Even though the US .gov states that it is meerly a benevolent dictator of the internet ICANN, which does the actual running, seems to have other ideas.

They’ve made a few horrible unilateral decisions that made censorship a whole lot more possible. In fact, it’s already happened within months of the changes taking effect.

So for everyone that thought the USA has a given right to run the internet, or that the UN would make a horrible mess of things. I mean, seriously.. do you think they’d be worse then ICANN?

The RIAA is using their monopoly powers to grab the entire music market by the balls. And record sales keep on slipping away. Now, I’m assuming that’s retail sales, which is a very important distinction as some people totally miss.

They buy straight into the rhetoric that the music market is slipping and completely gloss over the fact that sales are actually increasing, just not in the traditional retail venues. Direct sales are always up.

I think we’re getting a good dose of why monopoly’s are never in anyone’s best interest. Unless it’s nominaly owned by the customers it serves, a monopoly just screws everyone over in an effort to benefit the people in charge of, well, the monopoly.

The major labels (re: the parts of the RIAA) actually tried to screw over retailers in favor of direct marekting. And it’s largely worked. Now they’re using the bogey man of downloading to further screw over customers while making a mint.

Are you really shocked?

I’m not so sure that Microsoft is maintaining their competative advantage solely through intellectual property. They seem to have nastier tricks than that in the bag.

Tom Adelstein, however, draws a good parallel between prohibition in 20’s era USA and the current regime of IP rights. According to the editorial, both served to stymie free trade and harmed society as a whole in the states, with IP being even worse with regards to foreign nations.

A thought provoking read.