EFF's New File-Sharing Scheme 244
carpoolio writes "Wednesday at the Future of Music's Music Law Summit, the Electronic Frontier Foundation proposed a new licensing plan so file-sharing sites can operate, and musicians can get paid. The idea is based on the ASCAP/BMI radio music licensing schemes. But still, the RIAA seems happy to continue suing, and wait for iTunes and Napster to catch on more."
No sir, I don't like it. (Score:5, Interesting)
1) In regards to getting artists on board, their solution for people who don't want to participate says to me: don't join, and don't get money while people take your music, and fellow artists get paid for your work. That's harsh. What if the artist has an issue with the collection agency?
2) The payment system: how is this any different than Napster's subscription? It's somehow less expensive (only 5 bucks, estimated), and has access to more songs (everything instead of 500,000 tracks)? How does that work? I understand that most of the costs of distribution will be absorbed by the fact that P2P puts the loads on peers, not a central server, but is this even realistic? I am skeptical.
3) Wait a minute...If you stop paying, do you lose the rights to the music you downloaded? I scanned the document twice, and please correct me if I missed something, but it seems you can only legally use your music if you're still paying out to the industry. That's my primary reason for disliking Napster 2.0, and it's enough to sink this idea, in my mind.
I love the EFF more than butterscotch and jellybeans, but this proposal gives me the creeps.
Re:No sir, I don't like it. (Score:3)
From what I read of the article there was no talk of DRM so you could keep the music. Just depends on the format the music is in that you downloaded.
Re:No sir, I don't like it. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:No sir, I don't like it. (Score:4, Interesting)
Of note, under the title "What about file sharers who won't pay?" they say:
Copyright holders (and perhaps the collecting society itself) would continue to be entitled to enforce their rights against "free-loaders."
What does that sound like to you?
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Two- word summary of your post for the lazy (Score:5, Funny)
Well, the RIAA has already responded... (Score:5, Informative)
Article here [siliconvalley.com]
Re:No sir, I don't like it. (Score:5, Insightful)
Well if you canceled your service then they wouldn't know wether you had the music still or not. If they came after you and said you still had it then there would be an invasion of privacy if they knew for a fact. If they just came after figureing you would have kept it then that would not only deter anyone from using the service but also would have legal ramifications for going after someone like that.
Re:No sir, I don't like it. (Score:3, Insightful)
The EFF is treading on thin ice. What have they produced to qualify them as participants in the discussion?
Re:No sir, I don't like it. (Score:5, Insightful)
I hope these guys don't do their own taxes!
Re:No sir, I don't like it. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:No sir, I don't like it. (Score:5, Interesting)
If an artist opts out of the collection agency, they'll continue to receive what they currently receive from online music trading: absolutely nothing. If a user stops paying his fees, he will still own all the music he downloaded while still paying because they'll just be MP3/M4P/FLAC or whatever format he used to download them. Whether it's moral to pay $5 one month, then go on a downloading spree to last several months is up to the user to decide. (Though I doubt it, seeing as the main cause for piracy is the sheer convenience) The whole system is voluntary,
In short: P2P networks stay as they are but optionally hook into a non-profit collection agency. Think of it as a filesharing tax to help artists.
I personally think the plan sounds awesome but leaving payment to the goodwill of music fans makes me think it hasn't a snowball's chance in hell as long as the RIAA maintains its vice grip over the artists' throats.
Moral? Are you kidding? (Score:3, Insightful)
Then, they tell us that those CD's aren't actually our property, to dispose of as we wish, but really licenses to listen to the CD. Fine - So where's my free replacement when I scratch my disc? Or if its stolen, like so many were from my college dorm?
And, if
Re:Moral? Are you kidding? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:No sir, I don't like it. (Score:3, Interesting)
Key word: "optionally". Why would people pay money for a subscription if they can just hop on to another P2P network and get everything for free?
