The Corruptibles- Entertainment Industry Supervillians

I came across this link in the Microsuck forums: http://www.eff.org/corrupt/

I found it very entertaining. On another level, it's sort of scary. The old guard entertainment industry and the new media of the internet are a sharp contrast in paradigms. Under the old paradigm, information could be produced and controlled. In the 1950s, for instance, movies were made and shown in theaters. The studios had complete control over who saw the movies and how much they paid. The average home user did not have the equipment to copy the old vinyl records, so those could be controlled as well.

Today with the internet, information is thought of as something to be shared. Thanks to the Open Source movement, even software is thought of as something that people can share amongst each other. I almost balk at the price of Microsoft Office considering that Open Office does not have a cost up front. Linux is free, which makes me wonder what the point is to paying for Windows Vista when it comes out next year. Actually, when you buy software, what you're mostly paying for is support. If you buy a copy of Red Hat Linux, you are paying for the priviledge of making a phone call when something goes wrong. Of course you're also paying for the man hours to develop and maintain the software in most cases, but this is a discussion for another entry.

A problem seems to have arisen now that the two paradigms have clashed. We often think of information as something to be shared, and they think of it as something to be controlled. Most blogs these days have a Creative Commons license stating what way the information contained on that blog can be shared legally but may have limited restrictions. Many people create their own music and videos and humor and software and have no problem with sharing them under certain limits. The Old Guard does not like that. They have been very slow to adopt the new ways and when they do it is often under draconian measures such as DRM (dark arts if I have ever heard of any).

DRM adds a dimension of assininity (is that a word?) to the purchase of information. In the old days, I could buy a book and read it, then give it to my wife. I could give it to you and tell you that you should read it. With DRM, I may buy an ebook and the only way I can read it is on my laptop or Pocket PC. I can't share it with my wife. Music is working the same way. You can't buy a song and share it with your friends.

I've heard some very silly things about the "legal" music sharing networks. Some colleges will pay for them so that students can use them for free, yet the students choose not to use them. The songs that they download are only good until they graduate. What is the point of that? Music hasn't been that big a part of my life in several years, and the greedier the RIAA and MPAA get, the less I care for their products. Why should I go out of my way to buy a movie or CD if it's going to install a rootkit on my laptop, or if I can use it on my laptop but not on my desktop computer? What if I can't download a song to my Pocket PC? I'm sorry, but I can't think of a single artist who is worth all of that hassle.

So where do we go from here? Well, there are plenty of public domain and independent sites. If you like the classics, manybooks is a good place. There are some good independent song artists out there, and some bands are starting to embrace the new paradigm.

Now, I'm a free market kind of guy. Don't think I am disparaging ANYBODY from making a profit from their labor. I am not. However, if you can't play to the market, then you obviously don't deserve to make that profit, do you? Markets change, and you have to stay on top of them. I really don't buy movies anymore, except for some of my favorites, thanks to my wife's Netflix subscription. I don't even deal with Blockbuster anymore. If I want a movie, I put it in the que, when it comes I watch it, then stick the movie back in the mailbox. The hardest part of this process is finding time to watch the movie. If I really have to listen to music, there are plenty of internet radio sites. I don't understand paying for these things. I haven't even tried to figure out what they mean with how many downloads per month you get.

As for ebooks, I actually haven't embraced this yet. I don't mind book length material off the web. I've read several of these. I don't read many ebooks because they often require Adobe Craprobat, I mean, Acrobat, which I don't like to use any more than I have to. There are some decent free .pdf viewers out there, but some features work best in Adobe. Sometimes they require a proprietary reader, and I am not very fond of proprietary software. Sometimes it is required, but often it's more painful than it's worth. I have no idea what happened to Microsoft Reader. I thought it used to come pre-installed with Windows, but it doesn't seem to anymore. Now it must be downloaded and it keeps reminding you to activate, and it's been years since I've seen content for it anyway.

We'll have to sit back and see if this new paradigm will be market driven, or shoved down our throats by the "old guard". I do hope that the free exchange of information is honored.