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This week, the French government decided to adopt a”three strikes” policy against illegal file sharers on the Internet. Effectively, it means that if you are caught illegally sharing music, you risk a large fine and a one year Internet ban. The law is soon to be adopted in UK, and there are signs that other European countries will follow with similar laws of their own.
On one hand, government action seems reasonable. Musicians and music companies spend significant time and energy creating and promoting new music. It seems unfair that, after all this hard work, the product of their efforts is subject to a free-for-all with no obvious flow of money back to the producers. There is a parallel here with common theft. Arguments such as “the record companies make enough money, so a free copy of my own won’t make a difference” are equally applicable in the case of shoplifting, for instance.
On the other hand the Internet is totally unsuitable for a pay-per-copy model. It’s impossible to police without draconian measures that have impacts way beyond the stated intent of preventing piracy. From the viewpoint of the file sharers, it costs the music companies nothing to distribute their songs and the products are infinitely available, so the whole meaning of theft needs to be re-assessed in this new digital environment. There is also the argument that copyright restrictions greatly limit creativity in the digital realm, although this issue applies to many physical products also.
Personally, I don’t file share. I’m happy enough to get what music I want through iTunes without resorting to BitTorrent or Limewire. Call me a traditionalist, but the idea of having thousands of illegally obtained video and music titles clogging up my hard disk space is somewhat distasteful. If I like a piece of music, I’ll buy it, and I don’t have a problem with that. However I can also understand the argument that, with the Internet, the world has changed. I think the idea of limitations being placed on personal usage of digital products (i.e. Digital Rights Management, or DRM) repulsive. I think there are serious issues with governments and private firms monitoring our Internet usage. I’m inclined to agree that a radical re-assessment of the whole business is necessary.
With the Internet, we seem to be moving into a world of openness, rather than protection. Openness implies sharing, collaboration, continuous improvement and mass-participation. Although it’s obvious that many traditional businesses are suffering in these circumstances, it’s not obvious to me why there would be a whole-scale business implosion over time. Indeed the Internet might well create new ways of generating wealth, through, for instance, extension of brand image and mind-share leading to greater demand for performances, merchandise and premium downloads. The examples of Radiohead and Trent Reznor certainly point to some interesting ideas in this area.
I’m interested in your thoughts on this. Is file-sharing just a polite word for stealing or is it symptomatic of a changing world order? What are your thoughts about file-sharing and why you think it’s good or bad?
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October 24, 2009 at 12:09 am
Dan | thesamovar
Well, something has to give, the current model is unsustainable. The enforcement efforts cannot and will not be able to keep up with technological developments. The odds are stacked way too far in favour of the file sharers. That’s been obvious for at least 10 years now, and nothing has changed. All the French law and ones like it do is provide a spur for people to develop better technologies for dodging enforcement groups, such as PeerGuardian and Tor.
From my own point of view, I think there’s no moral excuse for file sharing, it is, of course, a (rather minor) form of theft. I use it to download TV shows, which I do because the file sharers provide a much better service than the TV companies – I can download in under an hour, a high quality file which can stay on my hard disk until I’m ready to watch it, with the ads removed, the channel’s logos obscured, and I can download them immediately when they come out first in the US rather than months later in the UK. I’d be willing to pay a decent amount for a service that offered something as good or better than this, but what they actually offer is something much, much worse. I have to watch it at the time they choose to show it on TV, with ads and logos, or I can watch it again on the internet at low resolution for a certain time afterwards (again with ads and logos).
Fortunately, I think the whole concept of ad-funded media seems to be going through a crisis. I hope it dies off, it’s pernicious, especially for things like news.
It’s an interesting issue – and the consequences are much wider than just about copyright theft of music and TV. As our economies move more and more towards the production of intellectual goods that are (almost) freely reproducible, these problems will have to be faced.
October 24, 2009 at 10:38 pm
dragonqueen
I don’t download from the web, but admittedly I’ve copied the occasional CD I’ve bought and shared with an offspring. Somewhere in my study there is a DVD with a P’Terry interview given to me by one of the hatchlings. It’s been there for quite some time now, but I’ve never got around to watch it.
I prefer to buy my DVDs and CDs out of many reasons. I think people should get paid for their work, that includes artists as well. Then I prefer to actually see what I listen to, or watch. Maybe it’s an age thing. Files on a computer are not the same.
