Cringely Proposes a Music Sharing Alternative

WEFUNK writes "The I, Cringely 'Pulpit' column at PBS presents an interesting idea for a new business model to take on the RIAA. He suggests that a publicly traded company could legally and profitably buy a single copy of each record which could then be freely copied and listened to by its shareholders under fair use. His 'Snapster' (Son of Napster) proposal is essentially a digital music co-op that would let shareholders/consumers bring copyrighted material into a quasi-public domain. While fair use and the public domain continue to be lost in our courts and congresses, maybe the capital markets will offer an alternative." While a neat idea, it's doubtful that it'll ever be implemented. Still, it's a good read.

FP

[usotsuki]

Fair use...that'd be so roxor.

-uso.

I can see it now...

[trudyscousin]

...the retail price of a CD jumps from $18.99 to $1899.

Re:Wow this usage seems very fair

[whiteranger99x]

There is no such thing as fair use. Just ask the RIAA.

You got that right, they definitely put the "F-U" in Fair Use! ;)

Re:Wow this usage seems very fair

[archen]

I donno about that. The musicians feel pretty used, and the RIAA thinks its fair.

Re:really?

[YllabianBitPipe]

I have an mp3 collection, not an audiophile collection. This is pop music we're talking about ...

Re:Best Article Ever

[El]

Try this experiment:

1) Buy one share of any RIAA member company.

2) Taking your share certificate with you, walk into their corporate headquarters with a CD burner, and demand to be allowed to make a copy of the IP you "own".

3) Be sure to bring ear plugs, as the laughter may exceed safe decibel levels!

v2.0

[ryanr]

OK, I thought of an improvement.

We'll sell shares in the Library of Congress. They will be issued to all citizens of the US, and the government can come up with some sort of service to collect revenue to fund it. Then, we'll have the right to a copy of anything in the Library of Congress (inc, tm (r)).

Now to figure out some way to trick all of the producers of copyrighted works into giving a copy to the Library of Congress...

logical next step

[frovingslosh]

No, your Honor. I did not pay this woman for sex. I bought a share into the corporation that she is married to.

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[account_deleted]

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Re:Best Article Ever

[LiquidCoooled]

make it a 48 speed cd and we will hear the laughter from England!

a more realistic version

[moral kiosk]

If this sounds good to you, you'll totally love my new plan:

1. Forward this note to five of your friends and send me and the ten people before me on this list a dollar and an mp3. Maybe on one of those cute little CDs. Then your friends will send you a dollar and an mp3, and soon you will have forty gazillion dollars (3. Profit!) and so many THUMPIN' TUNES that you won't ever have to buy another Now That's What I Call Music until they're at, like, eleventy billion. (What? They are at eleventy billion? Well, then infinity raised to the eleventy billion.)

2. Seriously, I mean do you know what five times five times five times five times five is? That's huge! And that's just how much you'll have after just five 'links in the chain'. But if you don't forward this right away, you'll have lots of bad luck. Oh and also I have testimonials, but I forgot to put them here, but they are totally convincing. Oh and we'll sell stock for $20 at our IPO, no problem. Just 'cause I'm totally awesome.

DON'T BREAK THE CHAIN!!! OR RIAA AND SATAN WILL PREVAIL!!!
3. Profit!

But seriously, no matter how you slice it, Fair Use does not involve making money, even if you try to dance around with some sort of 'public ownership' hogwash. The legal restrictions on what one (or many) can do with a copyrighted work seem much more well-defined and far-reaching than the rights that one enjoys, and no reasonable judge is going to swallow this. Moreover, no sizeable popular base will get behind it because it so obviously screws the musicians (even more than they are already being screwed).

When the power players abuse the intent of the law in favor of the letter, we all cry foul. But those cries carry less weight if we start sniffing around for loopholes of our own. The real problem, as always, is that the power players get to write the laws. They have the muscle to close our loopholes, whereas all we can do is find somewhere to bitch about theirs. Until that changes, any legal tomfoolery that we manage to abuse will just distract attention from the more fundamental problems.

Re:Why make a copy?

[pediddle]

I believe you can already go to an organization called a "library" to do this "borrow" thing you're talking about -- for free. The only thing new that you're proposing is that they mail you the copy.

I also heard about this new place down the street called a "video rental store". I hear it's cool -- I'm gonna go check it out soon.