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Still More RIAA News
We just did an article about the RIAA's mendacity with statistics, and here come some more: first, someone has gone to the trouble to deconstruct their income figures over the past few years, showing that the RIAA's lack of investment in new releases is in itself sufficient to explain any dropping sales, and second, this website concerning the music industry settling a price-fixing lawsuit, which I believe is this one, filed two years ago.
Ok. Let me see if I've got this straight. I fill out that form and the RIAA will give me some money to buy a DVD with?
High-speed Road Trip (18.000KPH)
But telling Slashdot won't achieve much - most people here already have a particular opinion on the RIAA.
Good luck with getting the message across to the public at large, to people who matter, and to people who make and shape laws.
I point this out because it gets grating every time it's suggested that the RIAA is some giant monopoly that controls what gets published and whatnot. It isn't. That's about as sane as headlining a report describing a "going postal" type massacre as "NRA goes on shooting rampage in post office".
The RIAA is an industry association. It does not control its members, its members control it.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
They scaled back supply because they knew that Napster would pick up the slack.
(-;
NOT!
Kill Trolls Dead. Here's
'gone to the trouble to deconstruct their income figures', Bad idea, there clearly not facts and so the RIAA can claim copyright violations.
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
I'd be much more willing to buy CD's if they were not insanely expensive.
Most new CD's cost around $15-$20... Considering I usually buy a CD mainly for 2 or 3 tracks, thats about $5 or more for a single song.
Or, I could buy the singles, and pay about $5 a song
Gee, that really makes me want to buy CD's. I'll stick with Kazaa Lite, Gnutella, or something.
The only time I buy a CD anymore is when it is a small band that I want to support, and then I usually buy from their website.
As usual, groups with relative power will alter and hide statistics if they really want to get their point of view across, especially when they are beseiged by FUD. On a side note, there are 4 CD's I wanted to buy but didn't, because of them.
Please direct all bug reports to
from the article : why is it that sales didn't start declining until AFTER the RIAA had Napster shut down?
kazaa, morpheus, audiogalaxy, gnutella...
frankly, can anyone (good or vilain) pretend that closing napster possibly changed anything in online music trading habits ? and hence in any sales reports an correlation analysis whatsoever ?
I wish the author was honest.
O.
Of course, that means I'd have to live with the thought that Oprah is still around in 3 years, but that's a pain I can easily live with.
Any sufficiently well-organized Government is indistinguishable from bullshit.
Back in the mid 1980s when CDs first came out you had a choice of LP, CD, or Tape. The typical list price for a new release LP or tape was $8.99. The CD list price was $16.99.
Their reason: There was a backlog of over a year to manufacture "back catalog releases". They (record industry) said the price high price of CD was because of the manufacturing process, as well as supply and demand.
Well for CDs there's no backlog now, they use less raw material, and provide less artwork. And yet the CD price remains inflated.
Does the artist get more royalties for CD than a LP or cassette? I think not.
The article referenced is quite clear on this point. It is quotoing the RIAA's announcements regarding income industry-wide (though presumably the RIAA's definitaion of "industry-wide" refers only to it's members).
The differnce between saying that the RIAA's income statistics are incorrect and saying that the NRA shot someone is that the NRA was likely not involved in the shooting, and likely did not colude to make the shooting happen the way it did.
The RIAA is directly reporting these statistics. They are the RIAA's collective industry statistics. Also, the RIAA members have been shown to actively colude to make these statistics what they are through price-fixing and other tactics.
On the point of calling the RIAA a monopoly, I think it's perfectly fair. Just as a corporation can act as a single entity even though it is made up of many individuals, so too does the RIAA act as a single entity for the purposes of controling retail sales of music and lobbying (i.e. buying politicians) for music-industry causes like passing the DMCA. BMI did not lobby to pass the DMCA independantly, the RIAA did. This is a tactic for gaining control over the market and over the technologies that affect the market by the RIAA.
Monopoly tactics? Yep.