Re:No sir, I don't like it. (Score:3, Insightful)
Why switch networks at all?
You don't get it: Everything would be exactly and precisely as it is now, where you can use any software to download any song any time any where as much or as little as you like. If YOU so desire, you can pay $5 per month. You don't pay the P2P network provider, they don't make sure you've paid. You pay the collection agency and in ret
Re:No sir, I don't like it. (Score:3, Insightful)
1) In regards to getting artists on board, their solution for people who don't want to participate says to me: don't join, and don't get money while people take your music, and fellow artists get paid for your work. That's harsh. What if the artist has an issue with the collection agency?
But the music/record/distribution world that we knew before, is gone. People are downloading their stuff for free anyway right now. For better or worse, the consumer has them over a barrel now for the first time, and the
Re:No sir, I don't like it. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:No sir, I don't like it. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:No sir, I don't like it. (Score:5, Interesting)
I agree with your doubts on the workability of this.
Additionally, I was wondering:
I think that the EFF is getting carried away by "rigtheousness" here.
Re:No sir, I don't like it. (Score:5, Informative)
You're buying into an RIAA fiction here. According to US copyright law [cornell.edu] there are six rights avaiable for licencing, but they really only amount to three different rights:
(1) A licence to make reproductions
(2) and derivatives
(3) A licence to distribute
(4) A licence to public display
(5) or public performance
(6) including Digital Audio
A licence to create reproductions, a licence to distribute, a licence to public display, period. A licence does not exist unless someone is licencing you one or more of those rights. There is no such thing as a licence to use.
Once you have a copy, you own that copy. You have every right to play it as much as you like whenever you like. You have every right to create a back-up of it, or to play it backwards, or to use it in a school project, and on and on and on.
So if you stop paying then you can keep playing whatever you already own, but you can no longer create/distribute new copies of them by sharing them on P2P.
P.S.
According to another clause of another clause [cornell.edu] of US copyright law, when you buy a box of software you also have every right to install and run that software without any licence whatsoever. EULA's are not in fact licences unless they are granting you reproduction, distribution, and/or public display rights as listed above. EULA's are in fact an attempt to impose a contract. You have the right to decline a contract at will, but if you decline it you obviously do not gain any benefits offered by that contract. Of cource most EULA's offer you nothing you'd want anyway - you already have the right to install/run the software.
Any attempt to enforce EULA's rests entirely on arguing that the buyer somehow willingly chose to agree to that contract. While courts generally bend over backwards to allow people to willingly create contracts, claims that merely buying a box indicates agreement to a contract are legally very questionable. The very purpose of the UCITA bill floating around is to turn all EULA's into valid enforcable contracts.
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Am I the only one (Score:2, Insightful)
No, you are not alone... (Score:2, Insightful)
It won't work with any P2P application that is not providing detailed downloads/uploads statistics to the music industry (or any other third party that is supposed to determine how much of the cake is each artist entitled to get): they can't possibly monitor every exchange on every P2P network.
Re:No, you are not alone... (Score:2)
Exactly right.
And that's also why this system *ignores* works by less-popular artists, that's how statistical sampling works.
Musician getting paid?? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Musician getting paid?? (Score:2)
Re:Musician getting paid?? (Score:5, Insightful)
This scheme doesn't work for me because I have absolutely no interest in sending money to Celine Dion and Britney Spears. I want my money to go to smaller artists.
Re:Musician getting paid?? (Score:3, Insightful)
I really can't think of a better way than popularity to distribute the money.
For the record, however, I do think that the scheme is a stupid idea.
Orders of magnitude. (Score:5, Interesting)
It's not enought to say "we have an alternative scheme." It's probably not even enough to say "we have an alternative scheme by which you can make equivalent money." Instead, you need to credibly be able to say "we have an alternative scheme by which you can make superior money." If you can't do that, you got nuttin.
