A Cheltenham man was arrested last week for linking to infringing television material on a website called “TV-links”. The charges were purportedly for “offences relating to the facilitation of copyright infringement on the Internet” and began with an investigation by the Federation Against Copyright Theft (FACT). TV-links was a website where users could post links to content hosted elsewhere around the ‘net.
The idea that linkage could somehow be infringing is pretty disturbing. No actual law has been cited as having been violated other than the idea that the website and poster were encouraging a culture of infringement.
Via Channel Register.
I thought people liked linking because it encouraged traffic?
I know that on some services, links to websites such as TV-links can cause your journal to be terminated because the service doesn’t want the potential liability of being associated with the distribution of pirated material, but I hadn’t heard of anyone being arrested for such a link.
Oh, I totally read that article wrong. I thought the website he linked to was upset he linked to them. Ha.
Will linking to a website seems like it should be protected I guess I *do* wish setting up sites clearly aimed at facilitating piracy was somehow illegal.