In this post I will discuss three of the essential parts in the filesharing debate.
*Consumers show a need that is not satisfied by the market,
*The intellectual property law needs to change.
*The need for control to maintain power.
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A Need

The filesharing is a result of improvements in technology and a need to share and be social with each other. When new technology emerges and it is superior to existing technology the market needs to adapt to the new needs of citizens in our digital society. People don’t want to wait another few days (or weeks) for the end of the show they are watching. A lot of people would rather enjoy music digitally right away instead of buying a CD and converting it themselves. People have a need to be spontaneous at home and deciding what movie they would like to see now instead of planning it beforehand or having to walk off to rent a movie somewhere.

Intellectual Property Law

As I see it copyright is a ”monologue” where people are meant to consume instead of participating in the further shaping of the copyrighted piece. This limits the communication and creativity that would otherwise take place. Before our digital age copyright had a good place in our society preventing physical copies to be made elsewhere which was directly damaging to the sales. Today when a technological change has made copying of digital material almost costless the old copyright law no longer applies in the same way it used to. The intellectual property law needs to change to reflect this but the established companies are happy with the profits from their old business model and do what they can to maintain this model. For society to adapt copyright to our digital age we need to either change intellectual copyright law or we are forced to change other existing rights such as Secrecy of Letters (Brevhemligheten), Source Protection (källskydd) and Mere Conduit.

A Need For Control

The filesharing debate is essentially about the right to knowledge and the sharing of it. Today knowledge-hoarders have power since they are the ones sitting on more knowledge than others have. With a bigger access to knowledge the society gets more equal. Inside larger corporations they have the possibilities of remixing each others work with that corporation. Having an opportunity of remixing leads to an increased creativity. The creation of copyright was meant to allow creativity but today it acts more as a restrictor of creativity. ”To discuss the actual conditions of creation, one should also discuss how the act of creation is done”

[Pics: Movie watching, CC-BY-NC-SA, julianrod / Leaf, CC-BY-ND, jaypeq21 / control, CC-BY-NC-ND, alphadesigner ]

For a further discussion around the need to change copyright take a look at my blog-post ”Copyright Worked In The Past But Not Anymore”
For more around the concept of copyright as a monologue listen to ”Larry Lessig on laws that choke creativity”.]

I’m reading a book called ”The Social Study of Information and Communication Technology”. One part of the book takes up an example that shows how a tool can be perceived very differently from a slight incident. They are unaware of the surveillance until they see it and they don’t like the spying on their every action even if they have nothing to hide.

”The case dealt with a fairly large application of Lotus Notes used for new product development within a worldwide team-based organization. Dedicated Notes applications were built to allow multidisciplinary and multinational teams to work jointly on common projects, regardless of distance between locations. Implementation of the new system was carried out according to a participative methodology, an incremental introduction of the system, and comprehensive training. Usage was immediate, ubiquitous, and successful. One day, however, a cheering message broadcasted over the network by a top marketing manager in London made every user realize that the new transparent platform could be deployed by headquarters as a powerful controlling eye, able to access any working document and local bulletin board of all the distant teams. Such a possibility made usage fall immediately and significantly. Attempts to revamp the system succeeded only when the applications were redesigned to replicate the pre-existing routines and organizational structures, thus losing much of the original innovative design, transparency, and collaboration opportunities.
This case provides evidence, among other things, about the ambiguity of new technology. Despite the careful planning and design, and the extensive training, the new groupware technology appeared to the user suddenly as an ambivalent, threatening stranger. The latent tensions between the professional dimension and the existential one exploded as a consequence of a small incident” (p. 26)

This story tells us a lot of useful things. One of the most significant ones being that the average user is very unaware of what the technique actually does and how it can be used until someone ”misuses” it. The surveillance of people is normally not a problem as long as they are not aware of it.

Another issue that becomes clear through this is that people are not comfortable sharing everything with others even if they have nothing to hide. Right now there is a lot of argument about not having to be afraid of surveillance unless you have something to hide. This is clearly not the case in this example.

The third thing we learn is how little is needed to shift the usage and opinions of people. Find the right thing to say and we can change everything instantly. One wrong (or right) thing to say changes the focus of the mass from seeing a productive and efficient tool to seeing a tool for controlling and spying.

We had a workshop about political communication where we chose to do some interviews on political communication and social media. The interview with Zana was done over e-mail and the one with Anna was taken over the phone. Both interviews were done in Swedish and translated into English by me. I’m happy to correct any misstakes I might have made in the translation if you point them out.

