Berkman Center Releases Digital Media Policy Paper

from the taking-it-all-in dept

Copyfighter writes "Last year marked another messy chapter in the music and movie industries' transitions online. Legitimate offerings multiplied while the RIAA and MPAA continued their lawsuits against P2P systems and users, even as P2P traffic reached new heights. How -- if at all -- should policymakers attempt to resolve emerging digital media conflicts? The Berkman Center's Digital Media Project today released a new research study examining options for government action and how it could affect four different business models for the distribution of digital media. The authors caution that government intervention is currently premature because it is unlikely to strike an appropriate balance between the many competing interests at stake." I'm still reading through the whole thing, but it is quite interesting. The Berkman Center has been pushing the "collective blanket licenses" which I think is a good idea, but not the most efficient. The paper also looks at the concept that makes the most sense to me, though I feel they do it a disservice by naming it "ancillary products and services." That suggests a cheapening of the products, when all I'm saying is that this is what is happening naturally, and has the potential to be much bigger than anything else out there. It also ignores the fact that this actually encourages content makers to share more, and has a much large societal and economic benefits in the long run.

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