Time to Face the Music 398
Mortimer.CA writes "The Toronto Star has an article up about the ailing recording industry with some possible scenarios for solving the problem(s). Choice quotation: 'We must ask ourselves what Elvis would do to stop the theft of music via the Internet, now so widespread and so brazen that it makes the Baghdad looters look like trick-or-treaters.'"
Explode on contact? (Score:5, Funny)
Record companies should start flooding the Internet with bogus MP3 files that look like songs, but that explode on contact inside the hard drives of Internet thieves. Anyone who illegally downloads an MP3 file via KaZaA or any of the myriad peer-to-peer (i.e. thief-to-thief) services would at best get a corrupted file, and at worst a ruined hard drive.
The companies should band together and enlist a dark force of special-ops hackers to make this happen. Once Net users discover that all they're downloading is a World Wide Web of pain, only the most determined and technologically savvy of them will continue to steal music.
Explode on contact? Hey great, while we're at it why don't we get those 1337o hackers make loads of nasty pixies flood out of the downloader's coffee cup holder... er I mean CD ROM drive (you know, that nasty thing used for ripping CD's)
So this is the sort of utter crap that Slashdot is linking to these days? Word to the editors: This is still in Mysterious Future, I'd recommend you dump it posthaste ;) (Yes I'm a subscription whore. $5 or so is fair game for an extended post history. Morbid curiosity)
Re:Explode on contact? (Score:4, Informative)
And the rest will be busy filing lawsuits for destructive files causing real damage. There are indeed things that could possibly be done to cause hardware issues, mostly relating to that hardware's firmware, but the legal implications of such an action are the same as they are for authors of viruses. What you'll see is a flood of lawsuits brought by individuals who will swear they've never downloaded illegal files, but somehow or other, this file from the RIAA found it's way onto their system, causing significant damage and downtime.
Re:Explode on contact? (Score:5, Funny)
I am not sure. I played a mpeg last week that I downloaded from KaZaA. The file had some really kewl content beginning with:
"Jim, your mission is
It had some junk about some museum in a place like Baghdad. It had something about saving humanity...it showed me dossiers of international incriminals and other kewl stuff...like it was going to be a really fun spy movie.
Then suddenly, my entire laptop fizzled on me. It was really freaky, the MPEG had all of these instructions on how to save the antiquities of the world.
But, it sounded impossible to me, so I didn't do anything.
Re:Explode on contact? (Score:2, Funny)
Lame Canadian radio is based mostly on gov't regs (Score:4, Interesting)
Explode on contact?
Indeed!
And this article talks about how Canadian radio is lame. Why is it lame?
Canadian radio is lame because the Canadian government has protectionist policies which force Canadian radio and TV stations to air 40% Canadian content. This is, of course, because we don't want to lose Canadian music because of all those evil American musicians brainwashing our kids...
Unless I'm blind and missed it, the article didn't even mention Canadian content laws.
The problem is that there simply aren't enough musicians in Canada who are capable of going head to head with the products of a very similar culture, 10x the size, next door.
The net effect is that, to achieve their Canadian content requirements, Canadian broadcasters have to play the same songs over and over and over. And then there are the marginal acts which really aren't good enough for the prime time but are being played anyway... The Tragically Hip are a good example.
If any American wonders what radio sounds like when you start letting pseudo-socialists control your airwaves, hit Kazaa and grab the Tragically Hip's Bobcaygeon. I'm a classic rock fan. The classic rock station in Toronto, Q107, wants to play Led Zeppelin and Jimi Hendrix. And that's what I want to listen to. But they're forced to play Bobcaygeon because of draconian laws which try to make me like bad music.
Canadian artists can sink or swim on their own. Alanis Morrissette, Burton Cummings and the Guess Who, Celine Dion, Shania Twain have all made it big in the US. Why? Because of Canadian government protectionism? No... because they're talented.
Beyond that and without protectionism (not to mention record company pressure, but we'll leave that for another time), radio stations should be playing what the broadest cross-sections of their audiences like. Of course that will result in more listeners and therefore more ad revenues. It's in the stations' interests.
The Tragically Hip should be working at the Wendys on Division Street in Kingston. The fact that my government has cost broadcasters their audiences weakens the music industry on a whole, disgusted consumers, and wasted billions of tax dollars rescuing struggling "artists" from the hell of working day-jobs in fast food while honing their skills playing bars at night.
"Paying your dues" is apparently too inhumane for the Canadian government to allow. Paying my taxes makes me want to see my government overthrown.
