Posted on 08/25/2010 12:03:18 PM PDT by a fool in paradise
ASPEN, Colo.--The Recording Industry Association of America said on Monday that current U.S. copyright law is so broken that it "isn't working" for content creators any longer.
RIAA President Cary Sherman said the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act contains loopholes that allow broadband providers and Web companies to turn a blind eye to customers' unlawful activities without suffering any legal consequences.
"The DMCA isn't working for content people at all," he said at the Technology Policy Institute's Aspen Forum here. "You cannot monitor all the infringements on the Internet. It's simply not possible. We don't have the ability to search all the places infringing content appears, such as cyberlockers like [file-hosting firm] RapidShare."
The complex--and controversial--1998 law grew out of years of negotiations with broadband providers, Internet companies, and content industries. One key section says companies are generally not liable for hosting copyright-infringing materials posted by their companies, as long as they follow certain removal procedures, once contacted by the owner.
In response to a question from CNET, Sherman said it may be necessary for the U.S. Congress to enact a new law formalizing agreements with intermediaries such as broadband providers, Web hosts, payment processors, and search engines.
The RIAA would strongly prefer informal agreements inked with intermediaries, Sherman said: "We're working on [discussions with broadband providers], and we'd like to extend that kind of relationship--not just to ISPs, but [also to] search engines, payment processors, advertisers."
But, Sherman said, "if legislation is an appropriate way to facilitate that kind of cooperation, fine."
Lance Kavanaugh, product counsel for YouTube, disagreed that copyright law is broken. "It's our view that the DMCA is functioning exactly the way Congress intended it to," he said.
The United States leads the world in the creation of innovative new Web ideas, Kavanaugh said, in part as a result of the compromises made when drafting that law: "There's legal plumbing to allow that to happen, to allow those small companies to innovate without [the] crushing fear of lawsuits, as long as they follow certain rules. Congress was prescient. They struck the right balance."
Last week, the RIAA and a dozen other music industry groups called on Google and Verizon to crack down on piracy, saying in a letter that "the current legal and regulatory regime is not working for America's creators."
Sherman acknowledged on Monday that YouTube is now doing a fine job of filtering and removing copyright-infringing videos. But, he said, Google "could stop filtering tomorrow and have no liability," as long as its YouTube subsidiary replied promptly to notifications.
And, he suggested, it could do far more: "If you enter in 'Beyonce MP3,' chances are, the first thing you'll see is illegal sites."
Disclosure: McCullagh is married to a Google employee not involved with this topic.
Update 6:20 p.m. PT: During dinner this evening, Cary Sherman told me that his response to my question earlier Monday was not a call for new legislation. Instead, he said, the RIAA would like to see congressional action only if necessary to formalize a voluntary deal with partners such as broadband providers. But a broader law enacted without their cooperation isn't what the RIAA wants, Sherman said.
“[We] cannot monitor all the infringements on the Internet. It’s simply not possible. We don’t have the ability to search all the places infringing content appears...”
Let me be the spoiler here and inject some rather painful logic into this gossamer web of RIAA fancy. If the “content copyright holders”, who are the ones who KNOW for sure that they hold their copyrights, can’t monitor all the internet for infringements, then exactly how is it that websites, large forums, ISP’s or server companies - who have NO KNOWLEDGE of who holds the copyrights or even IF the material is copyrighted - are supposed to be able to “police” the bits and bytes of all the packets and databits that are sent or stored on their copper, fiber optics or server arrays?
And if I’m not mistaken, the RIAA and it’s memeber companies are not “content creators” as they claim, but “copyright owners”. They have not “created” the materials they hold the copyrights to, the artists did, who were then forced one way or the other to sign over those original creator copyrights. The RIAA always claims to be the champion of the little artist or musician who actually had the creative thoughts and capability when in fact they are large, faceless corporations who have held the gun to the head of the creators and forced them, economically or otherwise, to give up the very copyrights the RIAA is whinging about. The artist usually gets paid no royalties based on the creative accounting used by the RIAA member companies.
“...current U.S. copyright law is so broken that it “isn’t working” for content creators any longer.”
And exactly why is copyright law supposed to work “for content creators” any more than it should work for “content enjoyers”? Silly me. I thought that Copyright was originated to “promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts”, not work for content creators. But then, again, I’m one of those bitter clingers to the original intent of the Constitution.
The RIAA and MPAA bought Congress and wrote the DMCA. Now they’re crying and whining that they don’t like it and want it changed. Why can’t I even find the world’s smallest violin to play “Hearts and Roses” for them?? Poooooor Babieeeees!
Considering that he spent a good portion of his life hunting down patent infringers, I think he had a pretty good idea.
The reason no one is discussing property rights is that “intellectual property” is not property in the same sense as real-estate or gold. It is consists in nothing other than a government-granted monopoly.
