Piracy: UK music fans can copy own tracks
July 12th, 2006 by Stephen
In this article, the magnanimous British Phonographic Industry tell us that we can copy songs from our CDs to our own digital music players so that we can listen to them without fear of prosecution. That is so nice of them!
But what annoys me about this and so many articles is the way it says that the BPI will favour targeting professional pirates.
Were the BPI dealing with piracy I would applaud them. Murder and pillage on the high sees is still a large problem, and it seems there are several ghost ships roaming the coasts of the world, acting as mother ships of piracy operations. This is a threat to merchant seamen, and even cruise liners – and the danger is very real.
But actually all the BPI are really concerned about is a legal doctrine of copyright theft. To say that the person copying tracks to his music player is a non professional pirate is a nasty use of hyperbole. Indeed, such a person is not stealing anything, and a law that could even suggest that this is wrong doing is frankly absurd. To suggest that inviting friends over and letting them hear our music (or lending friends the CD) is an act of piracy seems to be out of proportion with the alleged wrong doing.
Inasmuch as copyright theft really causes legitimate loss, we may be justly concerned about it. But call it piracy and everything else you say will pass over my head, as I disappear into a mental pciture of a pound of grape shot ripping through the flesh of the chairman of Sony corporation.
We should stamp out piracy. Yes indeed. But the BPI is not involved in that fight.
