Hollywood, Recording Industry Beg Obama to Help Save Them From Pirates

Faced with the global menace of digital piracy, some of the largest entertainment companies in the world have banded together to beg the Obama administration to help their industries, which they claim are under assault by digital brigands. Among them are AT&T (T), CBS Corporation, Microsoft (MSFT), News Corp. (NWS), NBC Universal, Disney (DIS), NASCAR, the NFL and the NBA.

"Hear us as we speak with one voice about the importance of creators' rights," the entertainment giants wrote in a melodramatic letter to President Obama published yesterday. "We are the essence of America. Since the founding of our country, our work has provided light in the darkness of conflict, humor in the depths of sadness, beauty in the face of ugliness, and reason in the dysfunction of division."

In its letter to the President, the Copyright Alliance, as it calls itself, claims it was speaking on behalf of its "grassroots network of creators." The group says it represents artists whose "work brings significant cultural and economic value to our society - and contributes $1.52 trillion to the nation's GDP."

But the letter goes on to say: "Yet that value is being disregarded as our rights and incentives to create are increasingly under threat," in a reference to the revenue supposedly lost due to illegal peer-to-peer file-sharing networks.

The Copyright Alliance is basically a coalition of entertainment companies, trade groups and others who advocate for a broad range of policies, including "effective civil and criminal enforcement of copyright laws domestically and internationally." Among its board members are Viacom (VIA), NBC Universal, the Motion Picture Association of America, and Time Warner (TWX), (which is the parent company of AOL, publisher of DailyFinance.)

The letter comes on the heels of the White House's announcement of Victoria Espinel as Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator, or IP czar, to help strengthen U.S. efforts to stop the sale of pirated or counterfeited music, movies, software and other goods.

The new IP Czar post was created when then-President Bush signed the "Prioritizing Resources and Organization for Intellectual Property Act" -- or PRO-IP Act -- last October, handing a victory to Hollywood, the recording industry, and the major media companies, which had lobbied hard for its passage.

Find the treasure buried at the end of this story at DailyFinance.com

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Comments

[Fred-Tahoma]

Ok so these guys just want more money and more people controling the illegal processes that have been happening for a while. Things are not goning to change any time soon and this just draws attention to what is happening. They "begged" for help, but that is nothing of importance to congress. The only reason why he would do this, would be to gain more points in a few years.

[RoseMerry]

Given the track record, the the rights of the megacorps to control music will be preserved and expanded until we have the death sentence for humming a song without permission

[tompoe]

A decade or more has passed since the enforcement arm of these companies, ASCAP, came down on the Girl Scouts. No more singing songs at Girl Scout campfires without a license, they demanded. Any songs must come from a pre-approved list. It's the law, ASCAP said.

They now want Obama to make the same law apply to each American. What they really want is to control what we see, hear on any device by having a handful of Music moguls decide what technology is "legal".

[mediamarv]

Hmmm. Notice how it's always the "suits" who claim money is being lost. Artists, the actual people who do the creative stuff, you know, like write songs, play them, give them away for free on web sites... seem to be benefitting from all the music listening media available these days.
Only the "suits" with their retail mentality don't get the fact that the old days of CD bins in large stores with price gauging as a matter of policy is gone. They can only think in terms of units sold. Retail. Brainless and clueless.
iTunes made it clear that given the choice of buying an overpriced CD with filler or just paying for the one or two songs of quality most releases have, the music buying public has spoken.

And with MySpace being the go to site for discovering music from a new or unfamiliar group, with several songs to audition, which of course can be easily downloaded in a poor quality version, the artists are going their own way. I only buy new CDs when attending concerts so the artist gets the money or I purchase DJ copies (which labels give away for free) at the local used music store,
So, according to the "suits" giving free CDs to radio stations (which they in turn often sell) is fine but giving a friend a copy for free cause he likes the music and might wind up going to see the group live, is wrong.

[dwatkins9]

"The essence of America?" Oh please, give me a break. Yeah, Lincoln and the entertainment business, nothing to choose between them.

And since when is division dysfunctional?