Once audio, video or print is turned into little ones and zeroes, it becomes impossible to control. You can wrap those ones and zeroes with some DRM pixie dust, but there's always some smarty-pants who can un-DRM them again. There are those still in denial about this, like the RIAA and MPAA executives, but history has proven this out in the last decade or so. Increasingly draconian laws have a short-term effect, but only postpone the inevitable shift to a different model.
Personally, when I get music or video, there are people I want to see paid for my privilege of enjoying the work. The writers, composers, musical artists and actors are at the top of the list, and also the professionals who capture and refine the work. Without them, there wouldn't be content to enjoy, so I want them to be paid. They need to be able to make a living.
Currently, though, a HUGE percentage of the money lines the pockets of people who have little part in the creative process. I don't care to pay them. They are not doing me any good. In fact, they often do me harm, screening thoughtful or poignant content out of the mix because it will somehow make them less money.
So, two problems - (1) we can't effectively control content in exchange for license fees in the digital world, and (2) we want to pay the right people and jettison the baggage. I propose that to solve these problems, a new economics of entertainment content must emerge.
Better, more informed and creative brains than my own need to noodle on this, and we need to quit wasting time arguing about the current, doomed paradigm of entertainment commerce. Of course, thoughts like these will threaten the barons of the entertainment industry - they are slow to move, and have no vested interest in seeing things change. But the status quo can't last forever, and is already on it's last legs.
Slashdot Mirror
it works gr
...will begin reading their incoming e-mail.
Wait, that's what we do...
OK. Forget I said that.
Once audio, video or print is turned into little ones and zeroes, it becomes impossible to control. You can wrap those ones and zeroes with some DRM pixie dust, but there's always some smarty-pants who can un-DRM them again. There are those still in denial about this, like the RIAA and MPAA executives, but history has proven this out in the last decade or so. Increasingly draconian laws have a short-term effect, but only postpone the inevitable shift to a different model.
Personally, when I get music or video, there are people I want to see paid for my privilege of enjoying the work. The writers, composers, musical artists and actors are at the top of the list, and also the professionals who capture and refine the work. Without them, there wouldn't be content to enjoy, so I want them to be paid. They need to be able to make a living.
Currently, though, a HUGE percentage of the money lines the pockets of people who have little part in the creative process. I don't care to pay them. They are not doing me any good. In fact, they often do me harm, screening thoughtful or poignant content out of the mix because it will somehow make them less money.
So, two problems - (1) we can't effectively control content in exchange for license fees in the digital world, and (2) we want to pay the right people and jettison the baggage. I propose that to solve these problems, a new economics of entertainment content must emerge.
Better, more informed and creative brains than my own need to noodle on this, and we need to quit wasting time arguing about the current, doomed paradigm of entertainment commerce. Of course, thoughts like these will threaten the barons of the entertainment industry - they are slow to move, and have no vested interest in seeing things change. But the status quo can't last forever, and is already on it's last legs.