[Shum]

Whatever this alternative business model looks like it needs to be legally possible for me to watch any movie, listen to any song or read any book I like for free. Alternatively, people will find illegal ways to do this. They'll share files over this internet or bring their harddrives round to each others houses. Inevitably, the only way to effectively stop people doing this will be to ban private communication and have DRM required on all our hardware. Otherwise piracy will still be possible.

I'm all for rewarding artists to encourage them to create more work, but I'd rather it be impossible to finance big-budget cinema then have the kind of dystopia that would be required to enforce copyright law.

[twainer]

I hear you - and I do think the kind of distribution you picture is clearly where we are going to end up. It just takes time: time for hard-liners to retire, time for a hugely complicated distribution system to rationalize itself. But we will get there - and I think it'll be a great thing for all the arts.

Now, about it being 'impossible to finance big-budget cinema': the elimination of copyrights would hardly have that effect - it would actually make it easier to finance Hollywood movies because the cost of licensing works on which films are based would become zero. In the case of a film like Lord of the Rings - the estate's deal was for 7.5% of GROSS. Take those kinds of costs out and you get a much cheaper film to make.

As for a dystopia being required to enforce copyright law: all that is required to enforce copyright law is for the law to be aligned with the marketplace. In any such case, that means the law is infrequently or inconsequentially transgressed; it isn't the law that is feared it is the enforcement.

As I stated before, the law and the marketplace need to get together. When they do, it'll be a fine thing and won't require crazy DRM or a dystopia.

[Shum]

You mentioned "reasonable safeguards" but I don't see how any legal safeguards can be both reasonable and effective - If they're able to stop me from sending someone a copyrighted file then they're necessarily able to monitor and control every channel of digital communication that's available to me. I don't think we'll actually end up with crazy DRM and a dystopia It's just that that's the logical conclusion of the industry and government's current approach. Until we take a stand against this things will get worse before they get better.

When the law is aligned with the market people will choose to pay for things. The only safeguard content producers will have is people's sense of reciprocity. This transition will take time but its a transition that can and should be supported by people in the tech startup space.