Re:Lame Canadian radio is based mostly on gov't re (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Lame Canadian radio is based mostly on gov't re (Score:3, Funny)
Well, if the Baghdad looters... (Score:5, Funny)
exactly (Score:2, Insightful)
The recording industry has never made as much as the figures they are citing for "stolen" music.
Imagine Torvalds charging $100/license for the Linux kernel. Would he be filthy rich, or would we all migrate to *BSD?
Re:Well, if the Baghdad looters... (Score:4, Insightful)
And like an oppressive government, The RIAA doesn't want their distribution and king-maker monopoly to crumble. It would be one thing it it were artist's interests that they were truly protecting, but it's obviously not. This 1999 Salon article [salon.com] is about who owns the digital rights (such as the website, customer database and merchandising). Guess who wants to get their hands on it?
This quote from the article:
...
"Traditionally, record labels have brought in the lion's share of their revenues by selling records, often using Draconian contracts to minimize the artists' take of the profits. Record labels took ownership of the music, its marketing and sales, reserving only a tiny percentage of the take for the artists. So, the artists made their money by merchandising ancillary products, like concert tickets or T-shirts."
But most record labels salivate over the idea of a mailing list of 100,000 fans, for multiple reasons. A list of fans of the Backstreet Boys, for example, could easily be used to promote another upcoming pop boy band -- this is what is known as data mining, and is a hot topic within the record industry. As Marc Schiller, CEO of Electric Artists, puts it, "The label wants the data not necessarily for the artist -- they are looking for that data for their artists who are similar to that artist. Should you use one artist's leverage to create a database of consumers that is used for other artists? That is going to become more controversial."
One question: Isn't Canada also one country that charges a tax on CD-Rs allegedly to pay back record companies for MP3 trading? Which leads to independent artists are being taxed for doing their own records instead of playing the record contract game.
Re:Well, if the Baghdad looters... (Score:3, Insightful)
I just had a thought about this. The complaint about the CD charge in canada hurting the indie recording artist. Um, why don't they just give recording artists a refund at the end of the year that adds up to the cd-r tax that they'd paid throughout the year
Elvis (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Elvis was a thief! (Score:5, Insightful)
Well... (Score:5, Funny)
File Chapter 7 (liquidation) bankruptcy on Monday, and by Friday, all your troubles will be over; I promise you.
Re: Good news, the rip off is almost over! (Score:3, Insightful)
The artist have to pay "expenses" first. These include a breakage fee to cover the cost of broken shellack 78 RPM disks!
Music would be better if the big 5 recording companies all went tits up.
We would have a better selection of Music. More artists would actually get paid.
The technology now exists for decentralised music distribution.
Re:Well... (Score:3, Insightful)
Ive said it before.... (Score:5, Interesting)
Would that solve the problem? (Score:2, Insightful)
That doesn't solve the record companies' problem of controlling their intellectual property. It also doesn't prevent digital sharing beyond the subscriber base, which would have the same effect on digital sales as on CD sales.
A subscription system I think is practical would involve a special sound card with an RSA-type decryption and DSP on one chip. Your RSA public key would be your subscription ID; just present it to the server to get music that you and only you can listen to. The private key would b
Re:Would that solve the problem? (Score:2)
ps anyone explain what this no karma bonus button is for? - im sure its in CmdrTaco's journal so ill head over there now
Re:Would that solve the problem? (Score:2)
Download, cut, copy and paste an image file?
Enjoy it for your own personal use (...as opposed to selling it?)
Why not a music file?
Re:Would that solve the problem? (Score:4, Insightful)
That doesn't solve the record companies' problem of controlling their intellectual property.
Their problem isn't controlling their intellectual property, it's that they're trying too hard to control consumers, and consumers don't want to be controlled. We want to pick and choose how we listen, what we listen to, and so forth, and the record companies don't want us to chose. They want us to bend over and take it the only way they're willing to give it.
Re:Ive said it before.... (Score:5, Interesting)
Lucky for me we have a store called cd warehouse nearby that buys the crap I don't listen to anymore, and sells me used CD's for $5-$9. That's at least a reasonable price to pay. I then go home and immediately rip to the jukebox, using high quality VBR, not fixed 128 bit garbage.
Re:Ive said it before.... (Score:2)
Some will be unhappy with the quality - they will continue to buy cd's. People who want mp3's accept their quality / Size tradeoff and want the ease of use of playing them in great long lists on their pooters.
Re:Ive said it before.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Lucky for me we have a store called cd warehouse nearby that buys the crap I don't listen to anymore, and sells me used CD's for $5-$9.