Re:Orders of magnitude. (Score:3, Insightful)
seems like $5/month per person is a hell of a lot more than someone buying one or two $10 albums a year.
3 billion profit vs 11 billion turnover (Score:3, Insightful)
The 3 billion is overstated through, as it does not include lost sales via other sales channels like cd's etc., nor does it include the investments that the record companies need to make to produce the music.
The other reason I think it will not work is because it is very disruptive for the established industry. It directly states that it aims to cut out the middle men like record companies and retailers. These people will not like to be pushed out of the way/job, and wil
Re:Orders of magnitude. (Score:3, Interesting)
You need to say: we're taking the music anyway, you can't stop us, this way you'll get some money. The rulings on blank video and audio tapes were a recognition that enforcement was impossible. Despite high profile busts etc there are millions of us sharing millions of tracks.
Many people I know buy an album rip it and share it with total strangers without even thinking about it. You can't fight that, it's how we use our music now, the labels that adjust and reposition will survive and prosper, those tha
Re:Orders of magnitude. (Score:2, Insightful)
The reality is, they will make less money either way, and will need to reprioritize their spending either way. A collective plan, or charging a penny or less a track, are the only ways I see them adjusting to what the populace wants (and now knows is possible).
Re:Orders of magnitude. (Score:5, Insightful)
I doubt it's about the money, it's about control for the RIAA and its members.
So the only way to get them to use this scheme is to say "we have an alternative scheme by which you can make superior money and have more control over the music distribution than for CDs."
And that isn't going to happen with free (as in beer and as in freedom) file formats that the EFF is proposing.
Re:Orders of magnitude: Incorrect (Score:5, Informative)
Seen in this light, if the artists were to make a quarter of the money that the RIAA/MPAA makes off of the artists, they would probably see a massive increase in their finances.
Remember, 100% of 8 dollars is better than 5% of 12.
Someone's going to be mad.. (Score:5, Funny)
Fair is good (Score:5, Insightful)
Artists need to be compensated for their work
(except the ones that show you how hard they live on cribs , the show that rubs the consumers face in how much they fleeced you for)
Re:Fair is good (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Fair is good (Score:2)
True. But how much of those $5 do you think will reach the artists?
Those TV-show casted Xgroups get paid monthly like any ordinary employee. The composer, who did the songs for them, got paid per job. If they got a good contract, they may also get revenues like 10 cents per sold CD.
In the end, from those $5 only the meta-collector and the big labels will benefit -- no matter, if I dowload their crap or not.
I get the creeps when I hear another "star" or
Re:Fair is good (Score:2, Flamebait)
People like you are the reason why class warfare works for the Democratic party.
Hrmm (Score:5, Interesting)
As things stand at the moment, artists without a record contract don't seem to do as well, but in what ways will this change? who will promote them? the artist themselves? or the filesharing system?
Re:Hrmm (Score:5, Interesting)
Ugress [ugress.com] tried to contact the big record companies without success for a long time. Finally, they said "fuck this" and released the music via Audiogalaxy. Soon a burned CD ended up on the office desk of the Norwegian State Broadcasting company youth music director who gave it the heavies rotation on the Petre A-list. Sony contacted them, and they said piss off, you didn't want us before now we're a hit and can do our own promotion.
I'm sure there are hundres mor of these examples. These two are just for Norway, the last year or so.
Re:Hrmm (Score:2)
Personally I think it would be a good thing if the major (RIAA) comapnies died and took all the boybands with them in the grave. But many of the artists that are big today would not survive without all the advertising and hype. Not that that should stop evolution though.
So maybe, just maybe, P2P and smaller independant labels c
Re:Hrmm (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Hrmm (Score:3, Insightful)
The various profitable Linux distributors would seem to disprove your simplistic assertion.
Re:Hrmm (Score:2)
Re:Hrmm (Score:2, Insightful)
The Record companies' current model is to have a few big selling artists, rather than more decently selling ones, placing artificial limits on who can make it big.