The total amount alotted for disbursement (sp?) is 75 millon and if the total per claim is less than $5, they don't have to send out cash, just product. So if more than 15 millon claims are filed (likely) then some non-profit is just going to get a bunch of left over Moby cd's, I doubt that any cash will every even change hands.
Read the settlement, its a hoot.
Am I the only one to be amazed by the weird
complains the RIAA keeps on making and thinks
people still believes what they say ?
About all the missing sales they get because
people download mp3s - do they really believe
every mp3 downloaded is a cd less sold ??
Do they think someone with thousands of mp3s
would buy thousand cds ? We don't have unlimited
budgets..
And now they're complaining they don't get as
many profit as the previous years;
Hey we live in a capitalistic world..
the market also changes, and you should evolve
your product.
If your product doesn't sell anymore you've
only got yourself to complain to..
You don't hear McD complain these days that
people buy less burgers and pizzas or other
take-aways should be closed or are illegal ?
Learn about pinball machines on www.flippers.be
Maybe not. The author of the article goes on to argue that file swapping, which may have killed the singles market, couldn't add up to this amount. Alas, he didn't read the quote properly. $4 billion is what they attribute to physical piracy, not online swapping. There are parts of the world where you can buy just about any CD, music or software, for a fraction of the price of retail. In a street market in Thailand I saw MS Office and NT Server for $20 (with activation keys), music CDs of current US and European pop releases for $5, PS games for $5-10. All were in jewel cases with artwork.
Physical piracy is their real enemy, not file sharing.
Amen.
:)
I'm glad also not to hear you (quite) say, "Well, I'd stop stealing if they'd just lower prices." Stealing will always be free (esp. when P2P cuts out the street corner middle man in the trenchcoat), and they can never compete with free. Just say "no" to extortion.
CD prices have fallen surprisingly little in 20 years -- about a third in inflation-adjusted dollars. I don't remember prices like this with vinyl, and when CD's came along there was a hefty premium for them. Yes, they provided higher quality, but I bet their production costs are now far lower.
I think the RIAA members need to do some serious introspection about their business model. That doesn't mean ignoring infringement, but realizing that the boat is sinking because of a lot of larger holes in the hull. Direct sales are a great concept; other methods to lower costs must exist. Note however that we do live in a society that somehow manages to buy $130 Nikes that cost $30 wholesale. (Astonishingly, Nike only makes a few dollars profit on each pair.) The record industry is far from the only industry with big markups, so don't rush to any conclusions.
The RIAA members should not abuse market statistics or fix prices to promote their cause. Resentful consumers should not steal to promote theirs. Now, all join hands and sing....
The funny thing is I'm sure 99% of the public has no idea what all this talk is about. The one-quarter who do don't even talk to the three-eighths of the 10% of the last ninth who uh... Well, I'd like to see some statistics on that, I'm 110% certain.
According to RIAA President Hillary Rosen, "107% of the music consumers surveyed believe our statistics."
It is quite simple
Haiku should not be funny
Try a Senryu
Well *I* won't be satisfied until I see a VH1 behind the music in two years about how Hilary Rosen is in Soviet Russia selling her body for 8-tracks!
--Jimmy has fancy plans; and pants to match.
to ruthlessly point out the factual, logical and mathematical "imprecisions" that underly the fight against savage piracy, then you are going to make it that much more difficult for the industry to successfully try and execute these heinous criminals who plague society.
Disproving the theory that "You'll never go broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public" (P.T. Barnum ??), U.S. buyers have apparently come to the realization that $3.50 to $5.50 is too damn much to pay for one song.
I believe the quote is "No one ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public." from H.L. Mencken, the noted satirist.
P.T. Barnum's quote is "There's a sucker born every minute."
As the article mentions, there is a proposed settlement in a class action price fixing lawsuit filed by 43 state attorneys general against several major record companies and music retailers.
The terms of the settlement are that people who bought music CDs, records or cassettes between 1/1/95 and 12/22/00 can apply for a refund of up to $20.
