The trouble is, even leaving the price of downloads aside, no “legal” music or video service can ever match a file-sharing network. The reason for this is that the content available is too limited and controlled. Certain types of music and film are promoted heavily, while more obscure titles are unavailable. Also, the industries tend to divide the world up into regions, and assume no-one from one region is interested in the culture of another. Often there is no legal way to buy copies of certain foreign films in another country. There is no way to watch most foreign TV shows in another country, no matter how much money you are willing to pay. And there’s no way to browse a huge inventory of the most obscure composers’ or bands’ music from around the world. All of these things are, however, possible with file-sharing systems, such as the ones that are currently branded “illegal”. With file-sharing, you can access any media that someone else has. It’s possible to discover new things, find obscure recordings, watch TV shows from any country, find that special cut of a film that’s never been released in your country… The list goes on.

My suggestion to resolve the issue of “illegal” file-sharing is that there should be an annual fee for which is it possible to obtain a file-sharing licence. This could be collected in a similar way to the TV Licence in the UK. Once someone has a licence, they could use file-sharing networks as much as they like, as long as it was for their own personal use, using any file-sharing system they choose (not one with limited content controlled by a particular company or organisation). The money raised would go to the performers, composers, etc. as royalty payments. I would personally happily pay £200 or even £300 a year to legitimise any file-sharing I might want to do. This would be very many times the amount I currently give to the film and music industries each year, but would be money well spent, unlike the poor offerings available at present.

A fallacy often repeated by those who don’t understand file-sharing is that every track or film downloaded represents a lost sale. My contention is that in the vast majority of cases, the alternative would be that the film or music would simply not have been obtained at all, so no revenue was lost through file-sharing. And as for the concept of people obtaining an excessive amount of content for free once they have a licence, it should be remembered that there are only so many films or music tracks one can watch or listen to in a year. Simply building up a big collection on your hard disc for other licence-holders to download isn’t an issue – again, the content wouldn’t have been paid for otherwise, so no revenue is lost.

The difficulty with the above is that very little of the revenue would go to record companies. Now, record companies, when pursuing people for copyright infringement, always use the argument that they are doing so to stick up for the rights of the poor, impoverished song-writers and performers. The truth, I suspect, is that very little of the money currently goes to the artists, certainly not to the less well-known ones. A good deal of the money goes to the record companies. It’s hardly surprising, therefore, that they should oppose any form of file-sharing. The phonographic industry and big film distribution companies are desperate to retain the stranglehold over the distribution of music and video content, even though there is no longer a need for any physical media to be distributed. This is the issue that is preventing modernisation of copyright laws to enable the public to access recorded works in a way that’s fitting for the 21st century. While the big companies wield the influence they currently have over governments and courts, such as that Swedish court, no progress can be made.

Unsurprisingly, the proposal is being backed by big names in the music world such as Sir Cliff Richard, whose first recording will go out of copyright next year, and Sir Paul McCartney, with the Beatles’ first recordings currently set to enter the public domain in 2013.

It’s important to understand that this proposal concerns recordings, and not the copyright on original compositions or lyrics. Copyright on those lasts for life plus 70 years, in recognition of the creativity put into producing an original work. This is quite different from simply performing someone else’s work. A singer who is talented enough to write his own songs should be less concerned about the copyright on the recordings as he (or his estate) will continue to receive royalties from the work itself.

An actor on stage, whether in Stratford or the West End, will be paid for the performance, then that’s it. The same is true of a musician performing live. There is no further income after the performance has finished. When an architect designs a new building, he is paid a fee for the work. Neither he, nor the engineers and building contractors who actually build it, will receive royalties every time someone looks at the building, or from the people who use it.

This is just an attempt by the music industry, and from a few big-name artists, to grab even more money when they have made enough already. If the so-called stars want a pension, they should make sure they put aside some of their income to provide for them in old age, just as everyone else has to, instead of spending it on an extravagant lifestyle. I can’t imagine either Sir Cliff or Sir Paul is living on the poverty line. And as for the argument that they are doing this on behalf of all the small-time artists and backstage staff, the fact is that most of these had to sign away their rights to royalties to the record company in order to receive the modest session fee they were paid at the time.

