GristyMcFisty informs us that proprietors of free online music and file-sharing services, such as Grokster and several other unnamed services, are coming to Washington to defend the rights of free P2P file traders. In a formal lobbying campaign they will try to convince the Congress of their legitimacy:
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The coalition, which plans to launch in the next 60 days, has not announced its name or hired a lobbyist. The group probably will work out of the office of whatever representative or lobby firm it hires, Rosso said. It also is honing what its message and core values will be, but the primary aim is to dispel the belief that online file sharing is at best seedy and at worst illegal. "The problem is that legislators have just been pumped full of so much misinformation," Rosso said. "They think that we're all back-alley smut peddlers and identity thieves, and that's just not the case." The misinformation, he said, comes from the entertainment industry, including the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA). The groups represent the biggest film studios and recording companies, which say they are losing money because of free, easily available copies of their music and movies on the Internet. |
The lobbying campaign will be interesting to follow. On the one hand file-sharing software has many legitimate users (and could thus be a potential marketing tool) but the companies behind the P2P software can of course not deny the piracy problem. They will have to present well formulated facts to convince the Congress. Read the complete article here.
Source: washingtonpost.com
