Pew Study: File Traders Don't Care About Copyright 494
An anonymous reader writes "A recent poll by the Pew Internet and American Life Project focused on that portion of the file trading community that is over 18. The major finding is that two-thirds of all file traders in this age bracket are not concerned about violating copyright laws. This remained consistant even when they split up the respondents by sex, income, and race."
No kidding, really? (Score:5, Insightful)
The other 33% (Score:5, Insightful)
Sweet (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously though, we live in a democracy, congress gets to set the limits it wants. If life + 90 years is 'reasonable' then so is a day. Copyright protection is a matter of practicality, not morality. If it's impractical in it's present state, then we should change it.
Note to RIAA: we will dance on your grave.
Re:No kidding, really? (Score:4, Insightful)
You really think that the average music file trader is an expert in copyright law??? Somehow I think it's more likely that people see other people getting music for free and decide to get in on a good deal.
Poll Rating: -1, Tautology. (Score:2, Insightful)
Furthermore most really free stuff can be easily downloaded from special websites.
So, I wonder about these guys who need a poll to get the result that people who are circumventing copyright laws don't care about copyright.
Usually you would suspect that every person on this planet has something called "common sense".
Next we'll see from these guys:
- Thiefs don't care about property.
- Phyromaniacs like fire.
- Drug dealers don't care about the health of other people.
- Bush invaded Iraq for Oil.
- Communism is a oppressive dictatorship.
- Linux and FreeBSD are for free.
But on the other hand, not everybody can be as clever as me.the law is only the result ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Therefore, the public *owns* the political process.
When the RIAA says they want to educate the public about the law, the public may eventually lash back by educating the RIAA about what it means to be at the receiving end of the public's wrath.
I'm sorry but it will never be a crime... (Score:5, Insightful)
In most people's minds, this is a crime in exactly the same sense as going 5 clicks over the speed limit. People just don't even think about it.
And when they do they just don't think its important. This is the reason that the more the RIAA ramp up the legislation and bully-boy tactics, the more they will get up the nose of Joe Average.
Everyone agrees that, in the abstract, speeding can kill people, just as in the abstract, people agree that musicians need to get rewarded. However, no-one thinks THEIR teensy, weensy breach will really hurt anyone.
see what the future brings (Score:2, Insightful)
these scare tactics will work in my eyes, as people will get educated by the laws that are being introduced slowly but surley by the riaa and its henchmen...
surely a handfull of people wont care and continue and it will take a lot more than a few laws to eradicate the filesharing scene, since its roots are deep..but at the end of the day the normal non-geek user will stop and start using itunes and its clones and start paying...
at least thats what i think...
(OT) Are your examples tautologies? (Score:3, Insightful)
Drug dealers don't care about the health of other people.
I have pharmacists in my family. Please don't knock the profession.
Bush invaded Iraq for Oil.
Are you sure? I seem to recall that the government had evidence that Iraq was getting ready to attack the United States. The forces in Iraq may not have found a smoking gun, but there was still enough evidence to warrant an invasion under the previous United Nations resolutions.
Communism is a oppressive dictatorship.
Perhaps as misimplemented by Joseph Stalin and his followers, but I've read that even Vladimir Lenin didn't like the direction the government was going under Stalin.
Linux and FreeBSD are for free.
In other words, you confirm that your time is worth little to nothing [google.com].
Playing the Game (Score:5, Insightful)
Ex1: Disney's obvious bribing of Congress to get the Copyright length extended.
Ex2: AOL, Microsoft etc bribing state politicians to pass DCMA even though it is as anti-consumer a law as you can get.
and so on....
The republic is a broadcaster-ocracy (Score:2, Insightful)
but in the end the political process will always revert to majority rule.
The people may control the republic through voting, but the broadcasters control the people to a large extent. TV and radio advertising paid for with campaign contributions from broadcasters seems exempt from FCC "equal time" regulation. MPAA movie studios own all major U.S. commercial broadcast networks except NBC. Get the picture?
Re:No kidding, really? (Score:3, Insightful)
And it doesn't matter if the most common use might be infringing--P2P apps have non-infringing use, and thus are legal (q.v. the Betamax case).
Question for the RIAA (Score:1, Insightful)
You can't stop it. What are you going to do about it? Stop selling music? Hah. If you can hear it, you can record it. Give it up.