But: Like most class action settlements, the terms are not necessarily favorable to consumers. For example, the settlement fund is $67,375,000 in cash plus $75,700,000 "worth of" prerecorded CDs. If "the number of claims filed would result in refunds of less than $5.00 per claimant, there will be no cash distribution to individual consumers. Rather, the cash portion of the settlement shall be distributed to mot-for-profit, charitable, governmental or public entities[.]"
Find out more at musiccdsettlement.com
Disclaimer: The poster (me) expresses no opinion as to the merits (if any) of this class action settlement, and this post is not legal advice nor is it an advertisement or solicitation for legal services.
in the Ziemann report. There's a great deal of emphasis placed on the decline of the number of releases over the past couple of years. However, this whole train of reasoning seems to be based on the following quote:
"Each year, of the approximately 27,000 new releases that hit the market, the major labels release about 7,000 new CD titles and after production, recording, promotion and distribution costs, most never sell enough to recover these costs, let alone make a profit." (from the RIAA Price of a CD page).
Now, perhaps the number of releases *has* declined markedly over the past couple of years. But it strikes me as an awful big assumption to just plug in this 27,000 number as the number of new releases for each of the past two years.
Again, not saying it's wrong. I'm just saying that it could as well be an average over the past decade or an inexact number thrown out in a context other than market data. It's a slender thread on which to hang a big chunk of analysis.
Well, it used to cost about 10 cents to make the cd itself. The packaging costs more. I think about a buck 50 goes to the artist, and about the same to the store IIRC. The rest goes to build Hilary Rosens ultra-secure super-secret super-villain lair, a (gently) used Echelon terminal, and a closet full of body molded rubber piracy fighting suits. This is what has proved to be so expensive, they keep having to let them out. True to form, she loves loves loves her ding dongs.
And if you think that's markup, I've got one word for you my friend. Plastics!
--Jimmy has fancy plans; and pants to match.
The recording industry's business is out of date. They are trying to sell us horses when we all want cars. There are better ways to get music than paying $20 for a CD that only has 1 good song on it.
Could you imagine this country if an RIAA 'like' organization formed from horse trading companies in the early 1900's to try to keep Henry Ford from putting them out of business? Saying Henry Ford's Model T violated the HTIAA's patent on selling transportation methods.
Sure downloading copyrighted material is illegal, but they have to do somethign about it. Obviously people are fed up with $20 CDs.
Actually, CDs were cheaper to produce than vinyl then as well as now. Of course nowadays, there is no correlation with the cost to produce a CD and its price--the cost of manufacturing is so low that if marketing et. al. was left out of the mix money could be made selling CDs at $2/pop.
As for quality, early CDs provided far lower quality than vinyl initially. Yeah, we got rid of the ticks, pops, scratches, and rumbles, but great violence was done to the music by the early digital recording and mastering technology which often couldn't muster more than 13 or 14-bits of resolution at best (and often far worse). To this day, many prefer vinyl and only the recent SACD and DVD-A technologies can give well produced vinyl a run for its money on sound quality. I'm not a luddite and most of my music is now on CD, but I'm not happy about it.
Better for convenience, yes. Better for sound, decidedly not.
--Len
Your description of mendacity is full of minacity.
What we call folk wisdom is often no more than a kind of expedient stupidity.-Edward Abbey
What does the RIAA think of barter? I have been searching for good resources on this issue but I haven't found very much useful information.
How to Download YouTube Videos
To quote Sam Clemens, "There are three kinds of lies...lies, damned lies and statistics." Trouble is, the American press (and by extension, the general American public) sees numbers and believes them to be absolute truth. The running joke/slogan seems to be "garbage in, gospel out".
It all sort of makes me wonder, though...what would happen to these numbers if the Generally Accepted Accounting Practices were applied?
Just my two cents' worth...save up the change for a root beer or something.
All the world's an analog stage, and digital circuits play only bit parts.
From the Cost of a CD from the RIAA web site:
"While the RIAA does not collect information on the specific costs that make up the price of a CD, there are many factors that go into the overall cost of a CD -- and the plastic it's pressed on, is among the least significant."
