Quote:
Originally Posted by kennyc
So then what do we do, make the internet a pay-per-bit entity and pay out royalties to all content providers based on some algorithm?
No free downloads that way.
|
Well, in the UK at least our internet fees are going to rise dramatically to pay for anti-piracy schemes that are going to make no difference whatsoever. Those extra fees could certainly be spent in a more useful manner.
What did they do about piracy before the internet? Some countries had a levy on blank tapes, and the money went to large corporations. Creators never benefitted from that in any way, not even already established ones. So if the idea is to encourage the creation of new works, that is not the answer (but almost certainly what would happen with such a levy).
A better solution would be to count the downloads of each individual file and pay a few pence to the creator of that file for each download. That way even new/unknown creators will benefit if anyone thinks they are worth downloading. But there would have to be some legal digital counterpart on sale somewhere, otherwise writers like Rowling who refuse to release digital versions would obviously be downloaded a lot more than they would be otherwise.