UK.gov makes total pig's ear of attempt to legalise home CD ripping

The whole idea of format shifting is totally moot in the digital age. Should artists get compensated when I copy an mp3 from one part of my hard drive to another? What about from once hard disk to another in the same PC? What about from one hard drive to another hard drive on another PC, what about from a hard drive to an SSD? To a USB stick? To a memory card? To a CD? When you play an mp3 it gets copied from the hard disk to RAM, should I pay for this?

The whole thing is nonsense, of course artists do not deserve any more when when we move bits about from one digital storage medium to another.

The sooner artists start thinking of digital copies of their music as advertising for their talents rather than the product itself, the better.

Navels of angels, existence of...

Given the amount of effect this law currently has on behaviour...

Cary Sherman of the RIAA said "We've have had no problem with people format shifting music that they've legally bought for many years now" and that was said about 5 years ago.

The problem with format shifting...

The problem with format shifting being illegal is that it's unenforceable. To enforce the law as it stands would be to make criminals of the majority of the population. Ironically back in the 90's the record companies weren't even that bothered if Guns and Roses' release of Use Your Illusion is taken as an example. The record stores actively promoted copying of the album by selling blank tapes alongside the CDs. The idea being you'd by one CD and your mate would buy the other and make copies of each others CD. As for a levy, that was never meant to make up the cost of "lost sales" due to format shifting. That's a false idea anyway, if you're format shifting for personal use there is no lost sale, you've already bought the music. The whole idea of the levy was to cover the costs of "stolen" music, which is an intangible figure plucked out of the air by the music industry. Chances are even if you couldn't download it for free the music industry's sales would still have declined, because a lot of what is downloaded is music that the downloaders would simply have not bought in the first place. And the other argument against the levy is the simple fact it penalises the wrong people. It was argued that the levy should be placed on writable CDs and DVDs, which means the IT industry. I don't know about anyone else but I wouldn't be best pleased if my backup discs for Linux and files were paying for the neighbour's kids downloaded Eminem mp3s.

Maybe the music industry would like to clarify (and decide) whether music bought on physical media is licensed (for life) or not. Because if it is, then once the license is owned, no further recompense should be needed to the music companies for allowing format shifting, etc.

Let's be honest here, the music companies had their fingers in all the pies, and are butthurt that they've been told to slim down and choose a single pie.

Compensation for what?

I'm really not sure I see the problem here. If I buy a CD (do people actually still do that?), I pay the people who made it. If I then copy it to my phone so I can listen to it in a more convenient manner, the people who made the CD have done nothing whatsoever extra and can fuck right off if they want any more money. So why the fuck should there be any compensation involved at any point in this law? You get paid for the product you actually sell to me, and that's it. For all the flaws the government might have this is one thing they've got absolutely correct, and the courts can find somewhere convenient to stick it if they think they can either stop me copying things that I own or charge me for the privilege of doing so.

Makes my blood boil

There should be a point of fairness in law, but this is taking it to absurdity

"The idea that compensation should accompany any format-shifting exception is based on the idea that the producer sells fewer copies. Not that many fewer copies, but fewer all the same."

So the government should pay the producer because I'm not I'm not being double-dipped for the content I've already purchased,

If I own a shop and don't sell more eggs as some people have let them grow into laying Hens can I also expect compensation?

How, in Gods name, does this stuff become law?

Surely

The Gubbinment can provide a fund totalling one pund per annum.

The music companies can then go to court to argue over how it gets split....

I like my idea of "Cliff's Law" of copy protection. Crap music doesn't get copied. Same for ABBA. Plus for movies, anything with Julia Roberts in it....

i'm sure we can all apply our own "Cliff's Law" to our collections...

When I play a FLAC it's "format shifted" into an uncompressed stream - does this mean playback of all compressed digital formats is now illegal?

whatever happened to

The sovereignty of parliament? UKIP may be a party onanists but they do have a point when it comes to who gets to rule the country. Do our elected representatives really need the approval of a bewigged septagenarian's interpretation of a document produced by a foreign bureaucrat before they can pass a law?

Come back Oliver Cromwell, all is forgiven (free wart removal on the NHS if you wait long enough ).

How about....

I go and buy a car and in the Top Gear style turn it into a boat and sail the seven seas. Do I have to pay compensation to the ship-building industry or to the car makers? No. That would be silly...... Though I wonder if applying logic to the law is akin to putting shoes on a snake....

I'm not stopping now

Thanks for the points made here.

Because of my love for music I've spent 10s of thousands on concert tickets and recordings over the past 40+ years: not unusual, I’d guess. Have any of the parties to this case (whatever the legal arguments might be) considered what response there might be from devoted music fans?

Once again, sections of the music industry attempt to punish those who contribute most to their profits, their incomes, by extracting more revenue from them for recordings for which they have already paid. Meanwhile, it will make no difference at all to those who rely on pirated copies, of whatever kind.

