This is why P2P is great!

I missed BSG yesterday. I'm really beginning to like this show, but I haven't got into habit of watching it every Friday yet. I'm a total airhead when it comes to remembering stuff. If it's not a scheduled task on my PDA there is no way in hell I'd remember it (and I'm also horrible about scheduling things). I would probably forget to put my pants on before leaving the house if this was not a routine thing now. I can't tell you how many times I forgot my cell phone in the morning, because it was not on my desk with my keys and my wallet. But I digress...

I did not watch BSG. Now they probably will be rerunning this episode at some point this week but I'm just to lazy to track it down. And chances are that I would also miss the rerun due to my forgetfulness :P But, that does not mean that I have to miss an episode!

I did what any self respecting geek would do. I scoured bunch of torrent sites, found the ep and two hours later I was able to watch it. Was it wrong? Perhaps... But then again, if you think about it - I do pay for my cable. So I already paid for the privilege of watching this episode on TV - I just didn't happen to be watching at the time. The version I got had the commercials cut out but I would not mind if it had them intact.

What I'm trying to say is - if I had to pay for downloading this episode I would never do it. Especially if it came with some DRM. But I would not mind downloading slightly longer version with full commercial spots. The whole concept of selling multimedia is a joke. But I'm terrified that this is where we are heading. Soon it will be difficult to find a movie or a song that's not crippled by DRM. I'm truly scared that my children will live in a world of pay-per-view media and all present DRM.

Why can't people figure out a way to make P2P work for them instead of fighting it. Here is my concept - why don't we insert non-intrusive advertisement into the media files and release them into the wild? Get the well established P2P networks copy distribute your stuff for you. Now, it's true that someone can simply cut out the ads - but if they are non-intrusive, why bother? Better yet - use non-intrusive product placement when possible.

The only way to really get rid of "piracy" is to make it part of your business model. Now, if RIAA and MPAA have their way, it might be perfectly legal to distribute DRM'd files via P2P. But who will want to do that? People will still prefer to share the illegal cracked copies without any DRM. If they can't break the DRM they will simply record the video output. Or they will simply get a non DRM'd version straight from the source. There will be always ways to get illegal copies of movies and shows. The only way to remedy this, is to make sure that there is no such thing as illegal copy...

Tags: bsg, battlestar galactica, p2p, drm, piracy