CBO supports DRM for profit in lieu of social benefits

[fsbooks]

A report by the Congressional Budget Office has recommended that no changes to the United States copyright framework are necessary and lauds DRM as an exciting market opportunity for copyright holders. ... It's strangely emblematic of the sterility of the copyright debate, at least in the United States, which has been driven down a cul de sac. For the phalanxes of economists and lawyers who engage in this, human creativity does appear to be a very distant and remote planet.

The authors acknowledge, in the first sentence that, "Historically, U.S. copyright law has sought to balance private incentives to engage in creative activity with the social benefits that arise from the widespread use of creative works." But from then on, the elusive animal called "social benefits" fails to make another appearance. The remainder of the 50 page report is concerned with maximizing economic goals.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/08/14/cbo_copyright_report/

Perhaps the most eloquent critic of copyright laws (and one of the creative people of our time) is Todd Rundgren, who says in an interview in the July Linux Magazine (the interview is not on line yet, too current):

I consider music a human sacrament. Music was intended to bring you closer to the mind; it was intended to heal, not only physically, but mentally; it was intended to express things that cannot be expressed in any other medium. What we've done over the past 100 or 150 years is essentially profane this sacrament by saying that you can't listen to it unless you pay for it.

I think musicians were better off when you first of all proved your skill as a musician by pleasing some people with your output, then by pleasing someone with money, enough so that they'd support you so that you could create music.