Russia's War on Piracy/Malicious Software 150
tmk writes "Russian minister Leonid Reiman has announced new legislation to fight software piracy. According to official information the share of pirated software in the Russian Federation decreased in the last years from 90 to 60 percent. Reiman dismissed as a myth the impression that many viruses originate in his country: 'Viruses are written all over the world. Russia is waging a consistent and successful war on malicious software.' Reiman calls for an international organization to fight Internet crime. Last year Russia agreed to take down Allofmp3 after the United States intervened."
Re:Allofmp3 (Score:5, Informative)
Walk to the subway station, and there are about 5 vendors who will happily sell you pirated version of any music CD, most DVDs, and almost any software for $5.
While there are plenty of people who download software in the US, you'll have a hard time finding that sort of rampant piracy in the US.
In fact, in Russia, I only remember one store where I could buy non-pirated CDs. The piracy isn't even the same order of magnitude.
Re:War on piracy...pffft! (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Stop the slanting (Score:2, Informative)
The term "piracy" has been used in this context for centuries. Nobody, reading about piracy as in copyright infringement, makes any mental association with the original definition of pirate in any way, since the alternate definition is something they have grown up with. If you want proof, just look at The Pirate Bay. If they honestly thought there would be serious negative connotations, would they name it that? It's not like the term "theft", where there are valid reasons to argue it (e.g., the fact that theft is still a very real problem in people's minds, thus equating the two could sway their opinion). Get over it.
Re:Copyright and fascism (Score:2, Informative)
As to hurting american jobs? So what - you're making the classic "broken window fallacy" error. Should we all smash windows to keep glaziers employed?
And do bear in mind that international opinion of the USA is at an all-time low - there are plenty of people who wouldn't normally even think to infringe copyright, but once they hear america claiming that doing so might hurt USA's interests, they do so with abandon,