A VC - Latest Comments in You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

mary — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 05:38:46 -0000

your point may good though ... but theaters are really going to be hurt much, it is the straight to dvd market, or post-theatrical run dvd market that will take the hit, The theaters make money on the cessions.

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mary

New York Treatment Centers

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

Michael — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 14:58:24 -0000

"but I believe that vast majority of downloaders are people like me who would gladly pay if the content was available to purchase when I wanted it in the format I want it."

Absolutely agree with you. There is a site: www. musicishere.com. They offer music in 6 formats and you can choose the presets for the most of the formats (no DRM). I think this is the future of the digital music. I wonder why nobody talks about them... most probably they don't have millions to invest like Microsoft or Apple, but I think these guys are doing great job. I was quite surprised to get know that they are from Latvia.

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

shbrown — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 09:49:44 -0000

I entirely agree. I don't understand from a business perspective what the content industry is doing: they're not even offering the product for sale, and then they go around accusing everyone of stealing it. When they're actually offering the content for sale in a way I can use (e.g. downloadable when I want, DRM-free) and they're still not making money, then I'll be highly sympathetic to any regulation they want. Everyone loves blockbusters! Even if we have to publicly subsidize them!

Black markets such as piracy are created from inefficient distribution systems. Until they even try to remedy this, I don't think it's the public's role to pay for the business mistakes of content-industry executives.

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

fredwilson — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 06:58:06 -0000

I will bet that I spend more money on media than 99.9pcnt of the population. And yes I do use the P2P and bit torrent networks to supplement our media consumption

My point is I'd like to never have to supplement and pay even more. But they won't take my money

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

fredwilson — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 06:24:04 -0000

I am not suggesting I don't want to pay for art. I probably pay over $1000 per year for music in an industry that says they can't get people to pay for it. I am saying that it should available in all digital formats to all people.

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

morgan — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 01:27:10 -0000

It's very hard to compete with free. I think your proposal is a threat. If the industry does not set prices at a level that you feel good about, then you will steal the product instead. Typically as prices rise demand drops and prices are set accordingly by the supply side. It's an agreement. If prices are too high, no one will buy and the supplier will make no money. In the case of the Dark Knight, demand hasn't dropped. Price has been forced to zero by pirates. Why is it that this so unacceptable with potato chips and bread? Why isn't Ferrari accused with overcharging for their cars. Why doesn't everyone hop the fence and steal one? Because they will be shot or put in jail. Food and water are essential and no one has ever proposed that we get them for free. At best, in some societies these things are subsidized by government and only in dire circumstances. What you are espousing is inconsistent with every other aspect of your life and yet you think it's ok where media is concerned.

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

Brian — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 16:20:57 -0000

Yes, it is still stealing. I bought a pack of gum this weekend. That does not give me the right to shoplift gum every time I want to.

If you want to see it more than once, but another ticket (like I did this weekend). Otherwise, wait until it comes out on DVD.

These arguments you state are not new. They are over a hundred years old. Artists have the right to set the price for their work. If you think the price is too high, don't consume it.

I for one am glad creators are finally receiving the wealth they deserve for the great art they are bringing into the world. Until we had strong copyright enforcement in this country, most of them died paupers.

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

Clayton Nash — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 06:33:55 -0000

I agree with your premise, but I don't believe this this the reason the ISPs are doing this.
Fundamentally, the ISP operational cost model is driven by the cost of backhaul bandwidth from the exchanges. ISPs who buy from BT Wholesale pay a per bit charge for traffic volume - those who've unbundled an exchange pay for the links form the exchange to their internet access points. Once the customer is acquired, this is by far the largest part of their variable costs for customer service.
The flat rate plans they sell give the ISPs little chance to realise more revenue from user who use large amounts of bandwidth. This action gives them a legal reason to threaten, and ultimately remove from their network, the users who drive the majority of their costs.
A licensed download service or a charge which gave the users the right to download is their worst nightmare - even more users would drive cost into the business which they could not recoup. The ISPs incentives are universally aligned against your proposal.

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

user239 — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 20:47:29 -0000

i thought copyright was regulation. someday my grandkids will be allowed to consume this media wherever and whenever they want. [insert "great" in front of "grandkids" depending on how many more times you expect mickey mouse legislation to be passed.]

i think this is a really creative response to all their whining. how about shortening copyright back down to a more reasonable timeframe? that could encourage copyright owners to get their works into the marketplace sooner rather than later (ties in with comments about release windows).

an aside: is anyone able to view comments from disqus on a blackberry? i often find myself reading a post through newsgator's decent client and wishing i had access to the comments. is there a RSS feed for the comments?

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

gregorylent — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 08:12:02 -0000

q dub, nice comment on being able to compete with free

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

gregorylent — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 08:09:49 -0000

and my brain informs me that intellectual property rights are on the way out .. may take a decade or two, but that meme is dying for sure

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

gregorylent — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 08:08:16 -0000

radiohead ... that reminds me, i still cannot buy "in rainbow" in india .. the shops never heard of it, even the big shops, the chains ... how do i find out where to do bit torrents? ... oh, google, thank you very much

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

fredwilson — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 06:51:05 -0000

I saw Dark Night in the theater last night

I paid $40 and took my wife and two kids

Is it still stealing now?