“Piracy” does not deprive anyone of, say, a song, as it creates another copy of the song. All it does is deprive someone (in the ideal world the artist who recorded the song, in the real world a company that bought the rights to the song and probably tries to not pay a continuing stream of royalties to the artist if they can help it) of putative revenue they might have earned if the person desiring a copy of the song to listen to at will had been willing to pay a price based on the government-granted monopoly. Monopoly prices are usually higher than those created by the market. (And for goods which can be infinitely reproduced, an efficient market drives the price toward zero.)
Once copyrights and patents extend beyond the Constitutionally mandated purpose, “To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries,” and turn into a way of using state power to secure the market position of some types of corporations, it is natural to talk about fascism, whose economic program involves state cooperation with moneyed interests “in the common good”. Once intrusive technical means of law enforcement are broached it is natural to talk about Orwell.
Actually, I’d like to see copyright law work better for content creators than it does now: it should be impossible for an artist, author, or inventor to completely alienate their rights to their own work by selling those rights to another person (natural or juridical).
Oh, that’s not what the RIAA meant? Gee, and here they claim to have the artists’ interests in mind.
“Orwell, fascism and evil corporations don’t come up when we discuss the use of eminent domain to obtain land for private development?”
Well, it does, yes, but not at all in the same manner. When people rail at eminent domain, it’s because the government is stealing instead of protecting private property. In the case of this thread, there’s certainly some form of government-bashing going on. Also, and more importantly, there’s a virile attack on—and association of nightmarish totalitarianism with—the notion of the government strengthening its protection of private property. Not the sae thing.
A better comparison would be not with eminent domain, but, say, with a call for the state to extend its legal protection of property rights by heavily subsidizing neighborhood security firms. Now, I’d expect this to be ridiculed as prodigal and unnecessary. But never would I expect it to be railed against as Orwellian and fascist (excluding those who consider most every outlay of government spending to be fascistic). Yet strengthening copyright protection routinely is, even amongst those who believe in its efficacy in a limited sense.
Frankly, I hace zero sympathy for the bottom feeders at RIAA, MPAA, etc. Until copyright terms become sane again, I’m much more inclined to just ignore it entirely.
What I don’t understand is why Republicans aren’t actively working to strip away the Clinton-era giveaways to Hollywood.
Nope. The industry wants to be able to switch back and forth between “you bought a specific physical object” and “you bought a batch of data”, depending on which one is convenient at the moment. Unfortunately for them, that’s not how legitimate law works.
That is a perfect example of the point I made previously.
If what he bought was "a bunch of plastic disks", then he has the undisputed right to use them as he sees fit -- stick them in a CD player, stick them under a short table leg, or stick them into a computer to produce MP3 files of the contents.
If what he bought was "a pattern of data", then the owner of the pattern of data might have a say about that MP3 conversion... but they also assume a responsibility for replacing the library in situations such as you describe (because otherwise they are no longer providing what he bought).
Capitalism is outdated an out-dated model. It can no longer safeguard the interests of creative workers and content providers in the music industry.
What we really need is a comprehensive plan, similar to the one that recently resolved our health care crises.
An equitable National Content Protection Act would remove the corrupting influence of profit seeking on our cultural life, insure equality in the treatment for all musical content providers, and promote full access to all forms of this valuable resource.
We need to look at the bigger picture. /Sarc
“The reason no one is discussing property rights is that ‘intellectual property’ is not property in the same sense as real-estate or gold. It is consists in nothing other than a government-granted monopoly”
It most certainly is not a “monopoly,” at least not in any sense that the word is regularly used. Just as reasonable to say you have a government-granted “monopoly” over the use of your home. Usually, to have a monopoly means to have exclusive control of the disposal of some particular commodity. Though it might be defensible in the name of rhetorical hyperbole to say I have a “monopoly” over a certain percent of the sales of the “commodity” that is some book I have written (for instance), it’s reckless, uncharitable, and prejudicial.
But no need to go too far into what intellectual property is and is not. We’re all familiar with the stock arguments, and, more importantly, it bores me. I just wish to point out my continuing perplexity that even in a post by a person who admits the efficacy of at least the “Constitutionally mandated purpose” of copyright law, you find the casual employment of words like “monopoly,” “Orwell,” and “facism” (though, granted, you are directly responding to my use of them). RIAA goes too far, big corporations have too many advantages already, digital piracy isn’t the same as other forms of intellectual theft, and so on. What are we really talking about here? A difference of degree. Is what they’re asking really that far “beyond the Constitutionally mandated purpose” of copyright protection so as to threaten free speech (still don’t understand that one, but whatever), push us further into the evil Corporatism, and conjure nightmares of Dystopia? No.
