Eircom Will Ban Downloaders of Illegal Music

One of Ireland’s biggest ISP’s, Eircom, signed an agreement with the four major record labels in which it agreed to disconnect customers if they illegally download music. This came as a result of a lawsuit initiated by EMI Ltd., Sony Music Entertainment, Universal Music and Warner Music Group Inc. (via the Irish Recorded Music Association – IRMA) in which the labels wanted Eircom to install network monitoring equipment. The offenders will be given two warnings before being shut down.

So now, instead of having to go to court to get an order asking the ISP to shut off a subscriber’s connection, the music labels will directly to the ISP, making the whole process much faster. And the record companies have agreed that they will take all necessary steps to put similar agreements with other ISPs in Ireland, although there are no signs of that for now.

Now let’s be realistic. Illegal downloads will not stop. Ever! So why do they even bother? I think it’s quite easy to understand that music sales will not rise because of this. People who download illegal music wouldn’t buy it anyway, and there’s the even the chance that music downloads increase record sales. That’s what far smarter people than me have been saying for a while.

Anyway, the existence of quite a large number of alternatives might eventually make Eircom change their mind, or at least place some effort in trying to avoid shutdowns by being especially strict about the evidence presented by the labels. I guess they don’t want their customers running away to their competitors.

So much hype about this being a big thing, but I don’t think it will really make any difference.