![[ code 000 ]](http://code000machine.files.wordpress.com/2011/11/code000header.jpg "[ code 000 ]")
Sirs,
I have been following the direction of legislative ideas to stop piracy for quite some time. Although I am Canadian, I feel the need to write to you as CEOs of both the MPAA and RIAA, as you seem to be spearheading the international movements to stifle the very creativity and openness that your organizations supposedly value.
The battle over SOPA/PIPA has brought to a head the very nature of creative ventures as a whole, in the music and film industries. Millions of people spoke out against such brutal legislative measures, and they have been put on hold…for now. No doubt your legal teams are busy regrouping to work on American politicians to revive this horrifying assault on free speech, and if passed, I’m quite sure my government would follow. In fact, I believe that SOPA/PIPA would have affected Canada directly, given our systems are so closely tied to yours.
My question to you is—exactly whose interests, and what interests, are you truly working for? Mr. Dodd, you are a former U.S. senator, so we know you have the inside track to lobbying Washington. Mr. Sherman, you and your organization have long held a reputation for assaulting your customers in the name of helping the music business. Your statements both during the SOPA/PIPA debate and after their fall make one thing incredibly clear—you represent the interests of a few major corporations that are afraid for their existance. You are not anti-piracy, you are anti-technology—technology which threatens a system your clients have built massive corporations around.
The MPAA, at least, is honest on their web site when they say they represent the major film studios. The RIAA has always suggested that they represent the interests of the music industry at large, and yet, legally they only represent the major four record labels. In fact, your organizations do nothing more than legally represent clients who are hellbent on maintaining control of the entertainment we consume, at the expense of creativity and technology. You are losing this battle, and you are becoming increasingly desperate in your tactics to regain this control.
I am a musician and artist, and I recognize the need for intellectual property rights. People shouldn’t be able to randomly profit off of my work, and yet the free technology of the Internet has allowed me, as an artist, to connect to people around the planet. If someone writes me to tell me they connected deeply with my work, and they admit they found it on my download site, should I write back saying “How dare you pirate my work? I won’t talk to you until you pay for it!”? What good would this do me? With digital music sales surpassing rising, now surpassing physical sales, I have to trust that this person would, in fact, eventually pay for my material?
In the case of the RIAA, when you found that ISPs weren’t as co-operative in removing web sites as you’d hoped, you began to sue individual people who had downloaded content. Your methodolgy was so shaky, though, that you were suing young teenagers and elderly people who didn’t even own a computer. Oh, but you did have that amnesty program where you could pay some ridiculous amount per song without litigation, or pay over $20,000 per song in the courts. When was the last time you, Mr. Sherman, paid $20,000 to download a song legally? And did the money go to compensate the artists who were infringed upon? Let’s not forget that you represent companies, not artists. When this proved to be a public relations headache, you turned to the one institution you thought you could count on—the American government.
With SOPA/PIPA, it would have made it so incredibly easy for you to stomp on web sites that allegedly contained pirated material. I suspect that the reason the two of you so wholeheartedly supported this legislation is that it would have made it easy to stomp on independent competition as well, thus reclaiming control over what we consume. How American.
Let’s also remember that in Canada, the companies you represent were sued for royalties they used trickery to not pay out to artists. I guess the RIAA is just better at sweeping these kinds of tactics under the rug. And how about that notorious blacklist regarding any film actors that spoke out against George W. Bush? At what point did the MPAA step up to protect their actors? You were more afraid that the backlash from conservative consumers might have affected your bottom line.
You will have to forgive me if I say that your claims of supporting the film and music industries are incredibly suspect. Mr. Sherman attempted to equate music piracy to terrorism, a notion which should be offensive to anyone who has suffered or died under real terrorism. Mr. Dodd, you have gone on record threatening lawmakers, who actually listened to mass concerns by most of the high-tech industry and artists alike, that you won’t support them financially if they don’t pass whatever legislation you see fit. How dare democratically elected officials do their jobs and not what you slip money in their back pockets to do….
The fault is not in the pirates who affect your bottom line.
It’s your fault, and the fault of your client companies.
Instead of working with and embracing new technologies and new media, you have fought against it from its very conception. Independent companies who saw the potential of technology such as the MP3 jumped at the opportunity to create new forms of art, new ways of distribution, and you sought to suppress it as a horrible alternative to physical product. What a mess—you mean filmmakers and musicians can now make their art available to the entire world without having to sign their lives and rights over to one of your client companies? This can’t be allowed to continue. You have told us for years that piracy is killing you, and yet your companies continue to record profits. You claim that physical media sales are down while neglecting to mention that digital sales continue to rise.
You have forgotten one important aspect of the Internet—the fact that it exposes all information to everyone. We can make smarter choices in what media we choose to take in, wider choices. This is what affects your bottom line, gentlemen—the fact that the general public is smarter and has unfiltered access to what is out there. You just can’t pay Internet radio stations to put your product to the top of the list like you could back in the days of payola. People are growing tired of formulaic, cookie-cutter media and finding more and more ways to access the alternative, which effectively removes your clients’ reason for existance. And this, with SOPA/PIPA, is what you sought to extinguish—not just piracy, but creativity and competition.
Perhaps it would be best for the entertainment industry if the both of you disbanded your organizations. Then, perhaps we could create motion picture and recording industry organizations that represented fairness to not just the major players, but all artists, labels, studios and independents so that we could all have a say in how we address industry problems. We could engage in new technologies instead of fighting them at every turn. We could level the playing field and allow people’s choices to determine our direction instead of antiquated manufacturing and distribution systems.
You are both thieves and liars who represent companies that steal and lie. The only problem is, you just can’t hide it anymore. And if the reaction to SOPA/PIPA is any indication, we’re just not buying your bullshit anymore.
Sincerely,
jason m norwood
