It’s time to float a few “go forward” ideas on protecting copyright in the digital age, arising from the two forums Labour has organised in the last couple of months on the issue and my own views. So here goes, and I welcome (constructive) feedback.
The genie is out of the bottle on internet sharing of files and behaviours. It’s estimated that between 60-80% of all internet traffic involves peer to peer sharing of files, the vast bulk of which is unauthorised use of copyrighted music and movies.
Another useful stat (from a UK report called Copycats, Digital Consumers in the Online Age) is that 70% of 15-24 year olds do not feel guilt about downloading music for free on the internet.
And there’s a pretty widespread view among many internet users that there is no “victim” of digital copyright infringement. That nobody suffers!
A conclusion of the Copycats report (May 2009) is that many digital consumers take for granted – indeed expect – free content of all kinds from the Internet to copy. We have a nascent, or perhaps established, copycat culture.
How have kids grown up with these attitudes? And let’s be clear. It’s not just kids. Many people of different ages have these attitudes too. Are we going to change them? Should we? Should we focus on blocking access to information and material? Or should we be providing access to content in ways where revenue can be gathered more easily and people understand why.
The policy challenge is to take responsibility for this issue. And consider how to approach it in a forward thinking way, to protect the rights and incomes of those who create content rather than trying to just contain access or punish those who illegally access that content. Which is why the National Government’s rewrite of section 92A is short-sighted and doesn’t take account of the wider issues. So to the ideas…
- Education about copyright is very important. Government has an important role to play and copyright education should become a part of the school curriculum and be integrated right through our education system. A public education campaign is also needed for people to understand that protecting the rights of people who create content is important.
- We should enable people to access the information/material they seek. And consider introducing a licensing fee attached to internet service provider (ISP) connections. This fee would then be collected and distributed by an external agency amongst copyright holders. In order to work, it would need the buy in of all ISPs and rights holders. It would likely be focussed on New Zealand copyright content first.
- Establishment of an independent rights agency to distribute fees and rule on disputes. We still need an enforcement regime and a rights agency could also have the power to investigate and adjudicate on copyright disputes and alleged infringements aka the Section 92A model. However, I am of the view that internet disconnection is not a viable option. It simply won’t work and will drive hard core copyright infringers more underground. Financial penalties are more likely to work.
- A commitment to protect NZ content first. It’s our heritage, and the people who create NZ content must be able to make a living from their work and have that work valued.
From the discussions I’ve had to date, there is a growing consensus around these ideas. And some of them are still just ideas. They need more work. But if you’re going to spend taxpayer dollars isn’t it be better to spend them enabling access to content and distributing funds to the people who created it rather than just punishing infringements, discouraging access and encouraging more black market activity. I don’t know about you but that seems like common sense and thinking ahead.
What do you think?
# Education about copyright is very important. Government has an important role to play and copyright education should become a part of the school curriculum and be integrated right through our education system. A public education campaign is also needed for people to understand that protecting the rights of people who create content is important.
In other words, waste taxpayers money on more education campaigns. Why? The entertainment industry already provides a great education. On most DVDs you are bound to get the video playing, if you wouldn’t steal a car etc. why would you steal online. Not to mention, the government already does far too much campaigns on every subject one can imagine. Eventually there is over-exposure to the point nobody will listen. As for making copyright part of the education system. No wonder kids can’t read or spell when they have so much other crap they have to learn. This would put huge pressure on teachers and the expense I imagine would be too much.
We should enable people to access the information/material they seek. And consider introducing a licensing fee attached to internet service provider (ISP) connections. This fee would then be collected and distributed by an external agency amongst copyright holders. In order to work, it would need the buy in of all ISPs and rights holders. It would likely be focussed on New Zealand copyright content first.
We already have high broadband/internet charges and you want us the taxpayers to pay a licensing fee? We got rid of the TV licensing fee years ago. This is mad-policy and brings us back to the eighties. The idea is maddening.
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Your third point makes sense but your fourth point doesn’t actually provide any problem-solving to it. Sorry but if this is the consensus out there. Then we are in troubled times.
