Wired News interviews Pete Ashdown, an ISP-founding geek who's challenging Republican Utah senator Orrin Hatch for his seat. Hatch made headlines by proposing that computers be modified to explode if they're used for copyright infringement, and he's a long-term incumbent. Ashdown DJs raves and runs his campaign with a wiki:
I think the artist's rights should be held over the corporation rights. I believe that the internet presents a great opportunity for artists to make more on their work than what they were formerly doing with the corporate distribution system. And I think the writing is on the wall for that corporate distribution system, and that's the kind of backlash we're seeing from them in regards to lawsuits and restrictive legislation. So I absolutely believe the artists need to be rewarded for their work, should be rewarded for their work, and that the internet presents them an opportunity to do that in a more direct fashion.
So I support their rights, but I also support the rights of the consumer. I support the rights of the consumer when it's in regards to fair use. If I buy some media I should be able to do whatever I wish with that media inside the domain of my own home, outside of sharing it with somebody else commercially. That is, if I play it in the car for somebody else should I have to charge them a use fee? I don't think so. But if I'm out selling their music and the artist is getting no benefit from that, then that's an obvious violation.
I'm against the idea of DRM because it restricts the individual. It punishes the individual, (restricts) the innocent from being able to do what they wish with the property they've purchased. And if people say, "Well, the pricing for this is so low that we can only sell it to a certain kind of use," well, raise the price! You know, that's what the market's all about. If you want to raise the price so I have no DRM on my music, I may pay an extra 25 cents, or whatever you decide to do to get that music without the DRM encumberment.
