'British Cinema's Golden Age Is Now': So Where's The 'Serious Problem' Of Copyright Infringement?

from the inconvenient-facts dept

Last week we learned the UK government has precisely no evidence to support its plans for stricter copyright enforcement, which include disconnection upon repeated accusation. Instead, the best it could come up with was:

The creative industries are an important part of the UK’s economy, and they regularly report copyright infringement as a serious problem.

They certainly do, and their periodic cries of woe are dutifully and uncritically echoed by the mainstream press. The problem is that the industry-funded studies that are supposed to back up these claims are, almost without exception, lacking in credibility. As the UK government's own team of experts put it in their "independent review of how the Intellectual Property framework supports growth and innovation":

we have not found either a figure for the prevalence and impact of piracy worldwide or for the UK in which we can place our confidence.

For such a "serious problem", the harm caused by copyright infringement is proving remarkably hard to demonstrate. For example, a couple of years ago, Techdirt reported on the fact that the UK music industry is actually growing, not shrinking; and now the Guardian's film editor has surveyed the UK film industry, and concluded "British cinema's golden age is now":

History will decide whether we really are living through a golden age, but in terms of ferment, excitement and dazzling variety, there has been nothing like it in Britain for decades.

The article concentrates on the health of the artistic side of film production, not of the bottom lines. But the capital-intensive nature of cinema means that you can't have one without the other, or at least, not for very long: if films fail to pay their way, investment will soon dry up.

As the Guardian piece makes clear, investment isn't a problem, which suggests that payback isn't either. That's hard to square with an industry on its last legs, ravaged by piracy.

In the absence of credible evidence to the contrary, and against a background of broad growth in the creative industries, the simplest explanation for this situation is that copyright infringement isn't a "serious problem" in the UK - which means there is no justification whatsoever for rolling out measures that will weaken civil liberties yet further.

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Filed Under: copyright, culture, golden age, movies, uk

UK Music Critic: This Is The Golden Age For Music

from the you-can-listen-to-whatever-you-want dept

While we keep hearing record execs and politicians bemoaning the state of the recording industry, UK music critic John Harris has written up a great article at the BBC pointing out how wrong they are, and noting that this is the "golden age of infinite music." Indeed. This is exactly what we've been saying for years, though not as eloquently as Harris:

Last weekend, by contrast, I had a long chat about music with the 16-year-old son of a friend, and my mind boggled.

At virtually no cost, in precious little time and with zero embarrassment, he had become an expert on all kinds of artists, from English singer-songwriters like Nick Drake and John Martyn to such American indie-rock titans as Pavement and Dinosaur Jr.

Though only a sixth-former, he seemingly knew as much about most of these people as any music writer.

Like any rock-oriented youth, his appetite for music is endless, and so is the opportunity - whether illegally or not - to indulge it. He is a paid-up fan of bands it took me until I was 30 to even discover - and at this rate, by the time he hits his 20s, he'll have reached the true musical outer limits.

What does all this tell us? Clearly, for anyone raised in the old world, the modern way of music consumption has all kinds of unforeseen benefits.

He notes that smarter musicians are realizing they can't just offer up "filler" material any more, but need to focus on music that's actually good, and that the industry itself needs to change:

So, yes, the record industry may yet have to comprehensively reinvent itself, or implode. Sooner or later, given that the need to read reviews before deciding what to listen to is fading fast, I rather fear that even music journalists may be rendered irrelevant.

But for now, this is a truly golden age - the era of the teenage expert, albums that will soon have to be full of finely-honed hits and the completely infinite online jukebox.

Even if the music business manages to somehow crack down on illicit downloading and claws back a few quid via annual subscriptions in return for that self-same endless supply of music, the same essential rules will apply. Really: what's not to like?

The one area where I disagree with Harris, is that he seems to think that this will push some artists to focus on creating more "hits" rather than more thoughtful music that "grows" on people. I'm not so sure of that (and I haven't seen it in the niche areas of music that I follow). Instead, because communities build up around certain artists or music genres, the community actually does a good job promoting the music and giving it life, rather than relying on it being a massive "hit."

We've said it before, and it should be said again: nearly everything about the music industry today is better. More music is being made than ever before. More people are making music than ever before. More people are listening to new music than ever before. More musicians are making money from music than ever before. Even more musical instruments are being sold than ever before. The only thing suffering is the sale of plastic discs (though, the sales of iPods are doing quite well). The problem isn't the music industry. The problem is with a certain small group of businesses who built their business on the concept of selling plastic discs.

Filed Under: golden age, john harris, music