Also, in the last several years, and med
Bad premise (Score:5, Insightful)
It is a good step in the right direction to show the record labels new and interesting ways to make money, but in the end any solution must rely on the power of the law to enforce the payment of artists.
Re:Bad premise (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Bad premise (Score:3, Insightful)
1. They're not paying because of a moral objection to the RIAA's business practices.
2. They're not paying because they don't trust DRM.
3. They're not paying because they don't have to pay.
Think back to your college days; chances are you weren't independently wealthy. Considering that, which scenario do YOU think is the mos
Re:Bad premise (Score:2, Interesting)
"How do we get filesharers to pay up? That's where the market comes in -- those who today are under legal threat will have ample incentive to opt for a simple $5 per month fee. There should be as many mechanisms for payment as the market will support. Some fans could buy it directly through a website (after all, this was what the RIAA had in mind with its "amnesty"
Re:Bad premise (Score:2)
Your Internet comes from somebody who cares (Score:5, Interesting)
* The percentage of downloads that head right to static IPs in dormrooms -- the artists would get paid by them, via their universities (after all, $45 per year per student payment to not have to deal with the RIAA harassing the sysadmin of a univ is a good deal). Besides -- they'd just charge the students via fees anyway.
* That ISPs will market this in with their products. Using lots of bandwidth? The ISP monitors you to determine if you've signed up for their (+$5 for music) plan. If you aren't and you've got lots of
Between universities and ISPs, methinks that there would be payment from the users responsible for the majority of downloaded files. The majority of users? I don't know -- perhaps that as well.
Who gets paid? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Who gets paid? (Score:2)
Two words: Anonymous statistics.
It's odd or precient... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:It's odd or precient... (Score:2)
He is still on the ballot though...
iTunes works (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:iTunes works (Score:3, Interesting)
In comparison to iTunes and Napster, I'd prefer the EFF's option. It basically provides a selection from whatever is floating around the internet including less popular and ultra-obscure artists and labels. I also think that a second tier bandwidth price option is not unreasonable (provided that the price itself isn't ludicrus).
Useless (Score:5, Insightful)
If it hadn't been done before... (Score:5, Insightful)
1. RIAA is busy [over]reacting to file-sharing
2. RIAA will never be able to stop file-sharing
3. There's gotta be a compromise. Maybe this is it.
Re: If it hadn't been done before... (Score:2, Insightful)
I think we are already past the point where a compromise with the RIAA is still possible. Most people will simply not accept any plan where the RIAA or its successor or anything similar to it is allowed to exist in any form.
An acceptable compromise would be one where the artist is the one in control of the distribution of their work, and also the one who actually gets paid. Which is exactly the opposite of the current situation.
Re:If it hadn't been done before... (Score:2)
There are 30 million+ (?) Internet connections in the USA.
So how are they planning to enforce this?
Re:If it hadn't been done before... (Score:2)
2. RIAA will never be able to stop file-sharing
3. There's gotta be a compromise. Maybe this is it.
Why would the RIAA wish to compromise? The most profitable demographics (meaning teenagers buying Puddle of Mudd or Britney, and yuppies re-buying the White Album) isn't buying fewer CD's because of the lawsuits, in fact the "bad publicity" is largely among people the RIAA sees as unprofitable troublemakers already.
I won't be surprised if the RIAA cold-shoulders it (Score:5, Insightful)
Napster (Score:5, Funny)
I'm still weirded out every time I see Napster as a company that the RIAA likes. Am I the only one?
Re:Napster (Score:2)
I think the thing I miss the most about the Napster days were the silly little NAPSTER BAD! animations. The ones with Metallica.
A Day Late, $0.99 Short (Score:5, Insightful)
You know as well as I that for every existing P2P client system that goes legit, two more "rogue" systems will pop up because "Music Must Be Free!"