The whole copyright issue is maddening. I believe artists should get returns on their work but, not that should be guaranteed by legal privilege, by the coercive, aggressive power of the state. I also believe that no man should pay to listen to see or read an idea created by his fellow man. It’s a perversity that one should pay for ideas. This is one of those issues where people who strangely consider themselves left wing have a rather propertarian attitude. There are two sides to the argument and here’s some of the other side for people who have an open mind (I hardly expect that from someone who wants a licensing fee on ISPs – an absurd idea). AGAINST
INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY
Intellectual “Property” Versus Real Property
“INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY”:
A LIBERTARIAN CRITIQUE
2. We should enable people to access the information/material they seek. And consider introducing a licensing fee attached to internet service provider (ISP) connections. This fee would then be collected and distributed by an external agency amongst copyright holders. In order to work, it would need the buy in of all ISPs and rights holders. It would likely be focussed on New Zealand copyright content first.
Your on the money with this one Clare. Having personally sat through a few briefings on such proposals, i think they (ISP levies being paid to creatives) are the future.
What is the point of trying to reign in what is already, as you said, upwards of 70% of internet traffic? Peer-2-peer file sharing is brutally efficient method of information exchange so let’s try and work with it not around it.
There was a fella who came and presented his business model to Ministers last year, he explained that for a mere few dollars each month ISPs could generate enough revenue to offset the losses that the creative industries have been feeling from internet related copyright infringement in recent times.
The only reason Government is sticking its nose into the internet is to aid business profit. Why not, just for once, back off and get on with government in the actual world?
There are already enough laws to provide adequate protection in Aotearoa. If corporates are losing money because people are stealing copyright material, charge the culprits with theft; if there are insufficient global agreements for that then sort it out, otherwise diddums for business. Artists will have to consider whether they are genuine artists or businesses exploiting art to facilitate profit and adjust their activities accordingly.
The internet is the one area where I believe the government should leave completely alone. Let the internet run free and allow the law of “self-organised criticality” to rule.
Labour has already wasted millions unsuccessfully trying to stop child pornography (an inexcuable and sickening crime against the inocent and most vulnerable in society) and has, instead, set up the aparatus for state censorship.
Enough already.
[...] Clare Curran floats four copyright ideas: Education about copyright is very important. Government has an important role to play and copyright education should become a part of the school curriculum and be integrated right through our education system. A public education campaign is also needed for people to understand that protecting the rights of people who create content is important. [...]
I have to agree that education on copyright is already abundant and the government has no need to advocate it.
I’m also surprised that you’ve looked into that report but haven’t come away with the conclusion that the prevalence of file sharing on the internet has to do with a rebellion against the idea of digital gatekeeping- people want to be able to try what they buy, and want to be able to really own their music in a way that the restrictions of retail don’t allow. Some of that feeds into filesharing.
There’s also overlap with the open-source and creative commons community, in that people have turned on to the idea that sharing and collaborative culture enriches society, and allows everyone to build bigger, better, and richer digital work. This taste of free collaboration gets some people into a mindset that they should just be able to get what they want without paying directly.
I think there are very real problems with the way intellectual property is treated as analogous to real property by digital industries. There’s a real need for a more flexible and freer approach that notes the fact that the only “cost” to copying in the digital world is the cost of media and bandwidth. You don’t lose inventory when someone pirates a song or a movie*- you may not even be losing profits, because they may never have listened to or watched your product in the first place.
While I disagree with Quoth that paying for ideas is always perverse, I do think that trying to prevent “leakage” of those ideas to copying or sharing or spoiling or so on is simply untenable and unnatural.
I think a small indemnity fee paid by ISPs in return for decriminalisation of file sharing is probably a very good approach, so long as the fee is small enough that it does not impede internet takeup. The indemnity fee could be distributed based on retail sales of music and movies, which should be a fair way to compensate both publishers and artists, be they huge or small, big corporates or independents. I imagine in the medium-term such a fee would need to be phased out, but it’s a fair way to allow business models to transition to the fact that they’re in a new century and that they need to tailor their strategies to the digital age.
