The Difference between Author and Intermediary

Usually, there is no difference between the costs of the author and the intermediary (publisher, producer, distributor). Without making this distinction, it is concluded that the economic effects of copyright are to create an income stream for artists and thus stimulate them to make new creations, and given certain cost structures, this is effectively achieved.

Notwithstanding the foregoing, there are cases in which copyright creates a scenario where the most benefited agents are the record companies, the publishers, the music intermediaries, being these ones who take advantage of the non-regulated and/or specified situations to obtain greater profit than it should correspond to them.

In this sense of ideas, the copyright system facing the emergence of the Internet and new the information technologies is ceremonial, since it stops foreseeing, at least in legal systems such as the Mexican, channels through which the works are distributed and shared.

In the past, copyright generated revenue to cover the costs of producers and record labels to select and distribute music. These costs have fallen so drastically that they no longer justify the existence of these intermediaries.

Producing, reproducing and distributing music became cheaper, allowing independent labels to enter the market. The organizations that mediate between producers and consumers need to adapt to these changes. By virtue of these changes, copyright has benefited non-creative intermediaries instead of creators, musicians and other authors.

American organizations have made studies revealing that the surfacing market will not be free of organizations that filter and rate information for consumers; moreover, these markets or emerging platforms will not replace the traditional markets but will interact with the existing one, fortifying each other.

The authors’ benefits and the community in enjoying their works seem difficult to achieve with a medium that is not prepared to contain the constant stream of technological innovations that enables the massive circumvention of copyright protection measures.

It is worth remembering that an imbalance created by a system that is too strict creates an increase in costs, which makes unjustifiable the fulfillment of the authors’ benefits and those of the community that enjoys their works. Is it then efficient to raise the defense of copyright from the point of view of traditional remedies?