RIAA/MPAA: the Greatest Threat To Tech Innovation

TAGmclaren writes "The Harvard Business Review is running an article stating that it's not India or China that are the greatest threat to technological innovation happening in America. Rather, it's the 'big content' players, particularly the movie and music industry. From the article: 'the Big Content players do not understand technology, and never have. Rather than see it as an opportunity to reach new audiences, technology has always been a threat to them. Example after example abounds of this attitude; whether it was the VCR which was "to the American film producer and the American public as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone" as famed movie industry lobbyist Jack Valenti put it at a congressional hearing, or MP3 technology, which they tried to sue out of existence.'"

Comments

The VCR? No

[countertrolling]

The printing press was/is the greatest threat. That's where it all started. The first "Bertamax" case..

Re:The VCR? No

[eggled]

"Bertamax" has me picturing a muscle building product whose spokeswoman is a large german woman...

BertaMAXX!

Re:The VCR? No

[clang_jangle]

Well at least now we know what to get you for christmas. :)

Re:The VCR? No

[flyneye]

The press was the FIRST threat, Wrong headed agenda and payola driven legislation for coporate morons by the morons that we morons elected is the greatest threat by far.
    Truthfully, Music quality, quantity and breadth of choice are stifled as well as innovation as long as these unnecessary middlemen insert themselves in the midst of what is mankinds heritage.
      The best solution is to continue to quit feeding revenues to these corporations till they figure out that music can't be successfully sold. Technology isn't going to back up and about face for the convenience of a DEAD Industry. It's time to bury the industry and let musicians make a living without unfair competition from self proclaimed talent experts. Musicians will be able to make loads more money as recorded music is given away to popularize the artist and create an audience eager to pay for live music performance. No industry is necessary or welcome to this scenario.

Bottom line. Don't pay for music!
I didn't say steal music, but then how can you steal something intangible, afloat on the air? I'll just say, don't hurt your conscience.

When this is outa the way I put on a cape and take on the ridiculous fallacy of other fantasy ownerships.
When an entity can catch this "BRAAAAAAPTFF" fart and paint it purple, I will admit ownership of the intangible.
However then to the disgust of the Scientologists in our government I will announce my claim to the soul of L.Ron Hubbard and my intent to sell it to the first fucker that sticks his hand out from under a volcano.

Re:The VCR? No

[Opportunist]

Huh? You kidding?

The printing press owners were pretty much what the "big five" and hence the RIAA are today: The ones controlling the publication. Copyright was never intended to protect the original author, it was since its inception about protecting the one owning the "right to publish", which were (at least for more interesting works) always one of the big printing presses. It has been a tool to keep the profits where they 'belong'.

Re:The VCR? No

[log0n]

Something tells me history isn't your strong suit. At it's inception, the printing press stood as a tool about as un-RIAA as was possible to be. Check out Johannes Gutenberg (of Project Gutenberg fame :) ).

Re:The VCR? No

[countertrolling]

In ye olden days, it was the writers guilds that was the "RIAA" of the time. The printing press was a scroll "ripper".

Re:The VCR? No

[AlecC]

You are looking from the wrong end. Eventually, when a technology is commoditized, the Big Players adopt it - and 400 years is long enough to do so. But when printing first appeared. the Big Players of that time - the Church, the Monarchs - were horrified by this new technology and did their very best to control and restrict it. In England, all publishers has to operate from St Paul's churchyard, and every volume had to be approved by the King's censors, on pain of penalties on both publisher and printer. Of course, it didn't work - people got their seditious ideas printed in more liberal places (Netherlands, Geneva) and smuggled them in. But in its first days, printing was as suspicious a technology as file sharing today.

Re:The VCR? No

[clang_jangle]

However then to the disgust of the Scientologists in our government I will announce my claim to the soul of L.Ron Hubbard and my intent to sell it to the first fucker that sticks his hand out from under a volcano.

A friend of mine actually has LRon's soul in a mayonnaise jar. He opened it for me once, just for a split second. Smelled like cheap cigarettes...

Re:The VCR? No

[Culture20]

However then to the disgust of the Scientologists in our government I will announce my claim to the soul of L.Ron Hubbard and my intent to sell it to the first fucker that sticks his hand out from under a volcano.

To be fair to Scientologists, they don't believe humans have souls. They believe that thetans (fake-memory-souls) of dead aliens are possessing humans and restricting their actions (making them act ethically). To that end, scientoligists strive to make themselves soulless, conscienceless animals like Tom Cruise.

Re:The VCR? No

[Digital Vomit]

Check out Johannes Gutenberg (of Project Gutenberg fame

Yeah, his online archive of out-of-copyright books was a great idea, but what has he done lately?

Re:The VCR? No

[PsyciatricHelp]

I thought the monks were the first threat. http://uncyclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Printing

Re:The VCR? No

[Anonymous Coward]

At it's inception

its&its.jpg

Re:The VCR? No

[Anonymous Coward]

I think we should just end all of western civilization so that these record labels can make money. It only seems fair, doesn't it? I mean. . . western society, RIAA profits. How could anyone choose the former?

Death penalty for file sharing! It's the only sensible solution, my friends!

Re:The VCR? No

[Runaway1956]

What did you have in mind? A size 54 G-string for his main squeeze? Ooops - that would be size 54 PETITE, I believe!

Re:The VCR? No

[magarity]

In ye olden days, it was the writers guilds that was the "RIAA" of the time. The printing press was a scroll "ripper".

No, writers then were the same as writers now; they want to sell as many books as possible and don't care how the books are made and distributed. It was the scribes guild that was the RIAA of the time.

Re:The VCR? No

[uniquename72]

No, the Church was the RIAA, and the printing press was the internet (just a shame so few could read).

History is interesting, if you bother reading about it.

Re:The VCR? No

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah I'm pretty sure the scribes of the day weren't too happy and neither were book owners I suppose.

Re:The VCR? No

[SnarfQuest]

The printing press was the cause of such things as the Wickedd Bible. Using the superior technology that existed before the printing press, such a thing could never have occurred. We should return to the previous tried and true technology!

Don't you want to be protected by the RIAA from such terrible attrocities as this?

Re:The VCR? No

[Anonymous Coward]

Check out Johannes Gutenberg (of Project Gutenberg fame

Yeah, his online archive of out-of-copyright books was a great idea, but what has he done lately?

What do you expect a dead man to do???

Re:The VCR? No

[flyneye]

I saw Kirstie on Dancing with the Fat Stars, I do believe you're on to something.

Simplistic view

[girlintraining]

These corporations are not a threat to tech innovation: Voter apathy is the threat. In every country where intellectual property concepts have been strengthened by legal precident, it has done so because the issues are too complex for the average person to understand. They are uninformed, and unable to feel any sentiments towards what is happening one way or another. They may vaguely understand that it is wrong, but being unable to form a cohesive argument against it, they shrug and move on. It's intellectually dishonest to place the blame on a handful of individuals and corporations for this situation. If you really want to drill down to the root cause of this, it's our poor public education system and a lack of training on using critical thinking skills that has caused this, and many other, social ills. And that's true globally, not just in the United States. Wherever you cut back education and voter participation falls, corruption grows and corporations become more powerful.

Re:Simplistic view

[countertrolling]

...corruption grows and corporations become more powerful.

In place of "corporations" or "government" (redundant terms actually), just use the term "authority". Authority is a direct function of corruption.

Re:Simplistic view

[somersault]

And you think many politicians are interested in this issue? What happens if they stand for some other more important issue that you agree with? Voter apathy is bound to happen when there are no candidates you completely agree with.

Re:Simplistic view

[Nidi62]

I wouldn't call it voter apathy. I would simply say most voters are more concerned about whether or not they will be able to afford rent or the mortgage next month, or have enough money left after taxes to take their kids on that vacation, or even just be able to put good, healthy food on the table for them. When ordering priorities for a lot of people, being able to listen to music in any format they want or being able to stream the newest episode of whatever TV show online falls pretty low on the list.

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

While I agree with your general sentiment, you do realize that this is precisely why we have a representative democracy, right? People are elected to worry about the details for us. It was intentionally set up that way. The real problem is that our representatives aren't representing the people of this country, rather they are representing the corporate interests.

Re:Simplistic view

[Labcoat Samurai]

These corporations are not a threat to tech innovation: Voter apathy is the threat. In every country where intellectual property concepts have been strengthened by legal precident, it has done so because the issues are too complex for the average person to understand. They are uninformed, and unable to feel any sentiments towards what is happening one way or another. They may vaguely understand that it is wrong, but being unable to form a cohesive argument against it, they shrug and move on.

In my experience, inability to form a cohesive argument doesn't stop people from having strong convictions. I won't politicize this with examples, but there are a lot of people out there who are very passionate about issues despite having incoherent, nonsensical rationale.

It's intellectually dishonest to place the blame on a handful of individuals and corporations for this situation. If you really want to drill down to the root cause of this, it's our poor public education system and a lack of training on using critical thinking skills that has caused this, and many other, social ills. And that's true globally, not just in the United States. Wherever you cut back education and voter participation falls, corruption grows and corporations become more powerful.

The problem is that they don't care, though. I'm not sure how you can educate the apathy out of them. I remember school, and I remember that people were apathetic then, too. If it wasn't something the directly impacted their priorities, they tuned out and couldn't give a shit. What's unfortunate is that there's not necessarily anything about this issue that *does* directly impact their priorities, so provided you can't change that thinking, there may be no way to get people to care. At least no way to get them to care enough to research and critically examine these issues themselves.

Also, I'm not even sure it's a skill you can teach everyone. I've run into some staggeringly irrational people, and I'm skeptical that it's all because their school didn't do its job.

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

So who exactly am I supposed to vote for, the guy who makes these bad laws or the one who lets these bad laws get made? The voter apathy in this case happens at the legislative levels, not at the individual voter level. The impact of these decisions is so far removed from the day-to-day lives of the average person that there's really no need for them to understand the complexities of the situation. This is, after all, why we elect people to represent us - so we don't have to be intimately familiar with the contents of legislative sausage. Unfortunately, our votes don't count for squat up against corporate dollars, so we don't get people who represent us no matter who we vote for.

Re:Simplistic view

[__u63]

Voter apathy is merely a symptom of a larger problem -- a legislative system that decentralizes decision making so much that elected officials are accountable only to their local constituencies and large campaign contributors and a legal system that is focused on the minutiae of rules and processes and that is all too content to lose sight of the bigger picture. We should accept low voter turnouts in the US as a given for the time being and try to work out a system that will optimize responsible decision making on the part of elected officials.

Re the subject of this article -- until IP law is revised, the RIAA/MPAA will basically have free reign to do silly things. US IP law is badly broken, something we've been complaining about on Slashdot for years. It will not be revised until there is sensible campaign contribution reform and an organized grassroots political movement.

Re:Simplistic view

[girlintraining]

I wouldn't call it voter apathy. I would simply say most voters are more concerned[...]When ordering priorities for a lot of people[...]falls pretty low on the list.

I think the distinction is academic. Whether you don't care, or don't care enough the end result is the same: Inaction. Now, I'm going to come dangerously close to Godwinning the discussion here, but I feel an excerb from Elie Wiesel's speech The Perils of Indifference sheds some light on this distinction. Keep in mind that what he was discussing was many orders of magnitude more severe than what we are talking about, but the principle is the same.

What is indifference? Etymologically, the word means "no difference." A strange and unnatural state in which the lines blur between light and darkness, dusk and dawn, crime and punishment, cruelty and compassion, good and evil.

What are its courses and inescapable consequences? Is it a philosophy? Is there a philosophy of indifference conceivable? Can one possibly view indifference as a virtue? Is it necessary at times to practice it simply to keep one's sanity, live normally, enjoy a fine meal and a glass of wine, as the world around us experiences harrowing upheavals?

Of course, indifference can be tempting -- more than that, seductive. It is so much easier to look away from victims. It is so much easier to avoid such rude interruptions to our work, our dreams, our hopes. It is, after all, awkward, troublesome, to be involved in another person's pain and despair. Yet, for the person who is indifferent, his or her neighbor are of no consequence. And, therefore, their lives are meaningless. Their hidden or even visible anguish is of no interest. Indifference reduces the other to an abstraction.

[Source]

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know about you, but next election cycle, unless some real conservative / liberal activist with a history shows up I plan on voting for Chuck Norris, Vladimir Putin or myself at the box.
captCHA: sincere

Re:Simplistic view

[girlintraining]

In my experience, inability to form a cohesive argument doesn't stop people from having strong convictions. I won't politicize this with examples, but there are a lot of people out there who are very passionate about issues despite having incoherent, nonsensical rationale.

Those people come to those convictions from a strong feeling. Cohesion does not require rationality, only a strong base.

The problem is that they don't care, though. I'm not sure how you can educate the apathy out of them.

If it was explained to them in terms they could relate to the social and economic impact these policies have on their lives, a minority of them would move from silence to activism. The problem isn't that they don't know, it's that they don't even have the tools to proceed forward with the analysis.

Re:Simplistic view

[Kjella]

And probably just as much that there isn't an obvious difference in the parties - least not the big two. The democrats have their list of what they are that the republicans aren't and vice versa. Even if voters do care, you'd still need a choice.

