14 DAY TRIAL // The world’s anti-piracy groups are trying to make a move and squash the phenomenon by asking tech companies to police the Internet, but that’s just not going to happen. Tech firms, including Google, Microsoft and Facebook, have already rejected calls for such measures in Australia.
TorrentFreak reports that the Computer and Communications Industry Association, which includes the aforementioned companies, as well as eBay, Samsung, Motorola and BT, expressed its clear opposition to the plans of the entertainment industry.
Basically, copyright holders would like for ISPs to be held responsible for the actions of their users, while additional measures would be implemented to deal with file sharers that won’t abide the law.
The Association pointed out that its members employ over 600,000 people and generate more than $200 billion (€154.22 billion) revenue as a way to establish the importance of its stance.
CCIA starts off by pointing out what the entertainment industry has refused to understand in the past few years, namely that policy makers need to focus on the issues that push people to pirate content, rather than punishing them.
The group states that the high prices of the content and the lack of availability of lawful content are key issues that lead to piracy, although the problems are far bigger than this.
“Naturally, from this follows that access to on-demand/online content across territories becomes even more cumbersome and restrictive due to territorial copyright restrictions, licensing conduct, geo-blocking, price discrimination holdback and windowing,” the CCIA’s states.
It’s been said numerous times over the years that if people wouldn’t have to pay an arm and a leg to get access to some content, they’d be more likely to avoid pirating content. It’s also important for the content to be available in multiple ways since the Internet is changing the way people consume movies and music, and the entertainment industry isn’t keeping up with the times.
“It is also absolutely essential that enforcement debate and policy is not based on manufactured claims, exaggerations and deceptions that will in the long run risk resulting in a negative public sentiment concerning intellectual property,” the group writes.
They note that there is little to no evidence that graduated response schemes are successful in fighting piracy, so the suggestions made by the industry officials aren’t best suited for the job.
It will also not come as a surprise that the CCIA also touched the topic of copyright infringement and the way it stifles innovation. The group states that economists have been expressing concerns that copyright has a moral hazard effect on incumbent creative firms, by encouraging them to rely on enforcement of the law rather than adopting new technologies and business models to deal with new technologies.