[Fmpro] P2P Piracy

[Simon Barber]

Actually, the car analogy works perfectly. It serves to represent your  
attitude to the consumer which is 'I wish to control what you do with  
the end product. In fact, I'm so worried that you might do something I  
don't like, that I'm going to build in restrictions based on my  
mistrust of you dear purchaser, now hand over your money.' You  
underscore my point by trotting out all of the old copyright dogma in  
which you list ways in which you hope to shackle the consumer. This  
granularity, this concern with each user's behaviour, and the infinite  
task of trying to police them, is futile. You would be much better off  
simply monetising the giant consumer base who aren't willing to play  
by outdated rules. Embrace them and watch the money roll in. You are  
also confusing 'free' with 'feels like free'. No-one is suggesting  
that any user should be able to access all music for free simply  
because they desire it. I am arguing that all users should be able to  
access all music *for a simple flat rate fee* because they desire it.  
Do you think about money every time you fill a glass with tap water?  
Why not? You paid for it! If what we create was licensed correctly,  
the system would compensate the content creator and turn the millions  
of scary pirates (who aren't acting as you would like them to because  
the system is too restrictive) into budding consumers. The average  
consumer can either spend $15-$18 to get a piece of plastic with one  
decent song on it, or they can download the track they like for free.  
Plenty of these consumers choose the latter route not because they are  
hell-bent on screwing the composer, but because it seems more 'fair'  
to them than the first option. If a small affordable fee (which could  
be rolled into another bill such as an internet tariff), was required  
in order to access unlimited amounts of high quality content, there  
would be no need for unregulated networks trading low quality  
material. It's about becoming part of a content stream where everybody  
pays a fair amount and the overall pie is much larger. You would love  
your PROs in this model! ;-) The reason this hasn't happened is  
because this empowers the user, it takes control away from the media  
companies. Loss of control feels like the end of the world to these  
incumbent, antiquated organisations. This is of course why we read so  
many articles declaring the music business to be 'over'. The broken  
model is 'over', yes. But the potential for a much bigger music  
business is healthier than ever. The pool of money created by  
embracing the general consumer's habits (and accepting that some  
people will never pay) would be far and away bigger than your system  
of hunting down individuals, and coming up with new ways to cripple  
your products.

Simon



On 13 Apr 2008, at 00:35, chris at alpiar.com wrote:
Simon, your car analogy is poor. When you buy a copy of Digital  
Performer, they make sure you know you cant copy it and send it to  
10000 buddies via P2P. And if you find a way then you had to really go  
out of your way to be malicious. Most every consumer or professional  
software in any genre is the same. OK my habit and desire is that I  
should get all the DAWs and sample libraries in the world that I want  
free and at any time. Why arent I being accomodated? That argument is  
simply ridiculous.

And furthermore, users of all products everywhere are restricted as to  
what they can do with a product. It is very illegal if I buy a car and  
dismantle and analyze every part and build 10,000 exact copies and  
sell them or even give them away. I would be carted off to prison  
before I could say power to the anarchists :p

Just because you buy a piece of music a. does not mean you own the  
copyright to it b. any right to duplicate it c. any right to  
redistribute it. When you buy a CD in the store you are effectively  
buying a license from that artist to listen to it, unlimitedly, for  
the lifetime of the product. You are not buying a thing that is yours.  
People need to be woken up to realize that.

Christopher Kennedy Alpiar
Cinematic Composer
http://www.alpiar.com/

-----Original Message-----
From: Simon Barber [mailto:simon at simonbarber.com]
Sent: Saturday, April 12, 2008 06:03 PM
To: fmpro at nxport.com
Subject: Re: [Fmpro] P2P Piracy
No, the resistance to DRM is because it restricts what the user is  
allowed to do with a product they have paid for. If I am buying a new  
car and the salesman tells me I am only allowed to drive on a certain  
street, I don't buy the car. To be successful, you accommodate the  
user's habits, you don't enforce a mode of behaviour you would ideally  
like to see. Have you considered the notion that the model you are  
trying to apply to digital content is simply not the right one? From  
the moment digital technology allowed perfect copies to be made, a new  
business model was required, but still you insist on trying to shackle  
empowered users to a broken system of digital handcuffs and control.  
As one of the other readers suggested, the cat is out of the bag, you  
can't go back and need to embrace new ways of generating revenue from  
your content. Sorry to sound exasperated, but I am shocked at how  
backward some of the thinking is on this list. All of this has been  
apparent to digital con!
tent creators for the past several years.  
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