| Do you think you are the happy owner of a software or piece of music just because you paid for it? Think again! If you accept the iTunes, MP3,Amazone or eMusic conditions you are the lucky owner of an extremely limited license. In Europe the term buying and selling can hardly be used for this. You are renting your Film or Music for a limited time. When you buy a CD you can lend it to a friend and you can resell it because you did not like the music  In theory you also have the right to make a backup because you have bought that piece of music forever -it's yours! Of course your rights are being heavily fubared bye DRM software and hardware implementations - that all are made for preventing illegal copying. The BIG problem with that is that it also is preventing legal copying. You have a GD right to the copy of that film you bought - It was never limited to the lifetime of a CD/DVD. When the DVD breaks you can burn a new one from your backup and thus protect your investment -in theory! Your Hardware and software will prevent that today - in the interest of the artist -of course  | Now DRM (Digital Rights Management) is a power game, giving the software and hardware producers power over the film and music industry. Microsoft, Apple and Sony do not give a damn about your right to a copy of that piece of Art. They want to build a money motorway forcing you to wave your rights and distribute for free what used to cost billions. Shipping DVD's to every corner of the earth is not for free so this is a virtual Klondyke for them. In the attempt to gain sympathy they push some poor and preferably stupid artist in front of them and say his rights are being violated and his lively hood is taken away from him. Hmm.... I wonder how much truth there is in that? The last time I checked Apple was making a load of money - on iTunes! How come the artists are still poor after that extreme increase in distributed music? They argue that copyrights are being violated by the billions. That might be true, but the increase in sales because of this new technology is also by the billions. Before it was possible to download music, Apple made nothing on it! So dear Artists and software producers out there; who do you think is stealing your money? If the Industry is so worried about being ripped of by this new technology - they can opt to not use it! Rather than making my video player and TV and computer spy on me (let us check if Viking payed for this one). Send out DVD's to every corner of the world and let us buy it in the shop! They won't! Why? Because they would loose a ton of money doing it and that makes their whining about loosing money through copyright violations rather distasteful.  |
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