[opendtv] Re: Wright Issues Call To Copyright Action
- From: Tom Barry <trbarry@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 21:32:44 -0400
I forget the details but after the printing press was invented one
company in England (not Gutenberg) was awarded a monopoly on printing
that lasted for about a hundred years. It was only after they strongly
lobbied to also control all book importing that there was a political
backlash and they lost it.
This cycle may repeat. ;-)
- Tom
Craig Birkmaier wrote:
> Add Bob Wright of NBC to the looooong list of entrenched media moguls
> who want their friends in Congress to protect their dying business
> model. Today Wright called on Congress to help the media moguls in
> their fight for copyright protection, saying that the Copyright
> Clause (of the Constitution) is under "enormous pressure and requires
> our vigilant attention."
>
> I've got to agree with him. But the question is, where is the
> enormous pressure coming from?
>
> The big media conglomerates have been behind the gutting of the
> intent of the Copyright clause of the constitution, with 11 changes
> in the past century alone.
>
> Talk about the pot calling the kettle black...
>
> Regards
> Craig
>
>
>
> Wright Issues Call To Copyright Action
>
> By John Eggerton -- Broadcasting & Cable, 10/28/2004 11:42:00 AM
>
> Add Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution to the freedoms NBC
> Universal Chairman Robert Wright is intent on defending.
>
> In Washington to accept a First Amendment award from the Media
> Institute, Wright, the dean of network chiefs, sent a message to
> legislators, regulators and whoever else was listening that his
> company is ready to lead the fight for copyright protection, saying
> the Copyright Clause is under "enormous pressure and requires our
> vigilant attention."
>
> Pointing to a recording industry "decimated by illegal downloads," he
> said unrestricted digital copying threatened a $1.25 trillion
> business--television, movies, publishing and software--"whose capital
> is composed almost entirely of intellectual property," as well as the
> sectors that support those industries or depend on them.
>
> Together, they comprise 12% of the nation's GNP and 11 million jobs,
> he said. "I don't think the government gets it," he said. But Wright
> wasn't done tallying up the cost.
>
> "Add in the intellectual property components of other commercial
> activity [the kinds his parent, GE, is involved in]...say,
> pharmaceuticals, engineering, semiconductors, microtechnologies, and
> its entirely likely that more than 20% of our national economy could
> be traced to intellectual property of some sort. This is a very big
> piece of the national pie to have at risk."
>
> Wright also said it was a "terrible mistake" to assume that
> intellectual property violations were a price or the necessary
> byproduct of the transition to digital.
>
> Wright said that technology, not legislation, is the best solution to
> intellectual property theft, but he also said that government needed
> to create "new rules of the road for the digital world...that
> encourage technological progress yet at the same time uphold the
> values that make commerce possible."
>
> His suggestions:
>
> 1. Support a house Judiciary Committee package of antipiracy bills
> "currently in limbo".
>
> 2. Find some compromise in the Senate Judiciary Committee on the
> so-called induce legislation targeted at peer-to-peer file sharing.
>
> 3. Support Attorney General John Ashcroft's proposed intellectual
> property protection recommendations.
>
>
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