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WIRED:THIS WEEK, I was an invited interloper at a particularly fascinating London meeting. The "ISP Future Content Models and Enforcement strategies" conference was an opportunity for music, movie and internet service provider industries to discuss what might be done to combat copyright infringement and make money with content online.

The meeting was grimly cordial. In Britain (as in Ireland, and practically everywhere else), ISPs and content providers have spent the last few months indulging in a war of words in the press, while negotiating under the eyes of government in private.