Downloading pirated products including software, music and video is something that industry associations have been fighting for some time. As we have seen some artists that seek to protect their rights can get hammered by their fans case in point Metalica whos lawsuit against Napster is said to be reason for breaking up the band and more recently Lilly Allen who just about walked away from music all together stating for about six months she would get into selling clothes with one of her relatives.
But what is interesting about Lilly or Ulrich’s quest to recover as much money as they can… their recordings were released by them or their representatives on a variety of media sites such as YouTube for anyone to access for free.
There is no need to Pirate anyone’s songs when you can build a huge playlist and play it back on your iPhone or home computer… its all right there .. tens of thousands of songs that labels not only want you to hear they compete for you to hear their artists.
However in this latest round of Video content lawsuits we are not talking about risque language that might get you a detention if you were listening in school or could get you fired if thats all you do all day at work … the group that has filed the latest round of copyright infringement suits is the porn industry.
Lets face it the internet was built because porn was on it and people wanted to see it.. but most people will never talk about it.
The stars of the films in question have to eat and pay their bills and because internet porn is so widely available now you don’t see a lot of shops selling it anymore.
Where we might go to the movies to see Terminator or Resident Evil instead of downloading someones hand held camera version because we want to take our kids or have a night out with someone special… Porn is usually viewed in the privacy of your home and purchasing it online with your credit card can leave a trail.
This is where the twist comes in … along with producers of videos like Debbie Does Dallas one of the primary litigants is suing because hundreds of Torrent users are downloading and distributing Transexual Pornography…
To each your own… whether someone looks at transexual porn for gratification or for sheer amazement is up to them but it seems if you are grabbing it off a torrent your name may be published in some international news when the IP Addresses of the offenders are released.
However what some have already said is just like the recording industry approached offenders and then arm twisted them to pay sums of money directly to the industry association they are expecting that the same will occur when people are approached about downloading porn …. HOWEVER with the stigma attached any out of court settlement will be more closer to extortion then protection of the artists property rights.
We will see how this will play out in the next few months but i think instead of going after average people maybe the video associations should look at how government employees were found in possessions of huge amounts of porn so much that one person in the NSA had filled their office and then started stacking spindles and drives through out other offices… I mean really where is the public interest here where is the offense….
Its difficult to say how this will play out but you can probably bet the same people that are saying they are victims because a few hundred or maybe thousand people downloaded a video will be out marching for the right to distribute their products … or for other rights… .
And much like Lily is now happy being a mommy and doing the occasional song for right now.. she probably wishes every minute of every day she could have not even thought about a few people downloading her songs… and just got on with doing more events because thats where the money is today in music….
Anyway … we will see.
