Cringely Proposes a Music Sharing Alternative

WEFUNK writes "The I, Cringely 'Pulpit' column at PBS presents an interesting idea for a new business model to take on the RIAA. He suggests that a publicly traded company could legally and profitably buy a single copy of each record which could then be freely copied and listened to by its shareholders under fair use. His 'Snapster' (Son of Napster) proposal is essentially a digital music co-op that would let shareholders/consumers bring copyrighted material into a quasi-public domain. While fair use and the public domain continue to be lost in our courts and congresses, maybe the capital markets will offer an alternative." While a neat idea, it's doubtful that it'll ever be implemented. Still, it's a good read.

Comments

error-Fair use

[linuxislandsucks]

People you forget Fair Use only applies if you do not in any way make money off of the copy..

So Cringely is quite wrong in this concept..

Now a non profit org that gives a used music cd for someone to use in exchange for another music cd fromtha tperson..would probably be very legal..:)