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Bon Jovi Tries New Approach To Fight Piracy
Dudio writes "80s-era rock band Bon Jovi is taking a novel approach to fighting piracy of their upcoming album, Bounce. Retail CDs will be distributed with a unique serial number with which the purchaser can register in order to receive such exclusives as prioritized concert ticket purchases and unreleased music. Finally, somebody in the entertainment industry is attempting to adapt to the changing market rather than rushing to protect an outdated business model." All Bon Jovi jokes aside, it is nice to see a fresh approach.
Um, yeah. Unreleased until it's released to the paying customers, who then pass it off to the non-paying "customers." The prioritized ticket thing, on the other hand, actually makes sense.
IWARS.
People, in general, disappoint me. Politicians even more so.
Well, lets not forget the efforts and foresigth of people like David Bowie who is totally hip to the values of Slashdot. He feels that copyright will be obsolete in 10 years, and he thinks its a good idea.
www.enthea.org
If you buy the new Counting Crows CD (and you should, because it's quite good) it gives you access to a secret bit of their site with unreleased tracks and whatnot. Makes for an interesting reverse engineering project.
it's not going to stop until you wise up, no it's not going to stop. so just give up.
Problem: RIAA products overpriced given what you get, people don't want to pay for them.
Sympton: People pirate the music instead.
Solution: Add value to the CD that makes people more willing to buy it.
The RIAA in the past has been trying to cure the symptoms, without attacking the core problem. This is a MAJOR step in the right direction.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
Honest World -
If it fails, they made shitty music which wasn't marketed well.
If it succeeds, its due to better music and perhaps the added incentive of the aforementioned offer.
Marketing world -
If it fails, its due to blatant piracy
If it succeeds, it didn't succeed enough. Piracy was still rampant.
Think nothing is impossible? Try slamming a revolving door.
I really hate when people compare the sharing of mp3 files to software piracy. Why? Because the two are totally different.
Music has been broadcast over the airwaves for years and years and then some more years. For most of those years, there has existed the technology to copy those songs onto cassette tapes and other mediums and listen to those songs at a later time; and numerous times.
Growing up, I always recorded my favorite songs off the radio; and I believe, just like recording a TV show, it was perfectly fine for me to do so. In fact, wasn't it Sony, one of the companies that is now whining about music sharing, that sold me the ability to record radio broadcasts? Why, I believe it was!
Since the radio reaches nearly every corner of our country and nearly everone owns the technology to record that music, I don't see a difference between that and sharing an mp3 file with your friends, other than you get to cut out the retarded DJ who always talks over the song like some dimwit fart.
A couple more interesting things to note, in Japan, they have stores that will rent you CDs, for a couple hundred yen, in much the same way American's rent VHS and DVD movies. Those same stores also sell very specialized cassette tapes so you can record the CD instead of having to pay around $30.00 for it. Since the stores are not owned by the record companies, I don't see a difference between this and sharing mp3s with your friends (other than you've cut out the middle man).
Also, you most public libraries will loan you music CDs for free.
On the otherhand, software has NEVER been broadcast over public airwaves or freely distributed in your public library. Nor are there stores that will rent you software and then the media to use to copy it. Nor has the means to copy software ever been commercially provided with the copying of software being its primary marketed function.
I think that the record industry is too damn stupid to provide their customers with a product in the form their customers demand and I think they are using an apples to oranges comparison of software piracy to sharing music to force the governments to pass laws that maintain the status quo of their current, obviously undesirable, business plans.
And all of that is why I hate hearing music sharing compared to software piracy.
At the beginning of the decade, they were asking some amount for lifetime membership in their fanclub. I don't remember the amount, but it was between $15 and $35. Got you a bunch of stickers, a newsletter, etc.
By the end of the decade, they were asking around $35 a year for a glossy magazine-style newsletter, preferential ticket sales, and backstage potential. (They were also selling 1/10th the albums.)
Doing it this way makes a lot of sense to me. Instead of charging extra to join the fanclub, put those unique codes on everything, and let folks punch in codes for everything they buy. Bought the CD? Yeah, we can hook you up with good seats at a good price. Bought the last five CD's, plus posters, videos and t-shirts? Front row center, baby!
Reward the folks who are dedicated to you, and all that stuff.