The RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) stated on Monday that United States copyright law is broken and that it "isn't working" any more.
Cary Sherman, RIAA President, harshly criticized the DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) and specifically, its provision that prevents ISP's from being held liable for users' illegal activities.
At the Technology Policy Institute's Aspen Forum, Sherman stated "The DMCA isn't working for content people at all. You cannot monitor all the infringements on the Internet. It's simply not possible. We don't have the ability to search all the places infringing content appears, such as cyberlockers like RapidShare."
The DMCA has been highly loathed by the general public, but is the take-down process outlined in the legislation actually an oft overlooked silver lining? Broadbrand providers and hosting providers can not be held liable for pirated content, but they can be served with "DMCA take-down" notices requesting that alleged copyrighted material be removed.
Due to this, ISP's and hosting providers generally don't proactively monitor traffic and content to detect pirated material, they simply just respond to DMCA take-down requests when and if, they receive them. Apparently the RIAA is now wary of this cat and mouse game of identifying pirated content.
Sherman also stated "We're working on [discussions with broadband providers], and we'd like to extend that kind of relationship not just to ISPs, but [also to] search engines, payment processors, advertisers." He went on to say "if legislation is an appropriate way to facilitate that kind of cooperation, fine."
An adviser with Google's YouTube legal team, Lance Kavanaugh, refuted the RIAA's claims "It's our view that the DMCA is functioning exactly the way Congress intended it to." "The United States leads the world in the creation of innovative new Web ideas." "There's legal plumbing to allow that to happen, to allow those small companies to innovate without [the] crushing fear of lawsuits, as long as they follow certain rules. Congress was prescient. They struck the right balance."
Regardless of Google's stance, it looks like the RIAA will continue to pursue secret negotiations with ISP's, hoping to forge agreements where broadband providers will cut off infringing users and possibly proactively monitor for pirated content. The problem is, unless they get every single ISP in the United States to agree (unlikely), users will just switch to other providers who haven't agreed to RIAA demands.
I'm more opt to believe that current US copyright legislation is too strict, especially in regards to the restrictions placed on consumers who just want to move their legally acquired content around as they see fit. Do you think the current US copyright law is broken?
