Craig Newmark, owner of the infamous Craig's List, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EEF) are suing Hollywood. EFF has asked a federal court to declare that Replay TV owners have the right to digitally record television programs, fast-forward through commercials, and send shows to other devices. In numerous press statements and legal filings, the entertainment industry claims that such recording for "time-shifting" and "space-shifting" purposes is a copyright infringement and that avoiding commercials is "theft" and "stealing". Five Replay TV owners have filed a Declaratory Judgment law suit against twenty-eight entertainment companies asking that their activity be ruled lawful fair use under copyright law. Slashdot has some commentary. [Chris Van Buskirk's ITV Weblog]

New Yorker. Interview with Barry Diller. Very smart guy.

Question: And what about Internet connectivity? Do you see it through the cable wire, or the telephone wire, or some other wire?

Diller: I think it's going to come from lots of places. I think that, from what I have seen, cable-modem penetration is growing, is efficient, people love it as a service. But it is wildly overpriced. It racks in at forty dollars a month, and the profits are huge. But the customer likes it. You would have thought that the telephone company would be right there from the first hour of the first day offering high-speed connection. I don't know where you live, but in New York City try and get a DSL connection in your house. It took me three months, and every part of the experience was a train wreck. So they have not done that. And cable has.

Question: But what is government's proper role? Should government be involved and engaged and policing some of these mergers?

Diller: Absolutely. I mean, I actually think that there is a real argument to be made for separating production and distribution, particularly when you have a situation where if A.T. & T. and Comcast combine twenty-two million subscriptions and Time Warner has twelve million, there'll be complete concentration one way or the other from the cable and pipe distribution. I believe there'll be complete concentration in the sky to compete with it. Because I think that's the only way you'll have any effective competition. So, when you've got that kind of power, distribution power—and, by the way, even if you get competition, it is still going to be a business in which the margins are extremely good—then I don't believe you should also have the ability to own programs as well, except in a very minor way.

Question: Let me make sure I understand that. So Comcast, which owns, say, QVC ... or AOL Time Warner, which owns cable and Warner Bros. and other network and television assets, should be asked to divest? Is that what you're saying?

Diller: Yeah. We were recently trying to look at the effects of all of these things. We looked at programs that were owned by cable M.S.O.s [multiple-system operators] and programs that were not owned by M.S.O.s. And the differences of preferences were so categorical in every case—the disadvantage of anybody who has an unaligned program service, as against an aligned program service, is so glaring.

Question: So where do you see the impact of technology? We've seen the impact of technology on the music business. Do you see it actually enhancing the movie business?

Diller: Well, I would hope that the movie companies do not act as the music companies have—they were protective and said that they were going to stand on the railroad track with their arm out while technology ran them over. But the movie business is engaged now in figuring it out before it happens to them—before you get the digital files up there and able to be downloaded with any speed and with any clarity, before that develops. And I'm hopeful that the film business will get out there with products that will keep tech piracy at reasonable bay. I think that's achievable. I mean, you think about the film business—technology has been the movie business's greatest friend ever.

[John Robb's Radio Weblog]

Will the music industry turn into the book industry?. Very thought-provoking Michael Wolff article on the theory that the music industry will turn into the book industry; smaller numbers, reduced circumstances, fewer gazillion-sellers. A fair number of book-trade people read Boing Boing -- whatcha think?

In other words, there'll still be big hits (Celine Dion is Stephen King), but even if you're fairly high up on the music-business ladder, most of your time, which you'd previously spent with megastars, will be spent with mid-list stuff. Where before you'd be happy only at gold and platinum levels, soon you'll be grateful if you have a release that sells 30,000 or 40,000 units -- that will be your bread and butter. You'll sweat every sale and dollar. Other aspects of the business will also contract -- most of the perks and largesse and extravagance will dry up completely. The glamour, the influence, the youth, the hipness, the hookers, the drugs -- gone. Instead, it will be a low-margin, consolidated, quaintly anachronistic business, catering to an aging clientele, without much impact on an otherwise thriving culture awash in music that only incidentally will come from the music industry.

[Read Source Article in New York Magazine] [Boing Boing Blog]

I have put this item here, in cinema minima because it is may be a bellweather: as the music business goes, so may go the TV or movie businesses.

Bush Moves To End Internet Competition. "The FCC (Federal Communications Commission) is quietly handing over control of the broadband Internet to a handful of massive..." [kill your tv dot com]

In the meantime, the faceoff between the media industry and the computer industry continues unabated and unreported. This is the business scandal of our generation, and professional reporters appear to be complicit. [Scripting News]