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Originally Posted by Robbie
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I don't disagree in theory with what you're saying Adraco. But it wasn't just okay in the 1980's. It was okay in the 1960's and 1970's too. And long before that as well. My dad is an antique dealer...and not only was there an Edison phonograph with dual cylinders to make copies, but a lot of folks back in the 1800's would just take a blank wax cylinder, put it on a phonograph and bring another phonograph in front of it and record a copy.
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But big websites monetizing it and using people like pawns to do the stealing for them and then monetize the traffic has led us to what is happening today with entire sites being ripped and given away for free to millions of people. Thus completely devaluing the product.
That never existed until the internet age.
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BIG difference between friends sharing a tape compared to internet piracy and file sharing when applied to the real world.
And the factor that makes it completely different...is the guy running rapidshare or hotfile or piratebay making millions of dollars without lifting a finger while the folks who did the work, took the risks and had the creativity to begin with...starve.
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This is why I continue to value your opinion and try to read and follow your posts!
Already Gutenberg or the munks/priests copied, but at that time it was books. Allright, we can stop the history lesson there.
I of course concur with you that the problem arises when someone makes it a business, a very profitable one, to live and earn off of someone else's property/work. It would be like free books outside the store and free cd's outside the concert and somehow the one giving them out would earn by having ads on his shirt.
And maybe the only way to stop it/prevent it would be to limit the right to free speech, and not allowing such websites at all. Get Google and Yahoo onboard to not list them or the content, that you as an author "registers" your new content with the Big G&Y and receives some kind of key. Then it will only be allowed to be played/listed/shown on sites withch have the autorization key. Maybe making it illegal to advertise on those stealing sites? It's already complicated to host them and not many host's will touch them. By continuing to chase them, the cost of moving or protecting themselves will eventually became too high to make it worth it. Harder bank regulations, not allowing banks to move/handle such incomes. More digital money, so it could be more and easily followed. Unfortunately the US are ages behind Europe in this. I mean, writing paychecks to workers, sending affiliate commissions as checks - it all seems like a big joke
. Haven't seen a check in Europe or Japan the last 10-12 years, but everytime I'm in the States - everywhere. Hopeless! And so much harder to track down than would be bank payments all in the digital world.
Maybe this industry, which I'm not in full time just spare time, would need to come together and create some kind of union to work against this. Then questions comes to who to pay for it and how much? That's a different discussion, but as long as one guy sits over here having his own little empire and another over there with his little empire, it's very easy to use uerilla methods against both and take advantage of them not talking or being organized enough. For someone who sees the opportunity and is a little organized, they can even become larger than all those small empires here and there, and then by their sheer size be able to hire lawyers and techs to protect them, legally and technically.
Off to a meeting in an hour, gotta get ready. Good morning from Europe!