A very balanced and sensible look in starkly capitalist Forbes at the current state of copyright in the digital era: EVERYONE is going to have to compromise - what a shock:
- File sharing has gotten a black eye from illegal downloads of copyrighted music and movies, but the technology behind it is important. A legal network of shared thinking will hasten drug research, software development and the flow of information. But U.S. copyright laws, designed decades before the Web was ever conceived, have tied file sharing--and many other Internet technologies--in knots.
The traditional holders of copyrighted material have dug in for a long fight against any loosening of the laws. In 1998, after intense lobbying from The Walt Disney Co. and other companies, the U.S. Congress passed a law making corporate copyrights good for 95 years and those owned by individuals good for 70 years past the creator's death. In January, the U.S. Supreme Court extended that law for another 20 years. But if the old-liners continue to get their way, the public domain in the U.S. will virtually disappear. And early-stage Internet innovations from digital music stores to virtual actors will forever be stuck behind legal firewalls.
....Can copyrights be protected without stifling innovation? Ultimately, the protection of content and jobs hinges on collaboration between producers and distributors.
Among the ideas being floated by lobbying groups like P2P United: a royalty pool created from small charges on Internet service, blank CDs and CD burner equipment. These so-called compulsory licenses would mean consumers broadly share the cost for all copyrighted music that passes through the ISP.
But such licenses would require the approval of the U.S. Congress, says William Fisher, a Harvard Law professor and director of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society. The idea would also get pushback from ISPs.
....There may not be any consensus on how to control distribution and licensing of content, but most agree that it's a train that can't be stopped.
History shows that conventional media reflexively shuns novel technology. In 1908, a music publisher sued a player piano company. The Supreme Court ruled that making piano rolls was not close enough to publishing music to be prohibited. In 1984, Universal City Studios and Walt Disney Productions took the VCR to court. There, the judges decided that taping TV programs at home was fair use, to the glee of VCR and Betamax makers and owners.
....Somewhere in the middle of cyberspace, the kids and the grown-ups have to lay down some ground rules. Even the U.S. Constitution was a compromise.
Article comments
1 - BB
Yes Eric, it is the never-ending war between the haves and the have-nots. It is always the same old story. In medieval times it was the rich landowners protecting their turf (pun intended). In the industrial age it was the robber barons protecting their wealth. Now it is the corporations protecting its interests. In the end it is always the same - those that have only see the masses as an exploitable resource (no I'm not a communist).
2 - Natalie Davis
Amen, BB. (What's wrong with being a small-c communist? RHETORICAL.)
3 - BB
And a double Amen to you sister (not so RHETORICAL ;).
4 - Eric Olsen
As with so many ideas, the ideas of communism, or at least socialism, make lots of sense in theory. What's wrong with "to each according to his needs, from each according to his abilities," and damn, you can't deny that history is filled with masses getting thier asses exploited off.
But the problem is putting it into practice. It just doesn't seem to bring out the best in human beings. It seems to make them lazy, indolent, breed as much or more corruption as any other system, and the "dictatorship of the proletariat" is totalitarianism that never goes away. There is no withering away of the state - there is the perpetuation of a small in-crowd of powerful party officials who call all the shots, and there is everyone else who gets squat and gets drunk to kill the numbness and sense of life wasted.
Democratic capitalism is the worst possible system, except for all the other ones. Sigh.
5 - jadester
ad a men to your...oh ok, look it's past 3am here and i'm knackered. I can't think of anything funny, so i'll just say i agree.
Believe it or not, some software pirates have ethics - everything they release to the public, they buy. They also advocate the same in downlaoders ("if you enjoy this game, show you do so by buying it" etc.)
i am of the view that if i cant get hold of a demo but can get hold of the full game, but then find i hate it, i shouldnt then have to go and buy it. If i had gone and bought it, i'd not only be pissed off but i'd have to pay to get to town to buy it and then again to return it for my moneyback, assuming the shop lets me. A choice between that and setting it to download in kazaa overnight in order to try before i buy, is an easy choice...
6 - BB
"Democratic capitalism is the worst possible system, except for all the other ones."
Excellent tongue-in-cheek comment Eric. Can I borrow it?