Kids pirate music.

There are a lot of kids in college.

Thus, to stop piracy all we would need to do is to keep kids out of college.

This isn’t exactly what the copyright holders of America have up their collective sleeves, but it is close. A bill backed by the RIAA, MPAA and the like is now sitting in the House of Representatives.

If it passes, Universities across the country would be required to spy on their students and report any signs of piracy. If they fail to comply, their students would lose access to Federal Aid.

Seems pretty air-tight to me…

Who Needs College?

Beyond the obvious insanity of requiring the already strained educational system to put together a police force to track down Sally in her dorm downloading The White Stripes, you have to wonder what could have compelled these copyright owners to attack a system that allows deserving college students to receive an education. The type of education that eventually leads to jobs that pay enough for these same college students to buy media.

The College Opportunity and Affordability Act is an otherwise fantastic bill. It aims to help streamline federal aid applications, make textbooks more affordable, increase college aid programs and generally improve the lives of students countrywide.

Unfortunately for us all, hidden deep within the bill is a rider that would compel colleges to test, “technology-based deterrents to prevent such illegal [file-sharing] activity,” this amounts to forcing the student body to sign up for services like Ruckus or Rhapsody.

Maura Corbett of Digital Freedom, a Fair Use watchdog group released the following statement that seems as close to the point as any I’ve come across, “Academic resources are meant to educate students, not to build police forces for wealthy corporations . . . To try to highjack legislation to force universities to hold billions of dollars of critical financial aid for their students hostage is below reproach . . . There is no question that illegal file sharing is wrong but as resources for education become more and more scarce, they are far better spent educating students rather than spying on them at the behest of large corporations. Requiring universities to spy on their students runs counter to the transparency that is the cornerstone of an academic community.”

Web 2.0 Roundup

This is the type of legislation that is created when an industry fails to understand the difference between protecting its rights and attacking its customers. I thought it would be best to leave you with a recent statement by Edgar Bronfman, the boss of Warner Music. It’s a little proof that despite efforts like this, a few people in the industry might actually get it.

“We used to think our content was perfect just exactly as it was. We expected our business would remain blissfully unaffected even as the world of interactivity, constant connection and file sharing was exploding. And of course we were wrong. How were we wrong? By standing still or moving at a glacial pace, we inadvertently went to war with consumers by denying them what they wanted and could otherwise find and as a result of course, consumers won.”

I think the industry would do well to take Mr. Bronfman’s example. What do you think?

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