I’d also like to see companies that rely on “licencing” us listening or viewing rights as a legal fiction to be obliged to replace damaged media, make their licence terms available in full publicly without a purchase, (like say, through their websites) and to be obliged to allow and facilitate full transferal of rights and resale. (software is especially bad about this last one, often deliberately trying to make it impossible to resell through copy protection schemes)
I’d also like to see much stronger protections for people who use copyrighted material for parody or not-for-profit derivative works such as software modifications or extensions, fan fiction and fan art, remixes, etc… We should not be in a situation where people get legal threats for making jokes using the little orange election person, for instance.
*Or an article, or a piece of software, or art, or a photograph, etc.. etc… All of those media need to be included in any liberalisation of copyright.
“A public education campaign is also needed for people to understand that protecting the rights of people who create content is important.”
The reason you’re struggling with this issue is encapsulated within that statement. We now live post the music wars – where arguably the only reason progress ever happened was because of widespread infringement because of the refusal of Big Content to make their stuff available in a sensible way legitimately.
Now that Apple have bashed the music industry over the head sufficiently we are finally making *some* progress, to the point where it is finally easier for me (not cheaper, *easier*) to buy music than it is to get it for free, we can see that if it hadn’t been for the willingness of users to infringe, we’d still be carrying around CDs and putting them in discman.
The failure to understand the importance of protecting the rights of Big Content was not caused by the government. It was caused by the industry. Almost every person who now feels no guilt about wholesale copyright infringement feels that way because they had no sane alternative when originally faced with the moral dilemma. Even today, we still face the unrelenting stupidity of DVD zoning, the inability to legally get TV shows at release etc. They’ve got the pistol firmly pointed at their foot and they’re pulling the trigger just as fast as they can.
Government cannot solve this. There is nothing you can do which will resolve the fundamental breakdown between citizens who wish to enjoy media, and media organisations who wish to prevent them from doing so until the time of maximum profit. Your best action is to simply butt out and leave things alone until the market finally shapes up and finishes rewarding those organisations who recognise the new world order. It is not as if it is impossible to support the creation of content on the net – news organisations, for the most part, have made the transition reasonably well. Music is getting there, only the visual media, movies and TV, are still really fighting the battle because they just love their zoning restrictions and their licensing to tv stations months or years after release.
Wait until all that has settled and instant, global licensing becomes the norm. Wait until you can get the latest episode of your favorite tv shows at the US release date. *Then* look around and see what is still broken and figure out if it needs to be fixed. At the moment, there is nothing you can do which will positively influence the outcome, all you will do is stretch out the inevitable death of those who refuse the recognise the fundamental change in the way that information is consumed.
It’s refreshing to see commentary on this issue which doesn’t presuppose that copyright infringement is unethical. Speaking as a ‘digital native’ and someone who has grown up with the internet, the strictures imposed by our current copyright regime seem alien and almost irrelevant. It’s impossible to follow the law, so why bother trying?
I like the idea of a small ISP-level tax: which seems akin to radio licensing fees. While I’m invested in providing mechanisms for content creators to make money (I’m an extremely amateur DJ and producer), I feel that an essential starting point is the freedom to copy, remix, mash and redistribute content. Legally. The current copyright structures sacrifice these freedoms in (theoretically) the name of the artists, but I feel that the overall cost to society is huge and the benefit to artists slight.
For this tax to work it would have to be paired with explicit legalisation of non-profit filesharing. Peer to peer distribution of media would become the new norm*, and tax levies could be distributed fairly amongst artists by monitoring the popularity of various releases on public trackers.
* Legal norm. It’s the actual norm already
The idea of yet more “Education” programs to teach children the one true message on copyright worries me.
I’ve seen some of the NZFACT contributed material used in NZ schools – it teaches that entertainment media is something that you buy from big giant corporates.
Completely missing is that copyright is held by everyone – anytime you create anything. All those paintings, essays, assignments the students create themselves are copyrightto themselves. You don’t need to be a giant corporate to expect copyrights. Please can we teach children that it’s not just Sony and their buddies who enjoy such rights.
They also teach that everything on the internet cannot be copied – completely missing the free culture movement. Growing everyday is the giant resivoir of creative commons licenced material. Checkout our flickr.com as a great example.
Also missing is the benefit to society of the public domain. You can release your own works in the the public domain, and it’s good for society when you do. Likewise, copyrights expire, and they expire for good reasons. They once expired in a decade or two – now days they’re an insane 50 years past artist death.