See, that's what I don't get about the labels. $15 is an iffy purchase price for a CD, as far as I'm concerned, but won't likely stop me. If it's above that price, there's a good chance I won't touch it except on sale, at places that sell below normal (like Best Buy), or used.
If a CD is $10, then my waffling ends and I'll almost certainly buy it.
If CDs were $5 a pop, I'd go f#@$in' broke buying CDs.
Certainly I can't be the only one like this - there's got to be enough people like me that the volume of sales would go up high enough to justify the reduced margins. Food for thought, although the RIAA et al don't seem to be hungry.
Re:Ive said it before.... (Score:4, Insightful)
The real problem is most people want something for nothing. They want to be able to get the songs for free instead of having to pay for them. If they offer non-DRM caopies of the songs for download, these will just be made available for free, so most people still won;t pay.
Re:Ive said it before.... (Score:2)
Re:Ive said it before.... (Score:3, Insightful)
"Most", you say. Well that's already a step in the right direction, isn't it. The industry should do what Loosewire says. There are lots of things to entice people from moving from the current crop of P2P applications to the industries legal alternatives (which might or might not be P2P):
- legality!
- ease of use - already Kazaa, especially, is already extremely easy to use;
Re:Ive said it before.... (Score:2, Informative)
Okayyyyy (Score:3, Insightful)
Elvis would just do more concerts (Score:2, Insightful)
Read in the paper today (Score:2, Interesting)
Nothing in the article is new that 95% the rest of us already know about.
T.A.T.U. is the answer (Score:4, Funny)
Re:T.A.T.U. is the answer (Score:2)
But there must be some way to give the artist and even the record company a some kind of reward for the music itself, for a theme or album you really liked, unattached to any media or way to get it (even if you hear it in the radio and liked it). It could be a "donation" system, or some kind of voting with money attached, or things like that.
I totally hope they do (Score:5, Funny)
If those two eat pussy, I'll eat my cat.
Oh man, I really hope they're lesbians. I'd love to see you eat your cat. (well, and if they were lesbians, that'd just be fucking cool).
;)
neurostarRe:T.A.T.U. is the answer (Score:2)
And what will you do if they eat your cat?
I sense a great pay-per-view event coming soon. Or at least a kodak moment.
The "Recording" Industry is Fine (Score:5, Insightful)
Well if you leave the RIAA (Score:3, Insightful)
1500% (Score:2, Interesting)
Wasnt that around the time napster was shutdown and everyone was looking for an alternative??
It ain't Elvis I'm worried about... (Score:2)
The RIAA ain't Elvis...
Ailing? (Score:2, Interesting)
What the HELL are they talking about...they are looking just fine to me. They are making money, tons of it even. And they seem to have plenty of money to spend on lawyers to prosecute college students.
Re:Ailing? (Score:2)
And they seem to have plenty of money to spend on lawyers to prosecute college students.
Lawyers are to failing companies as cockroaches are to post-nuclear-apocalypse civilization; they are all that's left. Take SCO for example.
I think this is a gross exageration... (Score:2, Insightful)
I don't think anyone can consider the downloading of Britney Spears equivalent to having mankind's oldest known writings stolen or smashed. But the music industry loves to exagerate...
Musicians will still make music (Score:5, Interesting)
-by not signing new bands to restrictive and costly (to the bands) contracts, more players in the indie scene will appear, more artists will take control of their own destiny
-CD's and mp3's will become promotional material available on artists' websites (already happening now) for the real money making venture - touring! (which is definately the place to hear your favourite bands)
Clear Channel and Ticket Master will be the corporate pimps in this new business model
How about selling CDs for a dollar? (Score:5, Interesting)
The pirating is just a side show. The real problem is that distribution and production costs have fallen through the floor and the industry has not responded to the market dynamics. Instead they cling to copyright laws and monopolistic tactics to maintain artificially inflated costs of their goods.
If you really asked the musicians...most would love the idea of a dollar CD. A dime a song.
The CRIA's complaint is that someone is robbing the plunder house.
BTW What's this noise about antiquities? Try pumping an antiquity in your Surburban and see where it gets you.
CD prices seem to have gone down... (Score:2)
Re:How about selling CDs for a dollar? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:How about selling CDs for a dollar? (Score:2)
I think the computer industry should demand special treatment from the courts...computers used to sell for well over $2000 a piece. Now now can pick up better computers for $500.
Somebody is STEALING $1500 for each computer purchase!!!!!!
