P2P and the Future of Private Copying Peter K

Texas A&M University School of Law Texas A&M Law Scholarship Faculty Scholarship 2005 P2P and the Future of Private Copying Peter K. Yu [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarship.law.tamu.edu/facscholar Part of the Intellectual Property Law Commons, and the Internet Law Commons Recommended Citation Peter K. Yu, P2P and the Future of Private Copying, 76 U. Colo. L. Rev. 653 (2005). Available at: https://scholarship.law.tamu.edu/facscholar/383 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Texas A&M Law Scholarship. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faculty Scholarship by an authorized administrator of Texas A&M Law Scholarship. For more information, please contact [email protected]. P2P AND THE FUTURE OF PRIVATE COPYING PETER K. Yu* TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................... 654 I. THE 2003 COPYRIGHT WARS ......................................................... 658 I. THE FUTURE P2P FILE-SHARING WARS ......................................... 676 A . Dom estic Challenges ............................................................... 676 1. Proliferation of New P2P Technologies ............................ 676 2. Transnational Nature of the Future Copyright Wars ......... 677 3. Increased Political Alienation of the Recording Industry. 679 4. Counterattacks and Setbacks ............................................. 685 B. InternationalChallenges ......................................................... 686 1. Heightened Tension Between the United States and Less Developed Countries ................................................. 686 2. Severe Criticisms of U.S. Copyright Policy in Foreign C ountries ........................................................................... 690 3. Diversion of Public Attention from Domestic Copyright Issues ................................................................................. 693 C. P2PFile-Sharing Wars in OtherIndustries ............................ 695 III. EIGHT MODEST PROPOSALS ........................................................... 698 A . Mass Licensing ........................................................................ 698 * Copyright © 2005 Peter K. Yu. All Rights Reserved. Associate Professor of Law & Director, Intellectual Property & Communications Law Program, Michigan State University College of Law; Adjunct Professor of Telecommunication, Information Studies and Media & Faculty Associate, James H. and Mary B. Quello Center for Telecommunication Management & Law, College of Communication Arts & Sciences, Michigan State University. Earlier ver- sions of this Article were presented in the Sixth FuturTech Conference at the University of Michigan Business School, the ITU Telecom Asia 2004 Forum organized by the International Telecommunication Union in Busan, Korea, the Fifth Annual Quello Communications Policy & Law Symposium in Washington, D.C., the LawTechTalk Series at the University of Hong Kong Faculty of Law, and the First Annual Intellectual Property and Communications Law and Policy Scholars Roundtable at Michigan State University College of Law. The article was also delivered as a public lecture for the Intellectual Property Department of the Government of Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. The Author thanks the participants of these events, in particular Adam Candeub, Cindy Cohn, Shubha Ghosh, Debora Halbert, Robert Heverly, Matt Jackson, Jay Kesan, Michael Landau, Lyrissa Lidsky, Michael Madison, Adam Mossoff, Susan Scafidi, Mitch Singer, and Katherine Strandburg, for their valuable comments and suggestions. He also expresses his appreciation and gratitude to Alexander Kanous and Jade Zuege for excellent research and editorial assistance and Richard Miller and the staff of the UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO LAW REVIEW for their thoughtful and thorough editing. UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO LAW REVIEW (Vol. 76 B. Compulsory Licensing ............................................................. 704 C. Voluntary Collective Licensing................................................ 712 D . Voluntary Contribution............................................................ 715 E. Technological Protection......................................................... 721 F. Copyright Law Revision ........................................................... 727 G. Administrative Dispute Resolution Proceeding....................... 730 H. Alternative Compensation........................................................ 732 I. The Argument for a Range of Solutions ................................... 739 IV. RETHINKING THE UNAUTHORIZED COPYING PROBLEM ................. 744 A. The Battle Between Humans and Machines............................. 