I understand how difficult it is for all but the most famous artists to make a decent amount. However, I draw the line right here. I bought this stuff and I will do with it what I want, short of selling it on or giving away copies. Right now I'm part way through ripping my collection to hard disk. I'm not stopping now, regardless of the change in the law.

To the organisations representing artists, I say: focus on getting a fair deal from the media companies and establishing a better distribution model for the digital age, one that rewards both performers and loyal fans. To the larger, more aggressive media companies (you know who you are), I say: your greed and lack of scruples disgust me. I love music despite your best efforts to turn it into a debased commodity. You need bringing in line, not for courts and governments to pander to your demands.

I legally purchased the CD so I will do with it as I please. As long as it's for my private usage and not shared around my friends and the internet I don't see the problem.

problem of usage license rather than format

So the artist creates the music but as theyre piss poor broke they rely on an advance from a music company to get them advertising and pay for their living, in which case the music industry takes quite a large slice of the pie. The music company is funded by shareholders who all want a share of the profit as that's why they put the money in the business in the first place. Once the music is created, the format for the master is cut and that becomes the golden source. The music company has to recoup their costs and sell the product. Ideally, they would like to sell the same thing multiple times to the same person to maximize the revenue and potentially have a big slush fund. The problem is the format and security on the format is "easily" (with the right tools) intercepted and converted into something else. As the internet is essentially the Wild West, jurisdiction of it is impossible and ends up at a country's/unions "borders".

If the music company could lock down the format to be only played by one device they would, this has probably been tried and failed in the past - essentially the People (or the Plebs if your a Roman (pleb being a free citizen of plebian status rather than slave and so had rights)) do not like to be told what they can do with something that they have bought the rights to listen to/watch/use and so will convert/subvert it to their own use.

The government owns a duty of care to its people but also to the companies that may/may not pay Tax to them (depending on how good their accountants are). The theory is that the goods sold have a level of taxation that is collected by the Revenue Office and are for the good of the social aspect of the country. The reality is that the tax collected may find its way back to the pocket of the music company due to a variety of schemes that are employed to minimize the tax profile of a company (for the benefit of the shareholders).

So the problem ends up that the music company believes that they are being ripped off on their products and hence needs the government to intervene so that in the long run, their theory is that they can pay more Tax and so help the country. The reality is that the Plebs don't like to pay twice for the same thing and so will "challenge" any formats that limit their ability to enjoy their goods/services. The music company calls this piracy and every person who is involved in it is helping fund terrorism/etc whereas in reality, probably 99.9% of the Plebs listen to it for 3 months and then move on to something else. Even with a ripped CD, theres probably about 30% of music worth listening to and the other 70% is listened to once and then skipped - or it never makes the favorite playlist.

Streaming companies have stepped into the gap so that the Plebs can listen to their favorite music, endure a few ads as they dont want to pay for it, and if they really do they can purchase a digital format that can be centralized and shared among their many devices.

The music company revenue model accounts for sales and not for other digital services that they could make revenue from - hence their drop in traditional markets and the perceived lower total revenue sales in digital than what they believe they are due (if a traditional model was applied). The Plebs are loyal to the Artist and not the music company as they are perceived as not having a value add and being greedy in terms of the slice of the pie they believe they are entitled to.

So... to cut to the chase, if the music company had actually marketed itself to its customers rather than just the artist, they may actually have some support from the Plebs. As they are seen as trying to stifle the market and introduce barriers/limits to entry to the music industry, transactions/sales, and overall crying "Wolf" with a "poor me" attitude, the Plebs have moved on and don't give a flying monkeys about them - they love their Spotify/[insert streaming music supplier here]/etc as that's whats being marketed to them.

So how does a company get loyalty from their customers... they should probably go talk to Apple marketing, take notes and not indulge in the after meeting drinks.

Now..wheres my vodka...

Copyright infringement is a political action too

I used to buy loads of /copies/ of media on physical stuff, which is now mostly my NAS (frack the legal), but I got so fed up being ripped off for ridiculously high prices and refuse to tolerate poorer quality lossy formats; I rarely buy media now so as to withhold funding this Psychopathic Corporate (fiction) greed and absurd state (fiction) backed privilege rent seeking for mere intangibles which are stored on /my real property/, which I'll do with as I see fit!

The ridiculously sickening thing for me is that digital delivered product can be poorer quality, worse value, less secure and more expensive than buying a copy in physical stuff, seriously WTF; the most obvious case is ebooks!

The business landscape has changed, the increasing spend on games and other media has (probably, zero facts to back this up apart form gut feel tbh) reduced the amount spent on music.

They need to suck it up rather than trying to use laws to bolster their fading model.

Be good if we could launch something like a US class-action to take them to task for selling us the same thing again and again on differing formats, for padding albums with filler, for all the disgusting formulaic rubbish (ooops, showing my age), for root kits, etc. etc.