Such education would need to be balanced with all the many aspects of copying rights that a syllabus written by RIANZ would never provide.
Bingo. Clare’s been listening to too many business/corporate people again.
Arg, I seem to have missed out a /blockquote. Sorry Ari and Brenda
“It” above is Allot Communications, a company that makes money out of network management tools, like the ones that filter out P2P traffic. The claim that P2P comprises the vast majority of Internet traffic isn’t sourced or substantiated in the Allot sales document, nor is the statement that most of it is “unauthorised use of copyrighted music and movies.”
Furthermore, the Allot sales document was published in 2007.
Another network traffic management vendor reckons P2P traffic accounts for 44% of the total:
http://www.multichannel.com/article/83907-Study_44_Of_Internet_Traffic_Is_Peer_to_Peer.php
Other estimates I’ve seen put it between 50 to 90 per cent (!).
In other words, noone really knows, and seems to pull expedient figures out of their hats to suit their causes.
@Richard Clark – agree generally with what you say but I don’t think we should just wash our hands completely of the issue and allow vested interests to work out who should have what right to clip the creative ticket – that way lies Google books and Kindle etc.
I don’t think newspapers would share your view that they are working it out – hence recent calls here, in US and Europe for copyright to protect traditional news against evil bloggers.
Agree entirely with Brenda – in fact I just wrote something similar over at NetSafe http://bit.ly/eSUjI (not my site and only linking as I don’t have time to recast here sorry).
Interestingly, the Copyright Tribunal, now thrust into prominence under MED’s s92A proposal is the body that resolves disputes around collective licensing schemes, which is effectively what an ISP levied licence fee could look like. So, the idea of overarching licence systems to validate use of copyright material which would otherwise be an infringement, and the distribution of revenue derived from such systems, is not new. APRA is one such
Why all this expense and effort to prop up entire industries built on failed and no-longer-relevant business models? Sheesh.
Even today, we still face the unrelenting stupidity of DVD zoning
Happily the one TPM our law does let you circumvent!
the inability to legally get TV shows at release etc.
It’s worth noting that downloading has driven broadcasters to screen flagship series much closer to their original screen date. The champs are C4, who, once downloading had built a brand for The Daily Show locally, moved to take it directly off the satellite and screen it so soon that there was no point in downloading it.
It’s harder for other content. So much documentary programming essentially isn’t available to NZ broadcasters, and just turns up three years late at midnight on pay TV. That’s a systemic problem.
Completely missing is that copyright is held by everyone – anytime you create anything. All those paintings, essays, assignments the students create themselves are copyrightto themselves. You don’t need to be a giant corporate to expect copyrights. Please can we teach children that it’s not just Sony and their buddies who enjoy such rights.
Amen.
Your on the money with this one Clare. Having personally sat through a few briefings on such proposals, i think they (ISP levies being paid to creatives) are the future.
I know for a fact that some people on the music copyright side of the argument would also welcome the idea. Which is not to say it would be easy to implement, or to sell.
It’s great that we’re actually discussing this. It’s not just the normal answer that we’ve all come to expect from government i.e. seek and punish. Instead, we’re actually discussing alternatives. Brilliant.
During the Auckland Copyright Forum someone from the publishing industry emphasised just how much copyright infringement is hurting that industry. If you’ve read something downloaded, you can’t attend concerts… That extra revenue stream just doesn’t exist.
While I think that education is important, I don’t think the classroom is the right place for it. The education I feel should come in the form of legal websites making the fact that the content that they’re providing is legal. Perhaps a logo that is recognisable much along the same lines of the “Kiwi Made” logo. A simple “you’re doing the right thing” would probably see the majority of the population doing the right thing. Positive reinforcement rather than negative. (Who would’ve thought?)
There are a whole lot of other guidelines to observe here. A friend of mine went and paid for a song online and downloaded it. He then tried to put it on his MP3 player. No cigar. He then paid for it again figuring that perhaps he needed to pay for each copy. Again, no cigar. Eventually he went looking for a DRM free version which wasn’t legal. When things are restricted because they’re legal and you get less rights due to them being legal, something is seriously broken.
