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TechDirt's Masnick Responds To Warner's Jim Griffin On Choruss 81

Posted by timothy from the bluster-is-best-powering-old-ships dept.
newtley writes "TechDirt's Mike Masnick writes that the Warner Music Choruss licensing scheme amounts to a Bait-And-Switch operation. Not so, says Jim Griffin, the man charged to put it together. Masnick's story is 'factually incorrect in every respect,' he states. But Griffin 'refused to name a single factual mistake,' Masnick says, noting, 'He fails to address the key problems that we outlined: 1. Why is this program even needed when plenty of musicians are coming up with business models that work today and don't need a new mandatory license (er... 'covenant not to sue') plan? 2. Why do we need a new bureaucracy and won't that divert funds? 3. Will the industry continue to try to shut down file sharing sites? 4. Will the industry continue to push a 3 strikes plan?'"
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TechDirt's Masnick Responds To Warner's Jim Griffin On Choruss More

TechDirt's Masnick Responds To Warner's Jim Griffin On Choruss

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  • Wow! There are so many "says" and "states" that I almost lost track of what's going on.

    Anyhoo, someone said this, maybe it was Masnick, maybe Griffin, maybe someone else:

    it's just a covenant for the labels not to sue, rather than a license, it doesn't cover all of the other rightsholders, such as songwriters and the music publishers -- meaning that those who file share will still be wide open to lawsuits from those parties.

    I don't think the labels care if other rightsholders get a fair share, they only car

    • Re:Who Says What? (Score:5, Funny)

      by broken_chaos ( 1188549 ) on Thursday March 19, 2009 @05:23PM (#27262529)

      Wow! There are so many "says" and "states" that I almost lost track of what's going on.

      No kidding. I actually had to read/skim the articles (!!) to understand the summary.

      • The mark of a good summary... you RTFA. :)

        • Or the mark of a bad one because you have no clue what it's even talking about until you RTFA.

          I was wondering what the hell a "Warner Music Choruss licensing scheme" is at first. I thought the word "chorus" was misspelt at first, but even that wouldn't make any sense without more context.

        • >>>The mark of a good summary... you RTFA. :)

          Well I read the fraking article, and I have to ask - Are you surprised? They job of a Corporation, which is essentially a soulless entity, is to maximize its monetary income in any fashion it can, with no regards towards morality. Therefore this license proposal is going to result in us, the people, paying MORE money than previously.

          Wow. Color me surprised. /end sarcasm

          I propose that we revoke the laws the enable these corporations to exist, and retur

    • Re:Who Says What? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by nine-times ( 778537 ) <nine.times@gmail.com> on Thursday March 19, 2009 @05:44PM (#27262755) Homepage

      So I guess the question is, will this kind of covenant work? If it will, why not extend to other rightholders?

      I think the right question might just be "huh?" As in, what are these people even talking about?

      Why should universities or ISPs be asked to pay some kind of license fee or buy into any kind of "covenant"? It's... hell, I don't know, like Coca Cola asking a toll road to pay them part of the toll on the chance that someone might be smuggling cola from Mexico on that road. No, I don't think what I said made sense, but it makes as much sense as this plan.

      I understand the record industry is in favor of plans that require other people pay them money. I'd like to propose that ISPs charge everyone a fee on top of the monthly service and then pay that money to me. That'd be great as far as I'm concerned, but why should anyone else go for it?

      • Re:Who Says What? (Score:4, Insightful)

        by CopaceticOpus ( 965603 ) on Thursday March 19, 2009 @08:33PM (#27263997)

        Exactly. Music sharing has NOTHING to do with universities except that it often happens there. At most, the schools might take steps to educate students and discourage this behavior. They don't owe the record companies a thing.

        This is especially heinous because college is already so expensive. We need to be looking for ways to make it more affordable to those who are looking to learn. This would increase tuition and distract schools from their mission of education.

        • This is especially heinous because college is already so expensive. We need to be looking for ways to make it more affordable to those who are looking to learn. This would increase tuition and distract schools from their mission of education.

