Music in Chaos (tech/RIAA Related)

[frogg609]

There's an article at http://www.mxdwn.com/feature.php?sid=38 dealing with technology and the RIAA, as well as possible solutions to this piracy mess.

[Malicious Intent]

Welcome to ZP frogg609!
Good article, perhaps not much that hasn't already been said, but it's easy ready.
Here is the summary for those lazier ones amoungst us..
The music industry needs to re-think how it works, and how they are going to keep everyone in the music industry from feeling that they are being cheated, as well as keeping the listeners engaged and buying music.

Is it right downloading music illegally? No, it is not. There are many issues: piracy, the prices of albums, the quality of music out there, as well as things such as online music stores and the experience of buying music in a store. Unfortunately it is sometimes the only choice, especially when you have to choose between buying a CD or eating lunch for the week. The music industry needs to ask us (from the casual listeners to the music obsessives) what we think needs to happen to fix these problems; especially since it is the people who buy the music that keep companies like the RIAA in business. Until that point, people will continually download, and the RIAA will be trying to watchdog it. The RIAA needs to stop worrying about the money they are losing now, and worry more about how they could be losing more in the next few years if they don’t try to come up with a solution. I hope that this situation changes, since it’s really about the music, nothing else but the music.

[DudeAsInCool]

thanx for the contribution, froggman

[HolyMoly]

I agree, it was a great essay. However, in all the news articles and essays I've read on the subject of RIAA vs. P2P, I've yet to read one article that puts things in a more equal perspective.

Five years before Napster was even born, the music industry began a policy called MAP (minimum advertised pricing). It was illegal. The FTC took the industry to court for violations of the Lanham Act. And in their investigation, they determined this price-fixing ripoff cost the U.S. music consumer $400,000,000 at least. Unfortunately, the Lanham Act has no provision allowing the FTC to assess monetary penalties for this. The FTC's role is investigative-only. However, a multi-state class action antitrust lawsuit was filed, spearheaded by New York state attorney general, Eliot Spitzer. The settlement? The industry was required to donate approximately $77,000,000 worth of CDs to beneficial community projects and give approximately $67,000,000 in cash back to the plaintiff states for distribution to affected music consumers. Do the math. This so-called settlement allowed the music industry to keep $256,000,000 of the $400,000,000 they stole. But here's the real rub.

The multi-state lawsuit was just that ... a lawsuit (a civil court action). And while the FTC's role was investigative-only, the Justice Department was supposed to step in and file charges against the industry for violations of the Sherman Antitrust Act (price-fixing). But to date, the Justice Department has yet to file a criminal court action against the industry ... and no one seems to know why they didn't. Many people (like me) want to see such action taken. They want to see the industry ordered to pay back the $256,000,000. They want to see punitive damages assessed as well. But most importantly, they want to see the architects of this multi-million dollar ripoff cooling their heels behind bars in a Federal prison.

The music industry (through their RIAA mouthpiece) has managed to spin the P2P controversy into a battle between GOOD and EVIL. It's not that at all. It's a battle between an industry that has gotten away with a monstrous theft and those who have chosen to steal from the thief who first stole from them. And barring a future criminal court action against the industry, I for one find it hard to blame the file-sharer. The axiom "two wrongs don't make a right" looks all well and good on paper. But that axiom assumes the existence of an authority that will vigorously pursue redress for wrongdoing. And so far, there hasn't been a peep from that authority (the Justice Department). The result? Electronic vigilante justice.

[DudeAsInCool]

I agree with Holy Moly. But the industry's desperate business practices are further threatened by P2P and other technologies which threaten their hold on distribution. That is where the real battle is being waged, and the big communication players--Microsoft, Cisco, and the electronic companies are sitting on the sidelines watching the entertainment industry bleed, while refusing to adopt standards which could benefit the consumer.

[HolyMoly]

I agree with Holy Moly. But the industry's desperate business practices are further threatened by P2P and other technologies which threaten their hold on distribution. That is where the real battle is being waged, and the big communication players--Microsoft, Cisco, and the electronic companies are sitting on the sidelines watching the entertainment industry bleed, while refusing to adopt standards which could benefit the consumer.

That's it in a nutshell ... except for Microsoft. There's a very good reason why the new Napster and iTunes require Windows XP on all Windows systems. XP now, and more-so in the future, will incorporate digital rights management tools making it problematic (but not impossible) to keep or share music without paying up. Still, if history has proven anything, it has proven that "what can be done can be undone" by a savvy user.

