The End of Copyright

Gamasutra has an article from the ever-interesting Ernest Adams on the future of copyright as regards creative works. From the article: "If we're going to go on making video games, the publishers have to find a way to make them pay for themselves. One approach is an advertising model, although I'm reluctant to say it because I hate the idea of ads in games. Another is to treat games as a service rather than a product. With broadband distribution, I think this is increasingly likely: you won't ever have a durable copy of a game, you'll download it every time you play it. Each instantiation will be unique, personalized for a particular machine and Internet address; encrypted to discourage hacking; and expires after a few hours. After that you'll have to download a new copy."

Comments

FTFA

[deblau]

On June 27, 2005, the US Supreme Court decided to hold companies that make file-sharing software responsible for copyright infringements perpetrated by the software's users. Everyone expected that they would rule as they did when Universal City Studios sued Sony over the Betamax in 1984: there were legitimate uses of the technology, and it shouldn't be held responsible simply because it can be used unlawfully. Instead, however, they ruled that file-sharing software actively encourages piracy and the makers should be held accountable.

This conclusion grossly misconstrues the opinion. Instead, they held that one who distributes a device with the object of promoting its use to infringe copyright, as shown by clear expression or other affirmative steps taken to foster infringement, is liable for the resulting acts of infringement by third parties. MGM Studios Inc. v. Grokster, Ltd., 125 S. Ct. 2764, 2780 (2005). They never said the software itself was illegal. They went on to reiterate the Sony rule:

[M]ere knowledge of infringing potential or of actual infringing uses would not be enough here to subject a distributor to liability. Nor would ordinary acts incident to product distribution, such as offering customers technical support or product updates, support liability in themselves. The inducement rule, instead, premises liability on purposeful, culpable expression and conduct, and thus does nothing to compromise legitimate commerce or discourage innovation having a lawful promise. Id.

One small note: the liability attaches to those who distribute, not those who create. They didn't get Grokster for the coding work, only for distributing the software while advertising its illegal uses.

A small procedural note: they didn't actually reverse the lower court, they vacated (threw out) the lower court's opinion, and sent it back for further trial on inducement. Grokster capitulated before the trial continuation finished, probably because they knew they had a losing case.

The rest of the article goes on to troll some more, but I won't give it credence by rebutting it. I just thought I'd help clear up any confusion anyone has about the Grokster holding.

Download limits will be a problem

[miaDWZ]

In many places, such as Australia - we do not have the luxury of downloading the same thing over and over again.

Your regular Internet plans down here are limited to somewhere between 3-10gb per month. The larger plans go up to about 40gb (20gb peek, 20gb off peek).

Now, if we are talking about a big game, say, HL2, we are talking like 2gb here. Whilst I am very lucky, and happen to be one of the few in Australia to have an ADSL2 connection - I'm still on a 20gb cap. So, I can download 2gb in seven minutes (assuming ideal conditions) - that's still 1/10th of my monthly download gone.

Play say, a couple of times a day and you've passed your download limit.

Now, remember, many people are charged money for going over their download limit. The largest ISP in Australia, Telstra Bigpond charge AUD$150/gb over your limit.

So, lets say you have a standard 3gb account, and play the game 5 times in a month - you pay:

[charges for going 7gb over limit] = 150 * 7 = 1050 + monthly fee

Now, I don't see many people willing to pay $1050 for a game.

Steam=nice DRM?!?!

[dupont54]

Steam a good system ?

Are you talking about the system which do not let you play an OFFLINE game during a week-end because their servers crash and you have forgot to firewalled Steam before launching it?

Are you talking about the system which, in contradiction to any advertisement, do not sold you any game, but only an "access" to some contents, access which can be terminated by the publisher at any time and for absolutely any reason as specified by their Subscriber Agreement?

A digital renting service may be interesting, but I just can't trust any digital "purchase" system, unless I can make a perfectly autonomous offline working backup (ala iTMS with audio CD). Especially when their legaleses are so wide open for abuse.