Through intense marketing, clever user interfaces, relatively lax DRM, and brutal scare tactics and legislative knuckle-dusting, the RIAA has begun to put the genie back in the bottle. You think they're ging to throw in with their ol' friends the EFF now? Sh'yeah...
Re:A Day Late, $0.99 Short (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:A Day Late, $0.99 Short (Score:2)
If your record label is an evil megacorp intent on draining every ounce of creativity from your body for profit then you're going to get screwed no matter what format the music is on.
Apple has a bunch of indie labels able to submit to iTunes. What's stopping a band from fronting up the cash for the recording studio and then passin
Who decides how much music is worth? (Score:5, Interesting)
Why should a quick tinkle on a xylophone be better rewarded than months of work on an orchestral masterpiece?
A better way of capturing music's artistic value is to auction it directly to the interested audience, e.g. using The Digital Art Auction [digitalartauction.com] .
Labor Theory Of Value (Score:3, Insightful)
You ask "Why should a quick tinkle on a xylophone be better rewarded than months of work on an orchestral masterpiece? "
Why ? Because that's the way the world is. If you spend 8 hours a day building a highly creative straw statue in your backyard while I spend same 8 hours mindlessly slogging in a corporate IT outfit,
Re:Labor Theory Of Value (Score:4, Insightful)
In a fair market, the orchestrator would look forward to $100,000 rather than a measly $100, that the xylophonist who just happens to be able to do a 20second cover version of stairway to heaven can get.
Re:Labor Theory Of Value (Score:2, Interesting)
Marx said, if man could co-operate instead of compete, then we would have all kinds of products, a great variety, instead of just mindless imitations of the same product each trying to undercut & outsell the other.
Malthus read this, rolled his eyeballs & said - yeah and if man was ostrich, then we wouldn't have the notion of private property
Re:Labor Theory Of Value (Score:2)
Fairness is a loaded term. You speak about "fair compensation". FYI, there is no such thing. Who is to say that the 60K a programmer makes is "fair" wages ? Maybe the programmer is a single 22 year old kid with no liabilities - he probably needs only 40K. Maybe the programmer is a 55 year old man with arthritis & a large family with 5 kids & plenty to pay for mortgage & health insurance - he obviously needs lot more than 60K.
T
Re:Who decides how much music is worth? (Score:2)
IMO an artist is someone who makes something because he want to express himself or makes something which the artist himself like.
On a sidenote: It would be funny if politicians made people pay to hear their views on things.
An artis with a huge following would earn a lot of money from doing concerts and selling different kind of mercendise. Also, a burnt CD in the bookself looks really lame.
Why not just let there be a donate button on an ar
Re:Who decides how much music is worth? (Score:2, Interesting)
I'ld really like to be able to donate money directly to artists. I downloaded the new Offspring cd (yes, illegally. I'm a bad girl) and it's really good and I would like to give them money for it, but apparently if I buy CD they get less than $1 and the rest of the money goes to the mean RIAA.
I'm pretty sure as long as the RIAA is around though, we're not going to be able to direc
explain to me this (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:explain to me this (Score:2)
have you noticed that most games nowdays include both single/online element?
whereas the single element can be played without having a legit CDKEY, but if you want to play online, then you will actually have the buy the game.
So single player mode is more like a demo anyways.
Re:explain to me this (Score:2)
Even though I've found it somewhat limiting to only play online with people I know, from my own recent experiences with the ut2004 demo, playing with people you don't know and can't voice chat with is just as much fun as playing with bots.
Re:explain to me this (Score:4, Insightful)
Once again, Sony has the system that's the easiest to pirate. Doesn't seem to hurt them though.
Another contributing factor is that games have a much better entertainment value to cost ratio.
