Last night saw a very well-attended debate, organised by MusicAlly and sponsored by the Guardian, on "Public Relations and Peer-to-peer: the perfect anti-piracy pitch".
It was an involving session, featuring a wide range of contributions and some interesting thoughts on the possibilities for positive promotion of legal downloading.
While the opinions were mixed on how to deal with illegal downloading and build a concerted PR campaign, the panel was - roughly - split down the middle. More hardline attitudes against downloaders - including the threat of litigation - came from BPI representative Steve Redmond and M&C Saatchi CEO Tim Duffy, while gentler approaches toward transgressors were displayed by PR guru Mark Borkowski and the Guardian's very own Neil McIntosh.
This is a massive and contentious issue, and one which the British music industry seems to have been reluctant to deal with head-on. I'll bring you more on the ideas put forward over the rest of the week; hopefully they'll be cause for some constructive debate.
