Following a stream of emails has forced me to write a train of thought.
Can independent labels justify spending money on watermarking and ISP chasers .
I am intrigued to know if these companies really make a financial difference. Or is there another approach? True story . Big club record appears on torrent. Watermark traced back to A List Dj. A list DJ denies all knowledge. What then? DJ no longer a fan of said label, as Dj is now accused of being the route cause of label bootlegging . Label loses support of one of their key promotions people.

As for ISP chasers. Well this is the new Geffen approach to slapping the hand of offenders. But. We all know the age range of those highest offenders. 18. – 24 if you don’t. Chances are they live at home. Chances are , it’s their parents ISP. Where does that leave anyone.
Ultimately this all leads to ignorance, and where there is ignorance, there’s bliss. Educating people in the awareness that escapism requires money to be created, is the key route to all off the above issues.

Since writing this AIM are proposing a three strike option. 2 hand slaps and then finally reducing offenders bandwidth. This will allow them to use basic internet facility, but not download large files. This seems to be one of the most realistic ideas so far.