Illegal file sharing on the Internet, what should we do?

SiD the Turtle

SiD the Turtle

SiD the Turtle

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So the Pirate Bay is up in court at the moment for sharing copyrighted material (or at least facilitating the process of allowing people to share these materials). Because of this news comments, blogs and forum posts everywhere are abuzz with the rights and wrongs of it all, so I thought I'd drag this debate to OcUK as well!

No matter your opinion on the way that the music and film companies persue file sharers, their profits or their way of doing things, or the technicalities of whether sites like the Pirate Bay are breaking the law, the fact remains that people are sharing materials that have cost money to make and expecting them for free. Surely this cannot be sustainable in the long run, you can't expect everything for free? At the same time you'd be dreaming if you thought that shutting the Pirate Bay down (and similar sites) will stop people from sharing media.

So my question is: the current situation is not sustainable, so what's the solution? Traditional methods such as a legal crackdown, perhaps a Canadian style tax on things like writeable CDs, a more radical shift in the music and film companies' business model to embrace file sharing or something else?
 
Piracy has been happening since the amiga days, thats a hell of a long time for a non sustainable system.

People will find a way to share things.

I don't know what the answer is to stop it, and doubt they will ever find one, short of arresting everyone who downloads anything.
 
The latter.

People/bands like Radiohead (to a lesser extent) and Trent Reznor off of Nine Inch Nails have shown that changing the business model can be a success.

I also think the price of CD's does not adequately reflect the cost of production either.
 
Thing is though "P2P" does not give away a physical good, it makes a digital copy of a digital copy - an act that has no price attached to it anyway.
My personal arguement is that none of the Copyright law is even designed to deal with digital systems, as you are merely transfering a bunch of 1s and 0s, not an actual object.

As for the solution, everything needs to be re-thought. The law that govern copyright and patents need to be re-worked so that they work in the digital age. The business models of the music and movie industry need to be re-done as well, once again so that they work in the digital age.
It is no use selling CDs if people expect music to be on their MP3 players. It is no use trying to sell MP3s online at a lower quality than CDs and for a higher price.

Perhaps this will be the end of artists making silly money so that they can simply go and waste if on whatever drugs they feel. However I doubt it, a successfull artist will always be able to draw good crowds to thier concerts and make decent money that way and from mechandise.
 
anticonscience said:
Piracy has been happening since the amiga days, thats a hell of a long time for a non sustainable system.

People will find a way to share things.

I don't know what the answer is to stop it, and doubt they will ever find one, short of arresting everyone who downloads anything.
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Yes, but the internet has made it sooooo much easier.

Back in the days of the Amiga, you might give a copy of something to a mate.

Now, a copy on a torrent site can be downloaded by anyone!

It's only getting easier and easier to download illegal copies, to the extent it's easier to click on a pirate copy link, than purchase a genuine copy online.
 
I have been thinking about this a fair bit recently, i honestly do not understand why the movie companies dont allow a digital download of brand new releases for a reasonable price e.g £1.00 per download with some kind of encryption or whatever that would allow the file to be only written to disk once.

I dont know how possible this would be or if the technology even exists but its the only way i can think that would be helpful to both party's.
 
anticonscience said:
I am 28, that's as far back as my involvement goes.
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Involvment?....quick who has the number for FAST handy?.....Let get him!!!

Seriously though, I remember the days of Pirate radio stations that used to transmit C64 and spectrum games over the airwaves that you could record on your Hi-Fi tape deck lol. Old skool WiFi
 
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This is going to turn into a massive argument.

The main problem is that a lot of younger people think that they are entitled to music for free and that record companies etc are all raping their artists.

I have argued - again and again and again - about this and why people NEED to buy CDs. It's not "all about the music, bro" because studio time is expensive and bands have to get that money back through CD sales.

What's the solution? Well, we're getting there. Slowly. Part of it is giving the music fans something that can't download. A lot of labels are now putting out special tins with CDs, t shirts, pendants, blah blah in instead. But a complete solution? Labels have been racking their brains for years and haven't come up with one yet.
 
zootfloot said:
I have been thinking about this a fair bit recently, i honestly do not understand why the movie companies dont allow a digital download of brand new releases for a reasonable price e.g £1.00 per download with some kind of encryption or whatever that would allow the file to be only written to disk once.

I dont know how possible this would be or if the technology even exists but its the only way i can think that would be helpful to both party's.
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Some companies have been experimenting with bundling a digital copy of the movie when you buy the Blu-Ray, The Dark Knight is a good example (though only in the States, natch).
 
rypt said:
My personal arguement is that none of the Copyright law is even designed to deal with digital systems, as you are merely transfering a bunch of 1s and 0s, not an actual object.
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Doesn't need to be. It's intellectual property just like a design.
 
Burnsy2023 said:
Doesn't need to be. It's intellectual property just like a design.
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A sequence of 0s and 1s cannot be classed as intelectual proerty really. The fact of the matter is, if I was to write by hand the same sequence of 0s and 1s it does not form any sort of design or file, it is just that a sequence ... it is how a computer interprets those numbers that matters. Now, who is to say that all computers should interpret all those numbers the same?

So does that mean we are protecting an idea, with no physical description or representation? Fine you might say, but then you cannot prosecute over transferring a bunch of 0s and 1s.
 
zootfloot said:
I have been thinking about this a fair bit recently, i honestly do not understand why the movie companies dont allow a digital download of brand new releases for a reasonable price e.g £1.00 per download with some kind of encryption or whatever that would allow the file to be only written to disk once.

I dont know how possible this would be or if the technology even exists but its the only way i can think that would be helpful to both party's.
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Because it would be a huge expense to them to manage it, and with hours programs would be out there to remove the encryption... So they'd just be helping the piracy...
 
Video piracy could be hugely decreased by giving a decent legal means. Something like iTunes where content is priced at a rate that is reasonable and there is a large archive, so you can usually find what you're after.

Why they haven't done it yet I have no idea.
 
The solution is.... make stuff cheaper to buy so that people can afford to buy it.

Even then some will still steal stuff.

There was a thread earlier about TV adverts. I'm all in favour of downloading programs to avoid these utterly stupid adverts being cramped down our throats. Plus we can get the new tv shows which are aired in America but don't get shown over here for months.
 
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