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11.4.2004
Content and the Election Results
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The post-mortem election discussions in the MSM (mainstream media, to those not hip to the usages of conservative bloggerdom) contain zilch of professional interest to anyone at PFF. There is nothing about tech policy, broadband, IP, or even general prospects for the free market.
However, some stories do mention that a big loser on Tuesday was the entertainment industry, and this does indeed have ramifications for PFF's interests. A clear result is that both the offensive and defensive capabilities of the industry with respect to legislation dealing with content protection have been reduced.
The industry was totally on the Kerry side, with both financial contributions and celebrity endorsements, and much of its rhetoric was venomous and insulting to both Republican candidates and voters. For example, Whoopi Goldberg at Radio City was one of the many events that mobilized not just the cultural conservatives but all Republicans, and it will be decades before the general approbation given Michael Moore is forgotten or forgiven. (If Karl Rove could stuff the Oscar ballot box for Moore, he would be in heaven.)
Triumphant Republicans will feel a tremendous temptation to stick it to Hollywood. Nor can the industry count on support from some of its usual allies. Academics, who are Democratic leftists almost to a man and woman, are on the "content should be free side," and the student generation is happy to download everything in sight. Nor has the industry any claim to help from the property-rights-protection movement, since it has never supported this group against outrageous physical and regulatory takings by marauding governments.
Hollywood is reduced to urging the the Republicans to stick to their pro-property and pro-market principles, and arguing that the people you have vilified should now help you out of principle is a bit of a Hail Mary. Especially when a political party -- any political party -- is involved.
Given all the fun in prospect for the Republicans, one almost hates to introduce a sober note. But, in sooth, the winners need to forego their fun and think seriously about how to protect content, not for the sake of Hollywood or the RIAA but for the sake of consumers.
Unauthorized downloading presents consumers with a Prisoners' Dilemma problem. Each individual consumer wants to get content for free while everyone else pays. But if everyone tries to do this, creators will not get paid and content will dry up. So consumers need to agree to forego their individual efforts to free ride in the interests of establishing a structure that fosters the production of content. They need to do this not for Hollywood, but for themselves.
If the victorious Republicans were to tell the ghost of my churchgoing, culturally conservative grandmother that they were going to let Hollywood be looted out vengeance, she would look at them sternly and say: "Don't cut off your nose to spite your face."
posted by James DeLong : 11/4/2004 11:26:23 AM
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