Don't think I don't buy music, though. [apple.com]
Copyright has never been accepted by the public (Score:5, Insightful)
The copyright system has traditionally been a system that concerns professional authors and professional publishers and distributors. The general public has never really had a need to pay any more attention to copyright than to many other business-to-business issues or issues that concern a narrow field of profession.
Now basically every individual who can access the Internet can distribute works in massive quantities. Any person who makes their own web page and has a few hundred visitors has done what was very hard for an average person a decade ago. Publishing is no longer an expensive task that only traditional medias such as newspapers and record companies can afford.
The copyright system will eventually go through a major reform. The current form is simply designed for a situation where there are few authors and few publishers and then the general public that isn't either an author or a publisher. That situation no longer matches the reality which is why a new copyright system (if there will be a copyright system at all) will need to handle copyright as an issue that concerns each and everyone.
Re:WHAT GOES AROUND COMES.. (Score:4, Insightful)
RIAA buys more laws with more bribe money not to charge customers to copy the above music 50 cents per violation (like they got away with above), but rather to hit them with multi thousand dollar lawsuits.
RIAA then buys more laws making copyrights to be infinate in length (effectively).
Then some wonder why people have no respect for copyright laws as they are now. Uh... why should we? The current laws were all bought and paid for, and represent the interests of 'we the people' in no way whatsoever. So screw them..
If CD's sold for $5 per disk (which is what they should sell for without all the cartel and payola action), the problem would pretty much go away, as most people wouldn't have a problem buying CDs for that price rather than hassle with looking for downloading them.
Re:Poll Rating: -1, Tautology. (Score:1, Insightful)
-Henry David Thoreau
Are the law outdated ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Then came Gutemberg. He found a way to make numbers of copies of a single work much faster. The initial work was still a long process.
Now, anyone can have a copier at home and copying of paperwork became available to anyone. But "production" costsof a copy and the finish of that copy are still quite expensive in comparison to "commercial" process. And duplicating a book damage the original and is still slow.
There are some "pirate" distribution of books, but having a book scanned in PDF or in TXT is not similar to hving the real thing.
For the music, the way was a little bit different...
At the beginning, there was NO way of recording music. Bands were paid to play. Then came the firsts recording, which were process unavailable to people (a little like Gutemberg press) and there was a protection which was mostly between companies (not companies vs individuals). This is like what we have for books.
Then, new media appeared, beginning by big tapes on a wheel, then the tapes we still use today, then the CD and now, computer formats like MP3.
The biggest difference is that, where it's still more expensive, destructive and less appealing to copy a book by an individual, copying a song is (very) cheap, don't damage the original recording and with color printers and scanners, you can have a CD-box with a copy of the original artwork or some custom artwork. Only the on-cd picture can't be done.
So, even if the law protecting both a book and a music record is the same, we have 2 distinct situations.
Add to that the fact that many musician complain about recording companies, that even if the manufacturing costs have dropped, the cost of music has increased (the cost of books has DROPPED).
One more is the fact that record companies are introducing more and more "one-shot" artists (making new stars from nothing, using mass advertisement and such). When you like some artist which make new musics of equal (or similar) quality over the time, you are more willing to buy its CD than when it's some "jack out of the box" artist you don't know and which won't last past the summer. You can be willing to support some artist you like, but when it's a one-shot artist, you are NOT given that opportunity.
And you can add to that the fact that many songs are unavailable at stores because the recording companies found that these were too old or that there is no interrest in these. While you can rent a book at the local library and won't probably read it again and again, this is not true when we are speaking of music because when you like a song/tune, you'll listen to it again and again nad will need to keep it. and if you can't find it at your local music-store, you're left with only ONE solution : copying it.
We have a similar problem with films. many films are NOT worth the price you've to pay for them. and, when you've paid to see it in a theater, you could find it incorrect to have to pay for it again to see it at home... not speaking about the many films which NEVER find their way out of their original country because of lack of interrest.
For films, we see more and more films with nearly no story but loads of known actors and of special effects. This lead to lots of "junk" with little interrest, which cost more and more to produce and is less and less worth it's price... and while the actual manufacturing of the film support (VHS or DVD) is less and less expensive, prices have actually gone UP.
