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MP3 Quickies On The Edge Of Forever
bbt wrote in to tell us about
Gnute,
Rolls wrote in to tell us about the Tabloids' Web site promoting Napster mischief, and
Jeckle shared the Washington Post article about the Canadian band, Kittie, using the web to propagate their music. I love Kittie.
Oscarfish wrote in about a fantastic "Wall Street Journal article at ZDNet reporting that Napster executives are in meetings with record label executives.
This here is a good one. KingOfBongo told us about the Economist article that suggests "...the music industry could easily build a closed commercial news distribution service superior to rogue freeware Napster."
Time to check some facts.
Napster is not publicly traded and does not have stockholders to answer to. If they did, this saga would have ended a long, long time before they had multiple, concurrent lawsuits piling up.
In Microsoft terms, RIAA is not playing "embrace and extend." Apparently you do not understand the meaning of that phrase, which refers to Microsoft's repeated obfuscation of open standards into proprietary ones which work with only Microsoft products. How you got that out of the RIAA situation is beyond me. All the pot in Mexico couldn't help me find a link between the two.
Wireless TCP/IP is an oxymoron, considering that wireless would seem to pertain to an entirely different layer of the OSI model (e.g.: one) than the TCP/IP suite. I'm still struggling to make the connection between TCP/IP radios, "pirate" radio (which, by the way, was basically legalized at the beginning of this year by that same pesky, greedy FCC that you speak so highly of), and government censorship. Again, it ain't happening.
Again with your "anti-trust" rant we see that you have little to no factual knowledge of the subject matter about which you are writing. The Big 5 record labels that are RIAA have existed for half a century without government prodding - and that harkens back to the 50s and 60s when there were literally no indie labels to speak of and they owned every avenue to distribute and publicize music available. If anything, the climate has gotten more competitive over the years, not less. All history aside, I fail to see how cooperating with Napster, RIAA, Napster and RIAA, Napster, RIAA, CuteMX, iMesh, and Scour combined would net them any sort of anti-trust violation. Perhaps you could elaborate more.
I guess what really annoys me about this post is how it got moderated up to 4 (and probably 5) for basically taking a bunch of buzzwords - "embrace and extend", "wireless TCP/IP" - injecting a healthy dose of anti-government sentiment, capitalizing some random and stigmatized words like KILL or FORCED, mixing them up, and praying for the best in terms of currying mod points.
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I think there is a world market for maybe five personal web logs.
Michael Robertson (510) 428-9866
michael@thetabloids.com
Don't forget to tell his wife Tracy hello when you call.
Who was the research genius who thought up this brilliant earth shaking concept? Of COURSE the music industry could embrace digital distribution of their content, and because they're fuelled by so much capital, they could probably put together a really slick and well marketed system. People would flock to it.
But they haven't. They've been content with their high priced markups on CDs, and until now haven't really been pushed to do anything about that. Sure, distro channels like Napster encourage illegal distribution of copyrighted material, but legalities aside... I'm just glad it's giving the music industry a sufficient kick in the bloated backside to compel them to do something substantial in the way of innovation.
It will be interesting to see how this pans out. I'll be keeping track of the news while listening to my MP3 collection with XMMS. :^P
-DrPsycho - Coping with reality since 1975
Um, is it just me, or is their site terribly misguided? I mean, sure, they're against Napster/MP3 trading, and I think they're wrong (speaking as a musician myself, even), but I can respect that (not that that means I'm not going to mock them and call them idiots).
First off -- uh, is it just me, or are these people trying to parrot the Major Label line so they can get signed? I mean, really -- how many of us have downloaded anything by The Tabloids. Wait, don't answer that -- how many of us have HEARD of the Tabloids. Something tells me that Tabloid-piracy isn't high up on the list of napster-users. Hell, I got bored, so I fired up Napster and did a search for "tabloids". I found two tracks. One a Dennis Miller rant, the other a Bob Rivers novelty song. Whee, they've got a lot to worry about.