The two interviews were conducted with:
Zana Hussan, who started one of Sweden’s biggest Facebook groups ”Sverigedemokraterna i Riksdagen – Nej Tack!”
Anna Troberg, Vice Vice Chairman of Piratpartiet

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Interview with Zana Hussan
The Facebook group ”Sverigedemokraterna i Riksdagen – Nej tack!” was created by Zana Hussan on August 31st 2009. The group is in response to ”Sverigedemokraterna” (SD), who is an extreme right party trying to get into the Swedish parliament. The aim of the group is to show that SD is not wanted in the parliament according to the group members. The group has no political ties and is open for everyone that wants to renounce the party. The group managed to reach 300.000 members in its’ first five months which is a significant amount compared to the population of Sweden of 9M inhabitants. The ”anti-group” that started in response to this group managed to reach 16.000 members.

”…large groups will remain latent and ineffective if not mobilized by selective incentives” (”Democracy and Lobbying in the European Union” by Karolina Karr, p. 46)

”I had been thinking a long time about there being no organization or movement on internet collecting Sweden against racism, xenophobia and especially against ”Sverigedemokraterna”. Xenophobia isn’t a left or right question but a question for all of Sweden. I wanted to do my part in this which is why I created this Facebook group with an ambitious goal of collecting the broad Sweden with everything from the stockbroker to the assistant nurse”

Zana writes that he wants the group to be a rally point for discussions and actions where everyone is welcome to debate. Members are able and encouraged to share articles, arguments, experiences and strategies. Zana stresses the importance of not being quiet to the members of the group.

”People who are members in the group can achieve something by showing that they refuse to be quiet and thereby actively taking a stance for diversity and against racism. I constantly encourage people to become members of a political party or an organization to have a better influence in society”

Interview with Anna Troberg
Piratpartiet is a Swedish political party that started in 2006 to limit intellectual property and enhance the rights for a private life. Piratpartiet has from their upstart been in the forefront of internet and has had a big presence in social media. Politometern just listed the most influential political blogs in Sweden where Piratpartiet was listed in 10 places in the top 25, this despite that the party has only existed since 2006.

Anna Troberg told us that Piratpartiet uses social media for a lot of their political communication. One of the reasons for them working mainly with social media is that newly started parties in Sweden have very limited resources, the other reason is because of it being an effective way of communicating. She also emphasized that even if they had more resources they would keep using social media to the same extent as today. Blogs, Facebook and Twitter often create a discussion climate where people have an ability to express themselves in a deliberative democracy. Anna believes that through social media the political communication of smaller parties has been simplified but that the traditional parties have a hard time adjusting.

Piratpartiet has an official Facebook group  with 20.000 members and an official Twitter account. Their twitter account is most of the time updated through their Skype channel which is accessible to 70-80 of their members. Piratpartiet also set up a ”live web page” to monitor and inform people about what is being said about the party.

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Some Conclusions
Social media will become more and more important, not only in political communication but also in other areas of society. There is a lot of talk about social media and the effect it will have on this coming election in September and many are inspired by Barack Obama’s campaigning for presidency in 2008. Social media has a big effect as a creator of public opinion which can easily be seen by a group on Facebook managing to rally 300.000 members or by Piratpartiet managing to get 7% of Swedish votes in the EU-election. The ”two step flow of communications” also maintains an important part in the spreading of information through opinion leaders who passes it on to a greater mass.

The importance of having a big network and several channels to reach people is of bigger importance today. Internet makes the line between a political actor and a citizen very uncertain. A user of social media can easily express their opinions and get others to follow their lead. Groups are created between like-minded people that enhance and strengthen their power. Citizens gain more power and politicians must realize the importance and possibilities that this new digital era gives to democracy.

Google has always had a hard time in China but now they seem to have had enough and wants change. Google just announced on their official blog that they would start ”a new approach to China”. Google implies that Chinese governments might have something to do with the following three crimes:

1.  A cyber-attack in mid-december on Google and ~20 other companies
2. Google claims to have evidence that the main goal of the attack was accessing Gmail-accounts belonging to Chinese human right activists.
3. The follow-up investigation on the cyber attack by Google also revealed that several e-mail accounts used by human right activists in US, China and Europe has been continuously accessed by a third part that initially got login-information via phishing or malware on their target’s computers. [Thanks to @nikkelin for summarizing the points in Swedish.]