          Nice idea, lowering the cost of education. Doubt it'll happen, though, because it'll help narrow the gap between the Haves and the Have-Nots. If it wasn't the case, we wouldn't see 2500 students fighting over 10-15 'opennings' for students in various programs, there'

          • It would be nice if renting a dorm room was more akin to renting an apartment. If you want internet you pay for it yourself, as a separate bill. And if you don't, then you don't.

            In such a system I'd probably be one of those students who used his $7/month phoneline connection, or the $15/month DSL, rather than have to pay an extra $100 for the ultra-high-speed 100-BASE-T lines. I suspect a lot of students would also choose to stop downloading music rather than pay for it.

            • Considering that colleges already have their network and phone system installed, what makes you think they'd save any money by not providing the service to students in their dorms? You're talking like colleges string individual expensive lines to each room, which isn't really the case.

              Besides, they have a vested interest in fostering community, enabling communication, etc. Some of those resources may even be necessary for classes.

              • In the same fashion that Verizon has strung FiOS lines in my neighborhood, and yet many people do not subscribe to it. Just as homes or apartments have a choice if they want to buy FiOS, or not, so too should dorm room residents have a choice.

                >>>colleges have a vested interest in fostering communes

                There. Fixed that for you. ;-) When I went to school, it was optional. You could rent an ethernet card and connect to the Penn State network. Or not (I used dialup). IMHO it should still remain that

                • In the same fashion that Verizon has strung FiOS lines in my neighborhood, and yet many people do not subscribe to it.

                  That argument only holds up insofar as the purpose of college is the same as Verizon's business plan. I don't think that most people would agree that it's an apt comparison.

                  But then I believe in individual liberty and choice, which I know is a foreign concept on today's campuses.

                  You have the individual liberty and choice to not go to college. You have individual liberty and choice when you live off campus. Your liberty and choice don't necessarily extend to you deciding how colleges should allocate their resources. Pooling bandwidth is smart, and probably ultimately cheaper per-student.

                  Yeah, colleges often

      • >>>Why should universities or ISPs be asked to pay some kind of license fee or buy into any kind of "covenant"? It's... hell, I don't know, like Coca Cola asking a toll road
        >>>

        Actually it's more akin to the deals Coke makes with government schools - Coke licenses the right to install machines* and the school gets a portion of the sales. The WB/university licensing sounds like a similar arrangement, albeit more complicated.

        *
        * I don't know why minors need access to Coke machines; we should

        • Coke licenses the right to install machines* and the school gets a portion of the sales. The WB/university licensing sounds like a similar arrangement, albeit more complicated.

          Except that the schools are paying in this case. It's like if schools were being asked to pay Coca Cola because some of the students were setting up their own Coke machines... or something. No metaphor you use is going to make sense, because the plan doesn't really make sense.

    • It wont work. I can't speak for anyone else, but I don't trust the music publishers as far as I can throw their Bentleys.

      I won't ever buy music again except from iTunes. And then, only because I know the music publishers hate Apple.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Chabo ( 880571 )

        Buy used CDs, or buy music directly from the artist (either "buy a CD at the show" for local bands, or go the Trent Reznor route). That way, you don't get high sound quality, and the labels don't get a dime.

        Then rip the CDs to FLAC (and get FLACs from Trent Reznor if you buy his music), and use FlacSquisher [sourceforge.net] (shameless plug) to convert the FLACs to Oggs for any portable devices you might own.

    • "I don't think the labels care if other rightsholders get a fair share, they only care about their own pockets and as long as they get paid, they don't sue." But do they hold MULTIPLE rights? If so, you could pay the protection squeeze and STILL be open for a lawsuit because you didn't pay the squeeze for ALL the rights.

      You ducked the left hook, but the uppercut got you...

  • A Choruss (Score:2, Funny)

    by MrEricSir ( 398214 )

    You could almost say there's a Choruss of complaints about this idea.

  • No bailout for the music industry? (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward

    C'mon...while we're printing money for all these other crooks why don't we offer the music industry some. $100B seems to be the going rate. Free music anyone?

  • These people are like cockroaches; when you turn on the light, they scurry, and then claim you're being unfair. If any college president agrees with this, if any ISP agrees with this, it's proof that they're not smart enough to do their job.