Two, check out the faqs... one of them, I'll take the liberty of posting here so you don't have to go and find it:
>>>>
CD prices are too high and I don't want to pay for songs that are crappy.
Simple economic theory will tell you that CD prices are not too high because people continue to buy them at that price. The only reason that CD prices are as high as they are is that that is what the market will bear. Maybe CD prices are, in fact, too high for you personally. Sure, that sucks. But the price of a Porsche is too high for lots of people, too and even though they'd like to have one, they can't just go and take one off the showroom floor. Perhaps the argument would be effective if there were no other ways for people to listen to music, but there are. There is the radio, there are stores that sell used CDs, there are web sites that auction used CDs and legitimtate sites that allow you to download individual songs for about a buck.
>>>>
OK, read the bit about used CDs again. Um, really -- when you get down to it, isn't it MUCH worse to buy a used CD than to download an album from Napster? In both instances the labels^wartists don't get jack, but with the used CD, not only do you just get the music, you get it in CD Quality AND you get the packaging/album art. Also, with Napster, there's a CHANCE that the downloader will go and actually BUY the album (apparently this happens less often than you'd think, according to the site, though, weird -- everyone _I_ know does buy the records, if anything, to free up HD space -- but I know that you CAN'T go by anecdote when proving things, so just leave that as an aside, eh?) -- but why would anyone later buy the CD NEW if they already have it USED? Doesn't especially seem well thought out, does it?
Thirdly, isn't that cute, they seem to think that artists actually get money from making and selling records! Isn't that adorable?! I'm not going to reiterate the whole argument here, because most of you have already heard it, but if you haven't, check out "The Trouble With Music" by Steve "Record Producin' Guy Who Had a Wesley Willis Song Written About Him" Albini (BTW, the "I hate Christians" shirt the intro mentions that Negativland sells are actually "Christianity Is Stupid" shirts after the Negativland song from "Escape From Noise" -- it's not part of the original article), or that one Courtney Love thing that was adapted pretty much wholesale from Albini's rant -- Love's version can be found at Salon.com -- just poke around a bit if you haven't read it already.
Anyway, sure, think Napster's Satan or whatever, but for christ's sake, is it too much to ask for people to THINK THEIR ARGUMENTS THROUGH FIRST?! AT LEAST A LITTLE BIT?
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"Music is music, but anarchy is stupid." -- Eli Armen-Van Horn
The press on this subject makes me sick. Napster settling with the RIAA is *BAD*, for us, and the artists.
Does anyone REALLY think the Record Companies/RIAA are trying to KILL Napster? Even if they could do so, another would follow in its place, so the answer is no. Music is going digital, and the carpetbagging middlemen in the music distribution business cannon stop it. In Microsoft terms, the RIAA is playing "Embrace and Extend".
However, if the RIAA can abuse the court systems to force mp3.com and Napster to the table, then they are in a position to negotiate. MP3.com and Napster are corporations with stockholders to answer to... if they are offered partnerships with the RIAA, they'll accept. The trick is for the RIAA to do this without providing evidence that they are colluding and violating Anti-Trust laws.
Napster can offer musicians a way out of indentured slavery. It can change the music industry forever, and free artists from writing MTV-specific music which promotes brands and consumerism. We can get "albums" that were not churned out like some Metallica Load/Re-load episode, to satisfy "contractual obligations".
Furthermore, when wireless TCP/IP goes into EVERY radio, we can if we choose give a big middle finger to the US Gov't and the FCC, and tune into offshore "pirate radio" in such numbers that they will be FORCED into more narrowly defining their roles into guarding the people's bandwidth, rather than auctioning it off for-profit and acting as censors.
MP3.com's already making deals with the RIAA. If we lose Napster, we are handed a setback. The best possible outcome for us is if we support the free music distributers, and if Napster, etc. make deals DIRECTLY with the ARTISTS themselves.