said while explaining the anti-piracy measures implementation, said that many of the impact assessment figures for the Digital Economy Bill were showed in ranges and some of the prices’ burden would fall on the rightholders and some by the broadband providers.
I work for the Open Rights Group, who are campaigning against the Digital Economy Bill on the basis that it is unfair and disproportionate.
We’re asking UK citizens to get in touch with their MP and explain to them why the Bill must be stopped, and possibly to meet them at one of their surgeries to discuss the specific problematic points of the Bill in detail.
We believe that visits and letters from voters will help change the minds of MPs currently for the proposals; our representatives will then see that people care about their rights and, as their duty is to vote in accordance with constituents’ opinions, we hope that they will then oppose the Bill.
If you, or your readers, want to know more details about the specific problems picked out by ORG and its supporters, don’t know who your MP is, need help with wording a letter or arranging a meeting with them, drop me an email – katie@openrightsgroup.org – and I’ll do my best to get you the information you need; all constituents have to do is the talking.