[d@DCC] SONY'S CD ROOTKIT - Is clamed to infring LGPL copyright.

[Jem]

>    The problem in my mind with this alternative is how it is perceived
> by parliament.  Parliament does not recognize that the reason why the
> major labels are loosing money is because of competitive forces (people
> going to the unsigned and independents, to musicians not
> owned/controlled by the US/European major labels, people buying other
> forms of entertainment such as DVD movies instead, etc) and because the
> labels refuse to provide the music in a format acceptable to their
> customers  (Voluntary collective licensing for online distribution,
> standard MP3/FLAC/etc format for commercial downloads, RedBook Standard
> Audio CDs, etc).  The false rhetoric of "theft" seems to have captured
> parliamentarians who blindly believe, without any evidence, that the
> correlation between the rise of unauthorized sharing and the reduction
> in US/EU major label revenues is a causal relationship.

Yes, it is an amazing failure of policy makers to recognize the free market 
in action :) People are disappointed with commercial audio CDs, and they 
seek alternative forms of entertainment. Myself, I have entirely stopped 
purchasing commercial CDs and now I increasingly rent DVDs and find second 
hand audio CDs to be used. For audio, I support labels such as Warp Records 
and [ www.bleep.com ] who sell high quality, DRM free downloads.

The market is robbing the labels of profits. This is not only legitimate, 
but the process should be praised by any true capitalist if they really do 
believe in free market forces, competition, etc.

>    Not recognizing what the problem is, every "solution" that they are
> coming up with is fundamentally flawed.

Well either the media companies genuinely expect that their sales must keep 
going on as usual (would be a shocking misunderstanding of the market), or 
they have recognized that they are in serious trouble without manipulating 
the government/policy to change the parameters of the market place. Again, 
a severe corruption of capitalism and the free market.

>    I guess I don't worry about the youth as much as I did in the past. I
> worry about those 308 folks up on Parliament Hill.   They are even
> weaker than the teens, always confusing the interests of the currently
> most successful companies with the very different (often opposed)
> interests of the creative and innovative people within the industry.

I think you're right about that too. The misunderstanding of the situation 
is shocking; or it could be that they do understand the situation, and 
genuinely think it is government's place to lend a hand to big companies 
that are going through tough times. The latter would be disgusting.