Phil’s Diary - [Blog @ http://www.philsdiary.net/]
Of late we’ve seen music and now movie companys sue net file swappers who swap their property. It’s taken a hit from various quarters, some for being too severe, some for being a tad daft for suing your own fans/customers.
What I find interesting though is that at present the movie and music companys quite happily intermingle this sort of file swapping with the car boot sale selling of fake CDs/DVDs.
They do this partly by talking about both within days of each other, and partly by using the same names for the people; Pirates. It’s has been written a few times that “piracy” or “pirate” are innappropriate terms, because the art of copying and even distributing copywrited work doesn’t even come close to what traditional piracy really is. Using this name of course magically enables the movie industry to make the new “pirates” seem bad, without even trying. They don’t need to murder, rape, pillage nor burn. But using that term will of course have the effect of making them seem like they do.
In the past they’ve also used the argument of buying counterfeit or just straight copied DVDs/CDs as a source of funding for Terrorists, drug smugglers and organised crime gangs.
This may be so. But the current trend for suing file swappers really can’t be defended with the same arguments. Sure it’s taking someone elses copywrited work, but it can’t contribute to terrorism or crime gangs, because no money changes hands.
Instead this latest onslaught can only be defeneded by saying that it defends the profitability of the companys in question. Nothing more.
Now, I’m not defending “piracy”, neither version. I’m just interested in watching the way the companys are playing the latest game, and are happy to suck people in with arguments that really don’t apply to this sort of “piracy”. They’re doing it subtly, and carefully. But it’s still there. They’re carefully building an image int he same way that companys would build a brand, and that image is one of an outlaw who’ll happily do very nasty things.
Posted by Phil on December 14, 2004 10:46 PM | Categories: Thoughts