They admit they don't really know the costs. They don't have the data so they speak from ignorance. Or, they do have the data but don't want to admit what they know.
How to Download YouTube Videos
I don't think it's quite that sinister, though your portrayal of the music industry is considerably sexier than mine.
I won't even ask what you mean by "she loves loves loves her ding dongs." (Lest any guys get misplaced notions about Hilary, read this.) I mean, I like ding dongs as much as the next guy, but....
I've heard figures for the artist's cut ranging form 50 to $2. I don't know what's accurate, but assume it depends a lot on how much leverage the act has -- there's a difference between Bruce Springsteen and WeEatToads but their CD's are both expensive. (Springsteen may be cheaper because of volume.) (And I'm not starting a f*cking debate about musical tastes!) Must be nice to be a solo artist rather than have to split the coins with other band members.
As for markup, we rarely think about it as we happily pay for it. Next time you see a box of Wheaties, ask yourself how much the wheat cost. Probably less than a raw CD. Now look at that pretty and informative 4-color box it comes in. Which costs more? Then look around at the supermarket. How much does it cost to run? A lot. What does this have to do with the price of wheat? Nothing, but it has a heck of a lot to do with the price of Wheaties.
Stealing is not free!!
That's a misconception. It doesn't cost any *money* to steal, but stealing still has cost. Most notable is time cost -- it takes time to locate and download a song you want. And even then once you're done you can't be sure you didn't get a lot of data errors in the track or different songs in the album were recorded with different loudness, etc.
Theoretically, if the recording industry priced CDs below ((peoples' value of own time * length of time it takes to find the cd) + value of quality) then the could compete with piracy on a price level. Obviously everyone's value of their time is different so they'll never be able to get everyone. For me, if CDs cost $5-$10 I would never mess around with Kazaa, and I think a lot of other people wouldn't either. $20? No, thanks.
We talk a lot about supporting indie bands and buying their music from their websites and all. But where is all this. All the media is in the big control
AOL,Murdoch, etc., so they wont give people information. How about the slashdot editors putting up a page that gets regularly updated.. with information about indie and small bands.. what genre are they, where can people buy their music and stuff.
I feel that rather than talking about extreme steps like boycott etc., slashdot should put up a page so that atleast slashdotters hit on it.... son it will show up on googles results too! More information the people will make things better. We can have an ask slashdot story about indie and small bands and then the most informative posts can be used to compose the page initially.
My Aurora : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o91ZsGwJYyg
FB : https://www.facebook.com/TanveersPhotography
I posted a similar comment to yesterdays RIAA story
Of course their declining record sales have nothing to do with the public is now fed up of mass marketed pop music where record contracts are won not by original musical talent and song writing , but by nieve and desperate individuals in f***ing competitions while real talent falls into the gutter, leaving a trail of destruction in its path while the instigators get rich.
The only thing killing music is not kids downloading mp3's or pirating dvds at market stalls but by the industry killing itself, kids are simply getting ripped off by these marketing/record companies and have just started to realise globally they are being taken for idiots
why is it that so many companies in the industry (or others for that matter), have so much contempt for their customers and choose short term monetary gains instead of actually concentrating on producing superior products ?
Here is my email to the author...
You have posted a great article. It's very informative and insightful and missing a couple important things.
First, I appreciate your promotion of independent artists and justly compensating them, but I disagree with you're numbers. Let me humbly suggest a different split. 16% for production costs. 34% marketing and bribes (we can dream that clear channel and mtv are with in budget). 16% for the label, 16% for investors and 17% for the band. I don't think anyone would disagree with their cut, but what I'm really trying to express is the rule that you spend twice as much on marketing as you do on R&D. And in this case, the world's demonstrated that marketing often counts more for sales than product quality.
