I really object

This would be laughable if it wasn’t for the seriousness.

We’ve already (ab)use of European Secret Sevices to get at teenagers allegedly reverse engineering code (which was quite legal in the nordics). We have scores of police in various countries turning up at computer fairs to “bust” those selling CDs and DVDs without Big Music’s ludicrous gravy-train levies. Now we have a small army of armed coppers paid for by the local taxpayer doing the bidding of copyright holders.

I’ve no major problem with people defending their copyright, as long as it’s proportional – and the cost isn’t foisted on us Europeans who already pay a ridiculous amount of tax for mostly sub-standard police services.

We have very serious problems with small groups of individuals wanting to kill large numbers of us. We also have large numbers of “petty” criminals robbing, mugging and generally making life miserable for the vast majority of us. Yet *we* are paying for tens thousands of man-days of expensive police time for *copyright infringement*. The cost isn’t just in money – it’s in the tens of thousands of man-days those cops *aren’t* on the streets doing their *real* jobs.

The organisers of CeBit could have dealt with this easily, with the help of 4 or 5 civilian staff. Any stallholder found to have products which infringed said copyright would be told to remove the products – or be ejected without refund.

Or – the other alternative, and which is forced on those who run LAN parties in most EU countries. The organisers of CeBit become legally responsible for what goes on at the expo as far as copyright infringement is concerned. If a bunch of 18 yr old Counterstrike fans can be threatened with multi-million euro fines and years in jail for organising the hall space for others – then why not the likes of CeBit?

What's all this then?

We have come to arrest err, Mr, err, Mr M.P Free. Is Mr M.P Free here? Come quietly the jig is up and all !