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Swords to Plowshares in the Multimedia Piracy war.

If multimedia companies focus on subtle, tasteful advertising via their movies and their stars rather than trying to sell the media itself, free distribution of their content will no longer be a harmful.  Instead, the free distribution can seriously improve the market for stars and media.  Suddenly stars will have enormous amounts of free advertising and gain popularity.  This in turn makes the the stars able to sell products more effectively since their face is seen more often.  They will take the enemy of media "pirates" and turn them into a powerful ally as "content distributors".   More importantly, expensive DRM strategies can be abandoned, and companies can once again focus entirely on making better media rather than harder to steal media.

"They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore."
— Isaiah 2:4 & Micah 4:3

We live in an era where electronic media is easily obtained.  Downloading music has been brought to the masses by the likes of Napster, iTunes, and Limewire, and many others.  Bitorrent has allowed distributors of free content to share files easily without placing heavy load on their servers.  Large organizations like the RIAA and the MPAA have a love-hate relationship with these concepts.  On the one hand, distributing media for little more than the cost of web hosting is phenomenal.  Companies distribute their media far and wide across the internet, while still selling masses of DVDs, Blu-ray discs, and various other hard media.  However, while discs and downloads are sold to most, some parties are stealing form these companies.  Third parties can still purchase DRM protected media, rip it into a format that is easily distributed, and then resell it with little regard for the original copyright.  The recording industries seem to have an ongoing digital arms race with pirates, and the consumer suffers as their options for viewing their movies and listening to their music are restricted.

The Sony rootkit fiasco, people getting sued for cracking DVD's Content Scrambling System, and a multitude of DRM schemes have made watching videos or listening to music many times more difficult when anybody wants to use more than one media player.  DVD and Blu-ray seem to be making some moves in the right direction: Blu-ray discs often come with a DVD copy and an electronic copy for portable media players.  This is a simple solution to a problem that the industries themselves have created.  If Blu-ray discs were not protected by restrictive DRM, it would be easy to make a copy for personal use in older DVD players (such as those found in automobiles) and personal media players like iPods and Zunes.  Instead, we have to create more plastic discs just to give consumers the media they would want to use.  How can content subscribers get their product to the masses, make money, and not have to worry about pirates? Companies have tried making it harder to steal media, and have tried suing the people sharing media.  These strategies have harmed consumers, and harmed the image of the companies selling the media.  After all, who likes watching a big powerful company crush a kid with crippling debt over music files?

It is unlikely that there is a single solution to the problem of media distribution for profit, but there are some simple ideas that can be applied to digital media of all types.  Advertising is the simplest and most effective answer.  In the music world, the content is advertising.  While selling music is profitable, giving it away sells the artist as a star.  Musicians that are popular are often paid to appear in advertisements, and certainly a portion of this goes to their label.  Why not make this the key source of income for music companies?  Artists and labels will be able to get their media to far more people since their media is free.  They can then appear in advertisements for products, preferably ones they actually use.  The same goes for stars on both the big and small screen: When we see Whoopi Goldberg or Chevy Chase in a TV commercial, we are interested in what they are selling because they were in something we liked, not because we spent money to buy their DVD.  In addition, any product used in a movie or TV is instantly advertised to anyone who watches.  How many people saw The Matrix and immediately wanted that sliding phone Neo answered?  Knight Rider replica cars from the 1980s version of the show are still sold today over two decades after it went off the air.  TV shows themselves are there to compel people to pay for services such as Cable or Satellite TV, but also to advertise products during commercial breaks.  Movies and music should not sell themselves, but rather should sell the stars within.

This strategy depends greatly upon the type of advertising used.  Ads that interfere with the viewing experience are annoying, and could turn consumers away from a product they would otherwise happily buy.  YouTube has advertisements that pop up in the bottom quarter of a video, overlapping the media and obstructing the watcher's view to spew garbage.  I have literally never read these ads.  I immediately begin hunting for the close button and exit the ad.  If this button was removed, I simply would navigate away from the video, killing both the opportunity to sell what was in the ad and the stars and products in the video.  TV shows sometimes have ads for other shows that pop up in the corner of the screen, obstructing action in the show I'm actually watching.  If I'm watching one show already, why would that network then interfere with my enjoyment to advertise another show?  If anything, I am now less likely to remain on their channel since I know the viewing experience will be ruined by constant advertising.  Meet The Spartans and other spoof movies seem to have moved to crass, blatant plugs completely unrelated to the movie.  Why is Leonidas eating a Subway sandwich?  That's not funny, relevant, or compelling.  It is just as distracting as the ads that cover video action on YouTube or TV, and indeed after the second or third unfunny, unrelated plug, I turned the movie off.

CD/DVD/Blu-ray sales will not suddenly dry up, nor will stars only be seen in the home in a free-media economy.  People will still pay for good quality copies of a movie or song they like, or to see a star on the big screen or live at a concert with an excellent sound system.  The people that would pay for this media already do pay for it.  Many of the people pirating media are doing so because they are either unable or unwilling to pay for the product.  Others are pirating the media to resell it to customers at lower prices because they are not paying royalties.  The people selling cheap DVDs made from freely available content will still make themselves money while doing free advertising for the original content creators.  Certainly the availability of cheap electronic copies, or the ease of stealing media has contributed to media piracy, but a strategy of quality advertising could recoup all the money spent and lost in this giant battle against pirates.