"When people are framed as consumers, society becomes little more than a marketplace. Social problems get treated with individualized, market-oriented solutions — where each consumer-citizen is solely responsible for spotting deceptive practices and avoiding unfair schemes — instead of collective, rights-based protections.
When the private sector enters into the social contract, ... [we get] shallow public-private partnerships in which the corporate actors are really in charge. While the public is hung out to dry with effectively no defense or recourse since our political rights have evaporated into market choices."
How is that applicable here? What political rights are in play here? We're talking about entertainment, about as purely commercial a product as you can get. We're not talking about healthcare or water or food or housing.
The EFF has kindly created a youth education project on the topic of legal rights related to the history of innovation and copyright law, fair use, free speech and the public domain. From http://www.teachingcopyright.org/
"Kids and teens are bombarded with messages from a myriad of sources that using new technology is high-risk behavior. Downloading music is compared to stealing a bicycle — even though many downloads are lawful. Making videos using short clips from other sources is treated as probably illegal — even though many such videos are also lawful."
"When people are framed as consumers, society becomes little more than a marketplace. Social problems get treated with individualized, market-oriented solutions — where each consumer-citizen is solely responsible for spotting deceptive practices and avoiding unfair schemes — instead of collective, rights-based protections.
When the private sector enters into the social contract, ... [we get] shallow public-private partnerships in which the corporate actors are really in charge. While the public is hung out to dry with effectively no defense or recourse since our political rights have evaporated into market choices."