http://www.zeropaid.com/news/87128/pirate-party-clashes-with-music-industry-boss/Panel on P2P turns heated as Patrick Rakow CEO of BASCA (British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors) says Pirate Party’s plan for five year copyright limit would “completely undermine” the ability of content creators to make a living.
Yesterday was day one of the three day In The City music conference in Manchester, England, and it got off to a bang with a panel devoted exclusively to the issue of P2P.
Rick Falkvinge, founder and chairman of the Swedish Pirate Party which won 7.13% of the Swedish vote in the 2009 European Parliament elections, giving it as many as 2 seats in the European parliament, addressed the crowd by detailing 5 copyright law reforms proposed by the party. “First, we want to reduce it to commercial use only,” said Falkvinge. In his opinion file-sharing for non-commercial gain should be legalized.
He furthered: We want to limit the length of copyright to five years from the day of publication. We want to limit the online technical measures, the purpose of which is to strip consumers of their legal rights. We want to specifically allow remixes and rehashes and encourage the mash-up culture, which today is illegal. We want to strongly keep the right of attribution – that is the artist’s right to be associated with his or her work.
Patrick Rackow, CEO of the British Academy of songwriters, composers and authors (BASCA), was quick to criticize his proposals and said that five year copyright limit would “destroy” royalty collecting societies as well as a “reliable and stable source of income” for content creators. “The Pirate Party seems to claim to support creativity and support creators, but what they appear to want is to completely undermine any chance that they have of making a living,” he added.
Another of the panelists, Jon Webster of the UK Music Manager’s Forum, reiterated his earlier calls for the govt to intervene and impose licensing solutions if the creative industries and ISPs are unable to come up with on voluntary licensing agreements on their own. “We in the MMF would like to see rights’ holders start to take risks to license more services and to make services that mimic illegal P2P,” he said. “[We are] not afraid of compulsory or statutory licensing should all the other methods fail.”
The problem with groups like BASCA and other copyright holder groups is that they have been to slow to offer what consumers want and use outdated copyright laws to protect a likewise outdated business model. Compulsory licensing and copyright law reform are needed if we truly want to serve the best interests of artists and music fans alike.
Not much in the way of compromise from the cartels there. I seem to remember them asking for an extension of of copyright to 70 years. It still seems the public and the entertainment industry are a long way apart. I can't see that repeatedly having to pay for the same thing in copyright charges, over a 70 year span, will ever go down well with the public. I wonder how long it will take people like the BASCA and MMF to realise that?
