RIAA, MPAA urge pro-copyright vows from presidential candidates
A coalition of entertainment and publishing industry heavyweights would like to see the 2008 presidential candidates champion "meaningful copyright protection" in their policy platforms.
The requests came Tuesday in the form of a letter (PDF) and a questionnaire (PDF), dispatched by the Washington-based Copyright Alliance to 17 candidates vying for Democratic or Republican nominations next year. The group has requested responses to its questionnaire by early January of next year and plans to make the answers public.
The alliance's 44 members include the Recording Industry Association of America, Motion Picture Association of America, Association of American Publishers, Entertainment Software Association, Business Software Alliance, as well as companies like CBS, NBC, News Corp., Microsoft, Viacom, and Walt Disney. The same group, which formed earlier this year, staged a Capitol Hill expo last month aimed at educating staffers and politicos on its stance.
Each of the five questions rests on the premise that copyright protection is vital to the U.S. economy, and they're clearly worded with an eye toward eliciting a certain response. (As one reporter on a conference call about the announcement remarked, the approach seems a bit like asking the candidates whether they like Mom and apple pie.)
One question, for instance, asks: "How would you promote the progress of science and creativity, as enumerated in the U.S. Constitution, by upholding and strengthening copyright law and preventing its diminishment?"
Others ask how candidates would "protect the incentive to create by committing sufficient resources to support effective civil and criminal enforcement of copyright laws domestically and internationally" and "ensure inclusion of copyright protections in bilateral, regional and multilateral trade agreements to protect creators and foster global development."
"The future of our creative output in the United States is at stake in the 2008 presidential election," wrote Patrick Ross, the group's executive director. "It is critical not only for members of the creative community but also for the U.S. economy to ensure that copyrights are respected and piracy is reduced. We are asking you to let us know what you would do to help preserve one of America's greatest strengths, its creative community."
In a conference call with reporters Tuesday afternoon, Ross said the group also intends to hold briefings with presidential campaigns about its copyright priorities, but it's not "in the endorsement game," although individual alliance members may choose to take that step.
The heads of the RIAA and MPAA both heralded the importance of the contenders' intellectual property views in posts at the Copyright Alliance's Web site on Tuesday.
"While national security and health care have dominated this season's campaign dialog, a key issue for the 2008 presidential candidates includes their commitment to recognizing the critical importance of intellectual property rights," wrote MPAA chief Dan Glickman.
RIAA chief Mitch Bainwol put it this way: "When Americans vote, they are making decisions about the values important to them. And one of those values must be a commitment to creativity. For some, that commitment will be a function of the economic significance of intellectual property. For others, that commitment will be about the power of the ideas our content spreads throughout the world. But the commitment to intellectual property rights, whatever the motivation, is what we must look for."
Translation: You have to pay us every time you listen to or view
one of the files we have control over. Preferably, in perpetuity.
We deserve to live off the sweat of others and should not have
to go out and actually get a meaningful job.
really good for - as toilet paper!
Satan has devised a special corner in hell for the RIAA/MPAA and
they deserve it. What they don't deserve is another dime from any
of us!
education, social security, medical and welfare LONG before they
worry about trivial things like the RIAA & MPAA. It's time the
American government stops being solely a representative of big business and start paying attention to the REAL people who put
them in office, the Tax Payers..!!
publishers, record COMPANIES - They could give a rats **s about
the artists.
They'll most likely get most if not all of the Republican cadidates
Whoever wins will probably want a second term. I'm sure they will not be able to ignore the "campaign contributions" the RIAA and MPAA shows they are willing to those who help their bills become law.
I will vote for the candidate to that is most likely to eradicate the disproportionate influence of corporations in our political and legal processes. Government officials having no knowledge of the source of their contributions might be a start. Is there a candidate willing promote that kind of legislation?
HINT: I will vote against anyone who kowtows to these blood-sucking, arrogant, leeches... that have already convinced [BOUGHT-OUT] our politicians, persuading them that the basic-rights, and prosperity, of the common-citizens... are a direct "threat" to what REALLY MATTERS... [http://I.E. ...a STATUS-QUO of obscene corporate-profits and absolute-control, of all consumers, forever|http://I.E. ...a STATUS-QUO of obscene corporate-profits and absolute-control, of all consumers, forever]...
...just my two-cents.
changed forever. This paranoid, litigation approach is nonsense
and inserting themselves into the election process is a retarded
move by men without souls or brains but way to many lawyers.
The more they push like this, the more detrmined will be the
resistance. All of this behavior by these greedy people will come
back and bite them on the a?s for certain. I think the deserve
every hit they take and believe the hits will never stop coming.
They seem to be delusional and driven by a premise that is not
at all in balance with the actual real world at all. It is interesting
to see grown men chase the wrong problem, insist on the wrong
answers and who seem determined to bring about what they
fear most. Sometimes standing up is brave and beautiful, but
sometimes people just need to shut up and sit down.
Litigation is not going to solve that want and need. What is going to solve it is non-DRM'd or ONE DRM downloads that everyone has agreed on the DRM to be used and sticks with it EVEN IF THE DRM IS CRACKED.
I want lyrics, liner notes and art that I will look at once.
I want DRM on all music media to remind me how under appreciated the ownership class is and how truly difficult it is to be an owner of capital.
Public domain and fair use.... pfft more like ownership domain and ownership use.
Comon people if we don?t pay ridiculous and arbitrary prices for creativity, who is going to pay for their private jets to run empty so they have a tarmac and landing strip access?
If I have a vested interest in the music, i.e., I know the money is getting to the artists, I won't want to pirate it out, or download it without paying for it. There is no reason for CD's to cost as much as they do these days, especially since so little goes to the artists.
Say cheese.
- Who I'm voting for.
- by lunarsight December 13, 2007 3:33 AM PST
- I will vote for whatever candidate tells the RIAA to go play in traffic.
- Reply to this comment
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(19 Comments)Actually, that's a euphemism, but if I wrote what I -really- wanted to hear the candidate tell the RIAA, this comment would probably get deleted. =)