Digitalwall: Crime and Punishment of P2P (2) Fire of Greed

P2P is inherently decentralized, born with the possibility of infringement. And the records companies can never put up with this.

[+] P2P should remain non-commercial

With legal determinations around the world getting more adverse, it is expected that commercial P2P software companies which ignorantly claim that, "I have no idea about users' infringement and no obligation to stop them from doing so," will soon falling away.

If P2P software remains non-commercial, and anonymous engineers around the world keep on volunteering to update the software and open the source, the music/records industry can hardly find a real target of complaint. Just like in the myth, Prometheus continued to suffer on the mountain, but men can never stop using fire.

Is the records industry, which has the mighty power to wreak torture on the Promethean culprit, a victim or an inflictor? It is an interesting question. In the past the records industry considered itself the victim and accused that illegal music download had caused it tremendous loss.

The deep-pockets who are capable of dominating the world not only choke the development of P2P but also direct their charges to search engines. August 2005, seven major records companies in Hong Kong sued the biggest search engine in China: Baidu.com.

The reason: Baidu as a search engine, provides information of and links to illegal MP3 download websites. China has been the paradise of free music and movies, and Baidu just went public in the U.S., which made it a conspicuous target.

[+] Who should check on infringement?

If the disclaimer that, "I supply the software only and will not be liable for users' infringement," can't prevent a commercial P2P software company from a legal action, then it is to nobody's surprise that a search engine is sued even if it claims, "I provide search results only and will not warrant the legality of such results."

Such thinking can continue to develop. Take a telecom operator offering ADSL service for example. It can claim that, "I offer Internet connection service only and will not be liable for the legality of users' online activities." But the record industry companies can still sue it, and precedents tell that they have a good chance to win.

So how to eradicate the root of illegal music, where to start? If there are loads of providers/software engineers/crazy downloaders everywhere, then to start with telecom operators seems to be a solution once and for all. In fact, telecom operators do have all the connection records.

But, telecom operators have their own trouble, too. It can cause huge burden to the system as well as extra cost if ADSL users hang on the Net and use P2P software to grab music and movies all day long. Not so long ago, there were even rumors that telecom operators in China were about to shut out one of the most popular P2P software: BitTorrent.

Telecom operators in China now plan to change the way they bill ADSL users. It used to be a flat fee per month for all, now they want to charge higher monthly fee from high volume users. Suddenly we realize that the flat monthly fee scheme is based on the calculation of telecom operators that we users will not need that much bandwidth at all.

[+] The true face of records companies

Will records companies work with telecom operators to take away the fire from men? The truth is, telecom operators have tried hard to avoid such an outcome, because it means they will have to bear the liability for users' infringement ever, which may lead to tremendous monitoring cost and endless trouble of lawsuits.

Yet the records companies will never give up. Before, the atmosphere was more favorable to P2P. Seeing that there was little hope to curb P2P, some records companies chose to work with P2P companies and sought to incorporate them into the legal music download business and "to get the child once gone astray back on the right track."

If you believe this benignant face, you can be very wrong. The records companies join your side simply because they are incapable of doing the opposite. Once they become strong enough to fight back, they will do so relentlessly. P2P is inherently decentralized, born with the possibility of infringement. And the records companies can never put up with this.

In addition to the legal actions employed to frustrate P2P software companies/websites, records companies are also encroaching on the area of legal music download. Apple has over 70% of the legal download market worldwide. It used to sell at 99 cents per song, but now it is under the pressure of price hike.

Apple's suppliers of music files say that their current offer is under-priced, and that they wish to have more flexibility in pricing. That is, some songs may be priced a bit higher, and some lower. Apple has helped generate magnificent profits for these records companies, and now they are asking to raise their prices.

[+] P2P will continue to survive

What the records companies are asking for is not really price hike but price differentiation theoretically. Yet for those who are familiar with the capitalist market know that, price differentiation is the start of exploitation of consumers. Through price differentiation, businesses are attempting to reap every cent they can out of the consumers' pockets.

Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO, is one of the people who are too aware of the essence of the game. Greed. He sees it through right away. It is quite natural that records companies would think about implanting the rules of their capitalist game in the traditional music industry to the digital world, as they have finally mounted on the throne of power for the first time.

In any case, there is already clear direction about how the digital world should run. In the future, all music files will be encrypted and copyright protected to ensure that every cent is safely collected. As to transmission of music and movies via P2P, it can only go underground. The two modes will co-exist, but there will be no gray area in between.

P2P per se is a communication technology, but once it gets involved with the distribution of copyrighted music, movies or software, it gets stained. Yet there is no lack of smart people. Like Niklas Zennstrom, the creator of P2P software Kazza, he went on and invented Skype. He applied P2P technology to VoIP and successfully got rid of the harassment of lawyers.

My memory brings me to the year of 2000 when the fire of revolution just broke out from AOL; I tried the very first P2P software with excitement and imagined the infinite possibilities behind it. It is true that Zeus could not take the fire back from men, but he did possess the power to have Prometheus chained to Mount Caucasus and tortured as punishment. Well I think we still have a long way to go, my friends. (
2005/10/02 - By Digitalwall.com - Way to
China Internet/Telecom )