Re:Simplistic view

[gravis777]

I think the problem is more along the lines of ignorant politicians. The USA is not a truely democratic society - ie we do not vote on every law that comes down, but instead we are a representative democracy. You really cannot vote for someone on a certain issue of none of your candidates understands the issue. In the few cases where a political party emerges that does understand (like the Pirate Party or something), they normally only have strong convictions about technologies and copyright. While that is all important, a politician with no major party backing, who has no clear cut agendas on things such as the economy, healthcare, education, enviornment, or any of the other hot topics, is probably going to recieve little votes.

Sadly, in the way the US government is setup, about the only way that progress is going to be made is if Party leaders come out, set forth guidelines of where the party stands in matters of copyright, get current politicians behind them, and then see where the votes lead. A half-dozen Congressmen who understand copyright and technology issues are probably going to have a hard time pushing reform through Congress if the other 400 members don't even know what an iPod or an MP3 or bittorrent even is.

Re:Simplistic view

[Lumpy]

Apathetic and lack of education.

Go and ask 20 people RIGHT NOW if they own the DVD's that they have in their home. 19 of them will tell you, "Yes I OWN those." They do not understand that they did notbuy a DVD but purchased a limited viewing license that is revokable at any time. the RIAA and MPAA are allowedto use Illegal false advertising in hiding this fact to consumers. All their ad's say "OWN your copy today" and this is false advertising.

it starts with education, then they will care.

Re:Simplistic view

[Jeek Elemental]

You cant educate everyone about everything, the time when the world was that simple has long passed, if it ever existed.
A solution to this is specialized political parties, which are very common in more enlightened parts of the world.

With 2 parties that basically spend their energy tearing down what the other built the previous term, you are screwed.

Re:Simplistic view

[Requiem18th]

That's kinda like saying women who don't know martial arts are to blame for rape. And we all know that wouldn't fly in the court.

Nor it should. And while it's true that training people to resolve this issue would help (how much is debatable) the truth is that there are a million issues like this and people can't be informed and in *all* of those topics and care about them simultaneously.

So I think it is fair to accuse those directly involved in the matter as they can understand and care about the subject, and still chose the one which is detrimental to society in the long run.

Re:Simplistic view

[Opportunist]

There's a red vase with a hole in the bottom and a blue vase with a hole in the bottom, but you have the free choice which one you want to buy.

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry but this Democracy garbage of which you speak is a ploy by the ruling class to give the ruled class the illusion they are somehow laughably in control.
Meanwhile life goes on as usual.
Try bloody revolution next time.

Re:Simplistic view

[infalliable]

It's partially voter apathy, but it's also a huge amount of regulatory capture.

I may feel very strongly, but I really have no money and have other things to deal with day to day.

As an industry with an agenda, I have a dedicated staff to doing nothing but lobbying and deep pockets behind it. A lone individual also lacks the "credibility" of an industry insider. Regardless of what the industry says, they live it so they "must know the issues." It's not necessarily correct, but that's how it works.

Re:Simplistic view

[Opportunist]

...a politician with no major party backing, who has no clear cut agendas on things such as the economy, healthcare, education, enviornment, or any of the other hot topics, is probably going to recieve little votes.

You say that like there actually IS a politician who'd give you anything concrete about his opinion on controversial topics...

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

Do me a favor... come around again when your home is in foreclosure and tell us how acedemic this all is.
 
Statements like these is what makes people hate acedemics and make them easy to dismiss.

Re:Simplistic view

[Nethemas the Great]

Do the academics a favor and stop being so bloody short-sighted and ignoring them. Consider what a stifled economy--because indifference permitted big content to hijack innovation and weaken our competitiveness--will do to the future job market.

Re:Simplistic view

[g0bshiTe]

Poor public education. Seems to me the education system has been manipulated to such extent. Was a time you actually learned in school. The shift happened during the time I was in school. Somewhere between Middle School and High School I realized that they weren't teaching us anything. They were simply rehashing what I had already learned.

Short is, stupid people are easier to control than those that can think for themselves.

Re:Simplistic view

[Silentknyght]

I wouldn't call it voter apathy. I would simply say most voters are more concerned about whether or not they will be able to afford rent or the mortgage next month, or have enough money left after taxes to take their kids on that vacation, or even just be able to put good, healthy food on the table for them. When ordering priorities for a lot of people, being able to listen to music in any format they want or being able to stream the newest episode of whatever TV show online falls pretty low on the list.

+1

In addition to those very fine reasons, I'd add that many people rely upon the news media for an update on "what's important," while it has historically been in the same news media's interest not to discuss IP laws or copyright reform. It needn't be malicious intent, either; discussion on COICA or other complicated topics may simply not "sell" as well as the current local/worldwide disaster. Many topics are worthy for discussion, but there's only so much time in a day.

Re:Simplistic view

[Curunir_wolf]

There's a red vase with a hole in the bottom and a blue vase with a hole in the bottom, but you have the free choice which one you want to buy.

Our "2-party" system doesn't work like that. There are actually plenty of other vases around, but you only get the vase you want if enough other people buy that vase, too.

It's a system of fear, where you are asked to pick the lesser of two evils, and are told that if you pick one of the "other" options, the greater evil will win.

Re:Simplistic view

[postbigbang]

The ostensible 'inaction' really has nothing to do with the core problem. The music industry has an evolved business ecosystem, and can blithely ignore whatever technology you want to throw at them.

They fund the band, they control the media and also who the 'stars' are going to be, they do the tour promotions, link to the ticket companies, edit the fan pages, and so on. This is an ecosystem. You have to kill most parts of it and re-do it to make indie music work. I have friends and relatives that are in the indie business. They compete with huge wads of cash and a set of walls at each turn of the road to riches. Their fans just want the music; they'd just like a little money to keep from starving.

In the motion picture industry (sounds old, doesn't it?) it's the same set of characteristics. Studios, producers, theaters, TV, syndication, stars stars hype stars. The indie film makers have their own festivals, but at the root of their desire is artistic expression and oh, gotta pay the bills. At each turn of the road, they, too, face an entrenched set of business ecosystems. To fight this, you have to replace the ecosystems, 'cause people have to eat and get paid. Lacking that, you're fighting windmills.

Re:Simplistic view

[Curunir_wolf]

Also, I'm not even sure it's a skill you can teach everyone. I've run into some staggeringly irrational people, and I'm skeptical that it's all because their [government-funded and -controlled] school didn't do its job.

Maybe it's because the school actually did its job too well.

Re:Simplistic view

[Culture20]

Voter apathy is the threat.

More likely voter ignorance. No one knows enough about every subject (and how every congressman really feels about every subject) to vote appropriately according to their desires. Apathy is a symptom of the vastness of politics and the futility people feel about it, not a cause.

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

Voters are too apathetic to get out and do something about taxes that favor the minority... how would you ever expect popular vote to influence something that the majority of the population either doesn't know about, or doesn't even pretend to understand?

Re:Simplistic view

[Opportunist]

No, it's just free market. Since there are not enough people that want green vases, purple vases or black vases (with or without holes), they simply ain't manufactured. They would, if enough people requested them, but since most are happy with the blue and red vase (despite the hole, seems people enjoy pouring water into a bottomless pit), they simply ain't made. Why bother if the old vases sell well enough?

Re:Simplistic view

[Rufty]

There is a system to cope with this. For many issues the voters are only marginally impacted, and have little motivation to become expert on the many ins and outs the situations. So the voters have historically banded together and hired one guy to do this for them. This representative is selected democratically; and, at least nowadays, is then given massive amounts of cash by lobbyists to ignore the voters completely.

Re:Simplistic view

[Nethemas the Great]

We had best find out how to remove the apathy and short-sightedness out of our population. Failure to do so will result in the failure of democracy. Its foundation is constructed from an active, well-informed, well-educated citizenry. To date we have never had this. The risk of failure becomes ever greater as the problems that need to be resolved become specialized and increasingly nuanced.

In large part I think what we need (forgive the cliche) is democracy 2.0. Wherein we reconstruct the hierarchy of government. Specifically, the middle portion which presently consists of senators and state representatives should be replaced with technocrats whose scope of activities are defined by their field of expertise. If you want to solve a problem don't bring it to a slimy politician, petition an engineer or scientist with subject matter expertise.

Re:Simplistic view

[SirGeek]

However they've stopped giving a crap about what is important to us. They now focus on one thing - re-election. Everything else is irrelevant (except passing laws that help the companies that make the big campaign bribes... I mean contributions).

Re:Simplistic view

[number11]

The real problem is that our representatives aren't representing the people of this country, rather they are representing the corporate interests.

And that will continue to be the case, so long as the corporate interests can finance the election of the representatives (through donations, PACs, and "independent" front groups) and manipulate the economic environment that each election occurs in. How you'd change that, I don't know. Even fixing the finance bit presupposes that you can somehow get representatives who are owned by corporations to go against the interests of those same corporations. And you'd still have to solve the problem of corporate blackmail, "if you do that we'll move our plant to another state/overseas".

The fact is, if you consider corporations to be persons, they are 800 pound gorilla persons, and their wishes are always going to be attended to before those of real live persons. And ultimately they are self-centered and amoral persons, persons without much concept of right and wrong, persons without any concern for the general good or patriotism, to a corporation the only moral issue is "will it make more money for us".

(Remember when Google coined the motto "don't be evil" and how easy it is to make fun of that? And they're probably better by far than most of their corporate brethren.)

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the distinction is academic. Whether you don't care, or don't care enough the end result is the same: Inaction.

You either didn't read the rest of what the GP said, or you still failed to look down from your high horse and see what the common people are actually concerned about: not by choice, but often by necessity.

The salient point is that people need to pick their battles, and that means fighting the most important ones first.

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

It's intellectually dishonest to place the blame on a handful of individuals and corporations for this situation.

No, it isn't.

That handful of corporations controls nearly all the media that Americans are exposed to, and they shovel huge piles of money at Congress to influence its decisions, regardless of how you vote.

It isn't just intellectually honest, it's intellectually fucking necessary.

Re:Simplistic view

[dbet]

Hard to blame voter apathy when every single candidate for every single office in my lifetime has been a man or woman who will bow down to the MPAA at every opportunity. Unless you think people should vote off-ticket for some nobody, which is incredibly hard to organize.

Re:Simplistic view

[jorgander]

You could also argue that unlocked doors threaten your property, and you would be correct, but don't forget to mention why we need locks in the first place.

Re:Simplistic view

[Vaphell]

it's not because of free market but because of 'winner takes all' and '2nd is the 1st loser' rules in political system. Without such pressure lovers of green vases in a free market would be catered to for their lower but not insignificant market share.

Re:Simplistic view

[nabsltd]

it starts with education, then they will care.

I think that education needs to start with you, since you are the MPAA's wet dream.

The MPAA wants you to believe that you are buying a license when you buy a DVD, but both the written laws (17 USC in the United States) and case law shows that you truly have made a purchase. The only thing you are generally not allowed to do with the DVD is to distribute copies of it to other people.

You can make as many backups of the DVD as you want, as long as you don't distribute them to other people. You can change the format of the content so it works on other devices, as long as those devices are yours. You can loan, rent or sell the DVD to anyone you want as long as you don't keep a copy for yourself. You can invite as many friends as you want over to your house to watch the DVD, and you can do so on as large a screen as you want, as long as the "public" isn't allowed to watch.

Re:Simplistic view

[Nethemas the Great]

The political system is hijacked primarily by interests whose scope of activity does not rest simply in campaign contributions. We like to scapegoat there but its a partial story. Even now there are limits to how much money may flow that direction. Politicians are still held captive by the citizenry. This is unfortunately a double-edged sword.

The voting public in reality is primarily at fault because they allow themselves to become tools. It is an interesting irony for our democracy that our first-amendment protections are also our Achilles heal. They enable anything to be said regardless of merit, regardless of truth, regardless of responsibility. Organizations of every color understand this and leverage it to take advantage of the portion of our citizenry that is very active, very vocal, yet poorly educated, poorly informed and highly gullible. These organizations may operate with impunity. Accountable to no one, and with funds limited only by the wallets of their sponsor they will saturate the public with lies and fear to twist and distort our political system through the voter into whatever form suits their interests.

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

These corporations are not a threat to tech innovation: Voter apathy is the threat.

Voter apathy is not the threat to tech innovation, excessive highway speeds and infant inoculations are the threat.

Or maybe Islam. Or saturated fat. Or . . .

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

Voter apathy definitely allows the threat to linger, but the threat is as stated: the large cartel of content producers lobbying heavily to stifle technology for the protection of their business models.

To provide a parallel: let's say muggings are the problem. The threat isn't that I am walking down the street without a concealed weapon. The threat is the shady guy in the nearby alleyway that wants my money. I can mitigate the problem by carrying a weapon, but being armed or not has nothing to do with the existence of the threat that I might be mugged.

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

Sadly I think you missed the lecture on "the tyranny of the majority" and why direct democracy is far worse.

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

I think Lobbying and corrupt politicians/"representatives" are the threat, not vote apathy. If anything it reflects the lack of trust on the political system.

Re:Simplistic view

[bryan1945]

I agree on the apathy part; what is the usual voting % in the US? 20-30% or so? The other thing is that the MPAA/RIAA are not government institutions, just very powerful lobbying groups. With issues such as wars, the economy, illegal immigration, abortion, mascara, what politician is going to talk about the **AAs? Besides, it seems that recently politicians take a shotgun approach to issues- shoot at them all, see what sticks (in opinion/popularity polls), and reload. I vote nearly every year, but I'm even feeling the drag of feeling useless because it doesn't really seem to matter who I/you/we vote into office- some crap, just a different flavor.

