ISOhunt Blocks US Access to Trackers

This Monday, popular P2P file-sharing website ISOhunt closed its trackers to computers in the United States in an effort to protect their American users from malicious surveillance and attacks by organizations such as the MPAA and RIAA. This action against the freedom and privacy of Americans by corporate cartels is supported by the federal government through increasingly draconian enforcement of copyright law, whose purpose is to stifle free competition and commodify information. Commenting on the issue in ISOhunt’s discussion forum, user Omega50 raises a critical point: ” I am sure the MPAA will be happy, due to the fact they are involved with a torrent site themselves. My guess is they hope that you guys will eventually pay them for the right to help them to spread their wares, for a cost! [...] The MPAA keeps saying that P2P is immoral and can only be used for illegal sharing… so how is their use of the same technology condoned, if the only use of bittorrent is for illegal file sharing?” Follow the first link to read the rest of the discussion.

Meanwhile, internet service providers across the United States are cracking down on file sharing, either by greatly reducing transfer speeds when users are using file sharing programs, or disconnecting them altogether (statements made by several acquaintances in the United States). So why is Washington and its financiers so up in arms over file sharing? An independent study contracted by CRIA (RIAA’s Canadian counterpart) revealed that file sharing had only a minor impact on reduced sales. Similar studies conducted in other parts of the world either reached the same conclusion, or demonstrated that sales had actually gone up.

The real problem with all this P2P business, from the perspective of these corporate associations, is that it levels the playing field. Until this point, music was sold in stores with a physical limit of shelf space. Retailers had to think carefully about what to keep in stock; they needed to guarantee the product would sell well. Corporate labels like Sony, Columbia, EMI and others (who together comprise groups like RIAA) acted as an assurance that there would be demand for an album by advertising, producing music videos for MTV, getting songs played on the radio, etc. Of course, in return they gouged the musicians that signed on with them. P2P file sharing opened consumers to a new kind of store, one where the “shelf space” is theoretically unlimited and options aren’t confined to big label music. This allows a garage band from Flin Flon to compete with bazillion-dollar megastars like Britney Spears on a relatively equal footing – and after decades of having an absolute stranglehold on the market, corporate labels hadn’t felt the need to make sure they were putting out quality music. Now that competition in the music market is based on how good musicians are, rather than how much financial backing they have, the corporate recording industry is at a significant disadvantage.

So the issue isn’t really whether albums are selling, it’s the fact that consumers aren’t buying their albums. Do they fight back against this trend by restructuring their business model and improving the quality of their product in the spirit of free competition, a virtue which capitalists constantly pay lip service to? No, they get the state to intervene and use/condone spying, coercion and intimidation to crush the competition as capitalists cheer them on (with a few notable exceptions among US libertarians).

ISOhunt used this opportunity to call on the people of the United States to end their silence on copyright issues, placing the blame for this squarely on the shoulders of the common people whose apathy allows things like this to happen. Rightly so. Let’s hope this is a wakeup call to our American companions to reassert their rights and freedoms.

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