Content and Control

   Assessing the Impact of Policy Choices on Potential Online Business Models in the Music and Film Industries

   Berkman Center for Internet & Society , 2005

   The online environment and new digital technologies threaten the viability of the music and film industries' traditional business models.

The industries have responded by seeking government intervention, among other means, to protect their traditional models as well as by developing new models specifically adapted to the online market. Industry activity and public debate have focused on three key policy areas related to copyright holders' control of content: technical interference with and potential liability of P2P services; copyright infringers' civil and criminal liability; and legal reinforcement of digital rights management technologies (DRM).

This paper seeks to support policymakers' decision making by delineating the potential consequences of policy actions in these areas. To do so, it assesses how such action would impact relevant social values and four business models representative of current and emerging attempts to generate viable revenues from digital media.

The authors caution that government intervention is currently premature because it is unlikely to strike an appropriate balance between achieving industry goals while supporting other social values, such as consumer rights, the diversity of available content, and technological innovation.

The Berkman Center for Internet and Society is a department of Harvard Law School, which focuses on the legal study of cyberspace. The Center sponsors conferences, visiting lecturers, and residential fellows. Members of the Center do research and write books, articles, weblogs with RSS 2.0 feeds, for which the Center holds the specification, and podcasts, of which the first series took place at the Berkman Center. The Center's headquarters is a small Victorian wood-frame building next to the bigger brick-and-stone Harvard Law School buildings. Its newsletter, "The Filter", is on the Web and available by e-mail, and it hosts a blog community of Harvard faculty, students and Berkman Center affiliates. The Berkman Center is funding the Openlaw project, and is a co-founder of the OpenNet Initiative.

Fellows have included David Weinberger, Ethan Zuckerman, Dave Winer, Jimbo Wales, Rebecca MacKinnon, John Perry Barlow, Wendy Seltzer, and Dr. James F. Moore.

Faculty have included Charles Nesson, Lawrence Lessig, Jonathan Zittrain, William "Terry" Fisher, and John Palfrey.

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