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

Steve Kane — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 12:45:04 -0000

Fred, on what basis do you suggest that the "vast majority of downloaders are people like me who would gladly pay if the content was available to purchase when I wanted it in the format I want it"?

Radiohead and Trent R. both tried to prove this thesis... and failed.

Any case, ignoring all the libertarian fist-shaking, i think download fees aren't a bad model. Metered pay-as-you-go consumer consumption models seem to work fine (and no one screams about tyranny and kafka-esque nightmares) in tons of analogous industries:

electrical power
natural gas
heating oil
water & sewer
gasoline
etc...

maybe the best solution is to ignore the media-centric aspects of the issue -- specific copyrights, specific titles, specific owners -- and instead simply view media as an amalgamation of bits and bytes (like water or fuel or power) and yes, compel ISPs and cel carriers (or whatever bandwidth suppliers and utilities) to set aside some revenues for allocation to content providers?

hmmm. maybe thats a recipe for a huge unworkable bureacracy?

any case, to all the angry rebels and cassandras - chill out. artists and creators and inventors deserve some form of ownership and control over their intellectual property. rather than disrespect and rasberries, how about applauding creative attempts to come up with solutions and build on what works and what doesn't

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

Andy Freeman — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 10:32:44 -0000

I think that the media industries lost when they weren't forced to choose between copyright protection and technical protection (DRM, encryption, magic monkeys). In other words, I think that a owner who claims copyright protection should not be able to use technical protection.

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

slowblogger — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 02:57:23 -0000

I am a bit more relieved now. I was very surprised to read "we should regulate them" in your post.

Many talk about consumer rights, but the free market is about agreement between buyers and sellers. If the supplier sells a stupid product, call him stupid. But that does not mean you can steal his products or ignore your agreement with him.

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

Brian — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 21:59:30 -0000

Fred,

Downloading the Dark Knight from bit torrent is stealing. I would like to buy a hot dog buns 2 buns at a time, but that does not give me a right to walk into the super market and pull two out of an 8 pack without paying.

Just because distribution is not what you want it to be does not give you the right to steal. Content creators have the right to distribute their work any way they please. They have the right to price discriminate and charge more to people based on their willingness to pay.

Lots of content providers in the early 1900s died paupers because taverns and night club owners stole their work using similar arguments.

I am the first to admit that the industry needs to improve their distribution, but if they don't they will lose customers. Content creation is high risk and those that create great content deserve to charge and distribute it any way they please.

On the other end, there is no reason the ISPs should have to pay content providers fees. That is just as ludicrous. The only role for the government is to enforce IP laws by prosecuting those that steal.

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

fredwilson — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 19:58:05 -0000

I like that model and have blogged about it many times

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

Jonathan Karon — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 18:43:55 -0000

Fred, thanks for all the work required to reply to everyone -- it's very much appreciated.

It was about 2001 and an ex-music industry guy and I kicked around a model for digital royalties based on the broadcast royalty model. It looked like this:

1. You build a big, independent, auditable service for logging plays by artist and track.
2. You write a simple cross-platform library that reports to your service.
3. You get all of the major music software vendors to incorporate your reporter into their software and into their portable devices (which cache plays and batch them to your desktop when you sync)
4. You collect subscription revenues from individuals or ISPs (imagine the sales leverage of an ISP who can say "get your internet from us and you can download and play all the music you want legally, for $5 a month")
5. You split the revenue into "mechanicals" and "broadcasts", just like the industry already does.
6. You distribute the money to C & P holders based on statistical data from your logging service.

Too bad there were too many moving parts. It really would have worked if we had gotten buy-in from the software / hardware manufacturers and we wouldn't have had 5 years of RIAA lawsuits.

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

fredwilson — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 15:42:14 -0000

Exactly!

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

Scott — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 15:35:11 -0000

But at least you're not using this as an opportunity to promote your own HDTV channel.

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

fredwilson — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 15:34:11 -0000

Ooh. That's not a compliment

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

fredwilson — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 15:22:10 -0000

I am all for your two ideas upfront. Patents are awful and must be elinminated. And open source software is better than closed proprietary software. Yes we are a nation of laws but its time to change many of them

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

Rogel — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 15:18:58 -0000

The only problem is that regulations, by their nature, tend to protect monopolies and set higher barrier on new entries. Therefore I'm afraid that the movie and music industries might welcome suggestion to regulate them...

Re: You Can't Regulate Just One Industry And Leave The Other Alone

fredwilson — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 15:12:08 -0000

Yes of course. First, this is the UK not the US we are talking about. Second I only am suggesting tit for tat. If the music and film industries are lobbying for regulating the isps, then they should be regulated as well since its their inability to amend their business practices that has led many of us to download