Martin Banks, Personal Computer World 06/84 - checked

June 1984

Ahoy, shipmates! Welcome aboard the good ship Rip-off. We're all bound for a little bit of pirating on the high 'C's, Basics, Pascals and Fortrans of this world, relieving rich, over-stuffed, Ferrari-laden superstar programmers of just a few of their ill-gotten gains.

What do you mean - 'But please sir, I'm not a pirate?' If you own a micro, be it for home or business use, the chances are that you have either directly ripped off a program, 'bought' one cheap from a friend, or 'borrowed' a copy for a 'long' time. You only need have done it once to be a naughty person, you know, and though it may seem a trivial offence to you, when you put them all together the potential is there for a rip-off against the software industry in general of gargantuan proportions.

What actually brought the subject of software piracy to the front of my lobotomy was a dinky little brochure that popped through my letter box the other week. It was from the Tape Manufacturers Group (TMG), a lobby group formed to protect the interests of the leading manufacturers of audio and video tapes; companies such as Agfa, BASF, 3M, Memorex, Maxell, Sony and TDK. They are up in arms about the recent proposals to impose a levy on blank tapes that would compensate the 'software' industry (the film makers and the music producers in particular) from being ripped off by home copying for fun, pleasure, and perhaps the occasional profit.

Their complaints are centred mainly around the proposals coming from the film and music industries, but the impacts and issues are also very closely tied to the home computer business with its dependence on the audio tape as the main vehicle of software storage.

In essence, the proposals are based on the idea that each blank tape should carry a levy on the price to recompense, in advance, the film and music business for the products that are going to be copied by Joe Public. The TMG says this should not be allowed to happen, for the perfectly justifiable reason (in its eyes) that it will hit its business.

There is both a moral and a practical question involved here and, unfortunately for the TMG, neither seems to revolve around the economic viability of its business. The moral question has a good measure of sadness and resignation in it. It is sad that the human race, when faced with the straight choice between paying someone the sum negotiated for an item and the chance to rip it off without much risk of getting caught, will invariably opt for the latter course. This tendency is something we must resign ourselves to and legislate for accordingly, which is why we have criminal courts and penal codes.

It becomes difficult, if not impossible, to police this human tendency effectively, where there is some common element to the crimes readily accessible to the law. Seeking retribution via that common element seems sensible. As the crime in this case is the deprivation of a full financial return to an author for his intellectual efforts - by simply copying those efforts onto another tape and not paying for them - then claiming payment 'in advance' by way of a levy seems to have a certain natural justice about it.

And as for those who cry that this unfairly penalises the honest, I would instantly say that this is true. I am, however, also reminded of a quote about they that are without sin being the ones to cast the first stones.

It seems strange that much of the moral argument hinges around the idea that because it cannot be effectively proven that the vast majority of the population is either innocent or guilty of copying, nobody should have to pay for what gets ripped off because it's always done by 'someone else'. The ones that suffer, as usual, are a minority group: in this case the software producers.

The second aspect of levying blank tapes is practical: how would it be administered? In its simplest form this might be the funding of training schemes for programmers and the like, though I see no reason in theory why the people who write the programs shouldn't get the money. If they didn't write the programs, music or films there would be precious little left to copy.

There has been much written and done in the area of software 'dongles' of one type or another (PCW is currently funding research in the area together with Acornsoft), but I can't help feeling this is only half a cure. After all, anything one human mind can devise to stop piracy can almost certainly be undone by another human mind of equal or greater ingenuity. A dongle is a challenge. A levy is admitting reality.

The brochure produced by the TMG contains some strange reasons for not putting levies on blank tapes. It draws a clear distinction between home taping by individuals and organised piracy, admitting that piracy is naughty. The effect on the software producer is exactly the same in both cases. One must assume that the pirates get their supplies of tapes from somewhere, and that somewhere ought to be leviable.

The TMG also states that the figures for piracy and illegal copying of tapes quoted by the British Phonographic Industry (specifically concerned with music tapes) cannot be proved, and should be ignored. It couples this with the bland statement that home taping goes on, 'but not to the extent claimed by the record industry,' without offering any proof of its own.

One little gem is the statement that a levy would prompt everyone to say: 'We've paid for it, so let's copy everything in sight.' Strange; wouldn't that be to the TMG's advantage? But then, of course, the money from the levy would go to writers and performers from abroad, creating a drain on sterling. The TMG seems to forget that it's made up of companies like Agfa, BASF, 3M, Maxell, Memorex, Sony and TDK; all good, indigenous British companies?

It also includes the classics: 1 ) home copiers do not do it for commercial gain; and 2) when referring specifically to film makers (but with comments that apply equally well to computer software), it says they sell broadcasting rights knowing their work will be copied, so it's up to them to obtain adequate compensation in the first place. Otherwise, they should not allow their work to appear.

Right, all you programmers, get your artistic tantrums ready. It's art for art's sake, but money for God's sake.

end