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RIAA Denies Hypocrisy in Royalties Dustup

Posted by Zonk on Wed Mar 12, 2008 11:42 AM
from the not-our-problem dept.
Media Music Businesses The Almighty Buck
Hairless ape writes "The RIAA is reacting to a story pointing out the group's hypocrisy in its attempts to have songwriter royalties lowered. The issue stems from attempts to get webcasters to pay fixed royalty rates. 'In short, the contention was that the RIAA wanted to pay a percentage of its revenue to songwriters as its profits have fallen, but pushed for a fixed per-stream when it came to earning money from webcasters.' The RIAA says that's not so, and that SoundExchange offered a similar model to webcasters. Either way, the rates sought by the two groups would have bankrupted many webcasters. 'Now you know; it wasn't about hypocrisy, but one of the seven deadly sins may still have been involved.'"
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[+] RIAA Wants Songwriter Royalty Lowered 343 comments
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "Lest there be anyone left who believes the RIAA's propaganda that its litigation campaign is intended to benefit the 'creators' of the music, Hollywood Reporter reports that the RIAA is asking the Copyright Royalty Board to lower songwriter royalties on song file downloads, from the present rate of 9 cents per song — about 13% of the wholesale price — down to 8% of wholesale. Meanwhile, the big digital music companies, such as Apple, want the royalty rate lowered even more, to something like 4% of wholesale. So any representations by any of these companies that they are concerned for the 'creators' of the music must henceforth be taken with a boxcar-load of salt."
Submission: RIAA denies hypocrisy in royalties dustup by Anonymous Coward
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  • Presumably one of the Vatican's new deadly sins (Score:4, Interesting)

    by giafly (926567) on Wednesday March 12 2008, @11:56AM (#22729556)

    Polluting of the environment, genetic modification, carrying out experiments on humans, causing social injustice, causing poverty, becoming obscenely wealthy and taking drugs all constitute mortal sins, according to Girotti.
    Vatican dusts down deadly sin list [businessgreen.com]

    Actually at least six of these new seven deadly sins apply to the RIAA, starting with "polluting the environment".

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Spy der Mann (805235)
      Actually at least six of these new seven deadly sins apply to the RIAA, starting with "polluting the environment".

      A little off topic, but why am I suddenly reminded of all those AOL CD's? :P

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by davester666 (731373)
        Gah. It still is hypocrisy.

        From their argument, they are implying that consumers are only buying individual songs, but that they, the overly generous music labels are paying songwriters and musicians as if we bought the whole album.

        Revenue may be down, but payouts are down as well. The music industry hasn't been lowering the price of CD's OR lowing the price of individual songs on iTunes or Amazon. If anything, the majors 'profit margin' has increased, because they have significantly lower expenses AND g

    • Polluting of the environment

      Everyone's guilty of that, and I don't see why the RIAA is especially guilty.

      genetic modification

      Let me guess, the exception, right?

      carrying out experiments on humans

      Other than studies and surveys (which are experiments on human behaviour), what exactly have they done?

      causing social injustice

      I'll give you that. They were certainly instrumental in unbalancing copyright law.

      causing poverty

      I don't think they've done much of that. If you're going to cite the artists as an example, I'

      • The hypocrisy lies in their creed:

        The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is the trade group that represents the U.S. recording industry. Its mission is to foster a business and legal climate that supports and promotes our members' creative and financial vitality. Its members are the record companies that comprise the most vibrant national music industry in the world. RIAA members create, manufacture and/or distribute approximately 90% of all legitimate sound recordings produced and sold in the

  • Payola? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Van Cutter Romney (973766) <{moc.liameeg} {t ... rataknev.marirs}> on Wednesday March 12 2008, @11:59AM (#22729584)
    Sounds like Payola all over. Maybe we'll get Eliot Spitzer to prosecute RIAA again ... Oh, wait!
  • Perhaps the new deadly sin of "excessive wealth" would cover this as well.

  • News? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Gat0r30y (957941) on Wednesday March 12 2008, @12:11PM (#22729726) Homepage Journal
    Unscrupulous organization denies blatant hypocrisy. Details at 11.
    • Oh, it's newsworthy. How else are people supposed to know that this unscrupulous organization exists and to steer clear of it if we don't hear about it every day?

  • At least it is legal (Score:3, Insightful)

    by PC and Sony Fanboy (1248258) on Wednesday March 12 2008, @12:12PM (#22729742) Journal
    Even if it isn't fair - at least it is legal. The RIAA sometimes has problems with that, too.
  • ...that everyone knows what we already know, people like my mother who think most artists make millions from CD sales will get the picture: the RIAA doesn't care about artists' profit- just its own.

  • Why the painfully inane comments today? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by DarkSkiesAhead (562955) on Wednesday March 12 2008, @12:42PM (#22730160)

    I came into this thread with 10 shiny new mod points hoping to find someone insightful, but found not a single comment in the entire thread worth promotion. What's happened to slashdot? A story on a hot subject, and I see nothing but off-topic trolls and insipid banter about deadly sins taken out of context from the description at the top of the page. Not a single comment on the actual article.

    Anyway, the RIAA's attempt to dodge the charge of hypocrisy is equally lame. First the new deal gives ridiculous profit to SoundExchange (30% of gross). And even though they do have a 'plan' to share with artists (an inequitable one, albeit), the lack of expediency is directly adding to the profit of the RIAA through this process. The artists are clearly an afterthought. The RIAA can't come close to hiding their real motivation: profit for its members at all costs, regardless of artists rights/needs.

