The ACTA and why to fear it

Look, I can understand that the Internet might seem like a scary place to the outside observer. I mean, it is quite possible that we are living through the biggest social and cultural transition since the Industrial Revolution here. Except whereas that brought with it mechanisation, pollution and the disenfranchisement of the peasantry, the so called Digital Revolution has brought with it digitisation, instaneity and more videos of cats than there are actual cats in the world. To wit: Zorro Cat!



But of course, periods of tremendous flux and economic realignment inevitably bring with them winners and losers. If the winners in the current alignment could perhaps loosely be said to be the common man and Apple Computers, then the losers, as common wisdom would have it, are definitely the media industries. For the last decade and a half, the media industries have been engaged in a Stalingrad-esque siege with the ever encroaching forces of the the Internet, witnessing industry after industry first come under pressure and then begin to succumb to the relentlessly expanding flow of unfettered information. First it was the music industry, the first, reluctant test case in infinite distribution. Then came TV and cinema, casualties of ever increasing bandwidth and speed. And now it's the turn of print media, newspapers and magazines heading into meltdown as the promised digital utopia of online advertising fails to eventuate.

Well, at least that's part of the story. The other part is a slightly less economically engaging one, but I'd say it's still pretty important. Because it's the part that talks about the fact that right now more people are making and listening to music, and are creating and watching film, and are writing about and engaging with the world than at any time in human history. And while most of the time the Internet might seem like the digital bilge pump for the effluvia of human creativity, it has also undeniably begun to democratise the idea of creative expression. And hey, if it all gets a bit too real for you, then you can always turn on Youtube Comment Snob. None of which is to suggest that the world would be better off without the media industries - there will always be a place for high-quality investigative journalism, special effects that you simply cannot achieve with two brooms and a chair in your backyard, and Lady Gaga - just that noone has yet worked out how to properly monetise this brave new world of easily accessible and shareable media content.

And if the media industries have their way, noone will have to either! Enter THE ACTA. Standing for Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, the ACTA is essentially a hyper-secretive effort by the developed nations of the world to implement a binding, global system of rules to govern the policing and enforcement of copyright law, both physical and digital. You know those anti-piracy ads at the beginning of DVDs that feature the dude in the suit inexplicably deciding to steal a woman's purse? Downloading television shows could soon be exactly like that! How exciting!

The ACTA negotiations have been going for a few years now, although nobody is entirely sure for how long, because unlike pretty much every other sequence of treaty negotiations, it is being conducted entirely in secret. Non-disclosure agreements and everything. This meant that up until this week, the only reason anyone knew something was happening was because some kindly soul would periodically leak a copy of the agreement to the world, giving us a heads up as they try and completely reformat the idea of intellectual property. However, after suffering through a few leak related public relations disasters, the parties involved have decided to put out a draft text to try and assuage the Internet's fears.

You can find a detailed analysis here, but broadly (and ignoring the physical copyright provisions) the treaty can be read as an attempt to enshrine the traditionally understood rules of copyright in the digital sphere. America's much-maligned DMCA, the scourge of YouTube uploaders and music bloggers everywhere, is purported to be a mandated model. There had also been talk of a broadly implemented three-strikes-and-we-take-away-your-precious-precious-Internet policy (now available in both France and the UK), but after mass uproar this appears to have been shifted to the backburner. A lot of uncertainty still reigns over questions like civil liability (how much you have to pay if the RIAA sues yo' ass), criminal liability (how long you have to go away for if the RIAA prosecutes yo' ass) and border control (whether guards can search your iPod for illegitimately procured songs and videos).

So, LOLs all round then. The proposed date for the end of negotiations is the end of 2010, and it would seem likely that the more severe provisions will be watered down somewhat in an effort to reach consensus. However, at a very fundamental level I think this all remains a concerning turn of events. Without getting too hyperbolic, the Internet has - pretty much - changed everything. Sure, some aspects of the world have been affected less than others (I'm looking at you, undiscovered Amazonian tribes!), but there is no doubting the fact that the way we think about and consume media has shifted severely and absolutely over the last decade and a half. Whether that's a good thing or a bad thing is open to question, the shift itself is unarguable.

The problem with an ACTA style agreement is that it is attempting to put in place a system of laws that only really made sense when physicality was the most important part of a media product: the shitty plastic of CDs; the clunkiness of VHS; the tissue-like paper of glossy magazines. But now the physical product is almost obsolete. We live in an age of infinite replicability, where the mere fact of having a particular song, or movie, or TV show on your hard drive means that you can distribute it as many times as you want and at almost no cost to yourself. Unless the RIAA sues yo' ass. Again, whether this is good or bad is open to debate, but the problem is, it's there and it requires an entirely new framework to understand and control the flow of media in the digital age. And whatever the ACTA might turn out to be, it is most definitely not a new framework. Instead, it's  just another frantic, rearguard effort by the scions of media to shore up their power and influence in a world that they haven't yet worked out how to manage. All these people, making, distributing and consuming media without their active involvement and without them making money off of it is a scary thought. And the Internet being what it is, it's not like these sorts of developments are about to stop it in its tracks. But it could well retard its evolution for a while, and in the end it would be doing it for no good reason except to allow the men who control the media enough time to shape the Internet into a mould that best suits them.

Which is a pretty sad way of looking at it really. So, in the meantime, THANK YOU INTERNET!




P.S. Not really sure why I'm so fixated on cats right now. I'm deathly allergic to the demons and as a result can't stand to be in the same room as them. It's strange. Perhaps the Internet just provides me with the sort of cat utopia that my childhood so sorely lacked... *sniff*... Nope, no tears, just allergies.