Second, as the above somewhat illustrates, the real enemy of both the consumer AND the labels is radio consolidation and the evil empire of clear channel and the event venue lackies it holds. They limit our choice and variety. For the artist and labels, they charge too much money. At one time, music was often the program that pulled people in to listen to adds. Because of extravagently high payola.. er, I mean, "promoter" costs through elimination of competition, the radio stations have really become NOTHING BUT ADVERTISING. Ads are paid for, programs are paid for, automate and underpay local talent, buy out the competition and then print your own money. The Conrad Burns '96 telecommunications act did good things, but it brought more harm than good and needs to be corrected. The record labels have much much more to gain from investing in policial bribery to bring back competition than they have from making all their consumers and benifactors criminals.
Last, that leads to what the REAL issue with RIAA is. The RIAA's end consumer, the people who pay them, are the records labels. The RIAA has to justify thier high costs to the labels every year. Every year, they have to justify the existence of this perpetual parasitic beauracracy. The labels feel that they get good benifits from the current payola system; they just don't like today's prices. If they didn't like it, the lables have plentry of shills to create politicial winds of change. The RIAA's consumer is the labels, NOT THE CONSUMER. They don't care about us; we aren't even the corn in Rosen's shit. They are paid by the labels. What this whole piracy thing is about marketing themselves as relevent to the labels. Let me repeat; the RIAA's emphasis on piracy is their effort to keep getting money from the labels and to start asking them for more money. Yes, of course it's all about money. The RIAA and the labels know the numbers and reasons you cited. They are pursuing what they feel is a safer, more profitable route. The labels are culpable in all of this of course. I just think you need to cite and remember the root motive to all of this non-sense.
Good Luck!
Democrats and Republicans only disagree about how to enslave you
This sentence of Hilary Rosen is often quoted to prove harm filesharing is doing: "When 23 percent of surveyed music consumers say they are not buying more music because they are downloading or copying their music for free, we cannot ignore the impact on the marketplace." And I see that it is used again in this article. What this really means is that 23 percent are not changing their buying habits, and 77 percent are spending more. Where's the harm to their marketplace? This is typical politician double-speak - I can see her laughing everytime she sees it quoted. With the figures they published they are doing better than most anyway.
Freedom of speech doesn't come with bandwidth.
Between the dates mentioned (Jan. 1, 1995 to Dec. 22, 2000) I bought hundreds of CDs and LPs. "Up to $20 per claimant" does justice to someone who bought 5 or 10 CDs during that time... but completely screws those who bought a lot more.
I read the section on my legal rights which states...
I'd assume that I could opt out of the settlement group and then file a claim independently... but that sounds expensive and time consuming in order to (doubtfully) recover what would be, at most, a couple bucks per CD/LP (maybe $1K total if I calculated that way).
The other option, and maybe more preferable, would be to become a member of the settlement and then show up a the courthouse to object (Portland, ME is a couple hours away... could be an interesting/educational trip to be sure). Maybe if we could organize a small army of people from nearby with LARGE music collections to come and (hopefully) testify/object. What do you think folks? I'm game.
-S
--- What parts of "shall make no law", "shall not be infringed", and "shall not be violated" don't you understand?
The other day I was listening to NPR and they profiled James McMutry, a singer/song writer (he is the son of novelist Larry McMutry, who Lonesome Dove, etc). Larry has a new album out, Saint Mary of the Woods. NPR talked to him and played some samples of his music, which a kind of country/rock/folk fusion. I liked what I heard.
When I got home I jumped on Gnutella and found a song from his new CD and downloaded it. I liked it. Then I downloaded another and liked it too.
The next day I went out and bought the CD.
The RIAA can learn from this. Without being able to sample some songs so I could decide whether or not I wanted to buy the whole CD, I never would have plunked down my cash for an unknown (to me) artist. Thanks to Gnutella, James McMutry made a sale, and got a new fan.
CDE open sourced! https://sourceforge.net/projects/cdesktopenv/
Good grief, can it be that simple? I just went to that Web site and it appears as if by spending five minutes filling in a form I have submitted a claim and will eventually receive a small check in the mail.
(Or did I just give my name, address, date of birth, and last four SS digits to a scam artist?)
If this is for real, it should be widely publicized.
