UK ‘three strikes’ rule for music pirates abandoned
The British authorities have been trying to mimic their American cousins by cracking down on illegal file-sharing and music piracy over the last couple of years. But the cornerstone of the efforts – an ISP-lead ‘three strikes and you’re out’ policy which would have seen persistent offenders booted off the Internet has now been abandoned.
The actions of the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) are well-documented. These music industry henchmen have tried to enforce a dying business plan on U.S. citizens rather than embracing the new technologies and fought to establish a new, workable solution for the long-term. This meant a lot of people were fined thousands of of dollars in an effort to set an example. The policy failed as music piracy is as strong as ever.
The British equivalent of the RIAA, the BPI (British Phonographic Industry), was a little late to the party, but 2008 saw this organization increasing its efforts to scare people into stopping illegal file-sharing of its clients music.
The onus was put on the ISPs to be responsible for what was sent over their wires. There were also the first rumblings of a ‘three strikes and you’re out’ policy. Virgin Media became the first ISP to agree to the measures, but the CEO of TalkTalk gave the first indications that not every Internet Service Provider would roll over quite so easily.
We ended up with a so-called ‘campaign of education,’ which saw hundreds of suspected illegal file-sharers receiving warning letters about their behavior. The letter also spelled out that if the offenses continued, the offender’s Internet connection was at jeopardy. But that no longer seems to be the case.
In an interview with The Times, David Lammy, the Intellectual Property Minister, claimed that due to the complex legal issues involved “I’m not sure it’s actually going to be possible.” This isn’t a surprising conclusion when there are an estimated seven million Brits sharing music illegally online. That’s rather a lot of people to deal with and regulate against.
Lammy added:
We can’t have a system where we’re talking about arresting teenagers in their bedrooms. People can rent a room in an hotel and leave with a bar of soap – there’s a big difference between leaving with a bar of soap and leaving with the television.
And quite right too. The music industry isn’t quite so happy with these latest turn of events, however, but the three strikes policy was always heavy-handed and unworkable. It was also a short-term solution to an issue that needs a much bigger rethink. Music piracy might sill be illegal (clearly) but at least you won’t get booted of the Web for it now. Unless you live in France.
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January 27th, 2009
Another stupid unworkable and pointless idea on this bites the dust.
The music and movie business are just going to have to get used to the idea that nobody is going to be destroying the internet to save their dying & outdated business model.
They are not the only businesses out there and everyone else makes far too much money out of it (and the music and movie businesses are just practiced liars, they make a lot of money out of it too).
They are even so blind that they deny file sharing generates sales.
But it only generates sales of their good products.
It is fair to say it kills sales of the ton of sh!t they pump out.
Try before buy.
Even the car industry will let you test drive a car for a few days and accept you might not buy in the end.
The facts speak for themselves –
“Ten Million Unsold Digital Songs
by George Ziemann — December 23, 2008
If you finally achieved retail distribution this year but still didn’t sell a single copy, well, you’re not the only one.
From TechRadar UK:
Recent figures suggest that out of the 13 million tracks available for download, just 52,000 songs made up 80 per cent of music purchased online.
When it comes to albums, a staggering 1.23 million albums were made available with just 173,000 bought which equates to 85 per cent of bands and singers who released an album this year did not sell one single copy.
Okay, first of all I’d like to point out that the RIAA claims to own 85% of all recordings released. This would mean that, at a minimum, 70% of the RIAA’s releases did not sell a single copy this year. This is the obvious result of telling us not to listen to them. So that’s working.
If you’re hoping to get rich selling music on Amazon or iTunes, think again. It’s just not going to happen anytime soon. If you’re in it for the long haul, though, you can take heart in the fact that if you sold one single album this year, you’re in the top 15 percent.”
http://www.azoz.com/newsarchive/2008/12/unsold.html
So, there you are, 70% of music releases fail to sell a single copy.
There’s the businesses’ problem right there.
It has nothing to do with people sharing files (which is a lie they have been pumping out – and supposedly suffering from – since the days of cassette tapes.
Anyone remember this gem?
http://www.orbitcast.com/archives/Home_taping_is_killing_music.png
They will never stop people sharing.
They ought to let it go and concentrate on supplying a quality product with so much ‘added value’ that the download, even the freebie download, is seen as very much second best.
But then they’d have to bother and spend a few more pennies than they would want to.
So they pick the easy way, the way that provides a gravy-train for their colleagues and friends no matter how dumb it is or how many ‘little people’ they ruin with their outrageously disproportionate fines etc etc.
January 27th, 2009
Far be it from me to suggest that the UK Gov is not fully capable of producing dumb & unworkable legislation (like every Gov I guess) but I think this is related to events in the EU.
Thankfully the EU have not fully swallowed the Anglo-US business model and will make a more frequent stand for the consumer (as opposed to doing just about anything big-business bl**dy well wants).
Here’s what happened in the EU last April –
“European politicians have voted down calls to throw suspected file-sharers off the net.
The idea to cut off persistent pirates formed part of a wide-ranging report on creative industries written for the European parliament.
But in a narrow vote MEPs backed an amendment to the report which said net bans conflicted with “civil liberties and human rights”.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7342135.stm
Would that be an example of a responsible and responsive Parliament or just a bunch of politicians trying to make themselves look good and buy votes, eh Dave?