Re:Simplistic view

[steelfood]

I think we tried that one, and ended up getting a RIAA lawyer a judgeship.

Grassroots can't beat a corporation. Individuals do not nearly have the amount of resources a large corporation has. And people do have a stake in things when their corporate overlord who puts food on the table is affected.

There's a reason why governments exist.

Re:Simplistic view

[robot_love]

That's great and all, but tell me then which things I shouldn't be indifferent to? Should I fight global warming with all my energy? What about crime? I can't care about everything. I don't have the time. I suspect many people are indifferent because there are too many issues competing for our attention, and they do not have the time, energy or knowledge to make a choice about any of them.

Yes, the voters are indifferent. If we could make them care about something, who chooses what that something is? If we could, shouldn't we rather make them care about the billions that don't have enough to eat. Where does your RIAA challenge rank on the scale of things that matter?

Re:Simplistic view

[elrous0]

It's not even a representative democracy, it's more like a two-party oligarchy. My Congressmen don't listen to me--they listen to their party. It doesn't matter how many letters they get from constituents, they almost always stand with their party over the voters on any given issue (especially Republicans, who have way more internal party discipline than Dems).

Re:Simplistic view

[mr1911]

I wasn't apathetic until I got my ballot and saw my choices.

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

but I feel an excerb

The word you were looking for is "excerpt", not "excerb".

HTH. HAND.

Re:Simplistic view

[magarity]

it's our poor public education system and a lack of training on using critical thinking skills that has caused this

And it's difficult to get this point across since they stress that they do teach critical thinking. Unfortunately, criticizing "the man" is not critical thinking.

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree. I am glad to see more and more people voice the position of let's work this out, biding our time under the current imperfections. The seats of power will always have those who seek to manipulate it for their own personal gain, despite the harm to the greater community. I have read stories where small cities have overtaken the entrenched politics to force their will upon the government. Often these people get a hard lesson in the finamces of governence and find out the political parties were never their true enemies.

The selfish interest that harms the larger community is our common enemy. We have such access to our government and power to change the status quo of politics, to sit still and restrain our influence is folly. The sleeping giant awakens. You'll see this next cycle. As a US citizen you have political power, use it!

Re:Simplistic view

[kaizokuace]

and that is where the argument against the damages the music and film industries flies over most people's heads causing indifference. The damage is not seen for a very long time. Thinking long term is not a strong suit of people in modern times. Supporting the big content providers has many far reaching effects in the future. As we see now that the whole copyright system is fucked. These industries operate under a legal monopoly, destroying competitiveness and innovation. But in the now people only see that they must pay bills and entertain themselves by buying music and movies and such products. No one will spend the time to educate themselves on the issues. No one has the time to do so. Uggghhhhh. This all just frustrates me to no end. Especially because I alone can't do very much.

Re:Simplistic view

[mldi]

Also, in the real world, 99.9% of politicians are corrupt and will always vote for the desires of the highest bidder.

And idiots who always vote "their" party no matter what's at stake.

Re:Simplistic view

[Flodis]

Interesting. You're putting the blame on the people who have to fight uphill.

It's a lot more difficult to organize enough voters to be heard when you don't have a fat wallet behind you.

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

Voter apathy is the threat? No. Voter apathy is the result of our elected officials not following through on their "promises". I can somewhat see where you are coming from, however I highly disagree with the "it's all the voter's fault" point of view. Many voters are largely uninformed because they are being misled or they're fed bullshit information (Fox News). No matter what party is in power or what official you think you are electing, the end result is always the same (on the national level at least). Notice the narrowing US definition of Democrat and Republican. I've heard that other countries consider our parties just varying degrees of right wing conservatism. I believe it is because many of our politicians aren't nearly as concerned with answering to their voters as they do their real concern. It's almost as if some force is driving them to take certain stances on certain issues, even though they campaigned preaching strong stances on said issues. Oh.... right. Money... has far more power than any individual voter has.

Have I lost hope? Definitely. But I'm still going to educate myself and vote on what I believe is right, even if the person I'm voting for has no intention of honoring those beliefs.

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

The best way to fix the problem with elected officials is to get rid of them.

They represent money, not people.

Even so, it's physically and logically impossible for one man to represent millions.

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

This is a cop-out statement

Re:Simplistic view

[dgatwood]

And you'd still have to solve the problem of corporate blackmail, "if you do that we'll move our plant to another state/overseas".

Oh, that's easy to solve. Just create tax structures that are not favorable to offshoring. This means:

• For companies that are incorporated in the U.S., remove all taxation on bringing money in from overseas branches and replace it with a blanket tax on all profit made anywhere in the world.
• Add a 200% "branded product" import duty (phased in over ten years) that is charged upon the import of any product that is marked with any trademark held by any company incorporated in the United States, with an added 20% duty for any additional trademark branding after the first three.
• Add a 200% "product branding" value added tax for any U.S. company adding a trademarked brand to any imported product after importing, with an additional 20% VAT for any additional trademark branding after the first three.

And so on. Make it cheaper for the companies to hire people in the U.S. or to build automated plants in the U.S. than to offshore the work in another country.

Now admittedly, this doesn't solve the problem of them threatening to move the plant to another state. That is best solved by rolling your eyes and saying, "If it were so easy, you would have done it already."

Re:Simplistic view

[Labcoat Samurai]

Well, if you don't mind me going off script a moment with some potentially oddball ideas, I think one way people are convinced to vote against their interests is with distraction issues like gay marriage, abortion, DADT, etc. Essentially, I think people vote in candidates often on religiously-motivated opinions on social issues. I have a feeling that, as social conservatives die off faster than they are replaced (at least I hope this happens), it will be harder to distract people from their own interests. Not impossible. You can scare people with the threat of terrorism, with misleading statements about the economy, and so on, but still, harder... and maybe enough harder that other issues will be forced to the forefront and people will begin to care enough about them to vote on them.

Maybe it's too optimistic, but in terms of social progress and enlightenment, we seem to take more steps forward than backward as time marches on.

Re:Simplistic view

[The Snowman]

Do me a favor... come around again when your home is in foreclosure and tell us how acedemic this all is.

My house is in foreclosure, my finances utterly ruined. I am insolvent, but cannot declare chapter 7 bankruptcy because my gross income is too high. If I declare chapter 13 bankruptcy, I still have to pay everything back and have not gained anything.

My situation is hopeless: no sense in worrying about it. I accept it and move on with life. Once I realized that my monthly income cannot meet all of my obligations, I also realized that I was playing with monopoly money. I wouldn't call this academic, but I do belittle it, even though I am balls-deep in the worst financial crisis of my life.

Some day you'll wake up and realize that money is just a tool created by governments all over the world, and that not having money really won't hurt you. Sure, you can't have nice things, but you'll survive, and be better off than most people think.

Re:Simplistic view

[Draek]

I wouldn't call it voter apathy. I would simply say most voters are more concerned about whether or not they will be able to afford rent or the mortgage next month, or have enough money left after taxes to take their kids on that vacation, or even just be able to put good, healthy food on the table for them. When ordering priorities for a lot of people, being able to listen to music in any format they want or being able to stream the newest episode of whatever TV show online falls pretty low on the list.

And how, pray tell, does that differ from "apathy" at all?

People care more about the skin color and sexual preference of their candidates than their posture on copyright, an issue that affects multiple industries from entertainment to education and productivity tools. It's fucking depressing.

Re:Simplistic view

[Nefarious Wheel]

I read that initially as "copyright on posture". Ok, bit of pre-coffee dyslexia, but now I'm scared.

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not sure that the politicians are ignorant.

They either understand the system very well and take advantage of it

or

They become part of the system because that is the only way they can get any thing done.

Either way they take money from the corporations.

Re:Simplistic view

[Kuroji]

Fiat currency has only the value that everyone agrees to give it. The fact that both your wallet and mine are filled with monopoly money isn't a new thing, but it's about the best thing we've got right now since gold-backed currency was phased out decades ago. The economic crisis is hardly due to the currency losing its value.

In lieu of any such currency though, is there anything you'd recommend to have to represent the time and effort you've put into working so that you can trade it for other goods and services?

Re:Simplistic view

[Skywolfblue]

If you want to solve a problem don't bring it to a slimy politician, petition an engineer or scientist with subject matter expertise.

Engineers/Scientists are not above apathy, shortsightedness, obstinacy and greed. We're just as messed up as the rest of humanity is, we just happen to like math a lot. :P

Re:Simplistic view

[Opportunist]

You're correct. We actually sell green vases with some considerable market share in Europe.

Re:Simplistic view

[mangusman]

Really? How do you explain the massive explosion of smartphones that stream video? I'd bet lots of people sacrifice nutrition (maybe even rent payments) so they can make their cell phone payment.

Re:Simplistic view

[loneDreamer]

Human Education, Human Imperfection or Human Existence. They are the root causes of most (if not all) problems, and often also the solution. But IMHO shifting all conversation to these topics is just like having no conversation at all. Reaching too far into the cause/effect tree leads you only to the origin of the universe and to a complete philosophical standstill.

Re:Simplistic view

[Anonymous Coward]

Any book you'd recommend that goes into detail on the phenomenon of voter apathy? As an apathetic voter myself, I am looking for the inspiration to change my ways.

Copyright Lawsuits

[TaoPhoenix]

The **AA singlehandedly turned the net from a fun place to mashup stuff into a hush zone where soon if they get their way a misclick will send you to jail! Even the usual patent games don't hold a candle to that!

Re:Copyright Lawsuits

[Anonymous Coward]

The net is already in a state where a misclick can send you to jail. Examples:

1) Accidentally hitting a web page that contains images that are considered child porn where you live.
2) Accidentally downloading copyrighted content that was illegally posted (like watching a youtube video, which has been prosecuted in some countries).
3) Buying something online. Perfectly legit. Except you may now owe use tax to your local government, and will not be informed of this until several years later when the interest is sufficent to wipe you out.
4) Buying something online which is (unknown to you) illegal where you live (but legal from whence it is being sold).
5) Posting an opinion in a forum, only to be sued by someone who dislikes that opinion.
6) Accidentally downloading a trojan that uses your computer as a proxy server for some kind of illegal content or activity.
7) Accidentally leaving your wireless router unsecured and being held responsible for the illegal activities that strangers use it for, without your knowledge.
8) Accidentally giving your child unmonitored access to the computer, and being held responsible for the illegal activities in which your child (possibly, innocently) engaged.

That's just what I can think of off the top of my head.

Re:Copyright Lawsuits

[Bahamut_Omega]

Think we should be hiring some YakuzAA to start a turf war with the MAFIAA?

obvious?

[halfEvilTech]

I assumed this has been well known for a long time, at least among the /. crowd. Other examples I can think of off the top of my head.

1) Mobile Cassette player
2) CD-RW drives
3) iPods
4) Youtube
5) bittorrent

do you expect anything less from these people. They rather sue to support their dinosaur of a business model than inovate and keep the status quo.

Re:obvious?

[countertrolling]

You have no respect for history.. Humans did roam the earth before 1980..

Re:obvious?

[jhoegl]

instead of iPods, you should have just said "Apple".

Re:obvious?

[ThePromenader]

Please allow me to clarify:

Gramaphone == Threat to live performances!
Radio == Threat to the Gramaphone industry!
Blank Cassettes == Threat to the Record (gramaphone) industry!
Burnable CD's == Threat to the Record (and Cassette) industry!
Mp3's + web == We're all gonna die!

Re:obvious?

[softWare3ngineer]

They rather sue to support their dinosaur of a business model than inovate and keep the status quo.

It is expensive and risky to innovate. change cost a lot of $ for companies so of course they are going to fight it. I can't bash them too hard for doing something they believe is in their best interests, after all we let them do so as consumers. Because they are large organizations that can't change very fast so they need to slow innovation down to help compete. However i support the new business model that is still maturing that lets people provide their own content. The major content providers are in a losing battle at a change or die crossroads.

Re:obvious?

[Anonymous Coward]

You have no respect for history.. Humans did roam the earth before 1980..

Well... okay, maybe you can convince me humans roamed the earth before 1980. But not much before. We all know time started on midnight (GMT), January 1, 1970, and anybody who claims they were born before then are filthy liars.

Re:obvious?

[davester666]

Well, something did.

They just weren't human. Or they didn't have a life.

Re:obvious?

[compro01]

WRONG!

Time started at 8:45:54 PM, December 13, 1901.

Re:obvious?

[Sulphur]

You have no respect for history.. Humans did roam the earth before 1980..

They drove it.

Re:obvious?

[Goffee71]

I'm guessing this was spurred on by the anger about Amazon's new cloudy-storage/Android music-player-thingy (http://bit.ly/ifaGS7) - It shows a degree of ignorance that only the very wealthy can afford.
just wonder how long they'll be wealthy for?

Re:obvious?

[Opportunist]

Mp3's + web == We're all gonna die!

Is that a promise?

Re:obvious?

[Anonymous Coward]

You forgot the first example:

Player Piano Rolls == Threat to live performances

Truly, that was their thinking at the time. But since the playback device (the player piano) was so expensive the sales of their media (the piano rolls) were never a real threat to live performance revenues. That changed with the invention of the wax/shellac/vinyl record.

Re:obvious?

