The eff wrote an essay on how to deal with music piracy. They basically said that although artists need to be fairly compensated that piracy is not going to di

The eff wrote an essay on how to deal with music piracy. They basically said that although artists need to be fairly compensated that piracy is not going to disappear. They also think that government interference should be minimized and that fans will always be better at distribution. Their suggestion is voluntary collective licensing. Basically artists join licensing organizations and fans pay money to the organization to get the right to legally download music. Artists don't have to join, but non-member artists would be faced with the tough task of collecting money from infringing fans. They also suggest compulsory licensing for property that owners refuse to license at any cost. They note that the government has done this in other cases. Compulsory licensing was enforced with radio, internet radio, cable/satellite tv, and player pianos. Links: http://www.eff.org/wp/better-way-forward-voluntary-collective-licensing-music-file-sharing http://www.eff.org/wp/better-way-forward-voluntary-collectiv... http://www.eff.org/pages/making-p2p-legal http://www.eff.org/pages/making-p2p-legal Overall the suggestions seem reasonable from my point of view.