Lessig And RIAA Answer NewsHour Questions

Zeta writes "The answers are finally in! Stanford's Lawrence Lessig and the RIAA's Matt Oppenheim have responded to all the tough questions on copyrighted music, many from Slashdot readers, for the online part of the PBS NewsHour with Jim Lehrer. Take a look - some of the responses may surprise you." We ran the original call for questions a few weeks back.

Comments

F.U.D

[Sean Hermany]

It's tempting to analyze everything from the RIAA's replies, however it would be preaching to the choir on this site, and rather unneccessary. However, this in particular stands out to me as a perfect example of how out of touch with reality the answers were:

"Given the increased cost to produce and distribute copyrighted works, Congress has tried to keep pace with what it has believed is necessary to continue to incentivize creators and publishers."

By increased cost, is he referring to the fact that you can record/make your own music with relatively in expensive equipment in your home, and distribute it to millions of people over the internet for the cost of a dialup connection?

I guess in their minds, it was easier/cheaper to pay for recording studio time, copies, and promotion to hopefully get your music played on a local radio station, where less than 1% of the audience the same song could receive on the internet today would actually hear it???