Why not avoid the labels altogether? (Score:5, Interesting)
The record labels only exist to market and distribute pop music and those functions can be completely done by other means now. I have found some of the
To take this even one more step off-topic, you can argue that the whole MTV half-time boobie stunt (which has now mutated into a weird free-speech thing)was simply to steal the thunder of the iTMS/Pepsi/arrested-by-the-RIAA commecial. It shows that the labels are not needed and can
All music related marketing and distribution can be done on-line. The old business model is dead and not needed or wanted. The first major band to sign directly with iTMS/Napster/whatever will turn the tide.
Clearly, I need to calm down and have a cup of coffee. Sorry for the early morning rant.
Re:Why not avoid the labels altogether? (Score:3, Informative)
"The record labels only exist to market and distribute pop music and those functions can be completely done by other means now."
That is oversimplifying it a bit. They also provide the (not insignificant) funds to have the recordings made. Additionally, running a successful sales marketing campaign is not easy. As much as we all like to revile salespeople and marketers, there is an art and a science to the practice, which is why degrees are issued in those fields.
"I have found some of the /best/ mu
This has a lot of potential (Score:3, Interesting)
Internet radio under seige (Score:5, Insightful)
Performance rights can easily be handled through Digital Age Fan Clubs, who better, right? Time for ASCAP/BMI/RIAA/MPAA to disappear. Musicians are doing just fine, thank you.
The Internet is the independent musicians' radio. Why take it away by imposing old business models on it?
Tom
OK.... (Score:5, Interesting)
The business model of the future is the penny arcade/homestarrunner model. Acquire a large loyal fanbase. Actually BE good people who make quality art and gain the trust of your fans. Allow your art to be distributed freely all around the globe without a care in the world. Make money from merchandise, voluntary donations from fans, and "legitimate" advertising (google and PA style advertising NOT weather.com or superbowl style advertising).
The real problem here is this. The RIAA can think of a ton of business models that work considering new technologies. While the organization as a whole is "evil" the people that make it up are not all stupid drones. They know. The thing is that there is no longer a business model which will turn musicians into multi-zillionaires.
Musiciains can live with a new business model and make enough money for food and rent and all that. What they can no longer do is make millions of dollars at the same time some record company also makes millions. It just wont happen anymore. Until the record company accepts that, they are going to keep suing us.
Re:OK.... (Score:3, Insightful)
And what about those who tapes and films?
You do realize that this is pretty stupid?
I guess you don't buy food, because someone else than the producer is making money of it. You must be making your own then.
I guess you produce your own clothes, or did you prefer to live naked?
I also guess you have a computer, but your must have built yourself, every single part from scr
Conan The Barbarian can't make rules for Superman (Score:4, Insightful)
The problem of distrubution (Score:5, Interesting)
For this to produce 'fair' results, all paying customers would have to be part of the sample group.
Instead, perhaps the distribution of money should be left up to the license purchaser. If I want my $5 this month to go to 'Ice Ice Baby', then so be it!
P2P software & media players could, by default, record downloading & listening habits to form a basic percentage allocation, which I could modify each month, if I felt like it.
whats in it for me??? (Score:3, Funny)
I'll use iTunes. . . (Score:5, Insightful)
Then again, I'm the kind of musical reject who actually buys Klezmatics CDs and has never actually heard "Hey Ya" all the way through (not through any effort of my own, it's just that I don't listen to the radio that much). I guess I'm really not their target market. But God Forbid I download MP3s of music they haven't published since the 1970s, because somehow copying something they aren't selling is stealing their profits!
Re:I'll use iTunes. . . (Score:5, Insightful)
artists still get paid royalties no matter how long it's been released
I'm sure you're trolling, but this is still worth saying: Artists still get paid royalties, but x% of $0 is still $0. It's truly silly to argue that the record labels and artists are losing sales on something that they're not offering for sale.
Music fan: Mr. Record Label, I'm a huge fan of this artist and his music that was published by you in the 1960s. Will you sell me a CD of album XYZ?
Label: We don't offer XYZ for sale, sorry. It costs too much to make all of those back catalog albums available on CD.
