With digital rights management (DRM) and other copy-protection schemes in tatters, media companies and other content producers appear ready to take their battle to restrict the trading of copyrighted goods up the ladder of control: from the customers to the middlemen, in particular the ISPs. It’s a bit similar to one theory of combatting illegal drugs: trying to change the behavior of users is futile; so target the dealer and his supply network.
In a speech yesterday, Paul McGuinness, the influential manager of turgid rockers U2, told a conclave of record industry execs, “I suggest we shift the focus of moral pressure away from the individual P2P file thief and on to the multibillion dollar industries that benefit from these countless tiny crimes. The ISPs, the telcos, the device-makers.” He particularly urged the application of pressure on ISPs, according to a report in the Financial Times:
He said that such companies could help if they wanted to. Their ability to block various kinds of activity, for example visits to controversial websites, showed that they also had the ability to target the P2P offenders who used their services.
He added: “We must shame them into wanting to help us. Their snouts have been at our trough feeding free for too long.”
In a column today on the BBC News site, law professor Michael Geist takes a broader look at what he describes as an attempt to “lock up” the Net:
The Internet locks approach envisions requiring Internet service providers to install filtering and content monitoring technologies within their networks.
ISPs would then become private network police, actively monitoring for content that might infringe copyright and stopping it from reaching subscribers’ computers.
The support for locking down the Internet revives an old debate – the appropriate role and responsibility of ISPs for the activities that take place on their networks.
As Geist points out, the ISPs’ traditional defense against calls that they block certain content – “don’t look at us; we’re just dumb pipes” – has become less compelling as they’ve sought to introduce their own tiered services that draw distinctions between different sorts of content:
As the content owners were promoting legal protection for digital locks in the 1990s, the ISPs were supporting legal frameworks that treated them as the equivalent of common carriers that transferred data across their networks without regard for the content itself.
While that approach ensured that ISPs did not take an active role in monitoring or filtering Internet-based activity, the recent move toward a two-tiered Internet – one in which the ISPs themselves dream of distinguishing between different content as a new revenue source – revived the notion that ISPs could be called upon to play a more active role in monitoring and blocking content.
To Geist, this all represents a “dangerous” trend that could end up “creating a locked-down, censored Internet.” His warning is well taken, but it ignores the real rights of the artists who create the works that are being pirated on such a massive scale today. I don’t think we should dismiss out of hand the scenario McGuinness sketches out: “For me the business model of the future is one where music is bundled into an ISP or other subscription service and the revenues are shared between the distributor and the content owners.” That may be anathema to the ideologues of the free ride, but it may well be the best way to ensure that both the creators and the consumers get a fair shake.
Here is one interesting false start, this idea might be one alternative for the future:
http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article3264556.ece
Alan
It looks like most are much more comfortable streaming rather than having the music downloaded:
http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article3240760.ece
Alan
Nick, the industry continues to whine. The digital channel has opened up a huge new customer base and immense new revenues. and yet the industry is focused on the exceptions. Piracy’s s not a new phenomenon. I spent time in Saudi in mid 80s and you could buy just about any album on tapes – not always great quality most from Philippines for around $ 2.
DRM has been such a pain to the majority of legit customers …time for the industry to focus on them not the exceptions. It’s another sign of accountants and related compliance and security concerns trumping customer focus and innovation…the tail wagging the dog
“It’s a bit similar to one theory of combating illegal drugs: trying to change the behavior of users is futile; so target the dealer and his supply network.”
The other option would be, both with your theory and with music, to legalize and find a way to profit of off the activity. The cost of enforcement will prove to be the stumbling block, as is the case with the attempts of Government to fight the use of marijuana, although the policy barons appear not to care about the cost of the war on drugs.
The music industry might prove to be more sensible though, hope lives eternal!
Alan
Of course, even if they manage to find a heuristic that allows ISPs to sort out “illegal” content sharers, some developer might come up with a version of LimeWire or BearShare that uses VPNs instead of unencrypted network connections.
Paul McGuinness’ comments look desperate. It’s obvious that governments aren’t going to regulate the ISPs and telecoms .Suing poor college kids and house wives make them look like villains. What’s his high technology solution? He going to “shame” Microsoft, ISPs and telecoms into stopping it? Oh! I’m sure they’re shaking in their boots…! ;)
Interesting, I always heard that the “error” was to go after the drug supply chain, rather than concentrating on eliminating the demand. Deal with the problem at home and we don’t have to get tangled up overseas (or south of the border) and can stay the hell out of places we don’t belong.
>> legalize and find a way to profit of off
>> the activity
The problem is that they did that in Denmark and look at the devastating results: the streets are safe, kids can walk alone to school, the prisons aren’t overflowing, low crime rate per-cap and everyone has health care! Do we really want THAT to happen in the United States?! LOL.
Short and sweet linuxguru2008! Alan
Northern European countries/common sense solutions!
http://nrkbeta.no/norwegian-broadcasting-nrk-makes-popular-series-available-drm-free-via-bittorrent/
Alan
It looks like every one is trying to make sense of the quagmire called DRM.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/jan/29/copyright.law
Alan
It looks like every one is trying to make sense of the quagmire called DRM.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/jan/29/copyright.law
Alan
Why doesn’t the music industry simply buy the ISPs? Capitalism ain’t what it used to be.
Nick,
Yesterday the European Court of Justice ruled that ISPs do not have to hand over personal data. This case (http://euobserver.com/9/25559) puts a spanner in the works for industry.
Best wishes,
Johnny (Institute of International & European Affairs – http://www.iiea.com)
This is the key one; “…As the content owners were promoting legal protection for digital locks in the 1990s..”
They wanted a way to get soup to nuts intellectual property security around the entire digitization process.
So in this “long jump” for intellectual property perfection, what the RIAA actually got was alternative methods of free downloading, then paid methods of downloading owned by someone else! They may actually have become marginalized in their own industry.
Reading the text of that speech made me sick. Paul McGuinness comes off as a goon and a hypocrite in my opinion. Taxing or penalizing the carriers wont solve the problem, it will just change the shape of the problem. This sort of non solution is security theater as Schneier would call it.
As for demanding a tax from the hardware manufacturers, thats an old song that keeps getting covered again and again. Just like the idea of taxing phonographs, tape players, etc. They got away with blank media taxes, but never managed to tax the hardware companies. Even a fool like Paul McGuinness can see that it ammounts to biting the hand which feeds you.
IMNSHO the agenda for a filtered Internet or prepaid music bundled with hardware has to do with an attempt to control who can make content available to the listeners. As it is the RIAA and their ilk do nothing for small labels like the one I’m part of. Trying to get money out of Sound Exchange is even more of a joke.
Interestingly enough, the real safe harbors for pirates on the Net seem to all have to do with EU laws which permit or encourage this sort of behavior. Maybe it has something to do with a mentality that music as a cultural artifact should be subsidized by the state. If so I should setup an address of convenience somewhere in the EU to try and get some of that tax money, it might just help offset some of the losses our label suffers from piracy.