In this picture, “Ramon Pulido of AT&T Broadband in Newhall (Los Angeles County) steamrolls 3,000 confiscated cable TV decoding boxes. The devices were seized throughout Southern California.”
SF Gate reports that pay-TV piracy is increasing with the use of computers (dah!) and that companies like DirecTV “has sent about 10,000 legal notices to people around the country in the past six months demanding that they stop using devices that decrypt satellite signals or face civil or criminal prosecution.”
For some reason, this story has given me an idea for a solution to the copyright/piracy debate. The entire U.S. entertainment industry could adopt the same royalty pay structure enacted for TV in some European countries. Instead of commercials, a royalty fee is charged at the point of sale of a new TV set and then a monthly fee is charged for all TV. Hell, so many of us in the U.S. have to subscribe to cable or satellite just to view network television because antannea interference has become to great. And instead of trying to prevent file-sharing, having audio/video manufacturers pay the RIAA/MPAA/whomever a royalty fee would be the solution. The artists/labels would get their money and the consumer would stop being attacked for enjoying their product.
