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EMI Customer Relations Tells It Like It Is
hype7 writes "The Register is running a story about the most outrageous email sent from a customer services rep at BMI in Germany to a customer who had difficulty playing a copy-protected CD in his CD player. One of the most stunning lines from the translation: "If you plan to continue protesting about future audio media releases with copy protection, forget it; copy protection is a reality, and within a matter of months more or less all audio media worldwide are copy protected. And this is a good thing for the music industry. In order to make this happen we will do anything within our power - whether you like it or not.""
You forget (or did you read the article and the links provided?) that the Reg does have evidence of other e-mails, some of which are also harshly worded.
If you read the original e-mail (posted on Heise.de in German), the tone of voice in the original is not far off from their translated version. Indeed, they adopted a tone of voice that German bureaucrats *love* to adopt. Very imperious, arrogant and pointed, but at the same time they stay (as a German would say) "sachlich", meaning "factual" or "sticking to the facts". German bureaucrats love to insult you between the lines, while being able to claim that they were 'only' making statements of fact.
Ah, another German that perfectly describes EMI's e-mail: "Scheinheilig". Means something like "holier-than-thou". And another word that most people will recognize: "Schadenfreude".
In meagre defense of EMI, the person who e-mailed them to complain about their CD was at times a little rude (see the Heise post) -- but that does not excuse the snotty response they sent him back.
I think I'm going to boycott EMI and BMG music from now on. Which is sad, since Beatles CDs are published by EMI, if I remember right, but I have quite a few Beatles CDs anyway (and plenty of cassettes).
I'm not mad so much because I want to copy or rip CDs (though I do it sometimes for my own use), but what *really* ticks me off is the attitude that it's somehow my responsibility to make their damned crippled CD work in my Red Book standard (!) player, and if I can't do it, then I must be some kind of idiot.
OTOH most of the music I tend to buy is usually marked "Nice Price" and is in the discount bins 'cos they were popular 10-20 years ago (man, I feel old). *sigh*
I doubt The Man would bother copy-handicapping them...
Cheers,
Ethelred
Everyone wants to be Ethelred. Even I want to be Ethelred.
I read German pretty well (6 years of classes and two long trips to Germany) and this letter is written in a very informal way, so if this IS a legit response this guy is probably acting as an individual and not responding with official company line. But the Reg's translation actually does a pretty good job of getting the point across. The informal style is considered to be rude if you are not talking to a friend, and this author uses it liberaly. He also uses a fairly dismissive tone when discussing the origional letters concerns. My guess is this is a pissed of answerdroid who just gave his company some really bad press (article is on slashdot, the register, and fark, not pretty if you want to cultivate the digeratti) and will be out of a job tomorrow.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
I was discussing a billing error with them last night. They said to me, flat out, "It doesn't matter who's right, we're a big company and there is nothing you can do to touch us. We say you owe us the money. Pay up." It's not just BMI. Corporations know they can roll right over any single one person and they are happy, happy to do it.
Maybe the state's highest function is to grind out insoluble problems. (Zelazny, Hall of Mirrors)
I think that pretty much gets the point across. Them's fightin' words. :-)
GreyPoopon
--
Why is it I can write insightful comments but can't come up with a clever signature?
I am german, I read the original Heise post and it is offensive and completely unacceptable. Even if this was the original party line inside EMI, it should never have been sent to a customer this way. Not in german, not in english, not in any other language.
Kristian
As i understand it, all copy protection that can be read on a standard cd player is weak to begin with. cdroms can read multiple indexes, cd players can only read the first one. but cdroms read the indexes starting from the last and working its way to the first. so most copy protections corrupt the second index so the cdrom will fail. a simple firmware upgrade to the cdrom can fix that and make it read the first index first and move down the list. Interesting article here
*** I suffer from a colorful array of psychological problems
After fuming about this as we all probably did, I thought about it and came to this conclusion: EMI's math is inaccurate, and more insidiously, they are hiding some very important facts.
.." well, you're getting PAID for them dude.
Here's what was said:
"There are 250 Million blank CDRs and tapes bought and used this year for copying music in comparison to 213 Million prerecorded audio media. This means the owners are only being paid for 46 per cent of the musical content. "
This assumes that either; A) all CDRs are used to pirate music or; B) EMI has some magic tracer on blank CDRs that returns which of them was used for illegal purposes. Since neither is true, the EMI statement is rubbish. CDRs are used just as much for backups, non-MP3 warez and coasters as much as they are used for infinging music and film files.
But they mention tapes as well. Ah HA! Now here comes the reall bullshit.
Know what the AHRA is? Well the Audio Home Recording act was enacted to make sure people paid for music they taped. IOW, when you bought a blank TDK cassette, the RIAA and labels assumed you were going to use it to copy music, so they wanted a cut. The therefore dreamed up the "blank royalty" which meant that $3 of the $5.99 you paid for that TDK cassette went to publishers, labels and artists (cough). In return you were given THE RIGHT to make copies.
According to the RIAA:
"This legislation exempts consumers from lawsuits for copyright violations when they record music for private, noncommercial use; eases access to advanced digital audio recording technologies; provides for the payment of modest royalties to songwriters and recording artists and companies; and mandates the inclusion of serial copying management technology in all consumer digital audio recorders to limit multi-generation audio copying (i.e., making copies of copies). "
They get paid for device sales as well. There are similar laws in every First World country, in particular, the UK and Germany.
So Herr EMI, in claiming that ".. 250 Million blank CDRs and tapes [are] bought and used this year for copying music
What's core? That EMI.de is complaining that people are buying media (for which EMI.de is generously paid) to make copies of music that they are entitled to copy BY LAW. The EMI.de guy is complaining that people are buying media that generates MILLIONS per year for EMI!
When EMI, Warner Music, BMG, UMG and Sony Music offer to give back the blank royalty, then we can begin to discuss what percentage of CDRs are actually put to infringing use.
"The pie shall be cut in half and each man shall receive.....death. I'll eat the pie."