Fan: Okay, how about on cassette tape?
Label: We don't have it on cassette, either.
Fan: Vinyl?
Label: Nope.
Fan: 8-track? I think I can scare up a player.
Label: /chortles
Fan: Well, are you ever going to offer it in any format?
Label: Only if there's a market for at least 10,000 copies.
Fan: But there's probably only a few dozen people who might want it right now, and the longer it's unavailable the fewer people will even know about it, much less want it.
Label: /shrugs. That's okay. If so few people want it, it's obviously crap, so you must be stupid to want it. Here, how about we sell you Britney Spears' latest album instead. Millions of people want it, so it's obviously good.
Fan: /stares in disbelief and shakes head
Fan: Well, I see that someone else has digitized it and made it available in MP3 format on Kazaa. I guess I'll get it there.
Label: Thief!
Label (to Congress): See! There's yet another sale we've lost to these P2P filesharing pirates!
In what way does it "promote the progress of science and useful arts" to permit people to lock material away so that no one can get access to it?
This is not intended to be a justification of copyright infringement in general, but the record labels can't seriously claim that they're damaged by sharing of music that they *don't* distribute.
The problem with all this... (Score:2, Insightful)
This will not work as a voluntary system (Score:4, Insightful)
there are two major problems, both related to the fact that the system is
voluntary.
First, how do you make the majors join the collective society? Those with the
most popular catalogue have the least incentives. I cannot image a major
label releasing a major act under such a license unless it's fairly clear
that the collective society has real money to distribute. But if the most
popular acts are not included, users could face the problem of having paid
their fees and still being sued.
The second question is: How do you get users to pay? The EFF suggests that all
the 60 million people now using p2p networks will pay. This is, to put it
mildly, very optimistic. Because, really, what's the incentive to pay? Users
can still download, regardless whether they pay or not, and if a user doesn't
share his music files, then the RIAA will never know what he have on his hard
drive. In other words, a few 10 thousand people willing to share their large
collections would make it possible for a few millions to simply download and
then disconnect, gaining all the advantages from the network without paying,
and, importantly, without risk of being sued.
A number of studies have shown that p2p networks are, indeed, not all that
p2p, because a small number of nodes serves the vast majority of content. But
if only that small number of people are actually paying, it will make majors
even more reluctant to release their content.
But, on a somewhat more positive note, the failure of such a voluntary
proposal would make the case of a compulsory license more stringent (which
also the EFF sees as a possibility).
$5 a month? Sounds familiar... (Score:3, Interesting)
It's a battle to the death (Score:2, Interesting)
Missing the point - again (Score:2)
We complain about how the media conglomerates restrict choice, produce fewer artists every year, cheat the artists they do sign, and then overcharge us to boot. We complain about the mainstream garbage and the same six songs on ther radio over and over again.
We complain about how file sharing gets restricted and the draconian and inconsistently applied copyright enforcement tactics.
So you're telling me that there's all these musicians out there that can'
RIAA End-run to Empire (Score:5, Insightful)
Lost Cause (Score:3, Insightful)
They would rather restrict and sue custmers ( and bilk artists as well ). this is their business model, not 'customer service' or ' product value'
Creating 'yet another' payment system for P2P does not intrest them at all. And why should it? They have a virtual monopoly built on screwing people out of their money..
The Burden is Surely Upon the Music Industry... (Score:4, Insightful)
People got used to saying "vote with your wallet" as some sort of wise-crack. Guess it came as a shock when millions did just that.
*shrug* I think the idea of trying to persuade the music industry to patch its leaks and to offer 101 different ways in which it might patch its leaks is odd... it is however crazy while said industry acts in such a petulant fashion.
Let the music industry worry about it's own leaks. The music industries lost billions is not something that should cause the EFF sleepness nights, and there are frankly better things it could concern itself with than where Popstar X is going to get their next gold plated toilet seat from.