Copyright has historically been a balance between the rights of those producing the works and the public, allowing artists to have a chance to profit from their work, while ensuring it can still be enjoyed and built upon in the way it historically always has been. The greed of those calling for the change in the law can not be allowed to destroy this principle. The new law would mean people could no longer share or enjoy old recordings that have long since been deleted from record companies’ catalogues, be they of rock and roll, or classical performances by long-dead conductors.

The proposal still has to be agreed by the Council of Ministers and European Parliament, and the latter in particular has been known to listen to the people on similar issues such as software patents. To help defeat the extension of copyright, please sign the petition against it.

A couple of weeks ago, the question came up of whether Ken Pounds was the first chief executive of PPARC. I couldn’t remember, but knew the answer would be in his Wikipedia article. I was quite surprised to find the article had been deleted. I checked the log for the article, and found it had been deleted by a Wikipedia administrator called Refdoc with the comment that is was a “blatant copyright violation”, and giving a link to a report by the Irish Higher Education Authority entitled Research Infrastructure in Ireland – Building for Tomorrow.

Initially, I suspected someone might have pasted a load of text into the article from the report, but wondered why Refdoc couldn’t have reverted to an older version of the article. However, when I checked the Irish HEA’s report, I discovered that they had actually copied the Wikipedia article word for word and used it as a biography for Prof Pounds, who is on the steering committee that produced the report. Thus the biography in the report uses my words to explain that it’s a “rare distinction” to be awarded an honorary degree by the institution one works at (or at least I think they’re my words – it seems the University have also been reading Wikipedia, re-worded in their case, for material promoting the Alumni Association Lecture 2008). The report also contains the slightly obscure statement that someone added to Wikipedia, that “one of [Ken's] many discoveries is that Black holes are common in the Universe.”

I know I wrote the article in summer 2006, shortly after I was contacted by the other user. I checked the Internet Archive Wayback Machine, and indeed, it had archived the article in September 2006. From this archived version, it is clear that the text is identical to that in the HEA report. Yet the report was only published in December 2006! While I personally already knew the text was originally from Wikipedia, I thought the evidence I’d found would surely convince anyone else. Yet Refdoc refused the re-instate the article, accusing me of being a user with “poor respect for copyrights” and saying he had little reason to believe me. He clearly hadn’t looked at the internet archive version. That comes as no surprise, as a little investigation before he deleted the article in the first place would have revealed that the Wikipedia article existed before the HEA report. The Wikipedia edit history would also have shown that it was written and improved over a number of edits by different people, rather than copied wholesale from anywhere else. Therefore Refdoc is clearly not a particularly thorough administrator on Wikipedia.

I have now initiated Wikipedia’s Deletion review process, and at the time of writing there is a consensus that the article was wrongly deleted. Hopefully the article will be reinstated by next week.

This episode brings up an interesting point about Wikipedia. They have a strict policy when it comes to copyright, where copying directly from another source is not allowed. But as more and more documents copy text from Wikipedia, it’s going to become harder to tell which was the original source. I think the Irish HEA’s report probably violates the GFDL, as they are supposed to credit Wikipedia, and also to license any document that builds upon a GFDL’d document under the same licence. They haven’t done so, and while I’m sure that I and the other contributors don’t object to our work being used, failure to include an acknowledgement has ultimately resulted in it being us who were accused of breaching copyright.

As for Wikipedia administrators, candidates for that role will have to be prepared to put in a lot of work to investigate suspected copyright violations, as more and more will be false alarms. Anyone who isn’t prepared to do that isn’t fit to be an administrator. In the future it’s going to be more important to check the history of an article, and look for any other evidence to determine who has copied whom.

Now, I wonder how many of my other contributions to Wikipedia have been deleted while I wasn’t looking…

Update: the article on Ken Pounds was reinstated the same day.

Today, a consultation was announced on changes to copyright law which would, among other things, allow limited copying for purposes of “format shifting” for personal use. The proposal is to make it legal to copy CDs for use on portable players. The consultation is a result of the 2006 Gowers Review of copyright law. At the time, government minister Lord Triesman said that the changes wouldn’t mean people could legally circumvent DRM measures to switch between formats. I think that would make the law of limited use. The new law would probably also only apply to recordings released after is was passed.

The Open Rights Group are preparing their own response to the consultation, and have invited comments on their website. My comments are reproduced (hopefully legally!) below:

How many format shifts would be allowed? Should consumers be allowed to format shift to a range of play back devices and to format shift again when certain technologies become obsolete?

