[dundee] BBC News - European trade committee votes to reject piracy treaty

[Robert Ladyman]

> I just seen this this morning. Looks good to me but, thoughts? Comments?
>  Suggestions?
> 
> Lets open the floor up, what does everyone feel about the news?
> 
> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-18533268
> 

A  result against an industry that equates copyright or similar violations 
with Somalis with machine guns and that came about (for films) mostly through 
copyright and patent avoidance, but eventually succeeded in spite of strong-
arm tactics of an industry body trying to protect its interests...sound 
familiar? (It's only been 100 years or so, strange how they've forgotten:-)

http://www.filmsite.org/pre20sintro3.html
http://www.cobbles.com/simpp_archive/edison_trust.htm

I have sympathy with their aims but not their methodology, which seems partly 
driven by their failure to recognise that there need to be different 
approaches for different branches of so-called "IP", along with a better 
appreciation of just who their customers really are. My uninformed opinion is 
that, for music at least, their customers are not (or no longer) the end-user. 

Imagine that your fairy godmother waves a wand and gives you an industry that 
exists in a world where artistes can now distribute their own music and that 
your industry:-

* can produce CD's and LP's, tracks, etc., containing artistes' music;
* has recording studios for the use of artistes;
* has a publicity machine for promoting artistes;
* has finance available for funding artistes;
* has contacts in the film and theatre industry thereby allowing artistes to 
perform live.

Question 1: from the list above, for each service, who are your customers? [10 
marks each, for 50 marks]

Question 2: which customers are (or 'will the customer be' if only one) likely 
to cause you problems with "IP theft". Note: you will need to identify the 
copyright holder correctly as it might not be yourselves. [25 marks]

Question 3: if your answer to question 1 is NOT 'the end-user', should you be 
attempting to prosecute end-users and put in place systems to criminalise 
them? [5 marks + 20 marks for use of the word 'bizarre' in your answer]

Question 4: if you are not currently selling efficiently to your customers as 
identified in question 1, should you change your business model? Discuss, 
giving reasons for your answers. [900 marks]


RJL



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