trippenbach
tanith6227
rustedangel
Pale Horse
Quote: “The trade body for UK music, the BPI, asked internet service providers to disconnect people who ignore requests to stop sharing music.
But Charles Dunstone of Carphone Warehouse, which runs the TalkTalk broadband service, is refusing. He said it is not his job to be an internet policeman.”
It seems like the British music industry is keen to have ISPs police their clients’ product usage. At least one ISP, however, has refused. As online piracy drives music, film and video game producers to reconsider their means of distribution, the question arises of whose responsibility it is to police the internet. On one hand I agree with Dunston; why blame the bullet, especially when its communicative potential is as great as any invention since the printed word? On the other, this could be seen as a question of externalities; Car makers let national governments maintain roads and provide healthcare for people suffering from smog - so when do the costs to industry associated with internet piracy outweigh the benefits of the web’s commercial and communicative applications?
The internet is a new kind of commons. So, on the third hand, how can we avoid overgrazing, and who is likely to stop us if we try? A fourth hand wonders about the possibility of the ‘net itself being seen as a means of production and its neutrality dissolved to turn it into a one-way means of production. Even if we avoid that (on the…fifth hand?), quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
In short, do we blame the bullet, the gun, the manufacturer… or the human impulse to shoot?
Filed under: internet | Tagged: technology, internet, net neutrality, carphone, oni, economics, externalities
Neverminding blame, actually, I suppose the question I’m wondering about is when and how will humans take responsibility for their use of the internet. We teach children not to steal, and for the most part they obey, either because of an innate/bred sense of justice, or because they fear consequences. So who is going to add consequences to the internet? Who will teach social cooperation?
I think this is the real key, Rusty. I don;t think social cooperation is the problem - all those people file sharing are certainly working together. I think the issue is how to get people to behave online as they would offline? Can we convince people to treat things they get on the internet the same way they treat things in a shop or another person’s home?
I suppose you could see some of the measures mentioned as being efforts to bring consequence to irresponsible internet use. Would you continue to torrent music and movies if you knew that someone was tracking it and getting ready to actually enforce those silly FBI warnings?
At the same time, it’s important not to get so upset about stolen movies and music that we open the door to real obstacles to internet freedom. If a music publisher is angry that they’re getting ripped off, I can understand that, but I don’t want to usher in tools that could be used to bring my entire internet experience under scrutiny.
If a music publisher is angry that they’re getting ripped off, they should switch business model.
Scarcity of information has ended. That’s a simple technical fact. If you release a piece of data - music, movie, spreadsheet, whatever - it is in the internet for ever, and it can be copied infinitely. Attempting to stop this is futile.
EA and Blizzard have understood this. Radiohead has understood this. Vernor Vinge and Charles Stross have understood this. These guys all make money with their data. They all distribute their stuff free online. They all have alternative means of making a buck off it. They’re all raking it in.
Even in music, Apple has understood this with the iTunes store. With them you can buy music, legally, for cheaps, and then you can copy it over to whatever you want. Make it cheap enough, and people will pay for the convenience, even if they’re getting something they could have for free if they put some effort into it. Apple is making millions off of people’s laziness.
The music industry has been pathetically slow in embracing the possibilities of online distribution. Instead of adapting, they’re trying to enact gross violations of customer privacy to save their profit margins. I think it’s sad, short-sighted, and ultimately doomed.
My point was that I can appreciate the frustration that would come from having one’s shit stolen (through illegal downloads, for example). Blaming the victim of a crime is … well, it’s almost as absurd as blaming the bullet. That’s not to say that I tihnk that music publishers should be able to go all Secret Police.
I think that the real issue is how the industry has decided to respond to piracy. As Tripp points out, some companies out there have woken up and seen the new reality, and have adapted to make money in different ways. Others have not. What I think is staggering is that more music publishers haven’t jumped on the iTunes bandwagon. There seems to be this mental block in that industry, where music has to cost X and if you sell for less (even if your profit margins are still good) then you’re doing someting wrong. Who’s to blame for this? Publishing executives who need to pay for their homes in the Hamptons? Agents looking for their piece of the pie? Artists who can’t live without diamond-encrusted Escalades and platinum fronts? I don’t know.
So I agree with Tripp’s final statement (or does he agree with me?). If things don’t change soon, the “industry” of music is going to go the way of the LP, perhaps to be replaced by artists distributing their work directly online. I’m having trouble seeing a problem with that.
Indeed.
Record manufacturers used to be big business, up to the ’70s. now they’re all but dead, a niche hobbyist manufacturing outfit for people who like the feel of vinyl. The cause? Tapes. Remember those? Easy to copy, compared to records. RIP Vinyl. Then CDs. Even easier, once computers start having burners as standard. RIP tapes.
Every time a new tech comes along, it destabilizes the market. So far, the music industry has adapted. And it has maintained a business model predicated upon the physical scarcity of its products - tapes and CDs.
That’s an important point: the music industry doesn’t sell music. It sells bits of plastic with music encoded on them. With ubiquitous broadband, people have now become aware that they don’t need the plastic.
So here’s the rub. Past technological advances have maintained the scarcity model of business that the record industry is now teetering on. But there’s no scarcity any more. If there’s an infinite supply, how can it be meaningful to speak of theft?
The only answer is to move to providing a service, like iTunes, or sell spin-off merchandise, like Madonna t-shirts, J-lo perfume, and . . . physical CDs.
The music industry is dead. Long live the music industry!
While I agree with your general position, I still take issue with the idea that you can’t steal music because there’s so much of it. Theft isn’t about scarcity - it’s about taking posession of something that isn’t yours. The supply of the item being stolen is quite irrelevant - if you help yourself to property or services without consent or compensation, you’re a thief.
For me, there’s no question about whether or not music (or movies or books or games or whatever) are beig stolen - that’s a fact. The issue - as we’ve already mentioned - is how the owners of all that [intellectual] property are choosing to deal with it. Some have sqaured their shoulders and accepted that they have be smarter if they want to make money. Others have decided that droppin lawsuits on housewives and teenagers is the answer.
The market will cull the herd of the weak and stupid, as it always does. Bye bye, Virgin Mega Stores; hello online distributors.
Tanith is raising what I consider the key point; who will take responsibility?
It is vaguely ironic that corporations who are usually the least responsible will probably fix the problem by changing their methods - I suppose that maintaning profitable viability makes the effort worthwhile.
Still, I’m curious what everyone thinks about the pirates themselves. Because of the lack of acccountability on the internet, a lot of people who wouldn’t usually steal things do. Changing distribution methods and tapping into basic human laziness (and the desire to buy things legally from apple, which is apperently genetic) is fine, but who, in the end, is going to fund the TCTF? Who will accept or be forced to accept the externality? Will we ever be able to teach kids not to steal online the same way we do in meatspace?
As a side note - here is an example of music promotion that’s up-to-date and smart as hell - Tycho from Penny Arcade writes:
Sounds like a good idea to me. The song in question is Paramore’s “crushcrushcrush,” by the way, and Tycho is right - it is f*cking terrible.