Filesharing crackdown divides UK music industry
Posted in: Online TV/Music at 13/09/2009 22:51
A growing rift is developing in the music industry over proposals by business secretary Lord Mandelson to crack down on persistent filesharers by suspending their broadband connections.
The row has pitted big names such as Billy Bragg and Annie Lennox against record labels and the Musicians' Union ahead of an approaching government deadline for comments in its illegal filesharing consultation.
A coalition of artists including Lennox, Bragg and Pink Floyd's Nick Mason argue such laws would alienate their audience and risk criminalising music fans. The Featured Artists Coalition (FAC) says the planned crackdown fails to recognise "evidence that repeat file-sharers of music are also repeat purchasers of music".
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/sep/13/filesharing-crackdown-rift