Even worse, computer programmers used to be able to pick up contracts for $100+ an hour. Now it is tough to get a $40 job doing the sam
The REAL solution? (Score:5, Insightful)
http://www.antimusic.com/news/03/april/item19.s
The way the indie promotion business works is record labels pay the indie promoters to work directly with radio stations to get songs on the air. It is estimated that this system can cost over a $1 million to land a song on Top 40 radio.
A million dollars a song? No, there's no way you can lose money doing THAT with homogenized bland "sounds like" radio, is there?
An open note to record companies: Downloading is not hurting you as much as you're hurting yourself (and your audience indirectly) with the payola and other fat inside the company.
Want to make money again? Stop paying for radio to sound homogenic. Stop paying everyone and their grandmother bribes to tell people that the music you paid too much to record (michael jackson's invincible is a good one) doesn't suck and it's worth getting 40 spins a day on the top 100 stations in the US. Make programming directors at radio stations do their job and discover new music again, and break the stuff that needs to be broken, and let the copycat mainstream music stay on MTV, where they're content to just use what they're paid to play.
Give Radio back to the people, and you'll see that people want your music again, and it won't always be just the stuff you force feed them. If the same 25 songs weren't put on a loop with commercials on most radio stations, you'd see more than the same 25 albums being sold, and you'd likely not need to pay a million bucks a song (and with the typical 5 single album, that's 5 mil in useless waste, multiplied by perhaps 100 albums a year, that's half a billion dollars in useless waste, isn't it?).
Amazing where you can find profits these days, isn't it?
Re:The REAL solution? (Score:3, Insightful)
So they start churn
looting (Score:3, Insightful)
The most of the looters are are expressing their new found freedom after 30 years of suppression and thievery from the regime. I'm pretty sure thats why Iraqi's are doing it too.
Re:looting (Score:2)
Hey, just like music consumers!
(Well, it's sorta funny
Reasonable Prices (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Reasonable Prices (Score:4, Insightful)
I've seen this DVD price comparison trotted out quite a bit. DVDs are definitely a good value for the money, and I definitely agree that CDs are overpriced, but the DVD comparison leaves out one part of the equation:
With a DVD, the cost-recovery for the initial project has normally already been done in the form of a theatrical release. This is where the studios normally recoup the costs of making the film. The DVD has some additional production costs, but those are generally built into the price of the DVD. You could hold up straight-to-video releases as an exception, but those are normally dogs anyway (or at least films that don't warrant the expense required for a full theatrical release), and wouldn't support a higher price. These "bargain-bin" releases are an attempt to recover at least some of the film's production costs.
With CDs, however, there is no theatrical release. CD sales are the only (well, primary anyway) means for the label to recover not only the costs of recording that album, but to support artist discovery and all the bands they paid for that didn't make it (essentially the same as R&D costs factored into the cost of software or computer hardware).
I agree that the RIAA is corrupt, screws the majority of their artists, and that CDs are overpriced. I also agree that lowering the price of a CD would do wonders for the music industry; the ease of digital transfer has lowered the effective value of music, but the industry has refused to acknowledge that, instead resorting to purchasing legislation that supports their outdated business model.
The best solution would be for musicians to realize that they truly have more power than they used to. The major labels are still needed for promotion and distribution, but they certainly aren't doing the work they used to do, specifically artist development*. As a result, they shouldn't be making the same profit/cut they used to. Unfortunately, we're dealing with a group that has immense political and economic power, that is extremely resistant to change, customer-hostile, and entrenched.
And that's never an easy thing to change.
*There are a few exceptions like Britney, but the only way to get real artist development these days is to either be signed directly by the CEO or have a multi-platinum first album. Many bands that are now considered classics (especially in the no-airplay album rock field) wouldn't survive today's environment.
Re:Reasonable Prices (Score:3, Insightful)
Free Joe (Score:4, Informative)
Who's that Copernicus guy, anyway? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Who's that Copernicus guy, anyway? (Score:3, Insightful)
That is, the RIAA just is *NOT* that important in the whole scheme of things. We had music before the RIAA, we'll have music after. And we can hope the music will get better without so much corporate "assistance".
On the
umm... (Score:2, Insightful)
Stupid Analogy (Score:4, Interesting)
Considering Elvis was the "bad-ass" of his time, he would probably be trading music with the rest of us. I don't know about you, but not all the Baghdad looters are bad, mostly the ones stealing from the hospitals and muesums that are bad, but even then you can't say trading music is worse than stealing needed medical equipment that would have been used to save lives. The only thing I'm depriving someone by stealing music is buying that brand new porsche to add to the collection, fucking Hillary Rosen.