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
I'm glad also not to hear you (quite) say, "Well, I'd stop stealing if they'd just lower prices." Stealing will always be free (esp. when P2P cuts out the street corner middle man in the trenchcoat), and they can never compete with free. Just say "no" to extortion. :)
It's already been pointed out that downloading has a time cost associated with it. Owning a CD also has a benefit (pretty CD graphics and booklet and a permanent "backup" that I don't need to spend extra for).
The real problem is that many people are willing to pay $8-10 for a CD but this is usually not an option. Given the choice between paying $18 and paying $0 many people choose $0.
the problem with music, by Steve Albini
Yes.
A thought experiment strictly from a buyer perspective:
Interesting?
There's two Disney executives walking across a parking lot when they pass a beautiful girl coming the other way. After they pass, one of the suits says "I fucked her". The other looks suitably impressed "Oh yeah? Out of what?".
(Replace Disney with your favoured record company du jour.)
That was classic intercourse!
Sure, nike only makes a few dollars profit per shoe AFTER they subtract the $600 million marketing budget...
I'm not sure I want to enter my personal information on this page, especially since they want the last 4 digits of my social security number. Given that sort of info, a crook could do a heck of a lot of damage to me identity-theft-wise.
Even if Rust Consulting is legit (and I admit, it looks like it is), I'd still worry about the security of their database.
Guess I'll have to pass up that $20.
It doesn't cost any *money* to steal, but stealing still has cost. Most notable is time cost -- it takes time to locate and download a song you want. And even then once you're done you can't be sure you didn't get a lot of data errors in the track or different songs in the album were recorded with different loudness, etc.
Agreed. This clearly shows that our large scale piracy systems still need improvement.
The price of freedom is eternal litigation.
I, in my overzealous hyperbole, may have mistakenly given the impression that I'm against paying anything above cost.
I realize that with that markup above margin, I'm buying my time back. I'm totally ok with that. 25% for the store, 25% for the distributor, and hell, why not something for the manufacturer too.
Even allowing for that, CD's are way way over priced. Without the cartel, CD's would likely be much cheaper. $5 dollars from a random guy on the street? No, probably not. While his production costs may well be higher (or not considering some of what one hears about the Chinese manufacturers), his supply chain is really short, his costs for the card table negligible. But $10 bucks for a new album, which isn't just chock full of crap, and is at least 30 minutes long, isn't that much to ask.
If the constituent members of the RIAA really have costs so high as to justify use of their super-cartel-ultra-best-friend powers, perhaps they should look into controlling costs rather than illegally manipulating the market to make up the difference. Maybe forcing the market to accept whatever crap the suits think it should like is expensive. I would certainly imagine that acts that promote themselves by word of mouth save on studio time (by sounding decent without special effect wizardry), and advertising.
Until they do something to address the problem, I have a hard time feeling anything but a dull sense that justice is done when a million petty thieves rob the giant thief swindling millions. But then I'm not a lawyer either.
--Jimmy has fancy plans; and pants to match.
Stealing is not free!![...]Most notable is time cost
I agree that there is a cost to stealing, but I disagree that the cost is time. By the time I drive out to the mall, find a parking spot, walk to the CD store, find the CD, stand in line and buy the CD, walk back to the car, and drive home I could have found the CD on some P2P 5 times over.
The real cost to those who steal (and to those who don't due to the backlash towards those who do) is economic and/or political. And that's the battle we're losing. It really is more convenient and less time consuming to download music. If the RIAA embraced that fact, they could profit from it. Instead, they're trying to dictate demand based on their desire to supply music in the one way they think they can control, and they still haven't realized that their economic theory is flawed (that is until/unless they manage to litigate their problems away).
How about an honour system for payment of all music and video.
Fact: Unauthorised digital distribution of copyrighted material is _never_ going to be stopped. Therefore, rather than try and beat it (impossible), accept it.
The new form of digital distribution is chaotic. Whether it be underground websites, Usenet, Kazaa, let it be.
