Everyone knows that piracy can affect an artist’s bottom line, and very few people would argue that artists, programmers, and the like, should work for free in all instances. Indeed, while there is a lot of hostility to lobbying groups like the RIAA, most folks do want to support the bands and songwriters that they like. That’s why the RIAA (and sister organization, the MPAA) often use the notion of the starving artist to justify their attacks on piracy-it plays at the heart strings and gives a sense of imminent doom. The groups routinely claim that their business is not just suffering, but even eroding on account of piracy. One result, we’re told, is that artists are suffering everywhere, and this could have dire effects on the entire industry.
Such claims seem rather silly though when the actual financial results are published. Most recently we have the example of BMI, one of the largest music companies in the world which represents artists directly (songwriters, performers, composers, etc.), has posted a record-breaking fiscal year.
BMI reported revenues of $673 million for the 2004 fiscal year, an increase of nearly $43 million, 6.8% over the prior year. The performing rights organization generated royalties of more than $573 million for its songwriters, composers and music publishers. Royalties increased by $40 million or 7.5% from the previous year. BMI President and CEO Frances W. Preston said both the revenues and royalty distributions were the largest in the company’s history.
Such results are confusing when we’re told every month that the industry as a whole is on the verge of destruction, mostly on account of piracy. We’re told that the industry, and artists are suffering (just ask Senator Hatch). Surely, one might think, that this year is an exception, but for BMI, they’ve seen a 9% average growth every year for the last 10 years. The songwriters and performers represented by BMI, it would seem, are doing rather well. No one wants to say that they’re doing too well or that they shouldn’t be doing well. No, that misses the point. The point is very simple, and rather subtle: when the industry as a whole is posting great numbers (and sometimes trying to conceal them), and in the case of BMI they’re posting record numbers, it’s simply disingenuous to pretend that the threat against the industry as a whole is nearly so serious as to justify the argument that artists are actually suffering immensely.
Of course, we don’t live in a binary world, no matter how much dichotomies such as “good vs. evil” are attractive to those with public voices and private aims. Piracy undoubtedly diminishes profits, but the extent to which this this represents a state of emergency is debatable. If BMI is breaking its own profit records, and if BMI represents songwriters, performers, and composers, how can it be said that those same people are on the verge of economic disaster?
We have the right and responsibility to ask: why is civil law being revised when the industry as a whole is seeing all time highs? Not only has BMI posted record results, signaling strong economic stability for the artists themselves, but the record companies are making more money, too. Why is there an open and vicious attack on Fair Use when record companies are making more than ever, as are artists’ representation groups?
Why do they want to spare themselves the cost of civil lawsuits against infringers by goading the Department of Justice to bring civil cases themselves? Why is it that relatively no one is discussing how the RIAA bends its statistics to wrangle for more and more support for their business model? Why is it that the RIAA and friends want legal rights and powers that are not even available to law enforcement? Fair Use, that’s why. It’s the content industry’s #1 enemy.
Related Posts
- Not yet time for record labels to be smug about the end of piracy
- (2006 Annual Piracy Report) Setting the IFPI Record Straight
- Music industry sets up website to back up their media campaign against ‘Music Online Piracy’
- Movie and Record Industry Piracy Figures Incendiary, But Not Fact.
- Record Sales For ‘cheap’ Albums
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