  • Seven (Score:5, Funny)

    by esocid (946821) on Wednesday March 12 2008, @12:47PM (#22730224) Journal
    1. Envy- of the artists and their fame.
    2. Greed- self explanatory.
    3. Gluttony- eating and boozing it up with all that cash from those royalties.
    4. Lust- for control and power over the music industry.
    5. Pride- in their "holier than thou" facade as guardians of truth and justice.
    6. Rage- hm, I guess that one is just reserved for everyone who hates the living hell out of the RIAA.
    • Hear me! Oh, Hear me! All pay heed! The Lord, the Lord Jehovah has given unto you these fifteen (crash)...Oy! ten-- ten commandments, for all to obey!

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by fishbowl (7759)
      #1, genetic modification. We will jail all who grow roses and all who have fruit orchards?
      #2, human experimentation. What's wrong with medical research, psychological research, etc.?
      #3, #4, #5 need definition
      #6, punish success and all suffer
      #7, only the drugs you don't happen to like. Does everyone agree on which drugs are bad?
    • So, let's see. The RIAA is certainly guilty of the new 4, 5, and 6

      Nothing new here... just because these sins were just recently listed didn't mean that the riaa execs weren't going to hell anyway: They were accusing innocents of "stealing" their "property" (that's perjury), engaging in monopolistic practices and asking too much of punitive damages (which would go against "thou shalt not steal"), etc. They were evil, and they know it.

      • Re:Fourteen deadly sins (Score:5, Funny)

        by MightyYar (622222) on Wednesday March 12 2008, @12:22PM (#22729880)

        In that case everyone's going to hell!
        Well, that's the whole point, isn't it? No one is without sin, so everyone must ask for God's forgiveness. Vendor lock-in.

        I wonder if the alcohol that Christ made out of water counts as drugs or not? If not, I'd like to hear why alcohol is not a drug.

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by nedwidek (98930)
          Because it's legal and the government gets their cut?
        • According to everyone's friend, Wikipedia, a drug is defined as "any substance that alters normal bodily function".

          Using that definition, alcohols would be considered a drug. Of course, food, water, air, and every other foreign object introduced into a body could be classified as a drug. Your normal body function is to die. Taking drugs like food and water alter that and keep you alive. Air has that nasty habit also. I say let's ban drugs and see how long the human race lasts!

        • I wonder if the alcohol that Christ made out of water counts as drugs or not? If not, I'd like to hear why alcohol is not a drug.

          Well, some religions (such as Southern Baptists) hold that alcohol is verboten. Others (such as Rastafarianism) have no problems with drugs. Most religions seem to uphold drinking as a celebratory or social act, and are silent on other drugs. So, I would say that religions tend to lump drugs and alcohol together, but the US is where they sent all the Christian groups that thou

        • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

          by mjwx (966435)
          Ayn Rand was a hack and a plagiarist.
          The whole idea of atlas shrugged was taken from the idea of using guilt as leverage in religion. Here's an oft quoted part changed to fit a religious context:

          There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power the Church has is the power to punish sinners. When there aren't enough sinners, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a sin that it becomes impossible for men to live without sin.

          . The whole idea is to make people think they are doing bad things in

          • By what standard does the US government have a close association to "the church"? I don't even know what church that would be.
            • Modus Operandi's are practically identical, by "the church" this applies to most theist churches. To be more accurate however how many US presidents have not been Christian? How many senators are not Religious? (willing to bet the vast majority (75%) are Christians in some flavour or another).

              Connection enough?

              At least the Australian government is honest about it, you have to be a member of the church of England to be a member of parliament.
              • So, what is the problem? The US government is carrying out the will of the people? Any democracy made up of 90% Christians is going to be represented by mostly Christians.

                At least the Australian government is honest about it, you have to be a member of the church of England to be a member of parliament.
                This is absurd unless your goal is to disenfranchise.

                • So, what is the problem? The US government is carrying out the will of the people? Any democracy made up of 90% Christians is going to be represented by mostly Christians.

                  So much for for the vaunted separation of church and state. Maybe not so bad for you but IMO, any theocratic state is bad.

                  At least the Australian government is honest about it, you have to be a member of the church of England to be a member of parliament.

                  This is absurd unless your goal is to disenfranchise.

                  Honesty not something you wa

                  • So much for for the vaunted separation of church and state.

                    I don't know what you are getting at. What social code should the US follow that would make it more separated? About the only thing I can think of is getting "In God We Trust" off of the currency. There's no government-sponsored church of any kind, no church is taxed, and there is broad freedom of assembly. Hell, even whack-job Scientology is permitted.

                    Honesty not something you want from government?

                    Honesty is disclosure, not forcing your politicians to join some bullshit church. Some of our most prominent politicians are Jewish. Many of them are Catho

            • I should have been more specific, by close association I mean more in terms of the way they operate, Modus Operandi.

              Hindsight is a wonderful thing, if life just had an edit button.
          • That is not entirely true. While alcohol is indeed referred to as "strong drink", there are numerous references to good ol' alcoholic wine: see here [tektonics.org].

      • Oh yeah, I know it's all extra silly. But the blurb made me think of it, and my SlashKarma could stand taking a hit for the sake of posting something interesting.

        My list like yours would look like this:

        (1) Does this cover reproduction? You're mixing your genetic material with someone else.
        (2) Technically, human experimentation would apply to your tailor. He fits pants to you, then modifies them, then fits them again...it's experimentation with a human involved.
        (3) Polluting the environment is re

        • (3) Polluting the environment is recursive. Say a Hail Mary to be forgiven, exhale CO2, have to say another one...

          But, the O2 we convert to CO2 and then we exhale is the same CO2 other organisms convert to O2 and then exhale. Is that pollution or just the proper working of a closed system?

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