The Lockyer p2p letter
p2pnet.net News:- When we took a look (around 8:50 pm Pacific), Google News had 93 stories centering on the letter leaked from the office of California state attorney Bill Lockyer.
Not one headlined the fact that the letter was put together with help from Hollywood.
It doesn’t appear to be worth a story by itself.
We ran three items (starting with this) and The Register’s, whose Andrew Orlowski wrote:
“The democratic veneer over the business of buying the legislation you want has never looked thinner. California’s State Attorney General Bill Lockyer has been caught acting as a public relations front for Hollywood’s big money copyright holders, only on the public’s dime. Nominally, the role of Attorney General is to act on behalf of all citizens of California, including consumers and recording artists.
“Lockyer called for a ban on peer-to-peer file sharing software, in a letter issued to other attorneys general, obtained by Wired. But earlier revisions of the Microsoft Word document indicate that the author was “stevensonv”. This is believed to be one Vans Stevenson, the Motion Picture Association of America’s senior vice president for legislative affairs, and one of its most visible lobbyists.”
The letter was prepared by California attorney general Bill Lockyer’s office but edited by Vans Stevenson, who reports directly to MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America) boss Jack Valenti.
“They [Lockyer's office] sought our input,” Stevenson, MPAA senior vice president for state legislative affairs, is quoted as saying in a Reuters story. “We didn’t write the letter.”
So that’s OK.
There’s apparently not much of problem with a senior member of the MPAA providing ‘input’ to a document designed specifically to bring pressure to bear on a commercial group with which the MPAA has had a long running and extremely bitter quarrel.
The right and the wrong of the argument – which of course stems from online file sharing – isn’t the point.
The MPAA, which can only be described as having an enormous vested interest, was allowed – if not encouraged – to have a significant hand in the preparation of a text which will ultimately be promulgated as an official document by Lockyer, who’s the president of the National Association of Attorneys General.
But no one no one in the mainstream media seems to find that unusual, let alone strange.
And that’s strange.
March 18th, 2004 at 12:49 pm
It’s not strange at all. Distressing, yes. But not strange.
Legislators, law enforcement and the judiciary all need technical help when it comes to dealing with Internet communications. Being frugal as well as professional, they naturally want to get this help from people who will respond quickly, proficiently and at no cost to the taxpayer. So whom do they seek out? As it turns out, they don’t need to seek at all. People will come to them and offer the advice free of charge. These people are called lobbyists. The successful ones seem to all share certain traits, such as money, public influence, and political connections.
In California, the prominent actuality of the MPAA, et al., gives them an inherent standing to let the politicians know what needs to be done for the good of the people and their state’s tax revenue. And if it should do themselves some good as well, that’s the cost of the advice. They certainly paid enough for the right to give it. It’s the way of things, and will be not be changing soon. What can be changed is who gets to be the lobbyists with the loudest, clearest voices.
Suppose it was revealed by the MPAA that the Attorney General of California had collaborated with the Electronic Frontier Foundation in drafting a letter to be presented to the annual meeting of state attorneys general. The letter would inform copyright infringement investigators that they believed a reasonable expectation of privacy attached to personal activities on the Internet, and that while logging shared files was acceptable, logging IP addresses in connection with those files was not.
Would we still feel troubled at the thought of government working hand-in-hand with private (albeit non-profit) entities? No. Would we be glad the good guys were going to win one? Yes. Government has always collaborated with business on drafting laws, policy, and decisions. This isn’t the first time a sharp-eyed quarry has pointed out the handshake behind the curtain, and it isn’t the first time the response has been, “So what?” Thirty years ago, an eager young reporter might have told his editor how the peculiar impressions present on a letter signed by the Governor revealed its true origin to be a typewriter in the office of the state’s largest real estate developer. And the editor would have replied, “All right, son, call and ask about it. And if they deny it, that’s a story. But they won’t deny it, and it won’t be a story.”