Artists will still want to create music regardless of whether they get paid by the big labels; we are in no danger of losing music here.

Home taping never killed music despite what we were told. Sick of it!

(rage quit)

Why levies will not work.

I am glad that idea has been dropped as I see no reason why my backups should pay for some randon band. Why my holiday videos (on DVD or now BluRay) should funda random film.

And so on.

It could be terrible, I could end up funding Wand Erection or silent C as in Rap.

Or bad fan fiction films of Twilight.

The technology of creating millions of copies from a master tape to sell as products was invented last century. For a short heyday for artists and more so for the publishers, they could make cheap and sell dear. Some got very rich very fast. Then the very same technology - to be able to make cheap copies - came into the private user domain. What those publishers want to preserve is that short lived heyday of getting rich fast, forever.

Fair use...

...does not include multiple copies or distribution. One back-up copy is fine and only one copy may be used at any given time. That eliminates the issue of copies. Reimburse artists/copyright holders appropriately (tacked on to original purchase price) and there is nothing to argue about. The new mandatory minimum 10 years in prison plus hefty fines for pirates fits quite well with the minor revisions required for a back-up copy.

Priced in

given how long format shifting has been going on I thought the argument that the record companies had priced in the impact seemed pretty reasonable. In the same way shops assume they will have a certain amount of stock leakage.

As it's not a new problem then any company that hadn't factored it in to their pricing model isn't doing a good job, which is their problem not the govt.s

Personally, I think a levy on format shifting is bollocks. Either make it legal to do it, or leave it up to the vendor to define the contract. Government should have not wasted money avoiding the EU law, and left the existing law on the books and amended it to say "But, you know, we don't really care if you do, because we actually don't believe there's really any significant harm done. But, no, that does not mean you can buy an old, damaged CD from a car boot and then download a copy off the Internet because you've "bought it already". And no, it doesn't mean you can take a copy from a friend because you might buy it later. And no, of course it doesn't mean you can copy it off a stream. You bloody know what we mean. No excuses about evil corporations or buts and buy-it-later."

Next there will be a levy on flour in case you format shift it into cake.

CDs???

Who uses them? Bit late init?

internet traffic royalties

Back in the day, there was a surcharge on CDs, which covered royalties and allowed copying audio CDs. There is always a reasonable way to make everyone happy. Maybe content makers get some royalty payment from overall internet traffic paid by ISPs and added as a surcharge to all internet users. This will pave the way for future increases in online content consumption.

"Back in the day, there was a surcharge on CDs"

Which meant those not using them to copy music were subsidising companies for something they weren't doing.

AND that those who were copying music were effectively paying a license to copy as much as they wanted.

The age old question still applies: Have I bought the media, in which case I can do what I like with it, or have I bought a license, in which case I can listen to it on any media I see fit?

Victory?

The effect either the original law or the court ruling had on the number of CDs ripped? Absolutely none at all, I'd guess.

A brilliant use of resources all round.

I've just finished...

... ripping my 78 RPM shellac to digital. I had to do it before the record player breaks. The alternative is for the authorities to provide me with a new 78 RPM record player please.

I only buy CDs as a way of obtaining music in a half-decent uncompressed format. I don't even own a CD player now, other than in the car, so I'm obliged to rip the content to a file server so I can play it on my audiophile network player. If it was as easy to buy a 16/44.1 (or ideally 24/96 or 24/192) FLAC download as it is to buy a CD from Amazon, and from the same back catalogue, and at no price premium, then my CD buying days would be over and this would be a non-issue. If the music industry is really against media shifting then they need to deliver the content in a decent format.

Of course it is "priced in"

How on earth did they get away with claiming format shifting is not priced in? It has been priced in forever, and that price is almost zero.

Imagine if a music company offered two versions of a CD: one permitting format shifting and the other not. The latter would have to be priced at a discount, of course. That discount is the "price" of the format shifting option.

If some company had actually done this, and had managed to set the prices such that they got significant sales of both options, then they could reasonably claim that there was a non-trivial price for format shifting, and that that was NOT priced in on the non-format-shifting CD. That would have formed evidence that format shifting was NOT priced in to ordinary CD sales.

But, they never did this. So, they cannot possibly claim format shifting was not priced in. They should not have been allowed to get away with it.

It is obvious that if someone wants to claim that some restrictions has some value, for which they should be compensated, they need to be able to point to evidence showing that, given a choice, people were previously buying both with and without the restriction, at different prices. The price difference is the value of the restriction (to both the buyer and the seller). This should be true for DRM as well: if you want DRM-removal to be illegal you should have to be successfully selling content with and without DRM at different prices so people should not be able to change one into the other after purchase.

Dumb question

If I buy, for example, a comic... and then I scan it to my tablet (or even photocopy the bloody thing) and stash the original comic in one of those dust covers that hardcore nerds have so that I can read it while retaining a pristine hard copy, have I broken the law?