The EFF Offers a Better Way Forward on File Sharing

Major Variola (ret) mv at cdc.gov
Thu Feb 26 10:01:05 PST 2004


Quoth A. Metet:

>>Many people have come of age with
the expectation that music ought to be free, because that is all they
have known. They see the creation of music as an inexhaustable fountain
from which they can drink as often and as long as they wish. Now that
they have gotten used to having their music for free, they won't want
to go back to paying for it.<<

Interesting that the govt and its RF licensees *created* this
expectation.
With the complicity of the creators and their ASCAP et al. mafia.

Since the 30s, people "came of age" with free radio, all you have to do
is listen to the commercials, you can tape what you want, and dupe those
copies too.  Later
the same situation with TV.

The  internet did the same with e.g., news and commentary, though there
was no govt-granted slice of spectrum involved here, just the value
of eyeballs, market share in an exponentially growing population.

The development of this expectation of "free as in beer" is really an
aside to Metet's essay.
But the EFF proposal which he lauds is just an upgraded ASCAP.  What
they and
others really need to get their heads around is the Street Performer
Protocol,
and/or the Grateful Dead business model.





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