Space/Time shifting Content = Web Services

This analogy probably wont help anybody in the music industry to understand but I thought it was worth pointing out.

When I buy a DVD and I can copy it onto my PSP, the DVD becomes more valuable to me. I've bought 2 different tv series on DVD only because I could space shift it onto my DVD and take it to the gym. That's money that the studios wouldn't have gotten if there was no way for me to space shift the content. The studios see this as an opportunity for them to extend their offering and increase the price. To keep this opporunity available to themselves they are fighting tooth and nail to keep control of their data.

Google maps recently published their API. There have been some very interesting combinations of listing services like craigs list being combined with Google maps to show customized maps of very interesting content. Google could've seen this as an opporunity to extend their offering and have fought tooth and nail to control what is done with their content. They instead decided to allow the end users to embrace and extend their service.

Space and Time shifting content is the same type of thing. It's users like me, taking something cool (a tv show) and using it in a way the originator didn't envision.