DRM IMPLICATIONS AND ALTERNATIVES FOR IP IN THE DIGITAL AGE

摘要

This paper represents an effort to broaden the Digital Rights Management (DRM) debate to include alternative levy based models. It does so by presenting and contrasting two extreme models to address the growing problem of digital piracy: one seeking to maximize copyright enforcement; the other entailing redesign of copyright laws and implementation of a levy system. The choice is to either adapt laws to better suit modern technologies, or rein in and control technologies to better protect the existing IP regime. Existing copyright regimes were established in the analog world to promote a healthy supply of Intellectual Property (IP). Fundamental differences in the digital age are creating enormous challenges for copyright systems, and hence DRM has recently become an important, controversial field. A selection of merits and drawbacks of each model, primarily from the consumer perspective, are discussed. To achieve the goal of fairly comparing two extremes of the DRM debate, consideration of more extensive free private copying levy schemes than currently exist is necessary. Two alternative compensation models, one proposed by Fisher, the other a broader extension of his model, serve this purpose.