Google has because of this opened up their censoring somewhat, one example being pictures of Tianmen Square crackdown that were not available earlier.  They also say they might cease doing business in China if they can’t find ”a new approach to China”.

”These attacks and the surveillance they have uncovered–combined with the attempts over the past year to further limit free speech on the web–have led us to conclude that we should review the feasibility of our business operations in China. We have decided we are no longer willing to continue censoring our results on Google.cn, and so over the next few weeks we will be discussing with the Chinese government the basis on which we could operate an unfiltered search engine within the law, if at all. We recognize that this may well mean having to shut down Google.cn, and potentially our offices in China.”

Another important point that didn’t come out in the official Google blog post was revealed on Wikileaks saying that:

”gossip inside google China is gov hackers found infiltrating google source code repository; gmail attacks an old issue.”

The possibility of Google moving out of China becomes very interesting when you look at the Baidu vs. Google war for the Chinese search engine market. In China most people prefer Baidu because of them providing a better service for the Chinese. If google pulled out it would most likely mean that Baidu got almost all of those searches. According to Jennifer Li, Baidu’s chief financial officer, their share of the market for search was 77% in the 3rd quarter (+1.4% from 2nd) and Google’s share was at 17% in the 3rd quarter (-2% from 2nd). I believe these numbers are related to the stock market but it still shows a negative trend for Google if they are true. Democratic ideologies don’t stand a chance before financial capitalism.

Another market loss for Google would be the one in mobile phones. Google announced a partnership with China Mobile in 2007, China’s largest cell phone operator, to provide mobile search and has been dominating the mobile market. At the end of October Baidu announced signing a partnership with China Unicom, the second largest cell phone operator. China Unicom are predicted to grow to 50% of the market by 2011. This must affect Google’s part of the market share for cell phone searching negatively and should be evident to them at about this time. Source

Another factor that might be contributing to their new approach to China is the recent negative media coverage Google received in combination with Bono’s filesharing hypocrisy and praise of Chinese censoring. ”Google’s currency is user trust” ”Simply put, China is one of Google’s weakest markets”. The censoring might get worse if Google does decide to pull out of China, an example of what might come:

Go to baidu.com – Search for anything. Then search for ”google.blogspot.com” You are now totally blocked from Baidu (via @azaaza)

There are often a lot more reasons then the official ones if you start looking. This will be very interesting to follow with big changes to come if Google gets a change in their approach to China OR if they pull out and Baidu is allowed to have a ”monopoly” on the search market in China.

The problem today is that industries still work under the old traditional economic idea of ‘choice under scarcity‘. When there is a limited amount it gets expensive. We have to choose where to spend our resources (money).

The part that has changed, compared to earlier, is that information no longer is limited in this digital age. We have an abundance of information. Now we have to choose where to spend our resources (attention). One of the ways of reaching peoples attention is using Word of Mouth (WOM), a specific message that is accessible and spread by users.

The cost of copying digital information is reaching zero and we are moving towards externalities and alternative economies. New technology’s deflationary force is nothing new but the speed at which this is happening causes a problem for companies trying to adjust to this new economy.  Unfortunately this fast shift has made a lot of companies try and keep the obsolete economy of ‘choice under scarcity’ by limiting the access to information and thereby causing a shortage. This limiting has mainly been done by lobbying and creating laws to protect their outdated business strategies. We are moving away from traditional economies and towards an attention economy despite the friction caused by some companies.

This new economy benefits from Word of Mouth spreading. Compared to spam the reaching out of information by WOM becomes personal and thereby receives attention. The value is increased by sharing the product and a big mass normally amplifies the effect and usability of the product.

Free is the future of business. A few examples of this employed as business strategies could be giving away free razors (to sell disposable blades), free cell-phones (with a monthly plan), free programs (with an upgrade option) to name a few.

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Business models of the ‘free’ economy:

• Freemium
  Giving away basic model for free. People paying for premium normally pays for other 99% of people
• Advertising
  Free in exchange for some of your attention
• Cross-Subsidies
  Free product that will get you to buy other products
• Zero Marginal Cost
  No appreciable cost to anyone
• Labor Exchange
  Free in exchange for work. E.g. answer questions
• Gift Economy
  Free for everyone, money not only motivator.

sources:
Free! Why $0.00 is the future of business
The importance of viral marketing