You have changed. Tell your MP.

Copyright Business

An entire generation is disregarding copyright law. it is not seen as useful anymore. "Information", they say, "wants to be free". Music file sharing is "normal".

Copyright law is intended to make sure artists get paid.

But copyright today is actually a big business for large corporations - Warner, Universal, Sony, EMI - to earn £M's. We have had the dot-com bubble, the housing bubble, next is the copyright bubble, ready to burst.

Copyright has been corrupted by the big labels who make all the money - for every £10 CD you buy, the artist get only £1, the government gets £2.50 in VAT!

Labels do this by insisting that artists sign away their copyright for songs and recordings, so they can control the sales and make even more money from back-catalogues. The payback, they say, is in the promotion and distribution of the work.

Enter the internet

The internet has created a way to do two things, share our views and deliver our needs.

The internet has changed everything, it has destroyed the Labels business model: artists no longer need the Labels to promote their work, nor to deliver it.

Labels can no longer keep artists captive with "Copyright = Promotion" contracts, nor the music delivery chain, CD manufacturing - distribution - retailing, under their control.

Bribery and corruption

Big business is bribing our government to attack us through the new Digital Economy Bill having ISPs monitor our internet traffic, which will cost £500M/year and we will have to pay. When you are suspected of file sharing they will send you threatening letters and the labels will sue for damages.

But this won't change people's attitudes. The battle is lost. Thank goodness. All we have to do is stop our elected government doing what the labels want, and have them do what we want. That is to force a change in the Label's business model.

Future

So if the purpose of copyright law has been corrupted, has it any further use in today's society?

Yes it has, but not in the hands of big business.

No one disagrees that artists should be paid, and this does not happen when you download a file, but don't pay for it. So file sharing is wrong.

The problem is that the Label's current business model is wrong in the internet age. We need a new model where artists can offer their products and get paid. This is growing and consists of two parts:

- Get known through social networks/relationships and viral marketing (promotion)

- Have a path to market through direct artist-to-consumer downloads (delivery)

You have only got to look at the phenomenal viral spread of Susan Doyle's songs through YouTube to see what I mean.

This is a challenge for a new entrepreneur, is this you?

Write to them

On a philosophical front, think about it, our Government is pushing for all its services to be provided over the internet. But takes exactly the opposite action to support music distribution on the internet by proposing the Digital Economy Bill (now in its first committee stage) that supports the outmoded Copyright-based business model.

Go to the web site They Work For Us and find your MP. Then write to them and stop the Digital Economy Bill file sharing provisions (the bill has a number of other aspects which are OK).

You might also want to read this The Copyright Bubble