Another big issue, the figures can always be skewed. So if 60-80% of the internet’s traffic is peer to peer sharing, and we can assume that because not all of that traffic is illegal (Linux distributions, content released under an open license such as Project Orange etc.) and then factor in the fact that copyright infringers (at least those on a large scale) only probably make up around 10-20% of New Zealand internet users out there (look at how many people are on low traffic internet plans), then the problem isn’t as wide spread as the figures would suggest. 10-20% doing 90% of the copyright infringement and then that being at a lower scale than probably reported by the various entertainment industries (no information is ever given on how their figures have been derived).
So, if tax payers money is to spent on the issue, then we need to be clear on how much of the population we’re actually looking at. In 2006 it was estimated, out of a population of around 4.2 million, about 74.9% of the population had the internet (source: http://www.internetworldstats.com/sp/nz.htm). so if we assume that because we’re fairly close to saturation levels, the % has grown by 15% at the most, then 90% of the population (roughly) have internet access. Assume that the population hasn’t grown terribly much, 4.4 million as a guess? That’d give us 3.96 million internet users, which, if we taken the figure of around 20% of all NZ internet users being perpetual copyright infringers, we arrive at a figure of 792,000 users. Of those 792,000. That accounts for around 18% of the total population. If we factor in the fact that probably around 80% (I’m trying to be fairly conservative with these figures) would use legal content if that content was available, then if we have business models in place to be able to provide the information asked for, then you’re only looking at 39,600 who are perpetual copyright infringers – which only accounts for 0.9% of the total population of New Zealand.
Is it fair for everyone to pay an additional fee because there are copyright infringers out there? Probably not. Do we need time for the content holders to get their act together? Definitely. If the government was able to come up with guidelines for content holders to be able to use to create a business model that’s relevant to these times, all the better. Again – education. And again – not in the classroom.
Regards,
Nevyn.
Very unhappy with the idea of a levy/tax on internet access.
We’ve seen such levies in many countries previously. Every purchase of a blank casette tape or blank CD sends money off to the incumbent music giants. Regardless of whether they earned it.
I’ve seen what they’ve used the funds for – for more lobbying, fake studies, and to advertise their made up statistics in a crusade to stop whatever media distribution mechanism comes next. The incumbents use the money to re-enforce the status quo.
How could you allocate funds? The music and movie industry are lobbying the loudest, but there’s also book authors, newspaper journalists, professional photographers, scientific researchers..
Actually it’s hard to think of a profession that doesn’t produce items that are under copyright, and certainly being traded on the internet – the internet is built for information sharing.
Right. I’m not so fussed as I really see a levy as something to tide over the whiners in Big Publishing and give them a chance to retool to meet a friendlier and more sensible regime. Not that such a small bone will make them stop whining- but I think it shows appropriate care and fairness to keep in mind that they’re still slowing down their digital transitions, and they deserve another chance at it if we change the law.
I’d actually like to see these phased out as internet indemnity fees are introduced, as people only really infringe copyrights using CD-Rs now by burning downloaded MP3s to disc, and taxing CD-Rs and DVD-Rs for that is a double-whammy.
Corporate welfare shouldn’t be indefinite.
And corporate welfare it is. Does anyone seriously think that small rights holders will be able to duke it out in the copyright tribunal against large organizations? We shouldn’t assume it is only Joe and Jolene Filesharer who potentially infringe on copyright.
Don’t tax payer dollars already go to subsidizing the arts? I am very happy for this to continue but if you are going to tax the internet (which everyone uses anyhow) be aware that 1. this is a flat and therefore unfair tax and 2. other tax subsidies for the arts should be removed.
Well this is the first time I’ve managed to sit down at my computer tonight and am pleased to see the breadth of commentary on these issues.
Sheesh (to quote SHG) there seems to be this attitude about education… like it’s a bad thing. Where on earth did that come from? Has education become PC or something? Perhaps I should find another word. Like teaching kids that stealing isn’t a good thing, making sure that this message is incorporated through their lives into the various environments they find themselves in, whether it’s “education” work or entertainment and that this translates into whatever they do on the internet.
Just sticking a message at the beginning of a DVD and calling that an education campaign seems to me to be a bit token. The test is in perception and behaviour. Just like attitudes to wearing sunscreen, smoking cigarettes, saving energy by turning off the lights etc… (oh dear I can feel the responses coming). If you want to change behaviour, you need to change attitudes. Um, how do you do that?
