Copyright Law

Billy Bragg: Music Industry Wants ISPs to ?Do Their Dirty Work?

By soulxtc

Calls it an effort to avoid “dragging their customers though the courts, with all the attendant costs and bad publicity,” that they want a “simple, cost-free solution” to illegal file-sharing, and questions whether the music industry really has its best interests of artists in mind.

British singer/songwriter Billy Bragg has been a top spokesperson for the Featured Artists Coalition (FAC), a group of UK-based musicians that includes Radiohead, Iron Maiden, Jazzie B, Jools Holland, Kaiser Chiefs, Kate Nash, Klaxons, Richard Ashcroft, Robbie Williams, Sia Furler, and many more. Though their main purpose is ?the protection of performers? and musicians? rights,? the FAC has been very public of late in their defense of music pirates.

?It is time for artists to have a strong collective voice to stand up for their interests. The digital landscape is changing fast and new deals are being struck all the time,? said Brian Message, co-manager of Radiohead and Kate Nash in the coalitions first press release, ?but all too often without reference to the people who actually make the music.”

The FAC is speaking out again via Bragg who wrote an article recently in the UK’s Guardian questioning whether or not the music industry really has the best interests of artists in mind as it tries to get ISPs to fight illegal file-sharing on its behalf.

The UK music industry is ratcheting up its efforts to force ISPs to institute a graduated response system - aka “three-strikes” - that will disconnect file-sharers from the Internet.

“Stating that a ‘write and sue’ policy will not work is an admission that the current copyright law is no longer fit for purpose in a digital age,” he writes. “The government has pointed out to the BPI that if it wants to crack down on unauthorized file-sharing, the law is already on its side. Fearful of the prospect of dragging their customers though the courts, with all the attendant costs and bad publicity, members of the record industry have come up with a simple, cost-free solution to their problem: get the ISPs to do their dirty work for them.”

Bragg points out that the plan is flawed for several reasons. He says not only is it “shameful” to force another industry to prop failings of your own in another, but also questions how it expects to stay ahead of technology if it’s never been able to do so in the past.

“Any unauthorized file-sharers who fear being caught out can simply encrypt their exchanges,” he adds.

So who’s to blame for illegal file-sharing? Bragg says it’s BitTorrent tracker sites like The Pirate Bay not individual file-sharers “that are really ripping us off.” The music industry needs to find ways to “monetise their behaviour” not discourage it.

The Internet Services Providers? Association (ISPA), a trade association that represents ISPS in the UK alternatively argues that illegal file-sharing isn?t the real problem, that the creative industry?s failure to offer consumers legal alternatives is to blame.

“Internet companies remain extremely frustrated by the ongoing difficulties in securing licensing that is needed to offer consumers legal alternatives through new models of online content distribution,” the ISPA said recently. “It is our view that legislation on enforcement should only be introduced on the condition that the rights holder industry commits to significant licensing reform.”

The ISPA argues that content licensing reform is what?s really needed so that ISPs and copyright holders could develop viable, legal distribution alternatives to illegal file-sharing. Without them illegal file-sharing will always be prevalent. It calls the licensing process “complicated” and says that it?s the “root of the problem.”

At the end of the day Bragg, like most of us, realize what the music industry is really concerned about in all of this - distribution - and for good reason. That’s what record labels have always done. They’ve made physical albums and distributed them to music customers like any run of the mill manufacturing sector industry. With digital music they’ve been reduced to a bloated marketing and financing mechanisms for artists and they’re running scared.

“The question is, are the major labels too wedded to their old business model to be capable of leading the next generation?”

“It is all very well to claim that they have already transformed their business models online,” he adds. “Evidence suggests otherwise.”

Most would agree.

jared@zeropaid.com

Full post as published by ZeroPaid on May 19, 2009 (boomark / email).