[Anonymous Coward]

Please allow me to clarify:

Gramaphone == Threat to live performances!
Radio == Threat to the Gramaphone industry!
Blank Cassettes == Threat to the Record (gramaphone) industry!
Burnable CD's == Threat to the Record (and Cassette) industry!
Mp3's + web == We're all gonna die!

By reading what you typed, I believe all their fear could come simply from buggy code in their treat_parser.c:

[...]
Gramaphone = Threat to live performances!
Radio = Threat to the Gramaphone industry!
Blank Cassettes = Threat to the Record (gramaphone) industry!
Burnable CD's = Threat to the Record (and Cassette) industry!
Mp3's + web = We're all gonna die!
[...]

Re:obvious?

[Anonymous Coward]

Add to that, the "motion picture camera" and "motion picture projector".

FWIW, the advent of the global motion picture industry was the direct result of the violation of the patents and licences on these two devices.

To quote one summary of the events,

The Edison Film Manufacturing Company, the Biograph company, and the other Motion Picture Patents members ended their competitive feuding in favor of a cooperative system that provided industry domination. By pooling their interests, the member companies legally monopolized the business, and demanded licensing fees from all film producers, distributors, and exhibitors.

A January 1909 deadline was set for all companies to comply with the license. By February, unlicensed outlaws, who referred to themselves as independents protested the trust and carried on business without submitting to the Edison monopoly. In the summer of 1909 the independent movement was in full-swing, with producers and theater owners using illegal equipment and imported film stock to create their own underground market.

With the country experiencing a tremendous expansion in the number of nickelodeons, the Patents Company reacted to the independent movement by forming a strong-arm subsidiary known as the General Film Company to block the entry of non-licensed independents. With coercive tactics that have become legendary, General Film confiscated unlicensed equipment, discontinued product supply to theaters which showed unlicensed films, and effectively monopolized distribution with the acquisition of all U.S. film exchanges, except for the one owned by the independent William Fox who defied the Trust even after his license was revoked.

As the independent outlaws flourished, the Motion Picture Patents Company was also hit with antitrust charges by the United States government. In October 1915, the courts determined that the Patents Company and its General Film division acted as a monopoly in restraint of trade, and later ordered it disintegrated.

Re:obvious?

[Daniel_Staal]

You forgot the Player Pianos, which overlapped with Gramaphones.

Re:obvious?

[Anonymous Coward]

Once you are old and established, you will feel the same way.

Young people are all interested in innovating some great new way to take money away from others. But once they get old and out-of-touch with modern times, they are far more focused on keeping what they have got. Their greatest fear is the next generation of youngsters who want to dis-enfranchize them and take away everything they have earned.

It will happen to you too. Just wait.

Re:obvious?

[SeeSp0tRun]

Perhaps suing "customers" into oblivion is their new business model...
They still exist, so something must be going right.

Re:obvious?

[johnny0099]

Thanks, I wish I had mod points. You deserve the special tag:

Insightful/Funny

Re:obvious?

[Anonymous Coward]

Next:

The music industry == Threat to the music industry.

then. . . .

paradise.

Re:obvious?

[Anonymous Coward]

And yet after each doomsday event came to pass and the gramophone became the cassette (a step back for quality, and forward in portability) through to CD, they still haven't figured out that mediums change, content delivery may change, they continue to make money selling the new format while saving money on the cost of reproduction and distribution... Hmmm, what's cheaper? mass-producing a boatload of CDs and trucking/boating/flying those CDs all over the world, or setting up an e-commerce site with the required bandwidth?

If they had seen this as a good thing a decade ago (and passed on some of the cost savings to the consumer), Apple would still by trying to find a way to pay back it's $10000000 loan from Microsoft, Napster would not have risen so large as it did, and the RIAA would not be spending more on court fees than it has made in fines.

Besides any of that, the Music industry is not even innovating the art of music lately with all the Biebers, Gagas and me-too genetically engineered clones of New Kids on the Block they think we want... I can't even remember the last time an album was even worth stealing (très sad indeed)

Re:obvious?

[ThePromenader]

Why did you post as anonymous? Dot on.

What bugs me most about the RIAA is their obstinant ~laziness~ - they fight against learning and adapting to any new technology, and to do so rely on the only trade they seem to know since centuries - making court cases. Even there, since recent years, they're failing miserably.

And yes, the fact that the music that they seek to 'protect' is 90% pre-programmed superficial shite makes their plight all the more ironic.

Re:obvious?

[ThePromenader]

Ah, but I made that program for them in php. Here's the full code:

if ($media == "Gramaphone") {$hysteria = "Threat to Live Performances!";}
elseif ($media == "Radio") {$hysteria = "Threat to the Gramaphone industry!";}
elseif ($media == "Blank Cassettes") {$hysteria = "Threat to the Record (gramaphone) industry!";}
elseif ($media == "Burnable CD's") {$hysteria = "Threat to the Record (and Cassette) industry!";}
elseif ($media == ("Mp3's" + "web")) {$hysteria = "We're all gonna die!";}
elseif ($media == "unknown" || $media == '') {$hysteria == "Oh, Nooooooooooo!"'}

$i = 0;
while ($i < 100000) {
  echo $hysteria . "<br />";
  $i++;
}

IP Laws as a whole are flawed

[imgod2u]

Treating all IP in every industry the same way is flawed to begin with and the barrier to entry to stake a claim on an idea is way too easy.

The whole point of IP is to encourage innovation by providing incentive for the inventor. Today's IP laws are a flimsy shadow of that. Studios and IP troll companies collect the rewards and inventors are relegated to idea-generating grunts.

There is no inherent morality to ownership of an idea; it is something granted by the public to individual holders of IP for the benefit of the public. If at any time, said laws are detrimental to the public, it should be repealed.

Of course, that would require a government that isn't bought and paid for and a populace that's at least decently educated and informed.

Re:IP Laws as a whole are flawed

[Old97]

Right. I was going to post separately complaining about how software and business concept patents are a bigger impediment to innovation. Your comment throws them all together as an IP problem and I agree with you.

Re:IP Laws as a whole are flawed

[countertrolling]

No, the whole point of IP is to create another commodity, ripe for speculation. It's just business.

Re:IP Laws as a whole are flawed

[xnpu]

Indeed. People should realize that how it was sold to them was not necessarily how it was intended. Which is a common "problem".

Re:IP Laws as a whole are flawed

[Yvanhoe]

Dear Congress,
I don't know this IP thing you are talking about, it would be nice to have a nice definition about what constitutes a copy, a transformed work, a derivative work, an original work, if possible by using the very convenient notions that information science brought us during the last century.
Please understand that as they are today, "IP" objects only exist within the range of the reality distortion field of big lawyers teams. Us, computer scientists, have no way to objectively discern between an information that is protected by free speech and an information that is subject to "IP laws".
Truly,
A concerned computer scientist that would love to be able to do his damn job without having to refer to a legal team.

time for copyleft for music

[circletimessquare]

consumers are obviously better off without mafiaa

it is my belief artists are better off without mafiaa. the evil communist business model in question is... the same business model as good ol' radio from the 1950s: give your content away for free. should we dig up senator mccarthy and tell him wolfman jack was endorsing a communist business model? make cash in related ways: gigs, ancillary revenues, advertising, endorsements, etc. on the internet, you are giving away your digital content for free, for free advertising, exposure. then you capitalize on that

of course, not all artists will take that route. that's fine. i think copyleft content will take off regardless as a valid zone of content that pays dividends for everyone who is not the beetles or the rolling stones. because really, with the mafiaa, unless you are the beatles or the rolling stones, some middleman is making cash, not the artist. they write the contracts in such a way you're screwed as an artist unless you have clout

so we just need to reach artists, and rather than confront IP laws directly, just route around them with a new generation with a new understanding: artists who want exposure more than anything else

Re:time for copyleft for music

[countertrolling]

Even "copyleft" is a license. The entire bureaucracy has to be demolished.

Re:time for copyleft for music

[circletimessquare]

i'm sorry, but you need some SOME sort of legal framework

anarchy only works in the minds of the young, the dumb, and the drugged out utopian. although... it would work for punk as a sales point for their core audience i guess: "steal this song! down with the system!"

Re:time for copyleft for music

[Anonymous Coward]

You do realize there's already plenty of music out there that doesn't have a commercial license slapped on it, right?

It might not be copyleft (which I guess would mean that if I sampled a 1 second bit from such a song, the entire rest of my song would become open and free in its original raw form as well), but they generally address the whole issue of wanting to be paid for music (*gasp* - the audacity, right?) or not being allowed to time/format-shift, etc.

Yet... I see no stories of people with an entire library of free (as in whatever) music who buy all their merchandise and go to their concerts to support them financially.

So I guess a more free license alone isn't enough to sway people. They want their Kanye, Lady GaGa and B.O.B. for free (as in beer, mostly) as well. And rather than accept that aforementioned choose not to use a more free license and ignore their music, they pirate instead.

Yeah.. good luck with the 'copyleft for music' concept.

The concepts that's actually working, to some extent, are iTunes/Spotify. Hey, look at that. Technological Innovation - and not at all stifled* by the RIAA. Now we just need an equivalent for movies to tackle the MPAA.
Unless the stifling is in that Apple can't make the song purchases $0.30/song, all $0.30 of which go to Apple.

* Last I checked, every week there's some new media player that will happily play back MKV files and support torrent and newsbin and the usual suspects (with legitimate uses, of course *smirk*) without any major lawsuits to stop the products from being made. Hey, look at that, more Technological Innovation happening right there.

Honestly - this is from the Harvard Business Review? I bothered to read the article, and it's mostly scaremongering about legislation number I-lost-count possibly getting passed. Woop-dee-doop. Doesn't do squat to what's actually happening in the world, including the U.S. None of it is going to stifle innovation from those who actually seek to innovate.

The best part? The argument that the VCR was the best thing that happened to the movie industry. Question is: what if the VCR did -not- have recording functionality, and only playback. Would that have cut into the profits made from video sales and rentals in some magic way that I can't fathom? Or was there a charge of blank tapes in the U.S. that I'm unfamiliar with that was such a cash-cow? It may very well have been an even better thing to happen to the movie industry.

Re:time for copyleft for music

[countertrolling]

Anarchy is all there is. Everything else needs to be propped up with heavy weaponry. And that's also very expense, and really a waste of money. Copyleft is the same bullshit as copyright.. It just shifts the power.. It has to be eliminated.. Time to turn the weapons on those who wield them.

Re:time for copyleft for music

[harperska]

I don't know if I'm just feeding the troll here, but some control is necessary. Do a little research, and read up on the concepts of the Tragedy of the Commons and the Tyranny of the Majority. When everybody is allowed to act out in their own self interest without limits in a world where we all have to live together and survive on the same scrap of dirt, nobody wins.

Part of the art of government is crafting a system which in which all controllers are themselves controlled. Hence the need for IP reform, as current IP laws grant control without any sane checks (allowing the MAFIAA to run rampant).

But maybe countertrolling already knows all this, and just wants to watch the world burn.

Re:time for copyleft for music

[countertrolling]

When everybody is allowed to act out in their own self interest without limits in a world where we all have to live together and survive on the same scrap of dirt, nobody wins.

Nature will take care of it, just like in the animal world. And despite our fancy language, we are just animals. It shows in everything we do.

Re:time for copyleft for music

[circletimessquare]

"Anarchy is all there is" he typed on his computer made possible by civilization

friends don't let friends post drunk

Re:time for copyleft for music

[circletimessquare]

a troll is someone attempting to lure you into a trap by conscious effort. a crackpot just lures you into his scattershot mind out of evangelical zeal. countertrolling is more of the genuine crackpot variety of internet denizen it appears. talkative, ignorant, harmless

Re:time for copyleft for music

[countertrolling]

Ah yes, your most sane system is working so well. I guess this is what I can expect from people who live such soft lives, with mittens made out of mink..

Re:time for copyleft for music

[Anonymous Coward]

Creative Commons?

Re:time for copyleft for music

[countertrolling]

Drunk is the only thing to be when arguing with bullshit. A sober person would just say "fuck off". I'm trying to be nice here.

Re:time for copyleft for music

[JasterBobaMereel]

Music video's were originally used to advertise a new album, then a new single, then they were sold to Music TV, then to the Customer ....

We are buying adverts for products ....

Re:time for copyleft for music

[circletimessquare]

no, you're bipolar, and you're entering your excessively talkative manic phase. can't wait for the depressive!

Re:time for copyleft for music

[circletimessquare]

manic-depressive experiencing hypomanic episode

please go back on your pills

Re:time for copyleft for music

[countertrolling]

Let's see your license please..

...you're bipolar...

And your excuse is...?

Re:time for copyleft for music

[KingAlanI]

I credit copyleft (and open-source software licenses, et cetera) for taking IP law and steering it to different ends. :)

Re:time for copyleft for music

[zeroshade]

I know many musicians who make a perfectly good living purely using Creative Commons Non-Commercial Share-Alike Licenses because their fans DO have their libraries of free music and buy merchandise and go to their concerts to support them financially (I'm one of those fans of many of those artists.)

The concept works very well for those who use it. The question is more a matter of what about those artists who don't use this model? People want to listen to the artists and are willing to go in droves to pay for concerts and merchandise. Embrace the fact that many of these people are going to download the music as a marketing tactic. I've seen musicians go from being completely nobody to gaining tens of thousands or even millions of fans while sharing their music. They make money in various ways, by merchandise, concerts, even having people donate money towards an album project in return for special things like having your name listed on the album or autographed copies, or even having a verbal thanks on the album itself, etc.