746 B. Imaginary World War III ......................................................... 750 C. The Conquest of Generation Y ................................................. 756 C ON CLU SION ......................................................................................... 763 INTRODUCTION Two thousand and three was the year of recording industry litiga- tion. For the first time, the industry filed lawsuits against individual end- users whom it suspected of illegally trading music. In April, the major record labels filed high-profile lawsuits against four college students who ran file-sharing engines that allowed fellow students to download copy- righted songs. 1 Five months later, the Recording Industry Association of America ("RIAA"), the trade group that represents the five major labels and other smaller member companies, launched frill-fledged battles against individuals suspected of swapping music without authorization via peer-to-peer ("P2P") networks, 2 such as Grokster, iMesh, KaZaA, and Morpheus. Hundreds of lawsuits were filed,3 thousands of subpoenas were issued, 4 and countless people-innocent or otherwise- received the trade group's notorious cease-and-desist letters. 5 These 1. Frank Ahrens, 4 Students Sued over Music Sites, WASH. POST, Apr. 4, 2003, at El; Jon Healey, Students Hit with Song PiracyLawsuits, L.A. TIMES, Apr. 4, 2003, at C 1. 2. P2P networks are computer networks that allow individual end-users to communicate with each other without using a centralized server. For a brief discussion of the operation of P2P networks, see Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, Inc. v. Grokster, Ltd., 380 F.3d 1154, 1158-60 (9th Cir.), cert. granted, 125 S. Ct. 686 (2004). See generally PEER-TO-PEER: HARNESSING THE BENEFITS OF A DISRUPTIVE TECHNOLOGY (Andy Oram ed., 2001) [hereinafter PEER-TO-PEER]. 3. Amy Harmon, 261 Lawsuits Filed on Music Sharing, N.Y. TIMES, Sept. 9, 2003, at Al [hereinafter Harmon, 261 Lawsuits Filed]. 4. SBC Online Music Case Moved to Washington, L.A. TIMES, Dec. 2, 2003, at C3 (re- porting that the RIAA has issued thousands of subpoenas since spring 2003). 5. Declan McCullagh, RIAA Apologizes for Erroneous Letters, CNET NEWS.COM (May 13, 2003), at http://news.com.com/2100-1025-1001319.html; see also Declan McCullagh; RIAA Apologizes for Threatening Letter, CNET NEWS.COM (May 12, 2003), at http://news. 2005] P2P AND THE FUTURE OF PRIVATE COPYING strong-arm tactics have alienated many of the industry's customers and political supporters6 and, to some extent, have backfired by driving unauthorized copying underground. 7 Digital piracy remains rampant today, and billions of music files are traded every month. 8 Since the beginning of the P2P file-sharing controversy, com- 9 mentators have discussed the radical expansion of copyright law, the recording industry's controversial enforcement tactics, 10 the need for new legislative and business models, 11 the changing social com.com/2100-1025-1001095.html. For a discussion of take-down notices, see infra text ac- companying notes 35-46. 6. See Peter K. Yu, The Copyright Divide, 25 CARDOZO L. REV. 331, 442-43 (2003). 7. See id. at 443. 8. See generally Peter K. Yu, The EscalatingCopyright Wars, 32 HOFSTRA L. REV. 907 (2004) [hereinafter Yu, EscalatingCopyright Wars]. 9. See, e.g., LAWRENCE LESSIG, THE FUTURE OF IDEAS: THE FATE OF THE COMMONS IN A CONNECTED WORLD (2001) (lamenting how the recent expansion of intellectual property laws have stifled creativity and innovation); JESSICA LITMAN, DIGITAL COPYRIGHT (2001) (detailing the expansion of copyright laws in the past two centuries); SIVA VAIDHYANATHAN, COPYRIGHTS AND COPYWRONGS: THE RISE OF INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY AND How IT THREATENS CREATIVITY (2001) [hereinafter VAIDHYANATHAN, COPYRIGHTS AND COPYWRONGS] (describing how the increasing corporate control over the use of software, digital music, images, films, books and academic materials has steered copyright law away from its original design to promote creativity and cultural vibrancy); James Boyle, The Second Enclosure Movement and the Construction of the Public Domain, LAW & CONTEMP. PROBS., Winter/Spring 2003, at 33 [hereinafter Boyle, The Second Enclosure Movement] (describing the recent expansion of intellectual property laws as "the second enclosure movement"). 10. See, e.g., Sonia K. Katyal, The New Surveillance, 54 CASE W. RES. L. REV. 297 (2003). 11. See, e.g., COMM. ON INTELLECTUAL PROP. RIGHTS AND THE EMERGING INFO. INFRASTRUCTURE, NAT'L RESEARCH COUNCIL, THE DIGITAL DILEMMA: INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY IN THE INFORMATION AGE 79-83 (2000) [hereinafter DIGITAL DILEMMA] (discuss- ing the business models and technological protection mechanisms that can be used to address the digital piracy problem); WILLIAM W. FISHER III, PROMISES

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