I don’t see how a good P2P service could be offered without spending good money to be sure you get good quality. Nobody does anything for free… pay a monthly fee (to cover royalties and maint) or get your computer infected with money-making ads. Otherwise, you would have to only be hooked up with peers who are honest and trustworthy. Is that even possible. Additionally, what’s the chance that your “peer” won’t have what you are looking for?

The programming gets smarter, the in-groups get smaller, and the product gets better. I personally went through problems like this with an MMORPG company, we continued to change our programming to sidestep them until they gave up. Eventually they’ll give up or the sharing will just go underground again, either way it’s never going to stop.

Quick article that shows a larger impact of the over-ruling.

Sorry Mark, I respect your point of view but think you’re way off base on this one. No one is killing the Golden Goose. The rightful owners of the content simply want it protected and paid for. Legal P2Ps are slowly starting to develop and eventually a robust digital distribution system will be in place. In the meantime, thank god for Overpeer and Loudeye.

But, if you’re really on the side of the those who steal and hide behind the argument that it’s just fine because those mean old labels make so much money, I’m sure won’t press charges if I sneak into the AAC and enjoy a nice platinum level seat for free. Or maybe I could come sit by you and we could discuss intangible property rights. Heck I’ll even by you a pretzel.

Bottom line, for those artists like Jeff Tweedy who don’t mind there songs distributed for free, great and they should go right ahead. For those artists who want to distribute for free to gain exposure, power on. But for those who want to receive payment, they should not be at the mercy of genius crackers who smash through DRMs and distribute there product for free.

Now, back to my paid for MusicMatch OnDemand service for some legal digital music.

Nice win over Sactown tonight by the way.

The movie companies already have a good business model. Movie receipts are through the roof, and DVD sales are insane. They provide tons of bonus features, and that attracts consumers like moths to a flame. Most downloading, to be honest, is of new release films that people would buy or rent on DVD if they could, but they’re not released yet….

The theatre experience is unique enough. They don’t have to worry a bit about this in the future. Really.

The RIAA’s problems are much more vast. Because of the lower overhead in making music, what the RIAA are trying to do is limit the promotion angles. They control most of the airwaves, with all the radio media consolodation. P2P isn’t competition for record sales. It’s competition for promotion. The RIAAs big concern is that the next big thing will say that they don’t need the big labels for anything, and they’ll self-publish. That will encourage more people to self-publish, then you end up with a musical community that is flourishing through the internet, and the labels are shut out. That’s their big worry, and why they’re so big on shutting down P2P.

That said however, about the overhead, I’m getting ready to shoot a no-budget horror movie some time in May. So it IS possible for the MPAA to be screwed by the promotion game…

Just not as likely I guess because the major labels still make and distribute good movies.

I’ve been working with IP for almost 30 years, now, and the solution to this problem is not tightening modern copyright law. The system needs, somehow, to find a way to reward creators without obstructing access. Obstruct access and you create pirates.

This is inherent in the internet.

Consider:
It is a classic observation that “The Internet treats censorship as noise and routes around it”.
Censorship is: “This we deem dangerous, therefore you may not access it.”
Copyright is: “This you have not paid for, therefore you may not access it.”

Both the activities are about controlling access.

Hence, it seems clear: “The Internet treats copyright as noise and routes around it”.

Playboy suppresses Scanmaster, a dozen, then a hundred scanners pop up to take his place.

The RIAA suppresses Napster, and Bearshare, Kazaa, Bit Torrent, and dozens, eventually hundreds, of other pop up to take Napster’s place.

The internet has routed around copyright.

Rewards are still needed, for creators to create and investors to invest — this is not by any means a polemic against personal profit from one’s works. But the rewards have to tie to the release and social utility of the creation, not to access to the creation.