More later…
How about leading by example? If you want to show that protecting the rights of people who create content is important, then make sure any legislation you write takes their views into account.
Parliament has a very poor record here. Publishers have been listened to while artists have been ignored. Publishers do NOT speak for artists.
Please seek out artists and get their views. A good place to start is http://creativefreedom.org.nz/
Sheesh (to quote SHG) there seems to be this attitude about education… like it’s a bad thing. Where on earth did that come from? Has education become PC or something? Perhaps I should find another word. Like teaching kids that stealing isn’t a good thing, making sure that this message is incorporated through their lives into the various environments they find themselves in, whether it’s “education” work or entertainment and that this translates into whatever they do on the internet.
Clare, re-read what Brenda wrote. An “education” message scripted by major copyright owners would be precisely the wrong thing. Talking to young people about what copyright is and why we have it, what rights they have in what *they* create, and discussing its limits would be the right thing.
Education itself is a sector in which “stealing is bad, m’kay?” simply isn’t an appropriate or accurate message. The Copyright Act offers specific exemptions for activities that would be “stealing” in another context precisely because there is a public good in it. Copyright law does not exist to serve the interests of owners, but to serve the greatest public good.
For me, the offensive thing about the RIANZ submission on the copyright amendment bill was its contempt for the public good. Among other things, it wanted to prevent libraries and archives from digitising works *for archiving purposes*, and to prevent institutions like the Film Archive from providing on-site research access to films and videos. It was, frankly, hostile. You cannot simply take the big owners’ messaging and recycle it into an “education” campaign.
Don has a good angle there – a levy that feeds money into the New Zealand arts community would be welcomed by many.
A levy that feeds directly into the pockets of giant multi-national corporates wouldn’t.
There is an article: This Is Wrong: ‘Without The Content Industries, The Internet Would Be Empty’
It certainly is. It starts with:
Which is basically Clare’s position – let’s “fix” something that’s not broken. Then it goes on:
Sorry, Clare it seems a bit far fetched (based on my own research this year)that the net is used up to 80% of the time for music and video p2p file sharing. Maybe only thats 80% of the bandwidth. But is all that illegal downloading that bumps up the numbers. Maybe that alleged downloading is people like myself actually watching legitimate TV transmissions or listening to overseas radio broadcasts where music is played. I also don’t see the bold or the stupid (if into illegal downloading and filesharing) rushing to tick a yes box admitting that they are a pirate.
Going back to the education issue , maybe you should suggest to the Prime-Ministers office they and Mr Key needs to learn a little more about copyright issues. While I believe they were right to revisit the Section 92A clause so hastily put into legislation last year, they certainly did not do the Hillary family any favours by brokering a rights deal for just twenty years.
My only other concern is I am going to pay my ISP a royalty fee for downloading how am I going to get a refund when I do not have any interest in New Zealand music except what I hear on FM radio.?
I think the content producing industries are going to have to go peacefully; that means an honour/grace system. “Scrobbling” solutions like last.fm could be part of the solution.
ie your media players should track what you listen to, and collect which tracks/artists you listen to most. This information can let you know who gets your dollar for listening to music this month – perhaps no-one if you are just re-listening to old music you’ve already paid for. This could be capped monthly, and divided proportionally among the artists you’ve listened to by how much you listened to them. Once an artist has been fully paid for a track/album you no longer have to pay them for listening to that track/album.
This is difficult to calculate, except for new digital devices or media players which could conform to this honour system. So long as your digital library is properly tagged, information about the labels which take money for the artists should be available. Private agents could be nominated to accept payments for groups of labels, or labels could co-operate to simplify payments – without need for a centrally run authority.
[...] “It’s time to float a few ‘go forward’ ideas on protecting copyright in the digital age,” she writes in a blog post. [...]
On suggestion #2:
“We should enable people to access the information/material they seek. And consider introducing a licensing fee attached to internet service provider (ISP) connections.”
I agree on the first point in this quote that people should have access to the internet… and some would consider it a disadvantage if someone did not have access to this resource.
The proposed solution of introducing a licensing fee for ISP connections would no doubt be passed on to the consumer. I’m not sure how much this levy cost but if the cost contributes toward deterring those on a lower income from obtaining internet access then this would be a problem.
