Lose-Lose
The cost may outweigh the benefits to trying to stop illegal downloading. The question is will the cost be burdened to the consumer and who will the regulate who gets in trouble especially on open ISP addresses.
My article, which included adescription of the plan to control illegal downloading in New Zealand,explained how Internet policy could become a lose-lose situation. In NewZealand they have decided to put in place a three strike policy, which wouldcontrol ISP use from people trying to download copyrighted material. These newregulations would warn the party twice before restricting access to theInternet. These new regulationscause many questions including the notion of cost to enforce and regulate. Alsothe article discusses the idea that some ISP addresses would be restricted dueto one person within a house and cause disruption to the other people. Alsopeople using unsecured wireless networks could also cause an Internet port tobe shut down.
Furtherin the article it discusses the future of downloading. After Napster the ideaof copyrights on the Internet became important and now with the knowledge thatis out there, movie studio and TV shows have become more aware of the copyrightlaws. Though these laws cannot solve problems of Internet users downloadingcopyrighted material. Some industries have decided to take action in largescale and high profile law suits though it seems that these are not costefficient. In New Zealand the fear is that the cost to regulate downloadingwill be a imposed on the internet user to help pay for the cost of regulating.