October 26, 2009 at 9:13 am
Colm
Thanks for your contributions all.
Dan, I agree that it is a broken model. Pay per copy didn’t work well with broadcasting either, thus the rise of advertising. Advertising also seems quite appropriate for the Internet, as we have seen through Google’s success, however it’s unlikely to be the only way to create wealth. Also I note the anti- advertising technologies available on the Net. It really is a conundrum for the business world.
DQ, I’m with you there. Maybe to ensure that we get the content we want in the future, we turn to models of sponsorship, akin to the way US public radio works?
Thanks again!
October 28, 2009 at 10:22 pm
Ben Warsop
Dan is way ahead of me, but has said everything I have to say and more.
You ask: “Is file-sharing just a polite word for stealing or is it symptomatic of a changing world order? ”
I think it’s both. I have very little material that has not been paid for, and just about all of that was given to me. Though I was for a while considerably less scrupulous about images than about music. I have no idea why.
We do need a variety of things. We need a new copyright model, a new way to reimburse artists for their time, effort and talent. On the other hand I have a friend whose boyfriend is a rock star, there’s an entry in Wikipedia, there are fan sites, and European tours and all sorts of good stuff. But he still has to have a day job. Magritte was a commercial artist. Philip Larkin was a librarian. You can see where this is going. I think the days of the Great Big Rock Stars may be numbered. The web makes it hard to monetise talent, but it’s almost always been hard to monetise talent. I suspect the web evens out the playing field.
The real question is not whether the Stones or Michael Jackson or Lady GaGa are making less money because of the web. There is a point above which more money is too much. The question is whether people like my friend’s boyfriend are making more or less money because of the web, and that’s a pretty moot point. More people know about them and pay to come to their concerts. More people download their music. Fewer people pay for it.
Buying singles makes more sense than it ever did before. A single is 79p from Amazon. When I was at school over 30 years ago a single was a pound in the shops. Unsurprisingly, more singles are being sold legitimately than ever before (or so I heard on the Word podcast). But fewer albums, and almost none via record shops.
What we are seeing is a stripping out of layers of leaches and parasites from within the record companies: people who could only add value in the old model. It remains to be seen whether artists and audience are actually worse off.
Interesting post. Who knew I had such coherent opinions on the subject?
Ben
October 30, 2009 at 3:29 pm
Colm
Thanks Ben. A very coherent post indeed. Maybe I’m too idealistic, but it would be nice to think that talented people can make a living from occupations other than IT Support Technician or Junior Assessor. Perhaps along the lines of Kevin Kelly’s 1000 True Fans perhaps? I suspect it’s going to be something of a mix in any case. There will always be superstars who will find imaginative ways of monetising their fame.
Just as an aside, Cory Doctorow has been writing about Peter Mandelson’s attempt to kick families off the Internet for file-sharing. It’s worth a read. http://tinyurl.com/yk2vxnn
November 4, 2009 at 4:43 pm
Phil
I’ve been trying to think of a nice well structured reply to some of the points here. I will leave the following links to a piece of news about file sharers instead.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/11/01/demos_music_survey/
and
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8337887.stm
Phil
November 4, 2009 at 6:48 pm
Colm
Thanks Phil.
What strikes me is that the record companies are increasingly under pressure from two sides: a) the customers, who are abandoning “approved” forms of music consumption. They are still spending money on music, just not the way the record companies want them to pay. b) the musicians themselves. The record companies are really exposed here, because if the musicians jump ship, the companies could be left with nothing to sell, and no supporters anymore. This is the interesting one, because if large numbers of musicians start to “do a Radiohead”, the record companies and governments are left with their trousers down around their ankles.
My feeling is that this day is coming. Some time in the future a tipping point will be reached, when musicians see a model that better meets their self-interest than anything the traditional channels can provide.
November 6, 2009 at 9:52 am
Phil
For probably the majority of performing musicians a recording contract isn’t on the cards. These people can only make their money outside of the record companies – be it the jobbing classical musician without an orchestra contract, the street corner busker singing their own songs or the pair of folkies driving up and down the country playing in pubs and clubs each week. Performance is where these musicians make some money.
As someone who goes to several music festivals and gigs over the course of a year I try and if possible buy cds from the performers – money in their pocket and a direct showing of appreciation of the music/gig I’ve just seen.