If such a provision is made, it should apply to all formats, including those protected by DRM, and not just to CDs. Any law that fails to address new downloadable formats belongs in the 20th century.

The law should give consumers a right to format shift that can not be “trumped” by contract law. Any such contract would have to contain the disclaimer “This does not affect your statutory rights” or similar, meaning that the consumer always has the right to format shift.

Claims that DRM exists to prevent copying it laughable. The main purpose of it has been to prevent consumers switching formats, which is anti-competitive behaviour on the part of large corporations. If people find they are still restricted by DRM, they will continue to resort to using illicit programs to strip the DRM, or to download unencumbered versions of the music they’ve already paid for via file-sharing networks.

If the new format-shifting law is limited in its scope, consumers will continue to lack respect of the law, which was one of the stated aims of the proposed changes.

Would the exception apply to works created or purchased after the exception was introduced or would it be acceptable to format shift back catalogues?

If the law doesn’t apply to back-catalogues, it’ll only cause great confusion among consumers. How many people understand the difference between the publication date of the CD, the copyright of the recording, the performers’ or composers’ copyrights? If people are told they can’t copy their existing CDs, but can if they buy new ones, they’ll continue to lack confidence in copyright law (and will continue to copy their old CDs anyway) so the change will have been a waste of time.

Restricting the new law to new releases will also discriminate against people who enjoy certain genres of music, such as classical or jazz, where the back catalogue accounts for a larger proportion of sales.

Everyone using one of these services to download video must give over part of their internet connection for uploading the files to other people. Now, on one of the so-called illegal networks, this seems fair enough: everyone who downloads then uploads to give something back to the community. Everyone gives a little, meaning the files can be distributed for free. With the “legal” services, however, users are paying for the content, but are still having to upload the files for other customers. Imagine buying a DVD from an online store, but when it arrives, you find there are a couple of other DVDs in the package that you must deliver to addresses in the neighbourhood. This is exactly what customers of the legal download sites are being asked to do.

Sky by broadband and the Integrated Media Player service that the BBC trialled both use a peer-to-peer application called Kontiki. Sky provide a FAQ page for users of their service, and one point in particular is worth examining:

Q: If Sky is using my PC to help distribute media files to other people, will my ISP charge me for this?

A: … Most ISPs only impose limits for the amount of data you download… not on data which is uploaded. These limits will only impact the number and size of videos that you want to download from Sky by broadband.

Most ISPs now limit the amount of data that can be transferred in a month, meaning that customers effectively pay per gigabyte transferred. But do they only measure downloads, or uploads too? Here’s what major ISP BT say about it:

Q: What is a monthly usage guideline?

A: This is the total amount of data you can send (upload) and receive (download) through your broadband connection each month.

This means that you are in effect paying to send the videos to other users. As the Kontiki software is installed automatically, runs in the background, and can’t be configured by the user, whenever the PC is switched on, the user’s precious monthly quota will be eaten up as the software sends the videos on.

Admittedly, both the Sky and BBC services are currently “free” for people who already pay subscriptions (in the case of the BBC, the licence fee). However, the movie industry plan to use the same model to distribute paid-for video to customers. Legal music download sites are becoming more popular, but video remains a problem for the industry due to the huge investment in infrastructure required to distribute the content. So the industry has had the smart idea of making the customers pay for the infrastructure, in addition to paying for the content in the first place: in effect, paying twice. From the BBC article:

Jonathan Arber, an analyst at Ovum, said [the peer-to-peer network] Velocix could prove attractive to net service firms as it reduced the amount of bandwidth they had to pay for.

So who do people think is paying for the bandwidth instead?

Of course, I haven’t even touched on the fact that legal downloads come with the dreaded digital rights management (DRM), meaning they can only be played on one computer, kept for 30 days then deleted, and can’t be played without Microsoft’s expensive and proprietary software. But that’s another story best left for another day.

The company behind Velocix “hopes its technology will start to wean people off illegal use of file-sharing networks.” Unfortunately, this is likely to to be the case, as once downloading films becomes mainstream, the average consumer won’t realise they are paying twice for the same thing.

Then, at the start of this month, something changed again, and people outside the UK could no longer connect to Classic FM even after entering a correct postcode. I’ve received lots of messages from disappointed listeners who wanted to know if there was a way they could still listen.

