[FussyZeus]

The fact is both sides of this have a lot to answer for in terms of eroding the underlying relationship when it comes to any consumer/creator transaction. For a long time media companies made it artificially hard to purchase content legally and in so doing are at least partially responsible for the rampancy of piracy. In turn, a lot of people got used to pirating content for free instead of paying for it, even when reasonably priced options were made available.

A decent number of pirates now refuse to pay for digital content/software because "information should be free." This is a farce and anyone who earns a living writing software or producing content knows it.

A decent number of media companies now treat their customers like criminals, constantly checking and rechecking if they actually own the stuff they're trying to use, which would be fine more or less if the software doing this actually worked. If any one of the thousand links in that given chain break, then the media the customer has paid for becomes unusable or is even deleted, and that is unacceptable.

Both sides have their bad actors and it's hard to see a way out of this mess.

[6stringmerc]

This is very encouraging to read and I'm in complete agreement. I've posted a link to my essay in this thread because I share the media/tech slugfest perspective.

Personally I think the starting point to get out of this mess is an overhaul first and foremost of Copyright terms. They're so far out of whack it genuinely stifles innovation and expression and progress...etc. Now, more than ever, time moves quickly - what may be profitable yesterday (e.g. "Gangnam Style") may quickly fade. Thus it stands to reason that temporary protections should be, well, much more temporary! I say this as a content creator and paying customer - life + 5 years is, to me, more than fair. There's a window to allow families of the deceased creator to make a bit of cash and get their affairs in order before the works head into the Public Domain for the benefit of all.

[TheOtherHobbes]

The problem is the greed and narcissism on both sides.

The content corps make a ton of money by exploiting creative people. They used to be able to justify this by claiming that they sponsored and nurtured talent.

That was always a stretch, even when 15% of a CD sale - maximum - went to the original creator, and the rest to the rest of the industry. But advances did happen, and they were the only way creatives could afford to get on the first step of the professional ladder.

Now we have shitty YouTube and Spotify streaming deals where advances don't happen, and the industry - all of it - keeps way more than the 85% of nominal value it used to.

But the "I want it, so you should give it to me for nothing because it costs nothing to copy" pirates aren't any better.

How many pirates have made any effort to sponsor creators, or pay creators directly for original content?

So what we actually have isn't a moral battle between good guys and bad guys. It's a battle between two distribution cartels - one legally sanctioned, the other not yet sanctioned but hoping to be.

And both are increasingly indistinguishable in their lack of interest in sponsoring and promoting original creative work.

[icebraining]

How many pirates have made any effort to sponsor creators, or pay creators directly for original content?

Studies in Norway, the UK, Australia and the US have shown that pirates actually spend more than the general population on digital products like music and films. The idea that you're either a Buyer or a Pirate is not, and has never been true.

The fact is that a lot of people simply can't afford to buy all the content they enjoy, and while some may find that morally repugnant, cracking down on that piracy won't bring a cent more to authors.

[swsieber]

Citations please? I agree, but would like to have sources to back up my own observations.

[icebraining]

Norway: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2009/apr/21/study-finds-pi...

UK: https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20121126/00590921141/dear-...

US: http://www.digitalmusicnews.com/2016/02/26/57-million-americ...

Australia: https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20150722/06502731723/aussi...

[swsieber]

Many thanks :)

[DanBC]

> How many pirates have made any effort to sponsor creators, or pay creators directly for original content?

At least some, because cstross and Stewart Lee (among many others) have bits on their websites about what to do if you've somehow got some pirated content of their and wish to give them money for it.

(cstross asks people to buy a book, which sends money to the infractructure he uses to produce books. Stewart Lee asks people to send money to a donkey sanctuary.)

Some forms of piracy have been recognised by industry who changed practice to mitigate. Parent who buy DVDs tend to buy many, and to see them destroyed by children. It's easy for parents to buy a DVD then download another copy of the film than to keep rebuying the same DVD. Disney now provide a free digital download when you buy a DVD/Bluray.

[6stringmerc]

Very well thought out response and I think you do touch on something I'm aware of and might be able to mention:

There are fan-artist platforms in existence. Patreon is one of the most prominent. BitTorrent now has a "rolling" grant process (disclosure: I plan on applying) to nurture talent by way of financial and promotional backing. These avenues exist, but they are, frankly speaking, outside the RIAA-dominated easy-access to content services like YouTube or Spotify.

The music business claiming artists "used to" make a living off sound recordings is total garbage. It only applied to the top 1%. The tech industry claiming that it's "being persecuted and rights are being trampled" when the root-motivation is to disrupt an industry for profit without the bothersome issue of negotiating licenses for content is also garbage. In the middle, fans & artists both kind of lose out in the grand scheme of things.

[FussyZeus]

> The content corps make a ton of money by exploiting creative people.

That shouldn't be part of this debate. It's despicable, there's no doubt but a company doing unethical things doesn't give license for anyone to steal from them. If you don't want to support them that's your choice, you can't choose to steal the product under the banner of moral outrage and claim to be in the right.

Tons of companies exploit tons of people, creative and otherwise. I can't steal a Ferrari because one of the engineers feels underpaid.

[xg15]

It shouldn't, but supporting artists is often brought up as an argument from the content industry to justify DRM or absurd lengths of copyright. So it's valid to debunk that argument in this context.

Of course that doesn't change the fact that supporting artists is an actual problem and TheOtherHobbes' objections to the privacy cloud are very real. However, there are other projects (e.g. Patreon) that experiment with solutions without resolving to DRM.

[xg15]

piracy crowd*. I don't even

[snuxoll]

> A decent number of media companies now treat their customers like criminals

To the point that the majority of the ways we consume video these days don't even allow us to keep copies locally. Thanks for letting me cache content on mobile devices Amazon, but a big middle finger for not being allowed to do so on my PC so I can actually strip the damned garbage and put it into Plex so everytime I put on a show for my daughter I have to navigate through all the other "offerings" you have available because there's no way for me to just organize and curate what displays on screen.

It's gone beyond just treating customers like criminals, as a result of getting locked into video providers we have to wade through a deluge of adverts for other content instead of being allowed to control our own experience. I'm this far away from just throwing money down to rebuy all my children's content on iTunes and pay the $50 for a DRM removal tool just so I can regain the control I had over my experience like I had when I first started purchasing digital media.

To make things more irritating it's horrendously difficult or simply impossible to actually buy physical media for a lot of things, especially TV shows, these days. Ripping a blu-ray is easy, I have yet to find any solution for stripping Widevine off a streaming video.

[njharman]

> reasonably priced

When a cartel has monopoly on distribution (which is $$ thing copyright provides and DRM attempts to shore up) and thus sets prices and even when/how/if you get to buy/rent content, how can you claim to know what reasonable price is?

Your other claims are even more spurious. "A decent number of pirates..." Yeah, how many is that? what % is "decent"? what study are you citing for this shocking revelation? and what exactly is the economic impact of these people refusing to buy what they were never going to buy anyway but proving free markting? Cause there are actual studies showing piracy increases sales. You can use the google. Though, I suspect you're too lazy, here's one https://ideas.repec.org/p/qed/wpaper/1354.html

The problem facing media industry is that the actual value of most content is probably near $0.00. The supply of content is unbelievably massive. Far outstriping demand. So, the Media industry spends much money to generate artificial demand. Through marketing, advertising, whole shows / channels E! exist only to generate demand for content and voa lobbying for distribution restrictions.