2003.03.08
2003.03.08
what is the internet? why are so many in power having such a hard time adjusting to it? this article covers that and should be read by every CEO of an internet related company in America.
in essence, it says that the internet is not a broadcast medium. the internet was designed to be stupid. this gives it a flexibility and durability not found in other forms of media. the internet is an inter-net; it can help create networks and can help those networks connect to other networks. because the internet protocols were designed only to move data around a network it makes no judgement about that data, whether it is your love letter email, encrypted bank transactions, pornography, illegal (or legal) MP3s, etc. the internet cannot be controlled from any one location or any one anything because it is a network of devices that agree to use a very simple protocol to communicate.
attempts to control the content of the internet are kind of like attempt to control human language. imagine i told you that you could no longer use the word “the” in the english language unless they pay me one cent per use because i own it (somehow). this sounds like a great idea to me because already i see about 10 instances of “the” in this article alone. i will soon be the richest man on the planet! at least if i can get people to pay up. how hard would that be? i think you can imagine: impossible. i might get a few people to pay me what they would owe me, but think of all the people on the planet that speak english… how would *you* feel if i came up to you and said you owed me money for every time you used “the”?
data on the internet is much the same. just as people would go on using the word “the” even if i were legally correct, people -through the internet- will continue to exchange data, whether that love letter, encrypted financial data, pornography, MP3s, movies… whatever. any protection scheme you can dream of can be hacked, and -illegal or no- it will be hacked by someone, somewhere.
keep in mind that legality and law in general is temporal. it changes with time. that being said i am not endorsing people act illegally or that they encourage others to act against the current laws. however i am saying to the people who promote specific law making (hello RIAA, MPAA, and any other company, lobby or rich guy who can pay up) and those who actually legislate (from congress down to individual towns) that they need to understand they are fighting a losing battle. they lost it the first day they decided they would participate in the digital age.
what do they do? they can either embrace how the internet actually functions or they will be seen as increasing dangerous to the freedoms of individuals because anyone who uses the internet sees it as a sort of freedom; almost a right. these companies need to embrace the internet, not fight it by attempting to control it.
recently a friend sent me an MP3 of a song he liked. the legality here is not open to discussion. however, i listened to the song and really liked it. i bought the CD. in the end, despite the MP3, some recording industry artist-ripoff man made his money. i think more people like me go through this process than they realize.
they cannot control their content without controlling the entire internet, and because of the way the internet is designed this is next to impossible. at the point it could be possible would be a one world government that stamped out every possible freedom on the planet. hail big brother and all that rot.
and that happening is as likely as me collecting my penny every time you use the word “the”.
Categorized: audio geek rights
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