In a potentially ground-breaking move, the six largest Internet service providers in the United Kingdom have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with hundreds of UK record companies via the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) and with the Motion Picture Association with the intent of reducing infringing traffic of creative works online.

The MoU grew out of negotiations facilitated by the UK Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR), but this is a self-regulated initiative. There is an important focus in the MoU on continuing consumer education programs, essential to ensure ISP customers respect the rights of copyright owners and also ensure that their ISP connections aren’t used for infringing purposes by others.

For those determined to infringe, the parties to the MoU will work with the UK’s Ofcom (its telecom regulator) to, as BPI put it, “identify effective mechanisms to deal with repeat offenders.” The MoU comes with a commitment by providers of creative works that they will continue to develop and license more legal ways to enjoy these works.

This MoU would seem to reflect many realities: (1) Copyright owners indeed have rights, and they need to be respected. (2) In a time when economic malaise (to borrow from Jimmy Carter’s dictionary) is spreading across the globe, any decline in copyright infringement is welcome due to copyright’s benefits to the economy. (3) Industries with different backgrounds and economic underpinnings can work together, without being compelled by a government.

That said, it shouldn’t be overlooked that these talks were spurred on by the UK government, nor should it be argued that the UK broadband customer who wishes to infringe should simply go to one of the smaller UK ISPs not party to the MoU. Accomplished reporter Dugie Standeford in Warren’s Washington Internet Daily (subscription required, and highly recommended) reports that BERR has stated there may still be a possibility of government regulation due to the fact that some ISPs aren’t on board. While BERR prefers self-regulation combined with Ofcom heading a search for best practices against repeat infringers, BERR could “authorize an outside body to consider evidence of piracy and order ISPs to act as required,” or force “ISPs to allow installation of filters or install them themselves.”

It’s hard to object to the idea of creative industries and ISPs partnering to target behavior that is clearly illegal. The first step emerging from this MoU will be a three-month trial of sending notifications to ISP subscribers believed to be illegally uploading or downloading music. This is hardly draconian, and if the subscriber is well-intentioned and doesn’t wish to behave in illegal activity, the letter should be more than sufficient to ensure that subscriber going forward adheres to the law. It is, in some respects, the most efficient education campaign.

There are pockets of objections surfacing here and there, of course, from folks congenitally allergic to record labels, mostly. But would they prefer BERR mandate ISP filters? I would think not. Perhaps they should embrace this MoU and encourage other UK ISPs to sign on. Those of us across the pond can watch this positive experiment and learn from it.

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This entry was posted on Friday, July 25th, 2008 at 10:08 am by Patrick Ross and is filed under creators, economy, education, international. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.