Thursday, August 28, 2003

Guardian Unlimited | Online | Auntie's digital revelation

Guardian Unlimited | Online | Auntie's digital revelation: "They are the great and the good of the BBC, and they are thrashing out the next Royal Charter: the Queen's own job spec for the BBC, setting out its goals and responsibilities for a decade, starting in 2006.

But planning for 2016 in today's media world is proving to be an impossible task. Why, notes one of the great and the good, what about this Napster business? With people copying music and television and film and distributing them among themselves for free, the whole business model on which commercial broadcasting depends could be undermined by 2016. It could...
He pauses.

'Wait a minute. Why do we care about them sharing our programmes?' "

More good stuff on the BBC's momentous decision. There really should be a 'bought it' clause in the U.S. copyright system. The conitnued extension of copyright terms has become ridiculous. To think that Casablanca, Gone With the Wind, and the Wizard of Oz haven't served their creators fully is foolish, IMHO. Locking them up at this point does more harm that good.

Regardless, I'll be fairly happy when I can set up a program to automatically download the day's news via P2P and have it waiting for me to watch or delete when I get home. Of course, I don't think this really applies to the 'World Service', so maybe this is still a pipe dream. By 2016 it won't be though, that I can dang near guarantee you (hell, TIVO is already there).

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