[wst3]

Originally posted by tw
I believe you are misreading what I posted. Clearly stated is that the creator has a right to profit. Also that it is critical to the society / economy for innovations to be shared - to the advantage of all AND to the profit of its creator. The problem is one of people who stifle the new creations. This is but another problem, another example, of copyright and patent laws that require serious, pro-active legislation.

I guess I did miss something... if you believe that both society and innovators benefit from the protection of intellectual property why aren't you extending that courtesy to artists?

Originally posted by tw
However the fumdamental point I made was that the creator also must be able to profit from his creation - as muscians should be able to profit from their's. The problem with music is that for all practical purposes, it is all but public domain after five years - and the industry's non-innovators don't like it.

How is music "all but public domain" after five years?

Originally posted by tw
In some other points: the internet's first major function was to share Grateful Dead concert --- in the 1970s. The internet is that old - just was mostly in the acemdemic community.

The internet goes back to the late 50's, and it's principle purpose up until the world wide web was the dissemination of information between the DOD and academia. That tape trading went on between deadhead geeks at universities didn't bother anyone, including the Greatful Dead, back then because the band encouraged taping and trading.

Originally posted by tw
When is it illegal to copy something if you don't sell it?

When you prevent the person who owns the rights from recognizing a return. If I steal a car and give it to a friend is that legal?

Originally posted by tw Also this special exemption for entertainment is new to me - as is the interesting lawyer's twist of claiming the CD's are for music study.

You'd be surprised at the breaks musicians get<G>! If I buy a CD for the sole purpose of research I can write it off on my taxes... now my accountant tells me that such things can be red flags, and the number of CDs I buy for purely research is so small that I don't bother, but the idea that artists study other art is not new.

Originally posted by tw
Napster's loss in court was not that they were infriging on copyright but that they were doing damage to the industry. Napster was not selling anything. Indeed most of the music exchanges were not even on their machines. But it was Napsters action's that hurt the industry.

That is not how I interpret the news stories I've read. I understood that the Judge issued a TRO because she felt that the prosecutors had sufficient evidence of copyright violations to win their case.

Originally posted by tw
Limiting law only to it myopic perspectives, then OK, that is correct. Lawyers are only interested in the letter of the law - not its purpose. But I agrue that the Napster case ignored the bigger picture - that people and music creator both are denied rights to freely exchange (and profit) from new technologies because,<examples snipped>

Lawyers (and legislators) are supposed to think about the intent of a law, judges are supposed to interpret laws in their context.

You suggest that the bigger picture is that artists and consumers are supposed to be have access to free exchange - while at the same time allowing the creator to profit. If it is free than there is no renumeration, and no one can profit.

The really insulting irony is that the only one who profits from the Napster debacle was the greedy bottom feeders who started it.

Originally posted by tw
Any industry that is more worried about their profits than about their products - is no different than the mafia.

I don't know if that analogy fits perfectly, but the fact that most medium to large sized businesses fear Wall Street analysts is a symptom of the problem. The consumer is no longer the person to whom the CEO answers to (maybe they never really were), but rather, it is the investor who now calls the shots.

Originally posted by tw
The purpose of a company is to provide society with new products and services.

Maybe in a ideal world, but today, in the real world, most company's first priority is keepling the shareholders happy. And we've brought this whole mess on ourselves through rampant greed.

Originally posted by tw
If said company serves its purpose, then it deserves the REWARD - profits. If said company is only worried about profits, then it is to society's advantage that it have none.

Again only in the ideal world. And (getting back on topic) I really don't see how the corruption of the free marketplace can justify hurting yet another business person, in this case the artist.

Originally posted by tw
Napster indicates that the industry may have more profits than it deserves - not necessarily legally but economically and socially.

Who is it that decides whether or not a company makes too much profit? I know who decides when they don't, Wall Street, but who is appointed the profit czar?

If the marketplace provides demand, then someone is going to provide supply, and they'll play with the price point until they find their maximum return on investment. That's called free market capitalism.

You want to get really angry? Do a little research and find out how much it costs to produce a compact disc recording. Include the costs of A&R, recording, mastering, publicity, etc, and I think you'll still be quite surprised. Yet we still buy them, even though we are being taken to the cleaners every time. I believe that is called an inelastic demand<G>!

As far as Napster goes, the bottom line is that a couple of greedy folks (the kind that pander to Wall Street, probably East Coast MBA's) figured out a way to let people share files on their computers and get paid. They didn't need servers, they didn't need content, all they needed was a hacked up copy of NFS, and something to display banners.

They don't share all the income from banner advertising with the artists from whom they effect the theft of intellectual property, or their "customers", the people who think that the world owes them a large music collection. They keep it for themselves, all the while hoping to make the really big kill through venture capital and eventually an IPO.

From a purely pragmatic point of view, it is a very clever business plan. Sadly, if you consider it ethically, it sucks!

Yes, they have provided a glimpse of some of the innovations that are necessary in this new internetworked world, but they've done so at great cost to the artistic community that we need to provide us with content. That is as short-sighted as managing for quarterly profits.

The music industry as a whole has a long history of taking advantage of the artistic community! Their ranks include some of the most ruthless, unethical business people ever.

But they aren't stupid! They have been looking at ways to profit from the internet for several years. The first time I heard it discussed was at an Audio Engineering Society meeting in (I think) 1994.

The problems are great. Once you open that door you open it to both honest consumers and piratess, and one thing Napster has demonstrated is that many of the former are quite willing to become the later. All the more reason to be cautious.

If you think that is an exageration, the first circuit to unset the SCMS bit in the SP/DIF data stream was available on the net within a couple of months of the release of the first consumer DAT recorder.

The entertainment industry as a whole needs to figure out how to manage the internet before broadband connections become commonplace. This is not up for debate.

Stealing music from artists is wrong, no matter what the rationale, and I still don't see how this can be debated either. Two wrongs still don't make a right!