The Blood-Sucking, Parasitically Osbsolete Middleman Industry Association of America, which inexplicably acronames itself the MPAA or RIAA, depending on the context, has yet again taken a break from whining about how its not fair that people don't buy player-piano sheet music anymore* in order to prove conclusively that it is still taking the entirely wrong example from China's economic success. This time its trying to
get ISPs to disconnect people who pay for internet connections that may have been used for infringement, without actually proving that they themselves infringed.** Because that would be too hard.
Ignoring, for the moment, the choruses of the Badge Bunnies and other Outer Party aspirants, bellowing their authoritarian hogwash about the
need to lock down wifi in order to live unmolested in a free society,*** let us just bear in mind that denying people access to the means of communication because they have used it in a way that undermines a legally sanctioned monopoly on the dissemination of information is functionally indistinguishable from censorship.
Hence the China comparison.
I know, I know China is totally different. First of all there is a difference between protecting the state and protecting private interest. Secondly, China is attempting to suppress speech which is critical of the state, while denying Internet access for copyright infringement is intended only to protect the economic interests of copyright holders. Both of these distinctions are true. They are also irrelevant when we consider this - the actions of the MPAA/RIAA (as an agent of its constituents) and the Chinese government are both taken in order to solidify their hold on centralized power. In the case of the MPAA/RIAA, its member corporations have two forms of power - a monopoly on vast swaths of our culture and, more importantly, money. Both of these centers of power are threatened by unsanctioned copying just as the political power of the Chinese government is threatened by unauthorized criticism. Just as a totalitarian government needs to control the minds of its citizens as well as their bodies, the industrial components of a corporatist state rely their state-sanctioned control of production to maintain their status. And this status must be maintained, regardless of whether the status quo benefits society at large, or even the interests of the group which is purportedly being represented. Remember, instiutional decisions are still made by human beings who, by virtue of being the in a position to make decisions generally have a great deal invested in the status quo from which they benefit so handsomely. Behind the institutional facades of the PRC Politburo and the RIAA, are bureaucrats and executives fighting to maintain this privilege.
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* In other news, the International Brotherhood of Bards, Minstrels and Skjalds is optimistic for the first time this century now that trivially easy copying allows any performer to market themselves and develop a revenue stream without relying on
notoriously rapacious middlemen.
**Of course the absence of due process has been noted and addressed ad infinitum I'm sure. While it is disturbing it is also depressingly common - as more of what we consider necessary to our day to day existence becomes a commercial service, the corporation eclipses the nation-state as the institution with the most influence upon our lives. As the actions of any given corporation are not limited by the Constitution (which limits only the power of government), due process will cease to protect us from the arbitrary exercise of power.
***This incoherent line of "thought" will make sense in 2050 when Oldspeak has been fully implemented, at which point we will finally be compelled to address their "arguments."
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