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I really don't know how to spell this out in words of one syllable, but I'll try to keep this clear: no business survives in a legal vacuum. And every business

by alexqgb 14y ago

I really don't know how to spell this out in words of one syllable, but I'll try to keep this clear: no business survives in a legal vacuum. And every business model represents a symbiosis between itself and the law. The law provides protection, and the business produces wealth to sustain the state. In short, it takes two to tango. And the people - via their legislators - state what level of legal protection they're willing and able to provide. Given this basis, commercial interests operating work out the most optimal arrangements they can beneath this umbrella. The point, which I've clearly clearly failed to communicate, is that this is how EVERY business works. Literally every single one. It's not just law they rely on either, of course. Business also depends on roads, bridges, air traffic control, stable currency, clean air and water, well regulated banks, I mean, the list goes on and on and on. And if the infrastructure goes to hell, so does the commercial layer on top. But within this matrix, the protection of the law is, perhaps the most critical, since its the one thing that absolutely cannot come from any source except the State and its (fully justified) monopoly on force. What bothers me to no end is this constant refrain from people saying "figure out a business model" to which I say "no business model is possible in the absence of a legal model." Seriously, where are all the great policy ideas? When SOPA/PIPA blew over, did anyone think "Holy smoke, these guys can tell a good story but they REALLY don't know how to write good legislation. We simply cannot leave the development of effective legal models to the media industries themselves. Instead, we need to do our part for the culture by defining and implementing an acceptable governing framework so that the people who produce the stuff we all enjoy can continue to do so effectively." You know, government of the people, by the people, for the people? I mean, what? You're going to ask the entertainment industry to write your legislation for you? Are you crazy? Our creaky analog-era law isn't great, but it's all we've got and it's better than nothing. And given the raging sense of entitlement that surrounds us, it looks like it's all we're going to get, so it's what we'll have to make do with until sanity prevails or we die waiting. Modernization of the law that protects the interests of creators isn't special protection, by the way. This is really about getting something commensurate with the basic rule of law that every other business enjoys, and without which, no business survives (black market trades backstopped by criminal enforcers excepted). And I think a lot of the more ridiculous terms (century + copyrights, for instance) would be given up in a heartbeat if there was protection that allowed people to recoup investments in stuff that lives online. Seriously, two decades after the internet appeared, and there's been no serious policy response that protects creators that has come from anyplace other than the lobbyists we've hired ourselves. It's almost like no one else gives a shit whether we live or die. Free content has been an enormous driver for the tech industry, but there's been zero social responsibility. You'll happily bleed the thing you love to death then complain when it finally collapses and dies. A friend of mine who has got an Oscar and several Grammys compared it to an ignorant mob storming into an ancient vineyard, chopping down everything they could get their hands on, building a big bonfire, getting rip roaring drunk around the ensuing blaze then looking up from the ashes and ruin in shocked amazement and surprise when they're told there isn't going to be any more. The cultural machine is like a rain forest or a coral reef. It's taken centuries to develop. When it's gone, it doesn't simply spring back because everyone suddenly sobered up and realized that they made a a tremendous mistake (wait, clear cutting Yosemite was a bad idea? Whoops!) This isn't creative destruction. It's just destruction. It's madness. It's wrong. And it needs to end.

ynniv 14y ago
You seem to think that any law is enforceable and with that basis, your arguments make more sense. But if I successfully lobbied and passed a law saying that anyone who swore, in public or in private, owed me a nickel, that law wouldn't last long. People wouldn't obey it, and sufficient application of force and surveillance to successfully enforce would only result in riots in the streets. There is more to lawmaking than desire. The problem is that technology has changed our reality. Making the artifact of media used to be difficult, hence profitable, centralized, and regulatable. In that context, protection is easy and acceptable. If a rogue publisher bucked the system, you could march in, trash his equipment and send the other publishers a signal. Now the equipment is in the pocket of hundreds of millions of people, for completely different reasons that are more important than movies. This TPB article is about one form of online sharing that is actually pretty easy to track. What you need to consider is offline sharing, which is next to impossible to track. Today's desktop hard drive can store roughly 2,000 movies, which with proper curation is basically every movie that matters. In five years, hard drives should be able to store 16 times that - certainly every movie and song that matters. Families will keep an encrypted heirloom drive of every piece of media they value, and share it when no one is looking. If searched, they would present a different file listing. What will you do then? How can you regulate something that you cannot see? You can try to burn a couple of offenders at the stake, but that's only going to make you look like a monster. I wish that I had an answer for you, but I don't yet, and neither is it my responsibility to have one. I can only tell you that times are changing. This constant refrain of finding a new business model is not to throw you out of the castle, but to warn you of the coming storm. The truth is that as much as we would like to help, as profitable as it would be to help, we can't figure out how to prevent copying. As far as we can tell, no one can prevent copying without outlawing computers entirely. So no, we are not an ignorant mob storming the vineyard. We are an intelligent mob trying to save those old vines from the coming eternal frost, and hoping that someone figures out how to grow them somewhere else. The destruction is out of our control. Apple and Amazon are doing the best jobs with the iTunes and Kindle stores, but even those look like passing fads when you could have a local copy of every movie, song, and book that has ever been notable. I hope that you realize that I would love to help you, WE would love to help you, if we had any idea how. Every VC would fund someone who could make this happen. All that we know right now is that legislation will not work, and will have vicious unintended consequences.

by alexqgb 14y ago

ynniv 14y ago

You seem to think that any law is enforceable and with that basis, your arguments make more sense. But if I successfully lobbied and passed a law saying that anyone who swore, in public or in private, owed me a nickel, that law wouldn't last long. People wouldn't obey it, and sufficient application of force and surveillance to successfully enforce would only result in riots in the streets. There is more to lawmaking than desire. The problem is that technology has changed our reality. Making the artifact of media used to be difficult, hence profitable, centralized, and regulatable. In that context, protection is easy and acceptable. If a rogue publisher bucked the system, you could march in, trash his equipment and send the other publishers a signal. Now the equipment is in the pocket of hundreds of millions of people, for completely different reasons that are more important than movies. This TPB article is about one form of online sharing that is actually pretty easy to track. What you need to consider is offline sharing, which is next to impossible to track. Today's desktop hard drive can store roughly 2,000 movies, which with proper curation is basically every movie that matters. In five years, hard drives should be able to store 16 times that - certainly every movie and song that matters. Families will keep an encrypted heirloom drive of every piece of media they value, and share it when no one is looking. If searched, they would present a different file listing. What will you do then? How can you regulate something that you cannot see? You can try to burn a couple of offenders at the stake, but that's only going to make you look like a monster. I wish that I had an answer for you, but I don't yet, and neither is it my responsibility to have one. I can only tell you that times are changing. This constant refrain of finding a new business model is not to throw you out of the castle, but to warn you of the coming storm. The truth is that as much as we would like to help, as profitable as it would be to help, we can't figure out how to prevent copying. As far as we can tell, no one can prevent copying without outlawing computers entirely. So no, we are not an ignorant mob storming the vineyard. We are an intelligent mob trying to save those old vines from the coming eternal frost, and hoping that someone figures out how to grow them somewhere else. The destruction is out of our control. Apple and Amazon are doing the best jobs with the iTunes and Kindle stores, but even those look like passing fads when you could have a local copy of every movie, song, and book that has ever been notable. I hope that you realize that I would love to help you, WE would love to help you, if we had any idea how. Every VC would fund someone who could make this happen. All that we know right now is that legislation will not work, and will have vicious unintended consequences.