Wait up a minute,there is still not one single piece of evidence that the downloading of copyright material hurts anyone.I along with a million other people watched the “Wolverine” leak and it made huge money on release,no harm done.Its free advertising for them and they know it.(quote from yahoo news)-Universal’s Fogelson said “even Twitter comments that seem critical can be good publicity because they show people are passionate about the movie and can spark discussion that increases attendance”.So how is that any different from watching a pre release copy and telling all your buddies its good but its worth watching on the big screen?.
The MAFIAA have been using the same tactics for decades to slow the introduction of new technologies until they are able to own it(NAPSTER,AND NOW kAZAA).If everything they’ve threatend would happen has never come to fruition(t.v,v.c.r,dvd,killing their business model)then why would anyone listen to the same lies yet again??.Sharing for personal use is not theft and no law will convince me differently,the artists get free advertising,the isp makes a truckload of cash($250 a month from me),the government gets their tax too.
If you try and catch me i will use vpn,proxies or whatever method i have to stay under the radar,even if i have to pay for that service.If you are smart enough to catch me then good luck.But i would rather spend time in jail than pay the MAFIAA scum or NZFACT 1 freakin CENT.
Just straying away from Section 92A for the moment.
If I own a business and play music for my customers, APRA demands a fee to support local music. What happens if I only play music by overseas artists (who wouldn’t see one cent of monies collected), OR another scenario I put. It could be more likely in my case I’d pick a channel from my my local music radio station for customers to listen to. Does APRA still want a FEE? Certainly wouldn’t be thinking of paying if that was case. APRA in my eyes would be then double dipping.
Nothing like other copyright issues to keep this debate alive.
Cheers all.
[...] “It’s time to float a few ‘go forward’ ideas on protecting copyright in the digital age,” she writes in a blog post. [...]
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[...] Labour’s spokesperson for communication and IT, CLaire Curran has also crticised the threat of disconnection, argueing that financial penalties would be more suitable. She has also floated some alternatives to current copyight legislation READ MORE [...]
I really have to agree with Clare about the disconnection issue. When someone slanders someone over the telephone or engages in a criminal conspiracy, the answer isn’t to cut off their phone service. Similarly, mail fraud shouldn’t result in cutting off postal service. And if someone spits gum on the sidewalk, the answer isn’t to ban them from walking on sidewalks.
As for copyright, the multitude of views shows there are different perspectives and interests, including the public interest.
What is a bit galling is the attitude that if you can do something, it is ok to do it. Some of you are saying “so what” if I steal a few MP3s or movies. If you try to stop me, I will go stealth. Um, isn’t that what all thieves do? They are much more effective if they can hide what they do.
Clare’s suggestion of charging ISPs is an attempt to make the thieves actually pay for what they take. We can argue about how that money should be distributed, but the point is that Clare wants to coerce the thieves into becoming paying customers and compensate the copyright holders.
It is akin to the shop owner making everyone pay a fee upon entering the store to make up for the thieves that cannot be caught. It functions like insurance. Everyone who pays for things legitimately pays a higher price than they otherwise would but for the thieves.
You know, I think about that when I pay those high prices for a digital mp3 or a movie. If everyone paid their fair share, I would be paying less. In that sense, all the thieves are not stealing from the publishers or artists, they are stealing from people like me!
Not only are they stealing from other customers, but they also cheat the government out of GST. That hurts everyone. Either you are paying a higher tax because of it, or you are getting fewer services and benefits.
The big issue for me is how to create an Internet analogy for libraries. How can you find a way to lend things for free or at a low cost without it being stealing? Do the digital libraries need to be registered with the government or have non-profit status? Is a torrent a library equivalent? What about the issue of returning something to such a library. In real libraries, you have to return what you borrow, and you only get to keep it a few weeks. And if you don’t return it, you have to pay the library to get a new one. And guess what, the library will use that money to buy a replacement. It won’t steal from a bookstore or another library.
The people who steal this material want to be considered legitimate users. They want to be like library patrons. If that is the case, they should set up systems that function like libraries do, not like digital clearinghouses of “hot” goods, as things are now.
What does one do?