It is time for a revolution in the way digital media is handled! From what I have observed, the music and motion picture industry is ticked that the consumer can copy media without any loss unlike magnetic tape and phonograph.
These items are copyrighted and it is illegal to copy them outside the fair use stipulations in copyright law. Media industry is infringing on these fair use rights by pushing laws making aspects of the process of copying illegal or having user agreement with the media that further binds the user. Having a copy of a song may not be illegal under the fair use in copyright, but how you made that copy may be illegal because of other laws and breaking the “user agreement”.
In reality, I think that it will “hurt” this industry since I will be even more careful what music I buy. I will definitely try to avoid Sony since my PC is my media player these days (see Sony Sued)
“…under the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), no one may create or distribute hardware or software that circumvents a copy-protection scheme. Thus besides suing someone for copyright infringement, encryptors of copy-protected content can sue someone for merely decrypting it.” – IEEE Spectrum, “Getting Copyright Right”, Feb 2002, Page 49
Under the original copyright laws as they were intended, there is no problem that I copied the above quote and because of the fair use of copyright. However, if the above was in a PDF using an encryption algorithm, I could get sued, not because I copied the two sentence but because I was able to get around the encryption and do the copying, illegal under DMCA. Because it is digital media.
I want to see good artists that are in to entertainment because they are artist and not because they want to be multimillionaires (thought this is a great side benefit) , leave the formal industry group and market and sell on their own or separate from these media “unions” such as the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). Create a consortium of like-minded artists to oversee a new marketing, production and distribution method. Imagine what an artist could make on a $15 CD that goes platinum when production and distribution only cost less than $2 per CD? Could mainstream popular artist CDs sell for $5 each? Wow.
As for copyright enforcement, I believe laws like the DMCA infringes on the rights of the consumer given by “fair use” in copyright. It also inhibits further creativity of the artist to develop new material to support themselves and their cause. Hey, if it is impossible for one to copy your stuff without first handing out $1+ per copy or thousands in a law suit why be creative anymore, the dough should continue to roll in forever. This also goes for the extraordinarily long time works can be copyrighted – another thing that was not intended by original copyright laws. Have you noticed how few artists anymore are really good for an extended amount of time?
There is a ton more on this topic that I can ramble about but I will stop with this: It is not worth my effort to buy media any more. Just listen to the radio or better yet, webcasts for free.
P.S. If you are interested in developing an alternative to media distribution without the likes of the big companies like Sony and associated “associations” like the RIAA, I would be interested in hearing about it.
