Posts by Cameron Junge
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It's of interest that the US, where mindboggling and ludicrous settlements have been sought by the industry and awarded against small offenders by the courts, is the one nation whose recording industry is still struggling revenue wise (Warner Music posted yet another loss today).
An interesting part of those settlements is that the artist who is infringed is lucky to see any of it:
None of the estimated $400 million that the RIAA received in settlements with Napster, KaZaA, and Bolt over allegations of copyright infringement has gone to the artists whose copyrights were allegedly infringed.
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If you think that the utility of the internet isn't improved by the presence of infringing material, well, you've never been to YouTube.
The amusing thing about the above comment is that consumers will vote with their feet. I don't mean YouTube, I'm meaning the media companies that issue takedowns and pull videos will lose (& have lost) customers of the artists they're "protecting".
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Uncomfortably like listening to an arms dealer complaining about what a violent and unpleasant place the 'hood has become.
One can only wonder what the meeting between Sony Music & Sony Electronics was like when discussing the first MP3 Walkman...
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It doesn't particularly matter if ISPs don't rake it in from people downloading Heroes, Lost, and the Fall back catalogue if they either (a) rake it in from people downloading the latest number ones, or (b) rake it in from people who buy Internet connections on the perception that they could download Heroes, Lost, or the Fall back catalogue. Either way, they profit from the perception of downloading as easy and risk free, and will be averse to making it not risk free.
Far out, do you have any idea how much current, common technology is encompassed by your premise? Let's name a few: Photocopier, tape deck, VCR, cameras. & that's not even going to the more digital tools like CD & DVD burners. Oh & least of all, the humble pen. *sigh*
Those things have no stars yet still cost a fortune to make.
Um, I'm sure the many voice actors would disagree with that statement. To take the most well known Pixar film Toy Story: Tom Hanks, Tim Allen, Don Rickles, John Ratzenberger. TS2 added Joan Cusack & Kelsey Grammer.
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My ISP certainly does, seeing as it caps its traffic and has a tiered structure that gets pretty expensive if you download a lot.
If someone was downloading a lot, then they'd choose a service that supports their addiction, rather than go with low caps & high overage charges. (Which, btw, are there to limit the usage, not so much to increase revenue).
As an example: Xnet will give me an unlimited plan (with restrictions) for $50 + peak data usage.
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That's not getting into the complexity of trying to capture and assemble streams of traffic, doing matching of traffic types because you can disguise bittorrent to look at a casual glance like other types of traffic, and then the maintenance of a database of hashes of infringing files.
Add in encryption and you've got a whole new kettle of fish. Considering services like Freenet, TOR, and bittorrent offering encrypted connections, gonna make enforcement very hard!
Oh, and with The Pirate Bay going the DHT (Distributed Hash Table) route, there doesn't even need to be a central tracker to monitor.
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@Danielle: I know, my point was that they're selling to the consumer what the consumer wants, and making it an experience that is impossible to duplicate online, and making a lot off it.
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For those wondering if it's possible to make lots of money selling music even if it'll end up online, here's a solution from The Beatles:
The Beatles have an agreement with EMI to pump out 30,000 apple-shaped USB drives loaded with the band's music in FLAC 44.1KHz 24bit—higher than 16-bit CD quality—and 320Kbps MP3 files. At this point, one has to wonder if The Beatles are aware that it's possible to make tracks available over the Internet that were not first sold over the Internet (Paul, if you're reading this: yes, it is possible).
Given the success of the USB drive promotion, Apple Corps looks poised to make plenty of money; the drives are sold out in the US, and appear to be going for $430 in Japan.
$8 million or so is a nice bundle by anyone's reckoning... (US$280)
Beatles piracy fixation gets stranger with huge FLAC release
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But if it’s the threat of internet being cut off then to be honest I don’t think it’s the end of the world, given that people can swap to a new ISP (although that has problems itself, with people trying to exit ISPs contracts, etc). I understand that the right to the internet is something quite vital, but to be honest, if you’re going to get caught so many times that you’ve gone through every single ISP in the country you deserve everything you get.
Ok, I propose a solution to the bigger "piracy" problem than P2P & other online avenues. I propose that we mandate schools, Unis, techs and other youth organisations to ask every group of students if they're transfering illegal copyrighted material.
As I stated in a previous post, "sneakernet" is a bigger source of "piracy" than online is (apparently). Yet it's not policed. What's the difference in asking ISPs to police their networks while we don't do it in the "real" world?
Ok, I'll admit I'm being argumentative & facetious. But I don't get why some people seem to think that ISPs should be policing what is effectively a different industry's problem. Enforcement agencies enforce the law, not businesses. And that's not even getting into the whole criminal vs civil thing. It's like asking the city council to monitor every vehicle that travels along their roads for illegal contents and then telling them they can't use the roads anymore!
...we won’t find innocent people getting caught up.
So NZ's system will be more accurate and effective than the US system? I'm sceptical. Even an ombudsman won't stop the accusations (and disconnections).
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Or borrow tapes and CDs off friends and take copies. And don't get me started on mix tapes!
An article I read a year or so ago said that 95% of respondents to a survey used "sneakernet" - aka giving a copy to your friends.