    Here's how to "fix" the download problem:

    1) Make the downloads available without DRM
    2) Charge a low price ($5/album)
    3) Make the downloaded version more valuable than the CD... location transparency, ability to download to any device any time, something, more, better.
    4)

    • Re: (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Two questions:

      1. In your scenario, is there any way to prove that people will still purchase music in high amounts once high capacity filesharing is combined with user friendly programs and no threat of legal action? I am talking transparent torrents, a website like Wikipedia of band information with download links next to all text.

      You certainly seem to affirm that very strongly, but I would like to see some clear evidence as well, because if it turns out they don't, it's a bit late to go back to the old mo

      • This is no different than the model that exists today, with the exception that music is readily available without "joining" or paying the apple tax or the RIAA member tax. The price is low enough that it becomes an impulse buy rather than "oh man, I've got to take 1/2 a day's pay" to buy an album.

        I can't "guarantee" that this will work, but I can guarantee what the record execs are coming up with is DOA. I can guarantee that my method would have a shot at working. You want "evidence" that my idea would w

  • Don't pay tribute to a dying industry. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by MarkvW ( 1037596 ) on Thursday March 19, 2009 @07:47PM (#27263783)

    The "music industry" ought to be irrelevant by now, but it's not. The technology needed to make a record is CHEAP. The technology to market and distribute the music is easily available via open source software and the internet. The only thing that the music industry can provide an artist is a good producer--but at the price of an awful contract.

    The music industry is an unnecessary parasitical middleman. It serves no useful purpose as it milks money both from consumers and artists. Its existence is artificially prolonged by the recent copyright amendments that extend rights so damn long and by the catalog of popular musicians that still depend upon it.

    Don't help extend the life of the music industry by paying it tribute.

    You can hurt the music industry the most by creating and supporting a technical infrastructure that allows musicians to directly market their product to the consumer (without itunes or amazons). Prices will drop and all sorts of new music will flourish. That is cultural support of the artist.

    The parasitical music pirates have it all wrong. They just want to steal without giving back. The key idea is to create a technological garden where musicians and their audience can both profit by the creation of cool new stuff.

    • provide an artist is a good producer

      You'd have thought they could do this - until you listen to Metallica's latest offering...!

  • The RIAA lies. That's all you need to know.

  • Another blind alley from the RIAA (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Like a middle-aged person faced with the task of getting in shape, the right approach to combating rampant piracy is obvious, which is not to say that it's easy: they need to get consumers to want to do the right thing (that is behavior that is a win-win-win situation for artists, consumers, and business). They need to provide a compelling value proposition; only then can they harness peer pressure, which is absolutely necessary since people aged 26 and under are very susceptible to "social proof" (note: t

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by cdrguru ( 88047 )

      Sorry, but I don't buy it.

      People today, virtually everyone I know, is convinced that "if it is on the Internet, it should be free". This goes for e-books, software, games, music and movies. The more clever people are good at digging out places to get stuff for free. The less clever take links and CDs from the more clever.

      How are you going to convince people that they shouldn't have free stuff anymore? I don't think it can be done. Certainly not while the schools are pirating software in the classrooms.

      • But it doesn't produce any revenue - between credit card processing costs and what they are paying to the copyright owners, they end up with maybe $0.10 a sale, if that

        Do you realize $0.1 a download equals $250 million dollars a year (as of last year, the figure seems to almost double every year)?

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by rossz ( 67331 )

      It doesn't even have to be free, just reasonably priced. The record companies are sitting on piles of old blues and jazz music that you can not find unless you frequent dusty old record stores (as in vinyl records) and garage sales. Put those up for a low price. Even at twenty five cents a track they'll make money. Even if the stuff has fallen into the public domain, people would still pay for the convenience of being able to find the music easily and already in a digital format. So what if you won't h

    • The record companies should experiment with sponsoring free, legal download sites in good faith. These sites would feature:

      1) works of expired copyright
      2) works from amateurs, fledgling professionals, and "past market prime" professionals
      3) promotional works from professional artists, including items such as concert tapes
      4) promotional works from the record industry, which would compensate the artists for giving away certain material
      5) works from professionals who believe in sharing everything
      6) works from

  • These stories are completely Slashdotted. p2pnet.net appears to have completely removed them even though their front page still links to them (same links as the Slashdot post).

    Can someone please provide the full text of both articles? Thank you :)

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