Both for music and films, the people feel that it has a "real" value which is constantly decreasing and a price which is increasing... Add to that the wories like protected-CD (well... these are not really CD as they don't conform to the standard)
Re:Question for the RIAA (Score:4, Insightful)
Then you go and copy the book. Normally, you have to pay for the copies. This is cheaper than a book from the store. But the quality is inferior since you only have a stack of paper as opposed to a handy book. You can not reproduce a printed book digitally - this is a totally different matter with e-books.
Furthermore, in some countries it is legal to reproduce excerpts (for personal or scientific usage) from a printed book since the author receives additional compensation based on the number of books sold. In Germany, this would be money from the VG Wort [vgwort.de].
Re:Poll Rating: -1, Tautology. (Score:1, Insightful)
Laws are not about justice. They are about keeping out the tyranny of the mob.
The interesting thing about this survey.... (Score:5, Insightful)
For a quick lesson in socialogy, legality is whether the law has determined something to be wrong. Deviance is whether or not it is against societal norms.
Speeding is and example of something that is NOT deviant, but is illegal. EVERYONE speeds, if only a little bit, despite that the law says you arn't supposed to. When a situation like this arises, usually the law is repealed, the punishment is slack, or there is leeway when enforcing the law. That is why cops tend to be lenient with speeding tickets. Cops will let you get away with 5-10 MPH over, while someone who is doing 35+ over will almost certainly come down hard. Prohibition in the 20's is another example, except in this case, the laws were repealed. (there are probably more recent examples, but IANAL, or a socialogist, so I havn't done much research)
This survey shows that amoung (american) internet users, file-sharing(downloading) isn't deviant, despite it's illegality. I'm going out on a limb here, but I'd say in most of the world, file-sharing isn't illegal, and it certainly isn't deviant. Even if laws are passes to severly punish the users, the judiciary system will almost certainly strike them down if the behavior is relativly harmless (nobody is getting killed), and it isn't deviant.
Sign the tide is turning? (Score:5, Insightful)
It is amazing to see how the people are always right, ahead of the politicians.
Since "intellectual property" is not a natural law, but was introduced only to increase productivity, one cannot help feeling that IP law, in its current form, may have outlived its usefulness.
What does the society gain by protecting the IP of music publishers? Do we risk underproduction (or extinction?) of music if the IP "rights" of Sony Entertainment are not protected at all? Or would that rather restore some sanity and the value of culture? IP is becoming a tool with which major corporations tax average joe and small business startups, not unlike emperors used to tax salt.
In the software field, for all I see, dispensing of IP would stop corporate lawyers from trying to destroy honest developers working in companies without huge legal departments, and would even encourage sane re-use of software and thus increase the general welfare, the Linux way.
Re:No kidding, really? (Score:5, Insightful)
People may not understand precisely how, yet often they can be quite aware that they are being hosed.
Neither republic nor democracy (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Copyright has never been accepted by the public (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:No kidding, really? (Score:1, Insightful)
They want what they want for FREE and they expect nothing less.
Amen! (Score:5, Insightful)
Imagine if Disney had had to keep on thinking up new characters and ideas, instead of the same old mouse and duck. Those would have been retired, new ideas would have come into play, and Disney would stand for new ideas every few years rather than tired variations of the same old mouse products. There would be no incentive for others to mimic the mouse and duck, because it would be so out of fashion, no one would care. Every generation would have their own Disney memories.
When the same stuff gets repeated over and over, the public just doesn't care. That old stuff becomes part of public history whether it's copyrighted or not, a de facto public domain.
I wonder if rock n roll is the same
Re:Playing the Game (Score:5, Insightful)
I have to disagree. I think the majority of Americans think a copyright is a little "c" inside a circle. They know nothing of the Sonny Bony Copyright Extension Act. They know nothing of the DMCA.
Now, they will believe that politicians can be untruthful. They will believe the rich are powerful They will believe, especially after the big exposure of scandals like Enron, that big busniess will be corrupt. And certainly they will tie all fo this together.
But most people DO NOT have a solid understanding of copyright and how it will affect their life. And the truth is, if it doesn't raise their taxes and put them in danger, they won't care.
