Media Groups Should Consider an MP3 Player Ban?!
That’s what the folks at Deloitte say, according to this brief article on FT.com. Are you kidding me?! That’s the best solution they could come up with to reduce piracy? Sheesh! Hey, while you’re at it, don’t forget about those pesky copy machines – after all, they can be used to copy and scan documents in a heartbeat. What about all those writable CD/DVD drives out there? Those need to go too, I suppose. E-mail programs and ftp sites? Nuke ‘em all!! We can’t afford to provide such an easy gateway for file transfers and uploads! Now that I think about it, the root of all evil here is the computer itself. Let’s get rid of every PC in the company!
I wonder how much Deloitte spent on this incredibly insightful research. More importantly, I wonder if some company actually sponsored it and had to pay real money for the results…
Seriously, the answer isn’t to remove technology but rather to provide clear guidelines on what’s permissible and then enforce those rules. (See my earlier post on this topic.) If you’re caught copying files illegally either you’re immediately fired or you’re put on probation, meaning the next time you’re caught you’re gone. Is that really so hard? There are plenty of ways to track this sort of thing, provided a company’s IT department isn’t asleep at the wheel.