Using lies to preach morality
Using lies to preach morality
In today’s issue (Sept. 23, 2003) of the USA Today, a story penned by recording industry attorney Cary Sherman appears, titled, "File-sharing is illegal. Period."
As with almost each and every statement that this man publicly puts out, this is a blatant lie. Period.
Perhaps Sherman wishes that file-sharing was an illegal activity, but this does not make it so. I personally wish that monopolization of the market for recorded music was an illegal activity but, despite actual laws to prevent such a thing from occuring, this is apparently not reality, either.
This man and his associates have lied directly to the United States Congress, Senate Subcommittees and the U.S. Copyright Office more times than I can count, foisting direct fabrications upon the American public on a daily basis, which irresponsible news outlets, like Gannett, the publisher of USA Today, willingly print with no attempt to set the record straight. To me, this is rather like having a drunkard preaching the dangers of marijuana use. The acts of the messenger deflate the message and the audience cannot be expected to take it seriously.
The truly offensive part of this story is that Sherman is using lies as an excuse to prop up his weak viewpoint of right and wrong, a pitiful attempt to confuse the public’s perception of the law by promoting a false and narrow perspective of it. Just because RIAA considers sharing the 6 or 7 percent of the recorded music that they own rights to to be a crime does not make the act of sharing files criminal.
File-sharing is NOT illegal. I defy anyone to show me a law on any level that says file sharing is a crime.
Let’s see, Apple first built file sharing into their operating system in about 1990. Every newspaper in the country shares files, which is how the production department gets all the stories from all the writers into one place so they can layout the paper. Children in schools across the country share files with their teachers each day. It is called homework. And don’t come back and say that sharing copyrighted material is a crime. It’s the public library.
It is the copyright owner’s call, not Congress’ and certainly not the RIAA’s. They do not own every copyrighted work in the world, only a miniscule percentage of it. They can say the same damn lie over and over as many times as they like, but it does not make it the truth.
However, false testimony before the government IS a crime. Using deception, deceit and anticompetitive tactics to control a market at the expense of all competitors IS a crime. It’s called antitrust.
Has file sharing hurt the music industry? Undoubtably. The public is downloading ravenously in an attempt to find something they like. Maybe when the recording industry stops wasting its time trampling over the rights of 12-year-olds long enough to concentrate on artist development, talent and content, the public will find something worth buying. Maybe when the record labels start reducing prices to a level that is justifiable and start paying the artists their rightful share, the public will embrace the music industry on a commercial level again and actually buy something.
But using lies to preach morality isn’t going to make it happen. Threats and extortion aren’t going to make it happen. Financially raping the artists through oppressive contracts isn’t going to make it happen.
The industry has treated the consumers as ignorant thieves for the past three years or so. In return, the public has a huge Christmas surprise waiting for the recording industry this year, a fitting reward for the lies, the lawsuits, Digital Rights Management, copy protection and the utter contempt the industry has shown for the consumer.
Christmas is the season for sharing.
May 13th, 2004 at 2:12 am
Right On!!! I’m sure there were a lot of pissed off horse and buggy suppliers when the automobile first appeared. Can’t stop technilogical progress.