So yea, 'copyleft for music' actually works pretty damn well for those who try it.

Re:time for copyleft for music

[Builder]

But it doesn't work well for other things like books. Writers don't tend to do live performances, but they still need to eat.

And yeah, I know that in some rare cases like Cory Doctorow people have managed to build an audience by giving their content away for free and monetize it later, but these are rare cases.

Re:time for copyleft for music

[countertrolling]

...you need some SOME sort of legal framework....intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it

I like that... A true believer that slavery can be reformed.

I heard a better idea a long time ago, "Drop the bomb. Exterminate them all"

Re:time for copyleft for music

[zeroshade]

That's the thing, they are only rare cases because it's rare that people try the strategy. Cory Doctorow noticed that the sales of his book skyrocketed after releasing it for download for free. This isn't a rare occurrence and in fact, happens over and over again. People want to support good writers and good artists, they don't want to support greedy publishers and managers. Provide a way for people to pay the writer or artist directly, and they'll do it. Show you understand the idea by releasing things so that the public can enjoy your work and people will pay you so that you can survive to create more. It's simple economics, people will give you money so you can write more so they can enjoy it. The amount of customers and money gained by releasing things, if you are well liked and good, outweighs the possible "lost sales" you will have because people are going to pirate it anyways.

Give them a reason to pay you (by being a good writer, by providing things that can't be pirated like autographs, books with personalized messages for a high cost, etc.) and people will pay you. Read up on the current state of self-publishing. Most writers nowadays can make more money by self-publishing a book digitally than by using a publishing house. That's without DRM or any draconian measures.

It's true that it doesn't work for everyone, but suing your customers doesn't get you more customers, piracy does.....

No need to understand..

[pablo_max]

No need to understand technology when in addition to having piles of money, you understand that buying law makers will keep your current system safe. This way you don't have to do anything different and you still make money.

Even as close as a few years back, I had the impression that Democrats somehow had the people interest in mind more than Republicans. I finally realized that both are the same. They simple represent different segments of industry which sometimes have competing views. One thing both can agree on, we are the enemy.

Off topic, I know but it still makes me sad. To think I wasted 6 years in the military to defend an ideal that doesn't exist anymore. You try to do something about it and everywhere you run into these stupid American hicks saying, if ya dont like'it git'out.
Well, you know what hick, I did get out. I have moved to Germany. Sure, I cannot have a gun without a really good reason, but at least I can laugh at you will all the people around here...even though it still breaks my heart to see what is happening to my old home.

Re:No need to understand..

[Anonymous Coward]

Thanks for your service in any case. Someone has to keep us safe, even if the freedom you are defending is somewhat less than you hoped it was.

Re:No need to understand..

[bye]

No need to understand technology when in addition to having piles of money, you understand that buying law makers will keep your current system safe. This way you don't have to do anything different and you still make money.

You got it wrong:

The RIAA/MPAA and big content studio executives understand the business effects of technology, perfectly. They probably understand it better than most of you.

They know that digital distribution of creative works means the end of their distribution monopoly, they know that digital distribution means the end of their profitable middle-man status, they know that digital distribution will end their private, unelected tax on most of our creative society and they know that digital distribution means an end to their undeservedly lavish life-style of a parasite.

They understand technology perfectly, and they use every trick in the book to stop/delay it, in the hope of even newer technology changing the balance of powers somehow, or barring a break-through technology, allowing them to squeeze the last drop of profit out of it, while it still lasts.

They only need to watch what is happening with E-books and book publishing houses to foresee their own future, or the lack of it.

Those who do not understand technology are not the RIAA/MPAA, but the artists whom these parasites are still feeding off of.

Re:No need to understand..

[Anonymous Coward]

You are my hero. It is sad to know you had to leave your home. But this shows me that sane people exist and therefore hope, no matter how small it may be...

Re:No need to understand..

[Anonymous Coward]

Much Respect

Re:No need to understand..

[atomicbutterfly]

You did more than a lot of people world for their (former) homeland. Try not to get too depressed.

Their efforts have been somewhat exagerated

[mysidia]

Note tried to sue MP3 out of existence. Haven't succeeded... at least not yet?

ranking the threats...

[Gbor]

if "RIAA/MPAA: the Greatest Threat To Tech Innovation" then I'm sure the outdated (broken?) patent system is a close second.

Filthy Pirates!

[grub]

Home taping is killing music!

Re:Filthy Pirates!

[ExploHD]

but don't you want to hear my mix-tape of songs from the radio?

Re:Filthy Pirates!

[Lumpy]

Nope, but my mix tape of songs from Last.fm I made with my copy of "the last ripper" sounds great...

I just don't like how you put in 6 copies of "Never Gonna Give you up" in your mix tape... Come on the song is not that good....

More important is the government’s collusion

[InsurrctionConsltant]

1. It’s great to see this coming (finally) from a well-respected business source. The Lessigs, Doctorows and even Nissons of this world are potentially dismissed as impractical ideologues; not so Harvard Business.

2. The things that really makes me sad and angry is the continuing complicity of the US government in the RIAA & MPAA’s money-grabbing, price-fixing, collusive monopolistic ransom-holding of contemporary cultural output. From the anti-democratic secret ACTA treaty shenanigans to Joe Biden’s White House lunches with the Big Content and law enforcement, even Obama, by far the most technologically forward thinking president ever, has completely failed to comprehend the nature of the problem, despite excellent books on the subject, notably Lessig’s Free Culture.

I thought Obama would change this, because his election campaign was funded by crowd-sourcing and he railed against the “Special interests” in public debates.

It’s the public’s interests vs. those of a business elite with a powerful lobby. Guess where the Administration’s placing its support. Change we can believe in, indeed.

Protest

[Anonymous Coward]

Burn the American flag.

What about the children?

[rabun_bike]

That is akin to the "what about the artists?" statement the industry always uses. What about the artists? They make most of their money from live performances since they don't have to pay the record industry to perform their songs live (usually). "Artists are paid royalties usually somewhere between 3% and 25% of the suggested retail price of the recording. Exactly where it falls depends on the clout of the artist (a brand new artist might receive less than a well-known artist). From this percentage, a 25% deduction for packaging is taken out (even though packaging rarely costs 25% of the total price of the CD)." The US Supreme Court recently refused to hear the Eminem/Universal case upon which the lower courts had ruled in Eminem's favor that he should receive 50% of revenue from downloaded songs versus the 3 to 5% he was receiving based on CD licensing agreements. That's a big deal and really does put money back in the artists pocket. If the record industry was really concerned about the poor artists they would not be fighting to keep their 95-97%. http://www.prefixmag.com/news/supreme-court-refuses-to-hear-eminemuniversal-case/50487/

Re:What about the children?

[Anonymous Coward]

It is worse than that.

http://www.toomuchjoy.com/index.php/2009/12/my-hilarious-warner-bros-royalty-statement/

They do not even BOTHER to keep the books right.

This dude was able to talk them into even keeping the books and they STILL got it wrong. How many others have they done this sort of thing to.

Re:What about the children?

[Anonymous Coward]

Nobody cares about the artists. I'm not being cruel or singling them out, but I don't stay up at night wondering if my neighbor is being adequately paid either. I surely don't slip him checks in his mailbox just to make sure he's doing alright, and I would think that I'm pretty representative of the human race in this regard.

The *IAA ppl are simply stupid (but rich). They hold the key by "owning" content that is in constant demand. If they were to sell this as a service like people want, then everybody would be happy. Instead, they try to artificially starve a commodity market and play games, and its only hurting them. What was the point of not having Beatles music "legally" downloadable for 15+ years?

Re:What about the children?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Artists are paid royalties usually somewhere between 3% and 25% of the suggested retail price of the recording. Exactly where it falls depends on the clout of the artist (a brand new artist might receive less than a well-known artist). From this percentage, a 25% deduction for packaging is taken out (even though packaging rarely costs 25% of the total price of the CD)."

Also keep in mind that the packaging costs are actually taken out of the royalty share for the FULL run of CDs produced (Including any that are sold out the backdoor, which the artist receives 0% royalties on.) but the artist only receives royalties as the CDs are sold (to stores.)

As such the artist won't receive a penny in royalties until the full cost of the "packaging costs" are repaid - and if the CD doesn't sell enough for that, they're charged the balance.

to further this topic

[Mr.Fork]

Michael Geist, Canada's copyright law guru and law prof at the University of Ottawa, posted an interesting observation about the copyright fight a lot of these organizations like RIAA and MPAA engage. It's marketing failure, not bad behaviour that is the cause of piracy.

Meaning, it's RIAA and the MPAA failure to properly price their products at a reasonable level that makes the consumer believe that the purchase is reasonable. I mean, if a movie to buy was $1 or $2, would you purchase it or DL it? If a music CD was $3, not $20, would you own your own copy? Or if they offered monthly subscriptions, like the Netflix model, would you subscribe or pirate?

Not only are they missing the boat and stifling innovation, they're attacking and going after consumers who don't believe the purchase is worth the money and then lobby governments to put in CRAZY laws that illegally downloading a movie can cost you $250,000 + 5 years in jail if you're charged and found guilty. Yet get in your car drunk and kill a family of 5, spend 2-3 years in jail + $50,000 in legal fees.

Is it me, or does the who copyright debate sound complete like corporate sheit they've bought and paid for and then rammed down our throats?

Re:to further this topic

[Drakkenmensch]

Not only are they missing the boat and stifling innovation, they're attacking and going after consumers who don't believe the purchase is worth the money and then lobby governments to put in CRAZY laws that illegally downloading a movie can cost you $250,000 + 5 years in jail if you're charged and found guilty. Yet get in your car drunk and kill a family of 5, spend 2-3 years in jail + $50,000 in legal fees. Is it me, or does the who copyright debate sound complete like corporate sheit they've bought and paid for and then rammed down our throats?

The moral to this story is that when a piracy crime is worse than a murder charge, you should simply kill anyone threatening you with a copyright lawsuit and get away with a slap on the wrist. Shakespeare's "But first let's kill all the lawyers" has never made more sense than it does now.

Re:to further this topic

[betterunixthanunix]

I mean, if a movie to buy was $1 or $2, would you purchase it or DL it? If a music CD was $3, not $20, would you own your own copy?

If I could make copies of those CDs and DVDs without having my own equipment kick and scream, and without having to worry about patent violations, then sure. $1 for a DVD? Absolutely.

However, keep in mind that there are already plenty of people who will spend a lot more than that on a movie. Those people are feeding the MPAA and creating an environment where $1 sounds far too low.

Re:to further this topic

[hedwards]

There's a lot of albums I'd like to own, but can't buy without breaking my boycott of the RIAA. It's a shame because a lot of those albums are quite good, but rewarding an industry that rips its own artists off even as it attacks pirates as stealing from the artists is a non-starter.

Personally, I refuse to pay more than $6 for an album by a major label, for indie groups I'll go higher than that, but I rarely if ever hear an album or song by a major label which is worth even $10.

Mind you that's for an actual CD, I'm willing to pay even less than that if it's a download, and definitely not if the download isn't full CD quality.

Re:to further this topic

[Opportunist]

I'd love to see that in court.

"Defendent, why did you drive over the lawyer?"
"Simple economy. It costs less."

Re:to further this topic

[Opportunist]

Marketing failure indeed, but, at least for me, it's not the price tag. It's the problem with the medium and the cram-down-my-throat ads.

I have a server that is connected to my TV and is able to record and stream videos. Now, of course I would love to buy movies on DVD, copy them to my server and archive that DVD somewhere where I don't have to worry whether I find it every time I want to watch that movie.

No can do.

First of all, I cannot copy it. Thou shalt not copy this DVD. Second, before I get to watch my movie, I get to see half a dozen or so unskipable ads for other movies I don't give a dog's turd about. What's worse, imagine we're a few years in the future and those "out now" movies are available on DVD and I made the mistake to buy them only to find out that the only good scenes are already in the preview, every time I watch the movie I get to see the ad for this incredible piece of turd, this waste of time and money that nobody will give me back, and I might well get pissed enough to ruin my movie experience.

Nope. No sale. Not even for 6 bucks.

Re:to further this topic

[TheCouchPotatoFamine]

"But first let's kill all the lawyers" was a quote from an man of evil slant dreaming of his ability to remove his impediments to power. Just so no one walks away from this thinking that "But first let's kill all the lawyers" was stated as a GOOD idea.

Re:to further this topic

[Drakkenmensch]

"But first let's kill all the lawyers" was a quote from an man of evil slant dreaming of his ability to remove his impediments to power. Just so no one walks away from this thinking that "But first let's kill all the lawyers" was stated as a GOOD idea.

Trust the RIAA/MPAA to take a clearly evil plan that's rotten to the core and make this a viable and sensible survival strategy in a world where corporate entities can randomly pick individual citizens and ruin their lives based on hearsay and shoddy logic.

Re:to further this topic

[Osgeld]

when I was in high school media play (remember them?) was selling cd's for like 10 or 12 bucks and I bought a royal fuckton of them then after a couple years they went back to 20+ bucks and I have not bought a new CD in darn near 15 years

Re:to further this topic

[kramerd]

That is nearly the definition of a false dichotomy.