One day history books are going to record how the american music industry burried itself by treating its clientel like criminals. Let me ask this though, why bother saving the music industry? The meat of the music industry isn't the companies distributing the recordings, its the artists performing the music. If the Internet enables people to get the music directly from the artist, and low cost recording equipment and instruments allow the artists to mix and record their own music, what the hell is wrong with that?
The RIAA is an obsolete business, thank god we didn't have the United States postal service going after the Internet because Email was causing them to lose postage stamp sales (they almost did). Someone came up with a better way, and you can't fight that. No matter what you do, the RIAA is going to be obsolete in probably 10 years.. The question is how much damage are they going to cause on the way down. Companies like the RIAA, MPAA, Microsoft, Sony, that think they can control the consumers make me want to change my profession from an engineer to a lawyer so I go after these damn corporations myself..
Ugh, infuriating..
What would he do? (Score:3, Informative)
The truth is that despite knowing full well what a computer is and how to use it, I've purchased more CDs in the last year than I ever have. They're almost all from independents, though. There's very little worth buying that comes from the major labels these days. Getting RIAA propaganda as part of the package makes what they're pushing even less attractive.
ITS NOT THEFT!!!!! (Score:5, Informative)
You can argue that its morally and legally wrong, but that doesn't make it theft, anymore than arson is theft because it is morally and legally wrong. The quote about Bagdad looters is rich, and incredibly stupid as it makes my point perfectly. These people are theives; all these thousands of year old artifacts might be gone forever. But if the looters were copying all the anchient scrolls as opposed to running off with them, they'd still be in the museum.
Any reasonably intelligent person should be able differentiate between infringment and theft, but even here on Slashdot there are numerous people who just can't seem to wrap their minds around it. Try imagining someone who insists that apples are oranges because they both come from trees and start out as flowers, thats what these guys are like.
To those people, before you respond, read these two things over and over until they sink in, and try not to let your minds be thrown into an infinite loop:
Why the discussion (Score:5, Interesting)
The music industry is starting to have problems because their method of distribution is outdated. The problem: digital music has become a huge online phenomenon, people want "formless" content that they can transfer to any media they see fit (hard drive, cd, memory stick) and the RIAA has so far been unable to provide consumers with that product.
The solution: consumers take matters into their own hands, downloading mp3's and then burning, ripping, copying, etc. The reason this has become such a huge deal is that the RIAA as a sort of oligopoly is having trouble coming to grips with the notion that the public will dictate the distribution methods and prices on its own terms. Like the "black market" writeup on K5 a month or two ago, we're seeing a system completely devoid of that which the public wants - on-line distribution at a signifigantly cheaper price than that of a CD (keep in mind blank media already benefits the RIAA).
Until the RIAA stops thrashing about in this all-out effort to dictate to the public exactly how, when, and for how much (no matter how inflated the price) they can get content, they're going to continue to have problems.
No morality, no ethics, just the facts. 'Nuff said.
Re:Why the discussion (Score:3, Informative)
I see one label is shutting down its classical music operation. Are classical music fans really downloading mp3s instead of buying CDs?
Some reasons why CD sales may have fallen.
1. Baby boomers have now replaced all their vinyl with CDs. This is a once off boost to sales and is now over.
2. Popular music is getting tired. There is no innovation and nothing to get excited about.
3. Lack of range. Go into a CD shop or listen to the radio.
Fewer titles (Score:3, Informative)
2. Popular music is getting tired. 3. Lack of range.
Darn right. According to studies by Forrester Research and George Zieman [theregister.co.uk], the 10 percent drop in RIAA labels' revenue from 1999 to 2001 is more likely to come from a slow economy and from publishing 30 percent fewer new titles than from peer-to-peer copyright infringement.
Industry changed by technology (Score:3, Funny)
This is nothing new from the Toronto Star (Score:2)
The breaking point for me was when they had an article pretending to be a list of all the great stuff you can do at the CNE that turn
Do what 50 Cent did. (Score:2, Interesting)
1. Get famous first (create buzz with mixtapes or giving it out free on net)
2. Put a performance DVD in the package(just some handicam stuff, fan's dont care its "free")
3. Put out the CD before the bootleg (he actually released it early for this reason
This is not news or even decent editorializing... (Score:2)
...so what are you going to do about it? Here's their contact page: http://www.thestar.ca/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?page name=thestar/Render&cid=972304684203 [thestar.ca]
Tell them what you think about this piece. Every bit of corrospondance keeps journalism a little bit more honest.
