Lostgallifreyan wrote in
:

I accept that the big Usenet providers took advantage of a way to make
money, but that's putting cart before horse. That was just opportunism,
a business model, but the techical foundation for it arose out of need.
If they'd set out solely to profit from bulk breach of copyright, they'd
be foolish even to say so in jest let alone mean it, because The MPAA
and SOPA types would be on their arses like stink on cheese.



About that, I wonder if the reason they don't seem to hit Usenet, but DO hit
BitTorrent, is that they want to have it on Usenet. If they can tap the
income of those big Usenet providers, they have a relatively easy way to get
paid. Tapping BitTorrent would be like drinking water out of damp muddy
ground. Why do that if you can do it straight from a pipe? I always figured
that tapping paid usenet services might be the RIAA and MPAA's best shot, if
they can reduce the leaks via torrents and small P2P systems. They don't even
have to work hard to make it happen, and nearly everyone gets what they want,
for pretty much what it currently costs them. The big providers won't like
it, but they'll put up with it, and pass the cost on as a small rise in
access costs for users.