The media has done a poor job of explaining to the public the problems with our current copyright laws. The price fixing the RIAA members were using in record stores passed under the radar of the common American. The ever extending copyright terms do too. The fact that the blank CDs American's buy to burn their music and files to cost more because the RIAA gets a piece of that pie (although, more and more, people ARE using them to record pirated music, so that fee is less uncalled for).
If the media could start to explain these things with their clever abilities to squash everything into catchy soundbites, then Americans would understand that those little "c"s inside circles are another way somebody is trying to screw them out of what's fair, then your statement owuld begin to hold true.
Copyright law doesn't always help small artists... (Score:5, Insightful)
Last fall we performed Mozart's Requiem Mass (composed 1791), and many of the singers wanted to make and sell/give away a recording... but we found out to our dismay that we couldn't. Why? Because the [i]scores[/i] we were using were covered by copyright. This is a bit absurd--of all the people who deserve to earn money off that performance, the typesetters and editors are the last on the list. We already paid them for their work, dammit: we paid $1000 for a hundred copies (plus orchestra parts) of something that should be public domain.
We have many recordings we'd love to publish on the Internet (publicity and all), but can't.
There are two CD's which we have secured copyright permission (from the score publisher--neither work itself is covered by copyright) to sell. While I'm not involved in the finances of the choir, I do know that the CD's cost $10 and we make a $5 profit off of each. Now, where does that other $5 go? Jewel cases, inserts, and the costs of CD replication are no more than $.50-$1, so [i]someone[/i] is getting $4 royalties from each disc--almost certainly the publisher of the score.
Modern copyright law isn't necessarily friendly to the "small artists". We'd love to put up our recordings on the Internet, or sell more CD's at concerts (the two aren't mutually exclusive!) for a greater profit... but we can't.
And all of us would be tickled pink if one of our recordings showed up on Kazaa.
Re:No kidding, really? (Score:5, Insightful)
Copyright is an exclusive right to control commercial usage and anything non-commercial SHOULD not have anything to do with copyright at all. That is a common understanding of the law. No matter how the law gets twisted by special interests who want to twist the word "commercial" till it breaks, that's what it was supposed to mean and that's how the majority feels.
Re:Amen! (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Tired but accurate comparison... (Score:1, Insightful)
~~~
Re:Sweet (Score:1, Insightful)
Rant Mode OnThis is funny, you know the only people who say "information wants to be free" are the ones that don't produce any. Think about it and then send me a list of modern books that are free or modern music from somebody I've heard of that's free. Congress get's to set the limits we want and the constitution allows. Copyright is very much a matter of morality. Just like equal rights for women, people of different faiths, and people of different race is. Copyright law is no different, there is a creative minority creating content and there are the stupid masses that want to use it, enjoy it, exploit it, buy it, etc.. The laws are there to protect the minority from the masses.
Let's take a look at a different problem, in the 1970's a lot of artists (ironically, many of them were black, an already oppressed group) who created a lot of cool songs with "deep breaks" in them. In the 1990's, a new generation of artists started wholesale copying those breaks into their new rap songs and mixes. Should the original artists, many of whom didn't make much money the first time around, be entitled to anything? Should the be paid? Or is this just simple fair use? The funny thing is many of them were smart enough to understand this possibility so they did something to protect their work, they copyrighted it. Now people like James Brown are making money from their samples that were being exploited by a new generation.
In a different way, what if some guy writes a book that is just 20 years ahead of its time. Nobody can digest it or understand it. Then in a couple decades people reread it and see the brilliance of it, lucky for him, the copyright was only for a couple years so he makes jack shit. Is that right? I suppose the only kind of art we want to produce as a society is pop art if we won't allow any protection or incentive for people to take the risk of exploring. There are numerous books in your "classics" list that were not understood until many years after the initial publication and then blew people away when they finally "got it."
The whole sharing thing has been taken way out of context. When you buy a CD or DVD there is an agreement you agree to, if you don't like it then you shouldn't buy it. Essentially you're buying a metal platter with data on it, you have a fairly limited set of rights beyond that; to protect the investment in the metal platter, you can make a backup and do stuff like that but that's about it. If you don't like the deal, then don't buy it, you have no implicit right to watch any given movie or listen to any given song or read any given book. It's like leasing a car and then halfway through the lease you realize you've spent some money so you just decide that the car is yours, take it to Mexico and sell it.
