[Free-sklyarov-uk] "Attack of the Cyber Pirates" - first impressions

[Alan Carter]

 --- Jim Peters <jim at uazu.net> wrote: > Andrew Rendle wrote:
> > I watched (and recorded, so I can check quotes from it) the Money 
> > Programme "Attack of the cyber Pirates" that's just finished on
> BBC2, 
> > and I'll give my first impressions of it.
> 
> It didn't seem quite so one-sided to me.  To me it seems that they
> obviously took pains to try to be neutral and get balance -- to find
> good case-studies for both sides.  They showed positive models of
> 'pirates', for example:

The pirates they showed didn't strike me as very positive models at
all.  I don't think the DJs did much to endear themselves to the
general public, and the girl who spent £100 a month on music wasn't
given much of a chance to emphasize that.  However, the guy from Public
Enemy, and the film producer, both came across very well.  Even so, I
don't think it was enough.  The good publicity from those two was
barely adequate to make up for the bad publicity I believe the portayal
of the DJs will have generated.  Having the Intel person take a stand
against mandatory copy protection was also encouraging, and perhaps
more convincing than the other pro-sharing accounts as he came across
very professionally and what he said was plausilbe, even if he didn't
have much of a chance to back it up.

As for the music industry people, that was a bit of a mixed bag.  The
Universal guy seemed a bit manic to me, especially when talking about
musicians stealing computers in retaliation for file sharing.  I hope
the public think he was as funny as I did.  The others were much more
convincing and I think most of the viewers will side with them as they
seem to reprtesent the status quo.  The only one who really hinted at
the music industry's desire to curb the freedom of all music listeners,
not just pirates, was the manic Universal guy; the others were a bit
quiet about copy protected CDs breaking iMacs.  I believe the program
was biased against our cause and didn't cover some of the most
important issues.  No mention was made of the negative aspects of copy
protected CDs, and the recent/coming changes to the law were hardly
discussed.  Someone did point out that the courts were more
pro-consumer in the days when VHS was given the legal go-ahead, which I
would say was probably the msot significant statement in the whole
programme.

Now, Pete Waterman...this one really annoys me...when I heard his
voice, I thought to myself "great, maybe he'll give a more balanced
viewpoint".  You see, I'd heard him on Radio 2 a couple of months ago
saying that music downloads were having no real effect on the industry
and the problems were actually caused by greedy artists.  I suspect
this is his real viewpoint, but his company obviously does not like
this.  Prime-time TV has a much higher 'viewership' than mid-afternoon
radio, so he didn't feel safe enough to tell the public that artists
are to blame for the declining music industry - that wouldn't go down
well with most viewers; far better to blame the evil pirates.  I doubt
this show of double standards will ever be brought to the attention of
the general public.

All in all, extremely disappointing, but that's what I've come to
expect from the BBC.

Alan

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Everything you'll ever need on one web page
from News and Sport to Email and Music Charts
http://uk.my.yahoo.com