ARCHIVED — Vankoughnett

Copyright Reform Process

SUBMISSIONS RECEIVED REGARDING THE CONSULTATION PAPERS

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Documents received have been posted in the official language in which they were submitted. All are posted as received by the departments, however all address information has been removed.

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Submission from Nicki Vankoughnett received on July 29, 2001 12:12 AM via e-mail

Subject: Copyright issues and opinions

I have been using the internet since at least 1994. I also keep reasonably up to date on the various issues that affect copyrights with respect to material distributed over the internet. I also work in the video game development industry, which has its own issues with electronic piracy of software. As such, I feel I am qualified to give a reasonably informed opinion on this matter.

First, any law that makes it illegal to break the encryption or other protections on Software, Music, or Digital Movies is simply meaningless. It is nearly impossible to enforce, and once the act has been committed, punishing the offender accomplishes nothing. Often, the method for breaking the protection has already been distributed to the offenders friends. The problem is not the circumvention of the protection. What would be to the software vendors best interests is to change their distribution model. If the software is distributed by way of a download, and the install customizes its self to the machine downloading it, then that software nearly unusable on any other machine, and reduce the problem of digital piracy significantly. Between encryption, and peer to peer file sharing, it is going to be impossible to completely eliminate the sharing of copyrighted material. Instead, the effort must be directed towards finding a new revenue stream for the creators of the content that is not affected by the sharing.

However, there is a difference between online file sharing and piracy of application software. File sharing (example: Napster) should not be outlawed or made illegal. It is one of the best possibilities of the Internet, because the costs to the consumer are drastically reduced, and the costs to the artist to distribute the work are also reduced. To properly compensate the artist, I think that an ISP should pay the artists some reasonable amount every time an instance of the file is sent across their network. This cost would not be a per instance fee to the consumer, but a cost that would be added to the bill for the connection to all customers. Once this is done, the artist would probably get as much money as they would from their publisher. And since the cost would manifest its self as a flat 3 to 10 dollar increase in service fee's, it would cause fewer problems. Those ISP's that don't pay for the right to distribute the file would not allow their customers to obtain that file. The artists could negotiate their own deals with the ISP's or other electronic distribution vendor service. And unlike forcing Napster to become a subscription model, the above solutions would not reduce the interest in the new service. Any laws that are destructive to new uses for the Internet are ultimately stupid.

The only party that would object to this method would be the publisher. As things currently stand with copyrights and typical distribution methods, they favor the Publisher. Not the Artist or the Consumer. As I see it, a publisher should not be allowed to own a copyright indefinitely. Ultimate control of a copyrightable creation should belong to the creator, and then only until the creator dies, at which time it should become public domain.

Publishers want to have the same level of control over the media they sell as they do with CD's and Books. The very nature of the internet makes this an unrealistic desire. Computers, by nature, make it easy to copy vast amounts of information cheaply, and the internet makes it easy to distribute it. Publishers no longer have as much control over the how many copies of their products exist, or where people can obtain it. Trying to pass laws that prevent people from using the Internet and Computers for what they are designed to do is like trying to pass a law that outlaws the making of steel buildings because it harms the Lumber business. Instead of passing unenforceable laws, the effort should be directed at ways of using the internet to create new ways of making money.

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