I’ve just got back from C&binet forum, a government organised conference bringing the creative industries together to discuss the challenges and opportunities outlined in this year’s Digital Britain report. It was by and large a worthwhile event, and as always much of the value was in meeting talented people from all corners of the creative industry. On the downside, the debate in the main hall focussed way too much on ways of preserving outdated business models in the face of web enabled copyright infringement and not enough on ideas and business models which exploit the new realities.
Lord Mandelson announced this morning after keeping us waiting for a suitably rock n roll period of time that the government’s bright idea to combat file sharing is to send letters on a three strikes basis. What then happens isn’t clear, but I can’t help feeling it won’t work. Clearly the government has to be seen to do something, but I can’t help feeling this will drive the behaviour underground via encryption. Yesterday I asked Sion Simon if the government has an appetite for a war on files alongside the clearly very effective one raging on drugs. It seems they have. To be fair the announcement did hint at help for businesses offering credible alternatives to illegal downloads, but in true New Labour style there didn’t seem to be any clarity over what that will be. More positive was a commitment to fixing the UK’s arcane copyright laws, making it easier for artists to clear rights for the production of new work. As David Lammy said yesterday in his well informed speech, quoting Picasso; “good artists borrow, great artists steal.” So we look forward to the possibility of legislation which will enable a legitimate future for sampling, mashups and other digitally driven forms of creativity.
Tags: c&binet, copyright, government, UK, web
Andy Beeching says:
October 29, 2009
In regards to the the three strike proposal, I don’t think it will have much effect, especially when trying to prove people downloaded what the ISPs are accusing them of. The comments on this Guardian thread sum up the prevailing attitude of techno-elites pretty well (www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2009/oct/28/mandelson-date-blocking-filesharers-connections).
I’d prefer it if the Government through the resources going into this ‘war on filesharing’ at promoting and educating content producers and consumers alike about simpler and more flexible licences such as Creative Commons licences, created by Larry Lessig. In his last populist book Remix he doesn’t argue that stealing content is acceptable, but rails against what he sees as an effort by media conglomerates to perpetuate a ‘permission culture’ that is at odds with the malleability of digital media, and when historically the stranglehold on content rights by media companies is actually an aberration.