“Once intrusive technical means of law enforcement are broached it is natural to talk about Orwell.”
Yes, if you’re a crank. We’re not talking about monitoring nearly every aspect of your life, leaving only a cramped corner of an alcove in your house in which to live freely. Nor calling for black helicopters to swarm your neighborhood at all hours. Such things exist, of course, and law enforcement has all manner of evil technology. But that’s neither here nor there.
Perhaps because some of us think that it is obscene that just because some guy writes a song or a book, that he, his children, grandchildren and great grandchildren don't necessesarily have sole right to distribute that work. The Beatles catalog hasn't reverted to the public domain after 30 to 40 years, and probably won't during my lifetime because we have the best congress money can buy. This kind of thing breeds comtempt for the law.
I don't begrudge a man for making millions of dollars for a couple of hours of work, but I do think it's immoral for his great children to. It says right there in black and white in the Constitution itself, that copyright was supposed to be for "limited times". These RIAA scumbags are on record stating that the heat death of the universe minus one day should be considered a "limited" time.
Yes, copyright and patents create a monopoly in the classical sense of the word.
A pharmaceutical company that develops, patents, and wins approval on a new drug (even if it’s identical to an old drug except for, say, substituting a fluorine atom for a chlorine atom at one place in a molecule) has a monopoly on producing and selling that molecule.
At present Henry Holt and Company has a government-granted monopoly on any economic use of the sequence of words
Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.
These monopolies are enforced by state power just as the Wool-Weavers’ Guild’s monopoly was enforced by state power in the late middle ages in many countries in Europe.
Until I saw /s , you had me going.
Please do not give the libtard socialist any ideas
“A pharmaceutical company that develops, patents, and wins approval on a new drug...has a monopoly on producing and selling that molecule...”
“At present Henry Holt and Company has a government-granted monopoly on any economic use of the sequence of words
Some say the world will end in fire...”
“These monopolies are enforced by state power just as the Wool-Weavers’ Guild’s monopoly was enforced by state power in the late middle ages in many countries in Europe.”
Go ahead and define some particular molecule and some discreet sequence of words as a commodity if you want, thereby sneaking it under the fence of monopoly territory. All I have to say is, “[Yawn].” Big deal. Cheap rhetorical trick. No matter what label you give them, serious and honest people will never believe a random publisher’s onwership of a certain title is equivalent to the British East India Company’s crown-granted trading monopoly.
By the way, the “enforced by state power” part makes for one of the weakest syllogisms I’ve ever read. Patent/copyright = state power and Wool-weavers guild = state power, therefore copyrights and patents are monopolies, is that it? Along those lines, I might as well say my state-enforced right to dispose of my labor as I see fit is a monopoly. I also, incidentally, have a monopoly on food grown in my backyard. I am my own little cartel!
Somewhere I heard that this is what boosted off the Hollywood movie business. In the early days, they were all infringing on Edison's motion picture patents, but if he sent investigators from NJ to catch them, they had time enough to step across the border into Mexico until the heat was off.
But particular molecules most assuredly are commodities—that much is clear: ethanol, propane, polypropylene are all traded on commodity exchanges. (I’d have listed metals, but they are generally traded in metallic, rather than molecular form.)
Copyrights and patents artificially commodify sequences of words, sounds, or visual images, and anything one can convince the patent office is enough like a device that they’ll issue a patent, respectively, and grant a monopoly on the artificial commodity.
This is not to say that state-granted (and regulated) monopolies are not sometimes a necessary evil: utilities requiring intrusive infrastructure are a classical example, and the Founders gave a reason to grant monopolies to authors and inventors. The problem, and the reason I take strong exception to the notion that “intellectual property” is actually property, is that by conceiving of the state-granted monopoly as a property right, rather than an incentive for the creation of art or scientific discovery, we have come to a state in which copyrights and patents, do exactly the opposite of what the Founders intended.
I chose Frost’s Fire and Ice for a reason: the monopoly held by Henry Holt and Company prevented the American release of a song using the 1928 poem as lyrics a few years back. The suppression of derivative works is exactly contrary to the Founders intent. One would think that the Constitutional provision read, “To impeded progress in the sciences and useful arts by granting to commercial interests and literary estates, for indefinitely extendable times, exclusive right to the works of authors and inventors who have died or signed away rights to their works”.
Copyright and patent law is broken, and the first crack in the edifice was creation of the notion of “intellectual property”.
And that's a good thing, because otherwise it's a violation of international law because RapidShare is based in Germany.
Sorry if I caused your blood pressure to shoot up.
I find it so easy to mimic leftist gobbledygook, and since they never consider consequences, it’s easy to turn it back on them.
The recording industry is one I wouldn’t mind seeing nationalized— just to watch them howl. And ‘bam and crew may do just that if their contributions slow down.
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