Your choices are not 1) download a movie or 2) murder a family while intoxicated. There must be something else that you can do.

Re:to further this topic

[Drakkenmensch]

That is nearly the definition of a false dichotomy.

Your choices are not 1) download a movie or 2) murder a family while intoxicated. There must be something else that you can do.

If that movie you downloaded was a romantic comedy from the last 5 years, then the latter is an inevitable consequence of the former.

Re:to further this topic

[k6mfw]

> If a music CD was $3, not $20, would you own your own copy?

Yes, if I can simply stop by a store for purchase on the way home from work. I have something tangible, I don't have deal with internet connectivity, input user account and password, etc. Just open the case, pop the CD in and enjoy the music. And there are some nice box sets with photos and reading material (it's real, you can hold it in your hands). However, there isn't much out there that is new that I'm interested in, I have plenty of CDs as it is. I guess I can't get too excited with new artists (on another subject there hasn't been a "New Sound" for some years, i.e. rap and hip hop been around for at least 25 years).

Regarding actual items, the old LP vinyls had distinction of large pictures that can be scanned for posters. i.e. Connie Francis and Julie London.

Re:to further this topic

[cbhacking]

For the record, there *is* a music subscription service analogous to (if not quite as nice as) Netflix. For $15/month (less for long-term subscriptions), you can get a Zune Pass which includes all-you-can-eat music downloads. They're DRMed, of course, but the bitrate is respectable. The problem is that they won't play on anything but a Microsoft platform.

You also get 10 credits a month for free MP3 downloads, 320kbps. These are DRM-free, play in anything, and are usable on some music where MS hasn't been able to negotiate for Zune Pass streaming/downloads. If you consider a tyical cost of $1/song, those 10 credits make up 2/3 the cost of the monthly subscription by themselves.

Re:to further this topic

[labnet]

You are already at 5 Insighful, but deserve a 6.
Inherently, people do NOT want to steal (otherwise shops would keep all their goods behind glass counters).
As you correctly state, it is a pricing problem.10c/song $2/movie would be the sweet spot for western countries.

Re:to further this topic

[MaskedSlacker]

Eh, I'd be inclined to call $1 low. Was the movie really worth less to me than a cup of coffee? Only if it was a really bad movie. Lunch at my favorite dive? Eh, maybe comparable. So I'd put a movie I actually enjoyed (that's the catch, most don't qualify) in the $5-$8 range. Anything over $10 and it doesn't pass the jerk-off test unless it's Casablanca or Seven Samurai.

Re:to further this topic

[gmhowell]

"But first let's kill all the lawyers" was a quote from an man of evil slant dreaming of his ability to remove his impediments to power. Just so no one walks away from this thinking that "But first let's kill all the lawyers" was stated as a GOOD idea.

Your analysis sucks. Stop carrying water for the carrion class on society.

http://www.spectacle.org/797/finkel.html

That Edison pirate

[Drakkenmensch]

We should outlaw wax cylinder voice phonographs! They will put all music-halls out of business and destroy music forever!

Re:That Edison pirate

[the_fat_kid]

ooh, we had better ALL get off of your lawn then.

If Intellectual property really is property

[Anonymous Coward]

Why cant there be a property tax on it?

Re:If Intellectual property really is property

[Anonymous Coward]

>Why cant there be a property tax on it?
Because that would make sense and the people in power have a severe lack of that.

More seriously, patents are easier to tax then copyright because of mandatory registration, copyright is a mess in this regard since it's automatic at the moment of creation with or without registration so the government would be completely unable to audit it to make sure you're paying for all of it [It also sucks because I don't want to pay tax for this Slashdot post just because I'm the "owner" of it]. This problem isn't insurmountable, it merely requires that the unregistered protection of copyright does not allow commercial use (even by you as creator), you only get commercial rights after registering which comes with the tax penalty attached.

Making it far less profitable to build and own patent war-chests is an excellent medium-to-long term economic stratagem [short term there will be a tonne of bitching about "destruction of wealth" with associated GDP and market volatility but the increase of industry profitability and new space for new competitors in the market will leave everything better than it started].

Re:If Intellectual property really is property

[Lumpy]

You sir are a genius.,...

Tax all IP at a low 8.9% if you OWN specific IP, then pay up. Use the RIAA's claims in court to set a price... It solves the budget problem, and makes the RIAA scream like a hot chick in a slasher movie.

Re:If Intellectual property really is property

[xnpu]

Genius indeed. I love it. Anonymous for president!

Re:If Intellectual property really is property

[Anonymous Coward]

It solves the budget problem, and makes the RIAA scream like a hot chick in a slasher movie.

Please refrain from ever again associating the RIAA with the concept of "hot chick".

Re:If Intellectual property really is property

[Anonymous Coward]

No need. Just reduce copyright protection to 25 years. After which it goes into the public domain. What is the point in keeping John Lennon and Elvis material locked away these days? They're not going to write any more material, which is what copyright is supposed to encourage, they both died many years ago, so their respective estates have had easy living for well over 30 years already!

Oh, I know why. Because the record companies buy laws that directly run against the public to serve their own ends. Maybe they should spend this money on alternatives rather then buying extensions on the status quo?

Re:If Intellectual property really is property

[Anonymous Coward]

Thats fucking brilliant! Someone call the IRS... They would LOVE this.

If the record industry really OWNS all of those cd's floating around the world. We just have a license..

And they claim their cd is worth x million dollars.... Sure seems like they should be paying tax on property they claim that they OWN.

And hell. we should all be able to charge the record industry a storage fee for all our cd's.

Re:If Intellectual property really is property

[tepples]

copyright is a mess in this regard since it's automatic at the moment of creation with or without registration

A government could always require an updated registration in order to be eligible for statutory damages (the US already does this), criminal penalties, anticircumvention, and an extended term.

it merely requires that the unregistered protection of copyright does not allow commercial use (even by you as creator)

Smells like prior restraint. How would that not violate freedom of speech?

Re:If Intellectual property really is property

[CRCulver]

No need. Just reduce copyright protection to 25 years.

Too late for that. For younger generations in wired countries, it's a normal thing to download a recent film or album without paying for it. At this point there's no going back.

Re:If Intellectual property really is property

[Rasperin]

Forget that, run them at income tax levels since the money they are bringing in is income. You want to hear them scream, wait till they recognize they are paying 36% tax on the latest coldplay or britney spears album. They would scream.

Re:If Intellectual property really is property

[Anonymous Coward]

Best comment I've seen in this thread.

- Progressive IP "property" tax for every patent to increase the burden of maintaining huge patent portfolios. The tax should increase based on the total number of patents owned. Allow the first 10 patents to be exempt, thus promoting the small inventor.

- Add an IP "transfer" tax that taxes the purchaser so that patent sales produce more revenue for the patent system and increase the burden of acquiring a large number of patents in the first place.

- Add a yearly-capped tax deduction for any company that places a patent into the public domain before the patent expires, pro-rated based on how many years prior to expiration.

- Add a law to allow patent lawsuits to be transferred to another jurisdiction at the request of the defendant if the initial filing jurisdiction is more than 100 miles from the headquarters of the plaintiff (basically giving Marshall, Texas the boot).

Re:If Intellectual property really is property

[Anonymous Coward]

Aaagh! Don't give them suggestions!

Re:If Intellectual property really is property

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't give them any ideas!

Re:Illegal downloaders must be punished.

[hedwards]

Nice try there. Copyright infringement isn't theft, never has been and hopefully never will be. You cannot steal a non-rivalrous good. Secondly, the reason why the *AA so loves the statutory damages is because it's impossible for them to prove that they've been harmed, consequently the conclusion that it's not a victimless crime is just as flawed as concluding that it is.

In their defense...

[GodfatherofSoul]

With widely available downloads, people do pirate A LOT of content. Yes, the industry should take an "embrace and control" approach before things get out of hand, but when you see your movies and music freely available online that makes it hard for some to see the big picture. I know lots of people who brag about having not bought a CD or DVD in YEARS because they can download what they want for free. And, it's so easy now even the technology-challenged can do it.

But, this is Slashdot so anyone trying to protect intellectual property is a fascist.

Re:In their defense...

[Haedrian]

The problem is that while this is true - companies are still making a ton of money. Its not like they've collapsed or something.

What the companies should do is adapt by giving 'bonuses' that other things don't. Cinemas are still popular around here, because you get to see things on a giant screen with surround sound, which is an experience most people don't get.

They should offer more incentive to get the music/film legally. Less stick, more carrot.

Re:In their defense...

[Travelsonic]

But, this is Slashdot so anyone trying to protect intellectual property is a fascist.

... Why did you have to end a pretty interesting post with this blatant baiting?

Re:In their defense...

[Jumperalex]

I brag that I haven't bought a CD or DVD in years because I pay for my content via things like Pandora and Netflix. My desire to posses media via media purchase or pirate ended around 2002/2003 and as such I haven't bought or downloaded anything since then. In many ways I'm the MAFIAA's worst nightmare because they simply can't dream of a world where their product (and to be clear their product is not music or movies, it is entertainment) is not a limited quantity over which they have dominant market control.

Buried in there is another concept: there was a tipping point at which either music became so lame, or I became too apathtic, that I didn't even think it was worth pirating no less purchasing. But I never was one of those "music is my life" type of people so there is every chance that I just don't "get it" anymore if I ever did [shrug]. As for movies, I used to copy rented VHS in college mostly because I had this obsession with building a collection. Those tapes have all be tossed and I stopped buying DVD's

Now what I do about TV shows that are either censored in the US (BBCA) or get skipped by my DVR because of schedule conflicts is a completely different story >;-) But I do my best to get anything I can via my DVD vice BT if for no other reason than it is just easier.

Re:In their defense...

[Opportunist]

The problem is that they're doing the exact opposite: The value for a customer is higher on cracked and copied content.

With legally bought content, you get a copy protection mechanism that keeps you from putting it on your server or otherwise shifting media, it might not work at all if you dared to buy it abroad, you might be forced to watch or otherwise "enjoy" content don't want to "enjoy" before you're allowed to use the content you paid for... all that and more does not exist when you copy it.

Usually, when you decide to buy a good instead of stealing it, you get a benefit. You have warranty, you have access to support and possible add-on deals you may participate in, you may have access to other benefits, nothing of this exists with content. Why not? Add some autograph card of the hypestar you sell on the CD and hype it so it's considered valuable and a "true fan" has to have it, and teens will buy instead of copy.

Usually I charge for good ideas. This one's free.

Re:In their defense...

[Jason Levine]

Yes, there are people who pirate even when the non-pirated version is available for a fair price and without DRM. In most cases, you can write those people off as customers. You could charge a penny for your product and they'd still pirate and say it was because it was too expensive. If you make your product available in a widely acceptable format (e.g. DRM-free MP3 in music's case) at a price widely accepted as reasonable (say, $0.99 per song) and easily accessed (don't design your music buying site with tons of flash ads and 500 clicks needed to buy one song), then people will stop pirating and will start buying. There's a happy medium between "I pirate all of my music/movies" and "Let's lock everything down and charge them more money at every opportunity."

The problem with the RIAA/MPAA is they don't think "how can we convince these pirates to purchase instead?" They think "how can we sue these pirates into oblivion and stop all technology either out now or in development which might, somehow, in any set of circumstances be used to aid pirates?"

Re:In their defense...

[Anonymous Coward]

when you see your movies and music freely available online that makes it hard for some to see the big picture.

So it's hard. That's an excuse for the MPAA. Doesn't make 'em any less of a problem.

It's also not a very good excuse, because they bought the DMCA and starting DRMing things. If we were talking about ignorant laymen here, then I could understand, but these people were the industry themselves, so they should have known (just like everyone else who actually thought about it) that DRM was a bad idea. Saying it's "hard" is like saying rocket science is "too hard" for rocket scientists to be expected to perform.

But even if we give them a free pass on the difficulty problem (which really wasn't all that difficult) there's still time. DMCA was passed in the 1990s, yet they still deploy their content with DRM and they still sometimes threaten people with lawsuits over anticircumvention devices. It's pretty clear now that DRM is a big problem for tech (as well as a problem for the media, since it encourages piracy), and all they have to do is backtrack on that. They don't.

So I don't think the "it's hard to see" is all that credible anymore. Hard or not, they see it's retarding tech and media sales, and either they don't care, or it's outweighed by other concerns (wanting to save face, stupidly fearing that it would "send a message", whatever). MPAA is still a threat to both tech and media, and an active one. They need to go.

Re:In their defense...

[Anonymous Coward]

I've donloaded everything at least thrice just to make them lose even more money!

Re:In their defense...

[Cajun Hell]

With widely available downloads, people do pirate A LOT of content.

Isn't that just all the more damning for MPAA? If fighting tech results in piracy, then maybe they should drop the anti-tech agenda and go back to a sales agenda. Anyone can guess what happens when you worry about pirates instead of worrying about customers: you get fewer customers.

That might be ok, if their new business model (have pirates be the revenue source, using the courts) were actually profitable, but it isn't. There is just no way that is result in them remaining the giants that they became back when they used to sell stuff. And the collateral damage from their anti-tech stance is making them lots of enemies.

The sooner they get back to the sales business model, the better for everyone (even themselves).

Re:In their defense...

[Anonymous Coward]

>Yes, the industry should take an "embrace and control" approach before things get out of hand...

The industry can sit on a rusty nail and spin.