Rant off Something else that is ironic, espcially to the younger crowd, art/knowledge creation isn't any different than most other professions, generally. Good artists work harder, do more, etc when they have incentives. It is a capitalistic business, you don't believe me then China with 4 times the population of the US should be producing 4 times the art and knowledge etc.. Instead they are a huge consumer of it, why is that? Anything to do with financial incentive you think? Same with the former Soviet Union. How come only the really capitalistic nations are producing tons and tons of the stuff? You want to just throw that creative force out so you can listen to some songs for free? Even during the Soviet regime they were very proud of their art and historical legacy, they just didn't add very much to it and then when they fell the amount of creation and creativity has been like a storm.
The last irony here is that the creators want to play ball. They don't mind making information available. There are people who put books online artists put singles online. The only thing they want is a fair cut and the acknowledgment that you don't have the right to do whatever you fucking want with their content.
Re:No kidding, really? (Score:3, Insightful)
Good Point (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Amen! (Score:4, Insightful)
But anyway...I think that your statement about rock n roll has a lot more to do with the media machine that has existed over the last 60 years than anything else. You see it in all aspects of society, really, not just music. Also, your statements about ragtime, jazz, swing, don't really take a very long term view of music. How long was what we deem "clasical" music the only game in town? Were people really coming up with all these new forms every 10 or 20 years until rock n roll, the end of musical history? I don't really think so. Plus, have you ever heard of Hip-Hop? Rap? Electronica? Rock n Roll has definitely had staying power, which I think is largely attributable to the aforementioned media machine, but is sure isn't stoping other music. And it's not like The Rolling Stones have a copyright on A, E and D chords or something. I think other bands have been formed since then, without getting sued into the ground for violating the Stones copyrights...
Re:Amen! (Score:5, Insightful)
Figures from popular culture are part of our subconscious, both collectively and as individuals.
I've had dreams with Mickey Mouse in it. I've had dreams in which I was at the helm of the Enterprise.
If I tried to film an enactment of that dream, I'd be in violation of intellectual property laws. I think the idea that something trumps the free expression of the imagery of my own subconscious is a pretty big crimp on my creativity, or at least my expression of it.
Pastiche, collage, and montage are vital creative techniques.
Re:Society's laws grow from its mores (Score:2, Insightful)
Consider this, though. If what you say is true, that "Society's laws grow from its mores", then can't we expect the same results as the Romans? The "mores" of Greed, Power, and Lust surely will overwhelm those of responsibility, honour and bravery. The former are "natural"; the latter -- they must be forged through much discomfort.
I think that you might actually be wrong. I think that people actually still (for this and perhaps one more generation...) have respect for the value of "a work", even if it is easily distributable. I think people still have at least a vague sense "payment for value"; What the masses are actually rebelling against is the extraction of wealth that occurs between those that Invent, Dream, and Create, and those that enjoy the results of that creation.
Generations of Management Schools have produced a stratum of society that cannot Create, but can only think in terms of Arbitrage -- Buying Low and Selling High -- who are prepared to feed the lusts of those in power, as long as they promise to protect these Manager's ability to ride the industries from which they derive their wealth. Adding nothing, but taking a slice of everything.
Unfortunately for this great mass of "Middlemen", the internet is becoming the great solvent of unnecessary power structures. When the mass of Creators and Enjoyers can be brought face-to-face with virtually zero cost and delay, the only thing left for the "Nation of Salesmen" to do is something -- anything -- to prevent it.
Well, those of us that are both technical and creative must fight back. Not with a bit of file sharing "freedom" (remember, the RIAA still holds most artists by the short and curly, and they *will* squeeze), but with a real, practical mechanism to provide direct, instantaneous compensation from the user to the creator.
You want to break the backs of those who provide nothing but Arbitrage? Then create a system that provides a stable, reliable market for the exchange of ideas and value. Create a system that pays the authors more than RIAA, and the artists will abandon them. On the other hand, if we continue on the path we are on, the artists will only hold on more tightly to their only semi-reliable source of income -- the recording industry.
The future of the creative commons is in our hands.
Pogrom? (Score:3, Insightful)
From the original article:
The RIAA is inflicting a pogrom against file traders? They are using death camps instead of lawsuits? Such extreme hyperbole does not call the policy of the RIAA into question as much as it does the judgement of the author.
