Mike McGuireOh boy, it just seems like these two kids – music labels (and probably the movie studios and some TV networks) and ISPs just want to get hitched, no matter how many family members, friends and members of the clergy are against it. It’s like they can’t keep their hands off each other. But instead of crying “get a room,” we need to be thinking about an intervention.
I mean, if you read the NY Times’ story (first link), even the head of the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (a trade group), is arguing against such ISP-music-label agreements. The important part of his quote in the Isle of Man story is that these plans could effectively tax all broadband users, not just those who are engaging in file-trading. The suggestion, in the story, that ISPs should be pointing file-traders to legal download services is both naïve and seems to be bereft of an understanding of telecoms policy, at least in the US. The common-carrier status for telcos and ISPs, and the “safe harbor” provisions of the DMCA for carriers and ISPs, are not about to be easily abandoned by ISPs and telcos. If they engage in forms of deep-packet inspection – in effect stating that they do care about what customers are transmitting back and forth — file-traders and the media industries will be the last thing any citizen will really need to worry about.
Simple plan: why not just charge users who consume more than what is deemed a “fair share” of hourly/daily/monthly bandwidth? In others words, drop the “unlimited data” (a bit of marketing double-speak if one peruses the Ts&Cs of any broadband data contract) from the spiels and just point out the GB/(insert-your-time-frame-here) and leave it at that. Now, if the content companies want to run around with their tin cups out and ask the ISPs for a cut of the increase in revenue, they should be free to do that.
Really, this is a marriage that cannot happen. As interested consumers, we need to be the person that actually stands up at the end of the marriage vows and says “I have a few reasons why this couple should not be wed…”
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