Re:This is not news or even decent editorializing. (Score:5, Interesting)
And try to be nice for once instead of just flaming. Face it, this guy is just a journalist reguritating stuff he heard, and even then, he said a lot of stuff that most of us can agree with:
Radio is boring and homogenized, and it is hurting CD sales.
Labels should be more artist friendly
Michael Green's 2002 Grammy speech was annoying and pointless. (Even Janis Ian ripped on it.)
Decent recording can be done with reasonable studio costs (He even mentioned the new White Stripes album only costing $10,000 :-) )
Indie labels treat artists better than majors
Labels are a) greedy and b) want control of listeners
This guy is already halfway in our camp. Don't flame him, just educate him a little. In response to his claim that "sales of CDs are in a freefall", point to the recent Christian Science Monitor article [csmonitor.com] we all read that said many indie labels have profits increasing 50-100% a year. Show him that the CDBaby sales figures [cdbaby.org] keep getting better while the RIAA whiles that sales are disappearing.
He talked about musicians
Give him the names of acts you know about that get no radio play [mofro.net] but who still [davidwilcox.com] can make money selling music and touring without a contract.In short, instead of yelling at him, give Peter Goddard a few more data points to use in his next article. This guy's views are not that different from most of the people here.
Elvis would agree with Janis Ian (Score:5, Funny)
"Sony's classical division in Canada" (Score:2, Interesting)
It's all clear to me now... (Score:5, Funny)
Ah, so that's how the Big 5 recording companies have maintained the status quo in the music distribution business.
Bart: I'd sell my soul for a 95% market share of the music business.
Satan (as Ned Flanders): [appears...POOF!] That can be arranged...
Bart: Nope, changed my mind.
[POOF...Satan disappears]
Marge: Bart! Stop pestering the devil!
Is Arthur Anderson the RIAA's accounting firm? (Score:3, Interesting)
And yet, the damage done to the music business by a file-trading network in Mishigan is worth $89 billion (US)? That's (*counting on fingers*) more money than the entire industry makes in two years!
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Bog all to do with pirates... (Score:4, Interesting)
The bad news is that sales of CDs are in a freefall, representing a $250 million loss over the last two years.
OK, so we agree sales are falling. Is it any wonder? Having heard the fifth cover version of "Spirit in the Sky" earlier and myriads of other "artists" releasing other people's work, I begin to wonder if the media have woken up to exactly who is the thief here.
Wake up call: There is a global recession, or something that very much looks like one. The music industry is being hit by a downturn in spending in general, just like everyone else. Not only that but they are exacerbating the problem by the broadside by turning out crap, stuff we've heard time and time again, manufactured groups and cover versions that shame the originals. Why are they making less money? Doesn't take a rocket scientist, does it?
Why wasn't there all this hue and cry when twin tape decks appeared on the market? Because they weren't as visible as the publicly accessible Internet. Album and song sharing is not a new, 'net age problem. It happened all the time pre-Internet. Anyone who says they haven't copied a tape or recorded from the chart show on the radio is either very young or a liar. The only reason this is gaining public airtime is simply because the 'net, being free speech epitomised, is an easy target for any group of totalitarians, the RIAA included.
Yes, BTW, I buy my music, when there's anything worth buying. I always have done. The problem is, the interval between my purchases has increased. This is not influenced by finances or that I can download from the 'net. Simply put, the amount of quality music available has declined. Not only that but the implication that I am a criminal simply because I am tech savvy and trying to blame me and worse, imposing a tax on me due to their own faliures and shortcomings doesn't exactly endear the music industry to me, making me think a little more carefully about what I purchase since my purchases may support this idiocy.
Re:Bog all to do with pirates... (Score:3, Insightful)
You must not have seen LP sleeves with a little [cassette-shaped] Skull and Crossbones, bearing the legend,
"Home taping is killing the Music Industry."
