The calls are getting louder for an updated global copyright system to better address the fast evolving digital content economy of a hyper-connected world. The key question, it seems, would be where best to start?
An excellent article by Lawrence Lessig, in the Wall Street Journal, spells out the futility of trying to govern a digital content universe with an analogue biased copyright system. He also suggests five key changes to the copyright system that should set us in the right direction, and I have paraphrased / extended / commented on them, as follows:
1. Deregulate amateur remix - non-commercial and/or non-professional reuse of digital content should not be so tightly regulated. Amateur creativity should be encouraged and if, God forbid, it makes any money then the original creator should get a cut. What?
2. Deregulate the "copy" in Copyright - copyright is centered around the act of copying a work, however the digital realm is pervaded by this very activity (i.e. pretty much anytime content is transferred, played or otherwise reused), therefore digital copyright enforcement should be more focused on the use of the work rather than, as is currently the case, the act of copying (or perhaps "even making available for copying", to stretch the point).
3. Simplify Copyright - Please make copyright clearer, and simpler to understand, for mere end-users and other "casual pirates" of content. We are not all big media companies with access to expensive lawyers (and a vulture culture for forensic litigation). Enough said.
4. Restore Efficiency - copyright is an inefficient property system, but since technology now makes it easier to enforce, it should be the responsibility of copyright owners to maintain their own copyright after a shorter, automatic, 14 year term. Therefore copyright owners would need to clearly state their claim on a work after the initial term expires. Hmmm. Not so sure about this one, but I'll defer to Mr. Lessig's legal expertise.
5. Decriminalise Generation-X - Stop suing the youth. File sharing is not going to stop anytime soon and legal actions do not seem to have slowed it down or compensated artistes in any significant way. It is now time to explore various options for ensuring that artistes get paid even in a file sharing world, period.
It certainly all sounds like a load of common sense, but I'll leave you to make up your own minds. In the meantime, I think the best way forward may also benefit from the idea that, in a global digital content economy, (where content flows easily across national boundaries), we should seek to implement and embrace a global framework for copyright, in order to lessen the reliance on national systems that far too often add undue complexity to the notionally simple concept of Intellectual Property. This is, in many ways, similar to Prime Minister, Gordon Brown's call for an overhaul of the global financial regulatory system that would better serve the needs of a global financial economy. Perhaps the copyright system should also take heed before it suffers a similar fate.
About the author
Jude Umeh is a member of the UK's Sector Consulting Group in Capgemini's global Telecom Media and Entertainment (TME) community. His areas of expertise include: music, media and digital rights management; and he contributes to thought leadership development and delivery of solutions and services to the stakeholders in these fields. Jude is the author of The World Beyond Digital Rights Management.
Comments (9)
Leave CommentSurely that's what Creative Commons is all about.
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Hasn't a lot of this already been arriving under the banner of copyleft? Creative Commons licensing, in its various flavours, of work allows most of these activities.
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I have little understanding of how DRM works technically, but I have a little experience as a reader of an electronic book. I bought this ebook in March 2007 and used Adobe Acrobat Reader to read it without difficulty, until the end of September 2008 when the hard drive in my PC failed. I installed a new hard disc, installed Windows and all the rest of my software, and restored the ebook from a backup. The Adobe DRM website refuses to allow me to read my ebook, claiming that I have installed the ebook on a new computer. I have been struggling with Adobe this last month, to get my reading rights restored. It seems to me that DRM is very one-sided. My rights to read my ebook are largely ignored and when I "bought" this ebook, nothing was said about my having the right to read it during the lifetime of my PC - which is what the Adobe DRM implies. After this experience, give me "real" books every time.
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Correct. Various initiatives like the Creative Commons, copyleft, and even advocacy groups like Electronic Frontier Foundation and the Open Rights Group, are all on message about the need to evolve digital copyright. However I believe the time is right for major institutions/bodies like the World Intellectual Property Organisation, and perhaps even the United Nations, to also get involved and push the same agenda, especially in light of the current economic situation.
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Jeremy, your issue with ebooks effectively highlights the limitation of using digital control mechanisms in an analog world. It boils down to the question of intent - because the same mechanism that stops you from making an illegal copy of the ebook, perhaps for your friend to read on their PC, has also prevented you from reading your own book on your PC (albeit with a new hard disk). Unfortunately DRM, and other similar control mechanisms, does not 'get' the subtlety of your particular situation, hence the inconvenience of your having to communicate with a 'human' operator. Ergo we are not there yet -perhaps one day an AI system (that has passed the Turing test) will be able to discern human intention, but until then -hardcopy books will remain a safe option.
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first - please distinguish better between your thoughts and the quotes - I wasn't sure which bits were yours... The above all makes perfect sense. It's not really a big departure from where we are now. Few people in the UK get sued for downloading movies/songs and by the way it is going I doubt that will change, though you may get your internet cut off. The above ideas try to make sense of copyright as it really doesn't work in this day and age. The fact that A video is pulled from YouTube before the uploader is told about it means with enough lawyers you can censor youtube in the name of copyright enforcement. I have the right to resell just about everything I buy, and software/media is included. If DRM carries on as it does, I soon won't be able to buy a movie and then sell it on for £2 as I currently do, let alone move it from my old pc to my new one.
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Apologies for any confusion - the whole piece was intended to simultenously paraphase, extend and comment on Mr Lessig's observations, but point taken... Glad you agree with the points above. The big danger remains that if changes are not made now, it may prove exceedingly difficult to do so much later on, when it has become too far entrenched and embedded into the general system and psyche.
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I question how long copyright and now software patents really encourage innovation. Back in the old days companies had to work to keep ahead of competitors. They have to innovate. Normal software copyright was enough to give the firs to market an advantage because it takes time to re-implement - but now we have patents on abstract ideas. The ability to own ideas or even file formats may be wonderful for entrenched monopolists - but it surely kills innovation. There's no reason to keep ahead now, and competition can't flourish.
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Jeremy: The other benefit of a paper book is that you can lend it to your friends when you have finished reading it.
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