Steal This File Sharing Book: What They Wont Tell You About File Sharing

There’s no question that sharing copyrighted files breaks the law. The problem isn’t how to stop file sharing networks. The real problem is adapting file sharing technology in a way that fairly compensates artists and corporations and yet doesn’t infringe upon a consumer’s right to enjoy the copyrighted information they purchased legitimately.

File sharing networks will not be forced to go away by lawsuits, copy-protected CDs, or outright sabotage by organizations that represent the music, video, or publishing industries. Rather than fight the inevitable, corporations must find a way to embrace that same technology that threatens their current business practices. If corporations fail to adapt to change, they’ll simply go out of business like Montgomery Ward and Pan Am, or they will suffer lingering deaths of irrelevancy, like Kmart, Burger King, and Polaroid.

What consumers want is the right to copy and use their music, videos, or electronic books anywhere they want, whether it’s on a laptop, desktop, handheld computer, MP3 player (like Apple’s iPod), or even in devices yet to be created. What corporations want is fair compensation for investing in artists and taking the financial risk of publicizing and distributing a product. (What artists want is fair compensation for creating their music, but that has always been an ongoing struggle between artists and the recording industry.)

If consumers don’t get what they want, they’ll continue to turn toward piracy. If the corporations don’t get what they want, they’ll continue to fight a losing battle involving lawsuits, copy-protection schemes doomed for eventual failure, and draconian laws designed to protect their financial interests at the expense of anyone else’s.

Oddly enough, the pornography industry, no stranger to embracing technological changes such as Polaroid cameras, VCRs, and webcams, may have the solution. The pornography industry is rumored to be working on a file sharing network dubbed Pornster (http://www.pornster.com). Unlike ordinary file sharing networks, Pornster will reportedly allow only copyrighted still and video images on its network and then will automatically track how many people download specific copyrighted files. Advertising and subscription revenue earned by the Pornster network will then be used to compensate the companies and porn stars for their work, based on how many people download their copyrighted images. The system allows consumers to freely share files while still giving artists and corporations fair monetary compensation in return.

The bottom line is that the corporations, who currently hold all the power and make most of the money, are going to have to change, and that’s something they aren’t willing to do. Unfortunately for them, their fate is already sealed and out of their hands in the same way that buggy whip manufacturers, slide rule makers, and whale-oil lamp companies found themselves wiped out by technological change. The question isn’t whether file sharing technology will put today’s corporate powerhouses out of business. The question is when, and that future is closer than they think.