"Album and song sharing is not a new, 'net age problem. It happened all the time pre-Internet. Anyone who says they haven't copied a tape or recorded from the chart show on the radio is either very young or a liar. The only reason this is gaining public airtime is simply be
Re:Bog all to do with pirates... (Score:3, Interesting)
I always wondered about this myself; It's nearly like the industry believes that it is entitled to growth, and that if the industry doesn't grow -- or even shrinks, then it must be piracy. Never mind the fact that CD prices have risen by about 20% in my neck of the woods since I entered college. When I graduated from high school, the loca
SImple economic problem (Score:3, Insightful)
Without enacting a lot of laws, police actions, whining, and their other garbage, all the RIAA has to do is lower their prices. If they can price CDs marginally above their cost, the piracy would be crippled. There are other ways to make money- a lot of bands I'd like to see play maybe 12 dates across the country each year, and not always in my neighborhood. If they toured more frequently, yes, I would pay $20-$30 for a show and probably buy food and a t-shirt, too. They just need to change their business model. Make CDs cheap and affordable (the way 45s used to be) and make up the rest with promotions. This used to work, and there's no reason why it won't again.
Re:SImple economic problem (Score:2)
The solution is in front of their faces. (Score:3, Interesting)
If the major record labels and a few minor ones would just get together and offer a reasonably priced (I'm talking $5 - $10 per month) subscription-based Napster-like service, they would make more money.
I prefer downloading music. I don't have to drive to the store, I don't have to buy 12 lame songs to get the one that I like, and I can mix my own CDs for my driving pleasure.
This would be good for artists as well. They wouldn't have to work so hard to release an "album". They could just release one or two songs and everybody would be happy. Or, instead of waiting until they have cobbled together a list of 12 - 15 songs (most of which will be lame anyway), they could release 3 - 4 good songs and forget all the crap songs (of course they'd have to come up with a bunch of crap songs if they wanted to go on tour I guess).
Anyway, online subscription-based services are the answer, not paying extra money for stupid encryption schemes that will be broken within minutes of being released.
Recording industry hurting? (Score:2, Insightful)
It is all about economics (Score:2)
Now, competition exists. The record companies aren't stupid. They realize that if they lowered their prices, revenues would probably rise. They will introduce online services, but they want to charge a buck or two a song, when in reality, the price that will bring in profits is more in the neighborhood of 10-20 cents a song.
If they low
What a piece of FUD (Score:2)
The worse news is that the slump has hit Canada first and hardest, because of our higher-than-average use of the Internet, compared to other countries, and the tendency of Internet downloading to cripple traditional record sales. FUD! Has there ever been any proof that people downloading music makes for less sales? If so, can anyone give me some links?
As music downloading continues to soar -- KaZaA's online file-sharing service leapt by a staggering 1,500 per cent between the summers of '01 and '02 -- l
meh (Score:2, Funny)
for once the 'crusin' crowd thought i had something sweet, but no. then napster came out and everyone's dog is downloading music.
damn. I want to be a badass again...
We love the Iraqi Information Minister! (Score:3, Funny)
"The music-pirating infadels shall fall to their knees at the hands of our lawyers! Our profits shall be restored once more!"
So, then the ($RIAA == "Saddam") (Score:3, Interesting)
-buf
WWED (Score:2)
Sick and tired of being called a pirate (Score:2)
budget for audio. I don't want to waste what I do have on bad product that I cant return,
unlike most any other industry except software..
Its simple as that.. its this easy to figure out: No free sample, no purchase..
If they don't stop trying to persecute and prosecute me, they will loose another customer.
Music Collections (Score:5, Insightful)
Some 17-year-olds I know have vast music collections but have yet to purchase their first CD.
(okay, you can stop pretending now)
Fair enough, but I know of a 42-year-old who has bought hundreds of pieces of music over his lifetime, but only has about 20 in his possession right now.
Lets see... there were 120+ albums that became nostalgia pieces when CD's hit the mainstream. Various CD's that got scratched or broken. Cassettes that met a sad demise in a hot car in the Texas sun. 8-Tracks... hell, we won't even talk about them.
Point being, the music industry keeps insisting that I'm not buying the actual music, just a limited license to listen to said music. Fine, but in that case I'm going to insist that I own that license forever, regardless of whether or not I still own the physical medium the music was recorded on. As long as I didn't give it away or resell it, it's still mine.
Until the music industry offers to replace all this stuff for free when it breaks or wears out, I'm going to keep hitting the P2P networks to get copies of the stuff I've already paid for.
His worst case scenario is bad why? (Score:3, Interesting)
As many people have pointed out, it's the big labels who are in pain: smaller labels aren't dying. When I lived in France, my favourite record shop was a boutique of a label called Harmonia Mundi [harmoniamundi.com]. It wasn't cheap, but every CD I got there was impeccable. It didn't stock any of the major big labels.