The ARTISTS should be the ones making the money, and they're not.

Re:In their defense...

[wertigon]

The biggest problem isn't that the downloading will get out of hand.

Either MAFIAA do a major copyright reform right about, well, now...

Or the people will say "Nah SCREW IT" and start listening to freely licensed content (CC and the like). It has already begun. What are they going to do? Oh, right, could do this:

"I'm sorry sir, you can't release that music you created all by yourself for free."
"Excuse me?"
"Yeah, we own all music everywhere."
"... So you mean you're depriving me of my legal right, the copyright you yourselves defend so much?"
"That's right. Now bend over and take it like a man."
"But I'm a transexual!"
"Oh. Even better!"
*Rest of post has been censored to protect sensitive viewers*

Duhh.

[LWATCDR]

Frankly the content companies are a disaster of run away greed. As the cost of creation and distribution have gone down and the volume of consumption have increased they want to matain not just their margins but their price! It is like the world can now all want computers and they cost only a $100 to make and then try to sell them for $20,000.
A great example are cable box DVRs.
Take a look at the size of a ROKU box sometime. There is no reason that a cable box needs to be any bigger. There is also no need for every DVR to have a hard drive. If the content providers allowed it the cable companies could simply have a SAN and you used that for your DVR. You could even mark the shows so that you didn't duplicate the recordings for users. And of course the logical extension of that would be for the cable companies to keep every show for say the last two weeks or month and if you missed a show you could just watch it when you wanted to. No need to remember to record it.But that is just to consumer friendly.

Re:More important is the government’s collus

[hedwards]

And if the sheeple wouldn't reward politicians for spreading FUD and deliberately breaking the process we might someday get change. But as long as you've got people punishing the government for acting in their interest it's unrealistic to expect anything different. The President tried change, and was rewarded by the people by taking away his majority in the house and most of the seats necessary to get anything done in the Senate.

April 1st again?

[brit74]

What a retarded premise. So what: you can't get your music and movies for free? What "tech innovation" have they stopped? The super-duper holograph audio/video machine? Even the examples in the story are pathetically weak - the RIAA tried to eliminate the MP3 - guess what? The MP3 still exists, and even if it didn't, some audio-compression format would have to exist. And spotify already has a deal with the record companies in the US (http://news.cnet.com/8301-13506_3-20040498-17.html). Sorry, but the two items in the summary are just an unnatural mashup of two things that Slashdotters care about: tech innovation and hating the RIAA/MPAA. For some reason (probably their rage against the RIAA/MPAA and the RIAA/MPAA's attack on "getting free entertainment") the commenters can't see past the fact that the argument doesn't actually make sense. Is this April 1st again or something?

Re:April 1st again?

[slim]

They may be unable to halt things, but they're trying, and they're slowing things down and wasting everyone's time and money in the process.

The thing is, they're right about one thing: Internet music sharing *is* damaging their business model. What they're wrong about, is that anyone other than themselves should care.

Music is healthier than it's ever been [citation needed, admittedly]. But the RIAA's share of that business is shrinking. Good.

Re:April 1st again?

[Anonymous Coward]

So what: you can't get your music and movies for free?

No, you got it backwards: you can't get your movies for pay. RIAA/MPAA bought DMCA, and MPAA (and their like) make it so that all commercial video comes DRMed, which leads to lots of problems and generally doesn't work well.

What "tech innovation" have they stopped?

They killed the optical disc and the broadcast-receiving PVR.

It used to be possible to build a PVR and it would be able to capture cable TV. Now, unless you buy a lot of special (expensive) equipment to create and then capture the HDMI stream, you can't do it anymore except for over-the-air TV stations. So we're stuck with downloading the shows via bittorrent, rather than just plugging the cable into our PVRs and receiving it when its broadcast. On the bright side, we can cancel our cable TV subscriptions, but even so, I'd rather be able to watch things sooner and take advantage of the massively-better scaling of broadcast. It's a technological step backward.

Same for movies. Although it was against the law, you could read DVDs. With Blu Ray, it's much more of a pain in the ass. We used to be able to take advantage of the "don't underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon full of tapes" principle (buy movies on optical disk and then either immediately (retail) or a week later (online store) have them without any continuous effort), movies now have to be bittorrented, which takes who-knows-how-long (especially with older, less popular ones). It's a (subjective) technological step backward, IMHO. There's a point of view that might say this is a sideways move, but no matter how you look at it, there's one less option for technology to explore.

Their insistence on DRM has made bittorrent piracy the answer to video. And while that's workable, it's not ideal. Kill the MPAA and maybe we can have the better tech back, some day. And on top of that, the studios can start getting paid again.

ASCAP also is Threat They tryed to sue arcade g

[Anonymous Coward]

ASCAP also is Threat They tried to sue over arcade games like guitar hero now whats to stop them from suing over any think they may look like a jukebox or may be used as one even in a small way.

Not big content---big everything.

[Bobzibub]

Big Oil is why you fight wars.
Big Insurance is why you can't have the health care you want.
List goes on.

In the end, it is that Big has too much sway in the political system. They pay little tax yet have a disproportionate amount of influence.

Re:Not big content---big everything.

[TheReaperD]

It's comments like this that make you lament that the moderation system only goes up to '5'.

Re:Not big content---big everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

Big government.

Re:Not big content---big everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

Big Oil is why you fight wars.
Big Insurance is why you can't have the health care you want.
List goes on.

In the end, it is that Big has too much sway in the political system. They pay little tax yet have a disproportionate amount of influence.

Agreed.. But what can we do about it? Vote people in that will say "I can fix this!" and as soon they are in goes "Oh.. Money! Shiny!!!!! What problem with Big Industry?"

It's too late. The consumer has already lost and we will always be stepped on by the Big.

Re:Not big content---big everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

Then we'd end up with "Big Moderation", and everything would go to hell.

Re:Not big content---big everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

They pay little tax *because* they have a disproportionate amount of influence.

Re:Not big content---big everything.

[TheReaperD]

Touche

Re:Not big content---big everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

All of those factors only exist because of the ultimate 'big'... big government. If congress simply couldn't grant favors to certain businesses, there would be no lobbying, no bribes, no government-enforced monopolies.

Re:Not big content---big everything.

[Opportunist]

Because they have a disproportionate amount of influence, they pay little tax...

Re:Not big content---big everything.

[johnny0099]

Duh, it should goto 11.

Whoa, that was my first "goto" since 2007.

Re:Not big content---big everything.

[steelfood]

Health care is a bit more complicated, and it is why no one has thus far been able to provide meaningful reform.

Insurance is only one of many players involved. There are also the people who actually administer the care (doctors, hospitals), the companies who make the equipment (pharma, medical device manufacturers), and plain old people (unions, individuals). Getting them all to agree on something is a ridiculously difficult balancing act.

If you think insurance is the one thing that's stifling reform, you're not seeing the much, much bigger picture.

But your point still stands. Big companies with deep pockets is the problem. They don't even make up the biggest employers. Small to medium-sized businesses do all the real work. Big companies are pretty much cancerous tumors.

Re:Not big content---big everything.

[zeroshade]

Sure there would, they would just first grant themselves the ability to grant those favors in return for the money.....oh, wait...

Re:More important is the government’s collus

[InsurrctionConsltant]

I still basically "support" Obama –whatever that means, being from the UK. How anyone even slightly left of Bill O'Reilly could favour the alternative, the Cavalcade of Crazy currently coming from the Republican side is beyond me.

Still, I don't agree with your assessment that "The President tried change, and was rewarded by the people by taking away his majority in the house." I just didn't see the evidence of him "trying change" –the secret ACTA negotiations and white house events for the MPAA (incl. presence of FBI brass) etc. were all going on way before the Dem majority was lost.

I do understand your point that generally there is a great deal of FUD (must not mention Fox News... dammit) that results in many people being grossly misinformed and therefore punishing politicians trying to act in their interest (cough health care cough socialism cough).

Please if you know of significant ways Obama tried to make government less beholden to "Special Interests" (as he promised), give us some info.

"American public"

[unity100]

"to the American film producer and the American public as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone"

dont you like how lobbyist whoresons mesh in 'public' with NO context whatsoever to fool the ignorant masses.

Re:"American public"

[Anonymous Coward]

"to the American film producer and the American public as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone"

dont you like how lobbyist whoresons mesh in 'public' with NO context whatsoever to fool the ignorant masses.

wat

eeeeh

[unity100]

mp3 still exists, not because RIAA wasnt a threat and tried everything to stop it - it was because people just didnt let them do it and kept using that format regardless of what RIAA was trying to do.

dont jump in with 'content for free' bullshit everytime you think there is some room to make an ayn randist argument.

Re:eeeeh

[Anonymous Coward]

He didn't make an "ayn randist argument". Stop trying to counter strawmen with strawmen.

Re:eeeeh

[Anonymous Coward]

so what exactly is your position here then?

Re:Important issue

[TaoPhoenix]

I'm not sure - I think the threat of Felony Misclicks is just about the top of the list! Just grab your beverage of choice and work through the results. Especially see your sig - that will be Trolling 3.11 and just might be the flip from web 2.0 to Web 3.0.

Think of the Social Network sites and what they are made of. An UltraTurfer sends you a link - but since it's not the one and only copy by the original producer, it's Illegal streaming. Lights out!

Job Applications: "Have you ever been convicted of a felony?"

When that kicks in we'll be desperately wishing for the cozy days of dear ol Goatse.

Re:Illegal downloaders must be punished.

[someone247356]

It's only a crime because corrupt politicians were bought by even more corrupt corporations making it so.

It was once illegal to drink alcohol. That didn't make it _wrong_ just illegal.

Copying our culture is the same, while it may _currently_ be illegal, that doesn't make it wrong.

Re:Illegal downloaders must be punished.

[Anonymous Coward]

Stop using "piracy" as an excuse. No one is talking about piracy.

Re:More important is the government’s collus

[killmenow]

So long as we maintain a first past the post voting system in the US, gerrymandering remains rampant (not to mention other vote-rigging tactics), and the fuckup started by Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad equating corporations with persons and the subsequent boosting of corporate rights since then (culminating in the recent Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission decision) remain in effect, we're all screwed.

Which means for the foreseeable future, we're all screwed.

the media control freaks

[FudRucker]

yup, since technology like computer hardware & software & networking methods can take command & control & $$$ out of the hands of the MPAA/RIAA the existing media distributors (mpaa/riaa) are naturally going to fight against it,

just think if some website allowed just anybody to upload their own recordings to either sell or give away for free, and if enough big names in music started using it the RIAA could eventually be left out of the $$$, a little more difficult with movies since more initial investment is required to make a feature film or movie that can compete with Hollywood.

Re:More important is the government’s collus

[Howitzer86]

I thought Obama would change this, because his election campaign was funded by crowd-sourcing and he railed against the “Special interests” in public debates.

It’s the public’s interests vs. those of a business elite with a powerful lobby. Guess where the Administration’s placing its support. Change we can believe in, indeed.

I knew all along he wouldn't change a thing about that. After all, Biden is the one who wants you to go to Federal prison for downloading mp3s. Someone who supports the idea of copy-left and new media technologies doesn't pick Biden as a running mate. I knew it and I still voted for Obama like a dummy.

Now look at us, we've got a former senator running MPAA, and Obama hasn't done a damned thing about the level of control corporate lobbies have in the government. Couple that with ACTA, the third middle east war, the continuation of guantanamo bay, and the debt crisis... heck I don't even need to say it. Everyone is thinking it already.

So true

[Anonymous Coward]

Just look at headlines from this past week. Time Warner had to remove channels from it's ipad app because the tv studios started complaining. Music studios are upset and threatening lawsuits because Amazons new cloud storage for music.

These are two great products that people want. The RIAA and MPAA are intent on killing these products for no good reason. These products are not in any way going to keep the movie studios and record labels from making more money. The Time Warner app will only work for Time Warner subscribers, so they are already paying the studios. And for the Amazon music service, they are hoping to get more people to buy music through Amazon giving the music studios more money. Any music people upload directly to Amazons cloud is music they already owned so the music studios are losing nothing.

Re:More important is the government’s collus

[Lumpy]

His majority was a mess of idiots anyways... they had 2 YEARS and could not pass anything except a massively watered down Healthcare bill, to make the special interests happy. Real changes that would have made real improvements like a public option were taken away because of whiny selfish bitches. none of the Dems could pay attention long enough to vote together...

The best thing that can happen is a stalemate where nothing get's passed. both sides are full of idiots and if they cant get anything passed then they cant do any damage.

Re:More important is the government’s collus

[SuricouRaven]

McCain wouldn't have been any differerent. Copyright is one of the issues on which both parties agree, and because they agree neither even feel any need to mention it in campaigning.

Innovation??

[swalve]

How does MPAA/RIAA hinder innovation? The only thing it hinders is copying someone else's work for free. It does NOTHING to stop anyone from creating new content.

Re:Innovation??

[zeroshade]

As has already been mentioned, what bout Time Warner having to remove channels from their iPad app? Or Music Studios threatening lawsuits against Amazon's new cloud storage application? These are two great applications that consumers want that might get completely canned due to greed on the part of MPAA and RIAA.

Velenti was right...

[surmak]

...when he said the VCR was a much a threat to the movie industry as the Boston Strangler was to the woman home alone.