Re:No kidding, really? (Score:3, Insightful)
1) Don't want to buy an overpriced album to get the 1 or 2 tracks on it that they actually like.
2) Want to actually own the media that they pay for, instead of a 'licence to use it', and have the right to copy it for personal use to any other media they wish, if they're going to damn well pay for it.
Until they decide to instate fair use (did it ever exist?), and let me purchase individual tracks with those rights attached, I'll remain in complete contempt of these companies' claims to my money.
Re:Amen! (Score:5, Insightful)
There has been some very interesting research that I have been following, but human trials have been put off indefinitely because they see no reason to invest funds into a market that is already very profitable for them.
One drug patent expires in 2008. I am certain that the next new development will only be released at that time. I am sure this is a common pattern. I realize that pharmaceutical companies need to make money to fund their research. It's just too bad that it's at the expense of future developments because they do not want to start competing with their current cash cows by introducing something new and better.
I hate to imagine what our drug markets would look like if drug patents never expired. I suspect that pretty much all research would stop on any disease for which we already had at least one treatment. Why innovate if the new patented drug will not sell for any more than the old one? It could even be considered irresponsible to the shareholders to do so.
Re:Copyright has never been accepted by the public (Score:3, Insightful)
That's exactly right. The best analogy I can think of is speed limits. People routinely exceed posted speed limits and don't think themselves criminals for doing so. The reason is that while speed limits in principle are a good idea, in practice they are set unreasonably low, for the purpose of revenue generation rather than safety. Likewise, while the stated goal of copyright laws are valid (encouraging innovation), in practice today they're used to reward special interests without concern for the harm they do to the public.
Most people aren't anarchists, they just have an intuitive understanding that laws in some areas have gone way too far. Just about everybody would agree that driving 80mph in a residential zone should be punished, as should duplicating thousands of music CDs and selling them on a street corner. But 3 years is prison for sharing an MP3 on Kazaa is preposterous.
Re:Wonderful Idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Whoa, hold on there. I can see the point you're trying to make here, but your analogy is flawed. Have you ever scanned a whole book? If that's your idea of cheap and easy, then the folks over at Project Guttenburg would like to talk to you. Ripping a CD (or even a DVD) is an order of magnitude easier then scanning an entire book. Especially any book on perl. Can you imagine the OCR software trying to figure out PERL source code?!?
Re:No kidding, really? (Score:2, Insightful)
Admittadly offtopic...
The law is what we rely on. It's the reason we live in a republic and not a democracy. If every specific law was open to "interpretation" by a jury, we wouldn't have laws, we would have arbitrary mob rule.
We elect representatives for a reason - to address changes in the law. It is then up to the Judicial Branch to decide whether the law was broken, or in the case of some courts, to decide if the law violates the basic tenants laid forth in the Constitution.
Don't like a law? Protest, run for office, write your congressman.
Re:No kidding, really? (Score:2, Insightful)
What is the point of sharing stuff that is already freely available?
If people want that stuff they go to archive.org
(Although is is nice of you to provide mirroring services for free)
Re:Poll Rating: -1, Tautology. (Score:3, Insightful)
Please find a better analogy. You wanting to download a Metallica song from Kazaa hardly compares to the basic human rights of black people in 1960s America.
Re:Copyright law doesn't always help small artists (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Society's laws grow from its mores (Score:3, Insightful)
Fortunately I did remember to say mores, as opposed to "impulses" or "instincts." We do generally have a shared sense of ethics, even when we all flout it. Whether or not our better qualities will triumph over the prisoner's dilemma is another discussion, although invoking the ancient Romans (or the Greeks) is never a bad idea these days.
I think that people actually still (for this and perhaps one more generation...) have respect for the value of "a work", even if it is easily distributable.
We have always had this kind of respect, and I hope I didn't foul up badly enough to suggest otherwise. I don't think it's going away, either. Rather, I think it's growing. It just has nothing to do with "property" or even "sharing."
People love their artists as they love life itself. They support them extravagantly - hence the Arbitrage-fest! With the king dead, copyright was just the first stab at replacing patronage, and I think you've got the next one nailed down.
The nightmare that keeps RIAA board members awake at night is a "pay the person who made this file" button. Of course, making a workable micropayment system is far from easy. I'd say we have our work cut out for us. But take a minute and really imagine the results.