BTW, I'm going to come clean about something. Everybody in this forum (except RIAA moles) shares and downloads files. I'm no different. But everybody has their own reasons for doing it. Some people do it simply because "free is a very good price." Others probably get a vicarious thrill out of "being bad." Me? I do it because I'm pissed (see my last post). I've been ripped off just like millions of others, Attorney General Ashcroft hasn't done squat about it, and I simply refuse to just bend over and take it up the ol' wazoo. If Ashcroft took action against the music industry and got even half the stuff done I'd like to see done to the industry, I'd quit sharing/downloading tomorrow. But, that's just me.

[origin]

HolyMoly: I must say I agree with you about 99.9% of the time(that is close enough ay :P). About the reasoning for FS I do it because I am a consumer who bought tons of cd's I would say somewhere between 400-500 cd's all @ about an average of 15 bucks each(thanks for target to come to the rescue!). Until I stumbeled into filesharing in about 1999. I was like they were ripping me off all of these years, I was mad. So I started to use p2p for everything but in the process I never really stopped buying cd's I still did but not in th larger amounts like I used to. So even though I could go get the cd's for free Anything I wanted, I would still go and buy it if I felt like the artist deserves it. It's a huge mess right now in the us the RIAA is rampaging around like some form of in formal cops on the net, it's ludacris. On top of all of this great stuff congress isnt doing much to help the little guy only help the greedy org/corp get bigger and do as they please. The RIAA must be out of there minds greed has consumed them whole and now they are going after the very people that still buy there cd's and are using p2p as a constructive tool.They are cutting the hand that feeds them, keep suing all of the fans then how are you going to make money then huh?

l8

[tikitanaka]

Regarding the settlement, I figure I've purchased around 400 CD's give or take. At an average price of $15. Since they've been found guilty of price fixing, I figure the real price of the CD's should have been around $10 each. 400x$5 =$2000 they owe me. Lets see, $2000 divided by $10 equals 200 CD's they owe me. I've probably only downloaded 10 percent of what I am owed. I have got to get hot and finish downloading my settlement payoff.

Really though, where the hell is my measly settlement money they owe me? Not one consumer will ever see the money that is owed to them.

People download because those rat bastages have been giving us the shaft for 20 years, and now, the shaft is in the other hand.

They whine and cry like every single song traded is "money lost". Well I hate to tell you this you greedy sobs's, but probably 75% of the songs downloaded are downloaded by people who were'nt going to buy the CD anyway, so no actual money is lost.

If anything, filetrading promotes unknown bands, and exposes the filesharer to new music they would have never known they liked. File sharing increases music sales, you bonehead corporate fat cats!

People download a song they never heard, like it, and then go seek out more from the artist.

You want to know how to fix your broken business model? Here's how:

1.)Make every song in your catalog available for free download at 128kbps.
and I mean every single one.
2.)lower the price of single Cd's to $4.99. Double Cd's to $7.99. All of them.

You know what would happen? Overnight the music filetrading would shift to YOUR corporate download site where you could learn more about your customers.

All those people downloading average quality 128 kbps songs would suddenly be exposed to a world of music they didn't have the chance to listen to before, and they would then be happy to go buy your Reasonably priced Cd's.

Sound incredible? Yes. Would it work? Yes. Sales would go through the roof.

If the corporate fat cats don't adopt a plan similar to mine, then I'll be happy to continue downloading my free songs.

They get to pick. Go out of business with an outdated business model, or adopt a new one and stay in business.

It's that easy. You fat cats got it figured out yet?

[HolyMoly]

You want to know how to fix your broken business model? Here's how:

1.)Make every song in your catalog available for free download at 128kbps.
and I mean every single one.
2.)lower the price of single Cd's to $4.99. Double Cd's to $7.99. All of them.


I suspect you're right. But, there's something else the industry could do and we're just starting to see this in the print-publishing world. Even my ancient CD burner (8x) can crank out a music CD in under 10 minutes. But nowadays, burners can crank them out much faster.

Imagine going into a CD store (in the future) and perusing the shelves. Every shelf only has one copy of each CD jewel-case. You write down a product number, go to the clerk and say, "I'd like this CD, please." He punches it into a computer and a "burn/print-on-demand" machine kicks in ... producing the finished product in under a minute. Nothing would ever go out-of-print ... and there'd be no niggly "inventories" for the music industry to warehouse. If a CD came out featuring an artist the public hated ... and it only sold a dozen copies ... the industry would still make a profit because only a dozen copies were produced ... the CDDA files and jewel-case printing info being "downloaded" from a centralized industry server to the POD machine in a store. Or if an old geezer walked in off the street and didn't see his favorite artist's CD on a shelf, he'd go to the store's Schwann's catalog, get its product number, and take it to the clerk. And a minute or so later, he'd have a CD of an artist who'd not sold a single CD in years because the artist was no longer popular. For example, try to find the "Live At The London Palladium" concert of Victor Borge in a new CD store. It hasn't been sold for over a decade. That would change ... for every artist of the past, creating unrealized profit the industry has been losing for years.
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