- Joined
- Nov 12, 2010
- Messages
- 326
- Reaction score
- 33
- Location
- Outside
- Website
- blazedzikowski.wordpress.com
You know the problems film, music and book publishing companies face because of the illegal downloading. Some might cheer the giants taking a hit, but it's also hurting the individual artist -- at least in my part of the world. I don't know many people who still buy DVDs or music CDs. It's just so easy to use torrents etc. With the popularisation of e-readers, we could join musicians and film producers in the ranks of those robbed by evil pirates, arr.
I've noticed one thing, however: no matter how many content people are illegally downloading off the net, without paying the creator of the content, there's one party that's still -- and always -- getting paid. The Internet Providers.
So, the situation looks like that:
- People pay ISPs to download things.
- ISPs are the only ones who can exercise control over users (by switching off the net)
- If there were no things on the net to download, ISPs would earn much less than they do now. So piracy acts actually in their favor.
And here's my idea (maybe someone thought of it before, I haven't heard about it anyway):
Why not just tax the ISPs so that everyone whose content was downloaded gets paid by Them?
It would act a bit like royalties in the golden age of Radio and TV.
Also, no seedy torrentz or w4r3z sites. You're a film producer? You set up a pretty website with your film free to download. ISPs would pay you for each person downloading it. Because the person would have to pay the ISPs first.
I imagine some sort of digital watermarks would be needed to trace how much a single work got downloaded, but hey, the humanity overcame harder obstacles in pursuit of the buck.
I've noticed one thing, however: no matter how many content people are illegally downloading off the net, without paying the creator of the content, there's one party that's still -- and always -- getting paid. The Internet Providers.
So, the situation looks like that:
- People pay ISPs to download things.
- ISPs are the only ones who can exercise control over users (by switching off the net)
- If there were no things on the net to download, ISPs would earn much less than they do now. So piracy acts actually in their favor.
And here's my idea (maybe someone thought of it before, I haven't heard about it anyway):
Why not just tax the ISPs so that everyone whose content was downloaded gets paid by Them?
It would act a bit like royalties in the golden age of Radio and TV.
Also, no seedy torrentz or w4r3z sites. You're a film producer? You set up a pretty website with your film free to download. ISPs would pay you for each person downloading it. Because the person would have to pay the ISPs first.
I imagine some sort of digital watermarks would be needed to trace how much a single work got downloaded, but hey, the humanity overcame harder obstacles in pursuit of the buck.