Banning MP3 Players?
According to Deloitte, media companies should consider banning MP3 players from workplaces with sensitive digital content because the risk of illegal copying and file sharing is too great.
The Financial Times wrote that more than half of all media companies were the victims of computer crime in the last year. Oh, really? Because to me that seems like pretty good odds. Here's a newsflash: every company in the world that has at least one computer was likely the victim of computer crime last year. It would seem probable that media companies would be among the better prepared and thusly suffer less crime.
Of course, banning iPods and memory sticks from the workplace is a woefully ineffective solution. My cellphone -which I use at work- has storage capacity and is infrared as well as bluetooth enabled. In the coming years there will be few technological devices that won't be able to share files simply by being near each other (or even in the next building).
And even if I had left my cellphone at home, I can post the sensitive content to a free website from my workstation -unless of course media companies start restricting internet access as well.
Perhaps the most annoying part of this is the vague scent of hypocrisy. Here we are on the eve of Steve Jobs doing a massive deal with Hollywood to make feature films available on iTunes so they can be watched on iPods and there is the possibility these lucrative little devices will be banned from the workplaces that are making money off their very existence.
Banning storage devices to prevent content theft will never work. It really only leaves you with one other -equally draconian- measure. Random employee cellphone/iPod searches.
There is going to be some icky times in the lead up to my golden age.
The Financial Times wrote that more than half of all media companies were the victims of computer crime in the last year. Oh, really? Because to me that seems like pretty good odds. Here's a newsflash: every company in the world that has at least one computer was likely the victim of computer crime last year. It would seem probable that media companies would be among the better prepared and thusly suffer less crime.
Of course, banning iPods and memory sticks from the workplace is a woefully ineffective solution. My cellphone -which I use at work- has storage capacity and is infrared as well as bluetooth enabled. In the coming years there will be few technological devices that won't be able to share files simply by being near each other (or even in the next building).
And even if I had left my cellphone at home, I can post the sensitive content to a free website from my workstation -unless of course media companies start restricting internet access as well.
Perhaps the most annoying part of this is the vague scent of hypocrisy. Here we are on the eve of Steve Jobs doing a massive deal with Hollywood to make feature films available on iTunes so they can be watched on iPods and there is the possibility these lucrative little devices will be banned from the workplaces that are making money off their very existence.
Banning storage devices to prevent content theft will never work. It really only leaves you with one other -equally draconian- measure. Random employee cellphone/iPod searches.
There is going to be some icky times in the lead up to my golden age.
posted by Gordon White at 9:20 pm
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