The Boston Strangler was an overblown threat which got a lot of press (as such crimes always do) and which whipped people into a panic. He ended up taking 13 lives, which while tragic, is pretty insignificant statistically. There are far greater threats bigger dangers than falling victim to a deranged killer.

Re:Velenti was right...

[airfoobar]

It's Valenti who was the Boston Strangler. He lobbied in all this shit while nobody was looking and now we have to clean up after him.

Ah..

[meowris]

Free culture.

The System is Corrupted

[Anonymous Coward]

Article I, Section 8, Clause 8 of the United States Constitution, known as the Copyright Clause, the Copyright and Patent Clause (or Patent and Copyright Clause), the Intellectual Property Clause and the Progress Clause, empowers the United States Congress:
“ To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries."

I really don't think the founders intended for this to go the way it has gone. Science was still a baby when this was written. I don't think they or anyone would consider today's music, movies, and television to be 'useful Arts'. Even so, the 'Authors' of such works should have control, not the distributors.

Honestly, I think we should just quit issuing patents altogether. Arts and sciences no longer need to be promoted so vigorously. However, if we were to keep our current system, I think it could be fixed by:
1. Decreasing the 'limited Times' of patents and copyrights to something like 10 years. No renewals.
2. Patents and copyrights should be non-transferable. 'Authors' can still profit by licensing their works to distributors.

Money is the evil

[Anonymous Coward]

I would say dependence on money is the problem. Intellectual work requires lots of time. But our society has made time become expensive. This time cost is represented by monthly expenses and bills. Free time means independence from monthly expenses, rent, energy, communications, transportation, food, etc. Ownership of infrastructure and less dependence on corporations and speculators seeking to profit from dependence on them, is to rescue one's control of time, and we can then do work with reduced economic and pressure. Finding any and all alternatives to economic dependence is key for everyone. Just look at the bills and find ways to reduce or eliminate them. Mainly that means building or purchasing infrastructure with other people, rather than monthly paying corporations for it.

Re:Illegal downloaders must be punished.

[spire3661]

Extending copyright well beyond its original scope is also wrong, its just legal. Enshrined in law doesnt mean it is right.

Limit copyright ...

[Anonymous Coward]

I like the idea of rolling back the term of a copyright. Let's limit a copyrighted work to 25 years, renewable to another 25 years for a sizable fee. Then renewable for a year at a time after that for a king's ransom. This will get more content into the public domain while reducing the national debt at Mickey's expense.

Berne Convention

[tepples]

Just reduce copyright protection to 25 years.

That would violate international treaties. The Berne Convention requires at least life plus 50 years for unregistered works. Leaving Berne would require leaving the World Trade Organization, which would impact numerous industries that affect voters far more directly.

Re:Berne Convention

[Myopic]

Yeah. Fuck those treaties. It's high time we violate them.

Possessions vs. real estate

[tepples]

Why cant there be a property tax on it?

For the same reason there's no property tax on the furniture and electronics in your home. A copyright and a patent are considered possessions, or personal property, not real estate or motor vehicles.

Re:Possessions vs. real estate

[imgod2u]

Why are they considered private property? It seems to me that they resemble real estate far more than they resemble furniture. They are publicly granted exclusive ownership of something that isn't inherently exclusive; similar to the land.

This is actually a brilliant idea. If you want to profit off of the exclusive rights granted to you by public laws, you should pay a tax to support said infrastructure (government) that enforces and protects said exclusive rights.

Re:Possessions vs. real estate

[zeroshade]

uhm, motor vehicles are considered possessions and personal property and are taxed anyways. In addition, real estate is considered personal property (why else do you think people can put up "no trespassing" signs on their property or otherwise restrict entry to their land? Something being a "private property" or "possession" does not invalidate the ability to tax it.

Re:Possessions vs. real estate

[tepples]

Authors and publishers would claim that the copyrights have already been taxed as an expenditure that can't be deducted from income, so why double tax it? And watch the major publishers withdraw the reelection campaign money from any representative or senator voting for such a tax.

What about just pricing product decently?

[Anonymous Coward]

When apple has an iTunes sale on a TV series I want to watch for $1/episode or less, I buy it. I am now spending way more than when it cost $3/episode.

When iTunes let me pay per song instead of per album, I started buying a lot more music per year than in the past.

Maybe it's just me, but I think pricing elasticity is a lot higher than the studios want to give consumers credit for. Give me a legal cheap way to watch shows and I buy them online as impulse purchases. I'm anything but an Apple fan, but they've given the industry a way of figuring out how to move forward in both TV and music and it's dumb to see how blind the **IA have been.

Music and Movies are just content

[brainzach]

You can argue that they record and movie industries limit are losing the innovation in terms of the quality of their work, but it is a stretch to say that it is a huge threat to technology innovation. Although the MPAA/RIAA have stepped out of bounds many times, they mostly put limits on is the content that they create, which is just entertainment.

What really limits technological innovation is all the frivolous software and hardware patents that companies build up. They are directly putting limits on ideas and technology that will be the foundation of further innovation.

UMC

[ThatsNotPudding]

...or have enough money left after taxes to take their kids on that vacation...

Versus the rapidly expanding LMC:

...or have enough money at all...

Re:More important is the government’s collus

[demonbug]

1. It’s great to see this coming (finally) from a well-respected business source. The Lessigs, Doctorows and even Nissons of this world are potentially dismissed as impractical ideologues; not so Harvard Business.

Promising, I suppose, but this "article" only appears in the "blog" section of the website - which is usually reserved for the personal opinions of various writers and contributors rather than the "official" opinion of the publication.

It is promising that someone on their staff thinks this way, but that doesn't necessarily mean it is the majority (or even strong minority) opinion of the Harvard Business Journal.

Assessing

[tepples]

Who would assess the taxable value of a copyright or patent for property tax purposes, apart from the already-taxed income derived from a copyright or patent?

Re:Assessing

[Anonymous Coward]

The owner would assess the value. Pass a law that says "you can give your IP any value you like for tax purposes but you are required to accept any offer in the following year to buy the IP at that price".

If you understand...

[maczealot]

this issue, then it is your DUTY to educate people as aggressively as possible. I know most of you already do, or think you do but I can't help but read the comments already made here today as being "the situation sucks, nobody understands, we are effed." Call me an optimist but I don't think the fight is over yet. Personally I am going to increasingly tailor my anti-IP-insanity rant to be along these lines:

The end-result of the current IP-law culture is a stifling of not only information flow and freedom of speech but to everyone's bottom line. Everything from stupid software patents to DMCA to the Mafiaa is stifling innovation and thus our economy. This reduces jobs, incomes and international competitiveness. The Baby Boomer generation in the U.S. made a conscious choice at some point to allow all manufacturing to die off and to replace this with the bastardized IP law business models. They did not understand the Internet, let alone the machines behind it, and so not only did they fail at the Dot Bomb point but long before that and continue to do so today. From the Democrats protecting "Hollywood" to the Republicans protecting "service providers" everyone knows the politicians are in the pockets.

So if you are talking to a Republican you explain that they should be for more information and copying freedom as it will take money out of their opponents pockets. If you are talking to a Democrat you explain that they should be for Net Neutrality because it takes money out of their opponents pocket. And if you are talking to a "regular joe" you explain that they should be for ALL of this because to do otherwise TAKES MONEY OUT OF THEIR POCKET. If we want an economy that can grow jobs and not just be a "new normal" then we must explain in DIRE & CERTAIN terms to Baby Boomers and the younger generation alike that innovation flees from IP law cultures like we have in place today. You can skip the lines about "making bits harder to copy is like making water less wet" because they don't understand or care about the impossibility of it if they can just ignore it. Instead, make sure you tie everything you say about stupid IP laws to their bottom line. Maybe a bit U.S. centric, but that is my perspective so it is all I've got.

Not Sexy Enough!

[DarthVain]

Probably because taxes typically get spent on things like health care and welfare, while lobbyist "donations" get spent on things like hookers and blow.

Maybe if we spent more taxpayers money on hookers and blow, we might get somewhere...

What were we talking about again?

buying advertisements

[KingAlanI]

buying advertisements comes off as double-dipping to many people, yes, but if something's an ad and worthwhile content in and of itself, why not?
might encourage adverts that are actually the opposite of the usual bothersome.

The new gold

[microbox]

Exactly. First the US economy was built on:

• * Natural resources -- e.g.: gold.
• * Manufacturing
• * IP

The common perception in bizzaro-corporate land is that IP will be the new gold that spurs the continued perpetual economic growth that society is predicated on. It is because of IP that we don't have to be worried about the gutting of the US manufacturing base, and the enormous amount of public and private debt.

Apparently.

you seem correct, sir...

[KingAlanI]

yes, it seems the D's don't vote/act as cohesively as the R's, weakening what majorities they do get and further weakening them when in the minority, a factor leaning against their supporters.
(Not sure the degree to which the Tea Party divides the R's in this matter)
A major issue in two-party systems...

Don't buy their product

[Anonymous Coward]

Anoyone who pays the Mafioso money, makes them stronger. The solution is not to buy their product, and to attack these vicious vermin, every time they pop up to tell their lies.

Star Trek Replicators, anyone?

[MattBD]

I suspect that if a Star Trek-style replicator or nanoforge of any kind were ever to be developed, rather than freeing humanity from scarcity and ushering in a new age of global prosperity where everything is freely available, it would be hobbled and hogtied by IP laws by powerful organisations with vested interests who claimed that "Home replicating is killing everything" to the extent that their true potential might never become a reality.

Re:first

[Joce640k]

Pity you didn't put actually your name on it so we can add you to the Slashdot annals of greatness.

International aspects

[tepples]

Pass a law that says "you can give your IP any value you like for tax purposes but you are required to accept any offer in the following year to buy the IP at that price".

That or a country's government can pay the ransom, take the work, and release it under an all-permissive license. At first glance, this appears fine under, say, the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution because the copyright owner has declared what it believes to be just compensation. But such a license would be limited to one country, and reusers of this work would have to firewall off visitors from other countries.

Since when was movie and music dist. important?

[Anonymous Coward]

How are copyright lawyers attacking distributors of pirated movies and music important? What increases in energy, knowledge of the universe, economic productivity or military prowess do media like, "Transformers 2", Britney Spears, or Justin Bieber provide? How is attacking the distribution of such pirated materials be? So what if DRM had made Americans companies uncompetitive in making MP3 players or personal media devices. So, there'd be no itunes.

What about PC gaming? You know, the segment of the gaming market that receives only secondary attention, because rampant piracy hurts most sales?

Wrong Title

[sparrowhead]

Actually it has to be turned around: Innovation is the biggest threat to RIAA/MPAA. Once the legal systems are being fast forwarded into this millennium they'll meet their well deserved death.

If protecting artists/producers is important

[Anonymous Coward]

If protecting artists / producers is important, important enough to have penalties worse than those of murder, shouldn't anyone who outsources jobs face similar consequences? What many businesses don't seem to realize is that at the rate we're going, soon no one will be able to afford what they want to sell.

You're exactly wrong

[jonaskoelker]

Sorry about the offensive title, but I think it's exactly the other way around

Voter apathy is [a symptom of] a legislative system that decentralizes decision making so much that elected officials are accountable only to their local constituencies and large campaign contributors and a legal system that is focused on the minutiae of rules and processes and that is all too content to lose sight of the bigger picture.

That's centralization. Power is centralized in the hands of fairly few campaign contributors.

Power is centralized in a national parliament and executive run in a way where each member is judged by his/her electors on the member's ability to do good for the few electors rather than the larger whole. If politicians want to stay in power, and only do so if they provide special favors for their voters, expect special favors.

I'm no legal expert, but I believe that just rules and predictable enforcement are valuable. And I like jury nullification, where the jury doesn't say "not guilty, he didn't do that" but rather "not guilty, the law is morally wrong".

For the legislative and executive, Fred Foldvary suggests multi-level federalism: from neighbourhood to city to county or region to state to interstate to nation to international to world, sovereign individuals should get together and solve larger social tasks in the smallest suitable group, deferring power upward only when necessary, and always retaining the right of lower levels to secede and join higher levels as they see fit (subject to payment for and/or loss of services, of course). That is: the solution to bad governance is more competition among those who govern, and rights of individuals to choose whom to be governed by.

Concentrated benefits, dispersed costs

[jonaskoelker]

These corporations are not a threat to tech innovation: Voter apathy is the threat.

I think it's the combination of voter apathy and industry benefit from retardation of progress.

That is, the benefits (of retarded progress) are concentrated in a few hands (the MPAA, RIAA, BSA perhaps, etc.), while the costs are dispersed among a large set of people (the voters and customer base).

This is the classic situation of public choice theory: the concentrated party has low transaction costs to lobbying their side, while the dispersed side has very high transaction costs to lobby their side.

In other words, it's perfectly sane and rational for the unwashed masses to not spend any effort to learn and demand what is good for them: they would have to give up things they value more (family evening, friday night bbq with the buddies, ...).

"The Master Switch", Tim Wu

[Anonymous Coward]

That is all.

Under the Crushing Boot

[Anonymous Coward]

The RIAA will not be satisfied until they develop immediate lethal electrocution as their ultimate countermeasure. Then they'll sue the estate of the deceased.

Re

[Anonymous Coward]

So true these groups are disgusting they went after my mother for downloading the hurt locker trying to use an ip from her unsecured wireless router which was in a huge apartment building. Not to mention she only had a work computer which had no torrent software. These suits should be illegal