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MP3.com To Restart My.MP3.com
retep writes: "MP3.com is planning to restart the My.MP3.com service that launched the lawsuit against it. However, it will probably launch without any music from Universal Music Corp. Instead it will probably offer music from record companies that have reached licensing deals with MP3.com Full story online at 32bitonline. " This had actually been submitted earlier, but this story had some additional information. The Universal is a key part because those are the ones who won the lawsuit against MP3.com, while they've managed to settle with almost everyone else.
And hopefully, those companies that have cut a deal will see an increase in sales. Universal, hopefully, will see a decline in popularity of its artists, leaving the artists no choice but to cut seperate deals with MP3.com moving us closer to switching the middleman from super greedy record label to super greedy dot.com company.
This is not the way to build a lasting empire.
I think Alanis was headlining the mp3.com tour.
Rader
Yes, but I'd mention that mp3.com settled with all the other major labels. They will now resume streaming all those titles through the my.mp3.com service but _not_ any music put out by Universal. Reasonable, but also a payback in spades to UMG.
It will be interesting to see if this has any effect on Universal's CD sales. One would doubt it, but it might have an impact.
Universal might rethink and actually settle with mp3.com. Hmmm, five years of appeals to receive $118 million versus $20 million for licensing per year, say 6% interest, looks like close to a wash to me in terms of net present value. Universal's potential marketing losses over the five years might make a deal attractive. They're sure not going to be very successful with their pay-to-download model.
Since the big music labels are nothing if not highly competitive with one another, it would not greatly surprise me to see Universal _buy_ mp3.com to regain parity in Internet presence. In that case, one would hope that the board of mp3.com would have the sense to make Universal pay at least $118 million (plus all their legal fees) _more_ than mp3.com is reasonably worth.
I have some issues with my.mp3.com, napster and the like. Maybe they're legal, and maybe they're not. But the simple fact is, if they ARE legal, they're walking a very fine line and you WILL invite lawsuits, and being so close to the edge, it doesnt' take much more than a simple personal opinion to rule one way or the other. And the consequences are so dire if you lose.
The biggest problem with these lawsuits are that they're setting precedent. They're establishing that what was once perhaps on the edge of legality, has now crossed over and will start bring other less questionable activities into the spotlight.
Imagine if napster loses. We will now have a precedent that trading copyrighted music is illegal, or maybe just music by certain companies. Who knows, but now someone will get an itch and go after people running gnutella servers. Since gnutella doesn't run a centralized server, anyone who searches for a song will go through MANY servers to find it, each server passing the information along. It could potentially be stated that EACH of those servers, even those not serving anything, are equivalant in scope to napster. Someday
someone will set up shop on a university network with a packetsniffer, bust hundreds of people, and make an example out of them.
We don't want this to drift into generic file trading as well. Because you can trade files other than mp3's on gnutella and if gnutella is declared illegal, where will they go next?
-Restil
Play with my webcams and lights here
I agree.
Clearly the sociopolitical and economic ramifications of this dramatic intersection between so-called new economy companies and the established purveyors of copyrighted material warrant sober consideration. Any attempt at facetious commentary demonstrates a profound disregard for the implications this issue has on the marketplace wherein intellectual property is exchanged - to say nothing of the impact of the internet mindset on the established concept of rule of law.
Furthermore (not to put too fine a point on it) the practice on this interactive discussion forum of submitting whimsical messages for internet display and perusal reflects a general immaturity on the part of these so-called "trolls" and their disrespect for the time and energy of their peers who attempt to have meaningful and productive e-dialogs within these cyberwalls.
--Shoeboy
Some artists are making their works available for free. MC (Stephen) Hawking has put up three of his works for no cost. Check it out.
I just don't understand why they're pursuing the model. Check out Sonic Net's personalized radio service -- I believe it's essentially the same model as standard radio, where royalties are payed for songs played, but a) it isn't trying to do an end-around on the current music business model and b) it allows you to listen to an amazingly wide variety of music without owning the CDs.
I'm not eager to go back to listening to music I already own while waiting for the buffer to be filled between tracks.
They cannot raise venture capital, cannot raise bonds, and have bonds due in a few months. Without a miracle (eg being bought out by Borders) they are toast. IIRC by Christmas.
Then Barnes and Noble will be able to raise prices and actually start making a healthy profit online. Which will let them get back to wiping out Borders...
Cheers,
Ben
My usual seat in the cluetrain is at A HREF="http://pub4.ezboard.com/biwethey.ht
I'm a big fan of mainstream alternative/rock/punk. I'm wondering where I can find information on what label a given band is signed with? I used My.Mp3.Com a lot, and I really miss the service. I wonder how many bands (from Universal) I won't be able to stream? Anyone know how to help me find out?
As far as I can see, from this article, the recording industry gets paid TWICE for each track you own, if you use the MP3.com service.
The software scans your CDs to ensure you have already got access to the CD (so, you could cut your own if you so needed.. Copying isn't hte issue here).
So, you've already paid the recording industry once, for the CD you've already bought.
However. If you want to access this online, without having to take all your CDs with you, or spend hours ripping and uploading to webspace (hideously wasteful on bandwidth and storage space.. All that replication that rarely even hits a webcache on the net), a SECOND fee is required, as MP3.com are now required to pay a licencing fee on those tracks that you've already paid for!
This reeks of that 'lets slap a tax on blank CDs because they may, on some occasions be used to copy music'.
This bullying by the recording industry really has to stop. They get more than enough per CD sold, without having to charge (effectively) multiple times for the same music.
If they're going to charge a licence fee, then I feel that it's only the same as paying for the music in the first place, so MP3.com should stop checking for ownership of the CD in the first place, as they are effectively paying the licence fee to distribute this music anyway.
This, then, is not piracy, but a new distribution method.
Cutting out the CD manufacturer middleman would save me a packet on my music purchases...
Malk
But amazon has a vaguely realistic business plan.
Bol.com are probably the only online bookstore capable of stealing their market and they still have some way to go.
Amazon do at least sell things and have revenue. Mp3.com's business plan appears to be something akin to setting up a cd store which buys discs in in bulk and then gives them out for free.
It just isn't viable.
The article mentions on going royalties being paid to the record companies.
I have to wonder how long it will be before mp3.com's capital dries up. Considering their lawsuits have probably cost in the region of $0.5bn they surely cant have *that* much left.
Also you can imagine the bandwidth charges they must be incurring by allowing users to stream 128kbit audio from them.
Just how long can you keep afloat such a hugely loss making website in the hope that it will one day be profitable?
Similary can anyone see any nice routes for how mp3.com could become profitable?
With all these lawsuits, I'd rather it were "your.mp3.com" ;>
Note that this removes most of the need for the RIAA's more paranoid copy protection schemes.
So we have new business models. Flat-rate downloadable music is here to stay, since some major music providers have agreed to it. For at least that part of the market, the legal problems are over. If Universal wants to stay with the old business model for a while, that's their option. That may or may not work. Much will depend on where new artists sign up. In time, Universal may end up being an archival service for music by dead people.
Maybe product placement in music is the future:
Specially Selected Pot Cleaner
The best pot cleaner in the world
Tortise Brand!
Shonen Knife