How to listen

Please note: These instructions are intended for use by people in the UK whose IP addresses are identified as being overseas, preventing them from listening to Classic FM. While the instructions may also work for people located outside the UK, it is the responsibility of the reader to ensure that they are not breaking any laws of their country by listening, and that any royalties due are paid.

Update 11 June 2006:
To listen, open the following URL in your media player:

http://gcap5.planetwideradio.com/ClassicFM

For example, if you use Windows Media Player, go to File > Open URL, then enter that address.

Listening via a proxy

If the above URL doesn’t wory for you, you could try listening via an anonymous proxy server located in the UK. A list of these may be found on the Great Britain (UK) Open Proxy List. Note that sometimes servers on this list are not in the UK as claimed, and that others won’t allow audio to be streamed via them. At the time of writing, 213.177.255.60 (port 80) appears to suit our purposes.

I don’t endorse the use of Microsoft products by any means, but I’ll assume most people are using Windows Media Player (WMP). The principles remain the same whatever media player you are using.

In Windows Media Player, go to Tools > Options… > Network. You should then see “Streaming proxy settings”. Select “HTTP” and click “Configure”. Choose “Use the following proxy server” then enter the IP address and port number of the proxy given above.

Now you are ready to listen. Go to File > Open URL and enter the following address: http://mediasrv.musicradio.com/classicfm
The station should now start playing!

There are several things that can go wrong. The proxy might be down, in which case you won’t be able to connect. Latency is another problem: the extra stage of using a proxy might cause interruptions to the stream. If you have problems, try using a different proxy, or tweaking settings in WMP such as the buffer size.

Please feel free to leave a comment if you have any problems, or if you have any listening tips to share.

Phonographic Performance Limited (PPL), who collect royalties on behalf of record companies, informed broadcasters that they are only in a position to sell broadcasting rights for the UK. Therefore, when the old licences expired on 31 March, all of the independent radio stations had to restrict their internet streams to British listeners only.

Radio has never stopped at national boundaries, such is the nature of radio waves. The internet should be a technology that brings people from different countries closer by breaking down communication barriers. It should now be easier than ever to reach a global audience, without having to construct a network of shortwave radio transmitters. But instead, the music industry is using this technology to place restrictions on who can listen to radio stations, based on geographical location. It’s turning technology against people instead of using if for the common good. In much the same way, it should now be easier to distribute recordings and sell them online, but the music industry has insisted on crippling such products with so called “digital rights management” (DRM) which makes the online purchase far inferior to buying a physical CD.

I am a regular Classic FM listener, and there would often be e-mails read out from people listening on the other side of the world (for example, a lunchtime request sent in by an American listener over breakfast). That has now ended. So for all those people who don’t know anyone from outside their own country, that one time of the day where they might have felt part of a global community has been taken away, a step backwards to the insularity of the pre-information age.

There is, however, some light relief, and an indication that the broadcasters aren’t exactly happy with the new arrangements. Coupled with the 1 April date, I even thought the whole story might be a joke, but sadly not. GCap Media plc, who own many independent radio stations including Classic FM and Capital Radio, have restricted their internet streams to listeners in the UK. This is done primarily by IP address, but in case they wrongly identify a UK-based listener as being abroad, they also offer the option of entering a valid British postcode to prove that the user is in the UK. This is the message that overseas listeners receive when they attempt to listen online to Classic FM:

Due to licensing changes, we’re only allowed to offer our radio stream to those in the UK. You seem to be outside the UK, so you need to enter a valid UK postcode below:
[...]
If you don’t have cookies enabled, you’ll have to enter your postcode each time you listen. This service is managed by GCap Media plc, 30 Leicester Square, LONDON, WC2H 7LA

That wouldn’t be a valid UK postcode that’s part of their address, by any chance? Just in case listeners are uncertain about this, Capital Radio give the following advice on their How to Listen page:

If you don’t live in the UK, and are unable to provide a valid postcode (eg WC2H 7LA) you will be unable to connect to the player.

Given that GCap didn’t ask for this restriction in the first place, there are no prizes for guessing whether entering their own postcode in the box allows the listener to hear the internet stream. But even if it didn’t work, it’s simple enough to find a valid UK postcode anyway.