From TechDirt, "The Insight Company for the Information Age", at http://techdirt.com/articles/20060426/1012207.shtml.
I copied the whole thing here, because I know many people never click on links. So there. No excuses.
Stick To Downloading Child Porn, Not Movies, If You Want Short Jail Sentencesfrom the misplaced-priorities-much? dept.
We mentioned recently that politicians are looking to expand the DMCA, hoping to crack down on the possession of any tool that would help to circumvent DRM. As if this weren't draconian enough, some have noticed sentencing guidelines contained in the law that seem really out of synch with other federal statutes. The bill's new revisions would allow for 10-year sentences for music and software piracy. This is longer than the five years one can get for assaulting a police officer, and the seven years for downloading child pornography. This seems like misplaced priorities, and poor use of the government's criminal justice resources. This is particularly strange, in light of the fact that The Justice Department is stepping up their fight against child porn. This includes new measures that would create more liability for ISPs, among others (nevermind that such liability is misplaced, since the ISPs aren't actually the ones engaging in criminal behavior). Still, any law that would make piracy a more severe crime than child porn is an indication that the government has completely lost its priorities, and is totally at the whim of its industry donors..
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