Missing the point of piracy protesters

NET RESULTS:Younger people rightly recognise that changes to copyright legislation could affect their use of the internet in legitimate ways

I CANNOT think of an issue that has highlighted the deep disconnect between politicians and Ireland’s younger population more acutely than the proposed statutory instrument to modify Ireland’s copyright legislation.

Even though the statutory instrument has been (surprisingly) championed by one of the younger and more digitally aware TDs, Minister of State for Research and Innovation Seán Sherlock, it has shown that TDs and senators generally are not only dismissive of the opinions and issues of concern of younger voters and soon-to-be voters, but also the ways in which they communicate.

The proposed instrument has been popularly termed Sopa Ireland by those who oppose it – Sopa being the recently failed Stop Online Piracy Act Bill in the US, which was shelved after a largely internet-driven campaign highlighting the many ways in which it violated First Amendment freedoms in the US and would stifle and “chill” legitimate online activity and businesses.

Calling Ireland’s proposed statutory instrument “Sopa Ireland” infuriated lawmakers, including the Minister, who insisted it was nothing of the sort.

Well, it wasn’t, in that it was a small bit of added text to an existing law rather than a stand alone Bill like Sopa – which makes things worse.

At least Sopa received public debate by legislators. Sopa Ireland would have had no Dáil debate at all, were it not for a major internet campaign (in the end it got 50 minutes, at the end of which the Minister said he was signing the instrument anyway, without changes. Democracy at its finest).

The statutory instrument was like Sopa in that it was a poorly drafted, alarmingly open-ended document that placed too much assumption on judges being familiar with existing case law. It was sneaky and owed far too much allegiance to the entertainment industry, which has shown over the years that it is happy to use lawsuits, even against school-aged teens, to “make a point”.

The suspicion is that this sloppy instrument would turn Ireland into a proving ground for the entertainment industry to score legal points on businesses and internet users (and case law), thus seriously damaging our international reputation as a positive, supportive environment for internet and technology businesses. Younger people rightly recognised that it could affect their use of the internet in legitimate ways.

Yes, some clearly were angry that it could limit their ability to pirate music or films. I don't support piracy but when people are offered so little choice of ways to easily consume the entertainment they like online, at a fair cost, in the medium they prefer and live in – the Internet, not DVDs, CDs or movie theatres – piracy is going to remain attractive (for excellent analysis on this see onforb.es/xlsB2Yin Forbes). Commendably, younger people, far more at home on the internet than the political generation, could see what many politicians could not – that proposing vague restrictions championed by the entertainment industry risked limiting legitimate freedoms.

To their credit, some politicians did realise there was a real issue on the table as the sheer weight of email and signatures on an online petition accumulated. Some did their homework to better understand it, and looked at both sides of the argument.

Yet the way in which politicians talked about and responded to the mass email protest (and most received thousands in their inboxes) causes consternation. Emails were dismissed as “rants” from “keyboard warriors” with nothing better to do. Lots, they said, were from students who weren’t even of voting age (as if this invalidates a concern).

This is your constituency, deputies and senators, regardless of whether they are old enough to vote yet. And sure, the heated way in which some expressed an opinion wasn’t the most adept or productive or polite. But I didn’t notice you saying the same about the seniors who marched angrily, mailed and rang you over the proposed withdrawal of medical cards. Many emails were not even from people in Ireland, some said dismissively. But since when is international opinion – which was critical in the US Sopa debate – not a matter of Irish concern? Especially on an issue that could affect inward investment?

Some politicians also noted they were “only” getting emails. Since when are emails a subordinate form of communication? If you get an email from your partner, parent or child, do you consider it less important than a phone call? This isn’t 1985: anyone under 40 is more likely to send an email than write a letter or make a call.

And, when is the last time any politician received 5,000 letters or calls on a single subject? Or the last time over 100,000 people signed a petition about a proposed piece of law making?

Anyone who has created an online petition will tell you, it isn’t easy to get signatures unless people feel motivated. People clearly care enormously about this issue. This includes, unusually, young people who are among the most politically disengaged; the generation all parties say they most want to reach, and most want to recruit into politics.

I can understand why they are disengaged when, going on this example, few in public office pay attention when they are incensed and dismiss their emails as annoying “rants”, or when a paternalistic Government tells them they are wrong because they don’t understand the issues or the statutory instrument.

They understand it better than many in the Oireachtas.

Here’s a piece of advice, Irish lawmakers: if you want younger people to be part of the public debate and plugged into this country’s future, you had better learn to listen to, rather than talk at, them.