EFF’s Fred von Lohmann suggests a system under which ISPs would charge consumers a flat monthly fee to be paid to the recording studios and musicians, based on a Nielsen-style ratings approach.
TeleRead would allow more precise tracking of individual items than the von Lohmann plan–something to consider, given the low sales of individual books. Still, his proposal is far more clueful than the recording industry is, and it jibes well with the previous thoughts on this matter by Pamela Samuelson.
“The reality,” he writes, “is that file-sharing is almost certainly going to remain a fact of campus life. The debate should be about getting artists and copyright owners fairly compensated, not about how many students should be expelled or how to install surveillance equipment on campus networks.”
(ISP-related proposal spotted via blPlog.)