Here's [lafolia.com] an article by Bernard Coutaz, founder of Harmonia Mundi, where he essentially calls for the death of the big companies who in his eyes are killing classical music:
Real correlation between piracy and losses? (Score:2, Interesting)
The problem with paying for online music (Score:3, Interesting)
So they want kids, to buy the mainstream pop stuff right? However, all the subscription services require, you guessed it, a credit card. How about this for an idea. You sell the equivalent of prepaid phone cards at b&m locations (7-11, grocery stores etc) and that buys you X amount of songs.
If you price that at about 50 cents a song or so, you probably can get kids to buy the cards. This is especially true, if I could get high quality, fast access, etc.
I must add to the conditions, no copy protection.
People will pay! You could even encourage people to buy cds online (or offline) using these cards. You could include the cards in CDs for promotional value.
One last thing, before P2P, I used to buy around 6 cds a year (this was at my cd buying height) so far this year I have purchased 4. I am pretty sure I will be adding one more on July 8th with Big Bad Voodoo Daddy's latest effort.
I pretty much have maintained the same purchase rate CDs.
Online downloading is more about convenience than anything else.
--Joey
The RIAA had its good times... (Score:4, Interesting)
OK, so I'm an old fuddy-duddy who remembers the days of vinyl. When I was a kid I got an old tube-type pre-amp that had an unusual dial on it. It selected the record de-emphasis to use for each particular label, and it had 19 positions. That's right, each record cutting company had its own ideas as to what the "best" pre-emphasis curve to use to reduce SNR without overcutting the record. (Yes, this was in the days of 78-rpm records, although even the early 33-1/3-rpm records were cut using proprietary filters.)
One of the reasons the Recording Industry Association of America, a.k.a the hated RIAA, was formed was to reign in the madness and develop some sensible standards for recordings. The work of the RIAA was to reduce the cost of both recording and playing back recordings in a number of formats: vinyl, magnetic tape, and at one point magnetic wire. By reducing the Babel, makers of cartridge pre-ampliers would need to put in less circuitry, makers of record-cutting lathes could provide the "standard" circuits for each speed/format, and the listening public didn't have to mess with that 19-position knob anymore when changing records.
The RIAA did such a good job that it put itself out of its original business, setting standards. Much of the standards work is now done by the developers of media: Phillips for cassettes, and I don't recall who brought us the digital compact disc. The DVD is pretty much out of RIAA's hands, too.
Interesting that the RIAA and many computer engineers have something in common -- a lack of need for what they do...
Music industry: shut up and soldier (Score:3, Insightful)
The dot-coms are gone. Airlines are going into bankruptcy. Major telecoms are in bankruptcy. The energy-trading industry blacked out California by market manipulation, took major utilities into bankruptcy, and then went bankrupt itself. The music industry isn't up there on the national priority list.
The music industry is panicking because their sales are down 9%. NINE PERCENT. Car sales are down more than that. Hell, all retail is down more than that.
The music industry needs to shut up and soldier. They have a retail sales problem - let them solve it. Work on the product mix, find some new products that sell, come up with an online distribution system that's usable, cut costs and retail prices. None of that has happened. That's an indication of top-management incompetence.
Out-of-hand production costs (Score:3, Interesting)
I doubt that Berry Gordy (Motown founder/producer) spent that much on studio time and production for all the Diana Ross, Gladys Knight, Smokey Robinson, and Marvin Gaye albums he produced added together.
Has all the expensive "modern" digital studio retracking and remixing made the music we get any better? I don't think so. Maybe record companies should start cutting costs on the production end at the same time they try to figure what to do with the distribution side of the business.
- Robin
He Forgot the One Best Solution (Score:3, Interesting)
To repeat what has been said over and over by musicians who are speaking out: musicians do not make money from recording contracts. Standard recording contracts are written so that all production, distribution and advertising costs come out of the musician's share, draining it down to zero. Musicians make money from the gigs that they get through the exposure they get by having their songs widely distributed. Give musicians an alternate distribution method which works just as well will rob them of nothing.
The RIAA thinks it is really important... (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, those mp3's you downloaded are more valuable than the priceless treasures and ancient artifacts from the dawn of human civilization. Someone needs to cut the RIAA down in half.
Living Colour put it best... (Score:4, Funny)
-fester
Re:Living Colour put it best... (Score:4, Insightful)
He should come back and haunt some of these RIAA assholes into understanding that copy protection and DRM are useless. If you can hear the music, you can copy it. It just takes one and it's out there. But it's no big deal if there is a reasonably priced, legal option. Most people aren't total assholes. Elvis' corpse would get that in it's current decayed state. It's just that simple.
Re:Living Colour put it best... (Score:3, Funny)