However, along with all digital entertainment content, include details of a website from where you can make an honour payment for the material you have obtained. MP3's etc. can use meta-data (ID3 tags etc.) and Video can just display a "Thanks, if you've enjoyed this please pop online and pay us".
I have a hard time feeling anything but a dull sense that justice is done when a million petty thieves rob the giant
:)
That's how they'll quote you, too.
I'll grant you that many CDs, perhaps most, do sound much worse than the best vinyl records, but that because the CD offers so much more capability that sound engineers abuse it. CDs can record trebles so high they would melt the solenoid coils in an analog record cutting lathe. CDs can record bass so strong it would make the needle jump off a vinyl record.
So, indeed, an LP can sound better than a CD, but that's because the CD was badly recorded, not because of any limitation in the digital recording system. Even the cheapest CD player will give you a 100+ dB signal-to-noise ratio, while the absloutely best analog record player, costing in the $10000+ range, will never get more than 75 dB or so.
The CD's themselves cost right around $0.08 each at relatively low volumes. This is for 5 color glass mastered cd's. Then, add a cover and 4 color jacket and you are around $0.80 tops. This is shrunk-wrapped, glass mastered cd's ready to go! This cost also includes the glass mastering fees and the film fees ~$750.00. Now, keep in mind these are prices paid to a third company...I hope the recording industry owns their own replication plants. I WILL NOT pay over $10.00 for a music CD! I also have not purchased a music CD since the RIAA started crying two years ago.
Yep. I assumed inelastic demand to make it simpler.
OK, now redraw the curve with perfect law enforcement -- every copy is a legitimate copy. What happens? (Not that I think you'll say, but someone will -- no, the music companies do not all go out business.) Where's the optimum price to maximize profit? Where's the "fair" price?
I'm playing with mostly because these questions affect nearly every discretionary purchase we make. Music CD's are just among the more irritating items.
This article is a joke. His conclusions are no more sensible than thos of the RIAA. The only thing that is true from the stats is that cd sales are down after 10 years of growth in sales. The reasons are more complicated than either side will admit. Both the economy and piracy are factors. Saying piracy isn't a factor is delusional. Saying piracy is the only reason is equally delusional.
Vote for Pedro
It is legit. This Google search shows that website linked directly from websites of 4 states' AG offices.
-S
--- What parts of "shall make no law", "shall not be infringed", and "shall not be violated" don't you understand?
I think what you really mean is that there is a relative benefit in time cost of stealing vs. buying, not that stealing does not have a time cost.
Everyone agrees that the RIAA could profit in all sorts of ways by taking advantage of this fact. Downloadable albums? Sure. Why doesn't the RIAA do this? Because any fuckhead can set up his own music download site, and nobody needs the RIAA record companies to distribute music anymore. Everything that the RIAA says is corporate PR bullshit that people, for some inexplicable reason, take at face value.
Lawyers and executives and musicians and record shop owners and .....
I was kidding, anyway.
There is more unfairness. The plaintiff attorneys general have to release their (your) rights to sue, and there is a consent decree (injunction) that says the companies have to stop fixing prices, but only for a period of 5-10 years depending on the type of business practice involved. Then the defendants could (presumably) resume using Minimum Advertised Prices and other allegedly unfair business practices as alleged in the Third Amended Complaint.
If Slashdot readers really wanted to throw sand in the gears of the record companies, and if upfront money for legal expenses could be raised, the settlement agreement between the state AGs and the distributors says that if 500,000 people "opt out" of the settlement then the settlement is void and the lawsuit goes forward!
Suppose 500,000 or some large number of people opted out, hired lawyers, and demanded 1) more than $20; 2) a consent decree of longer duration; 3) removal of the clause that cuts off payments if too many claims are filed; and/or 4) the right to use peer-to-peer music sharing services as a remedy!
Again, (IAAL and I have to recite these words, sorry) this is not legal advice nor an advertisement nor a solicitation for legal services.
if anyone could get a hold of the RIAA mailing list, then publish this, I bet a few major media outlets will do some pieces on this.
No matter what the RIAA does to shamelessly promote the piracy issue, people who illegally download songs are no better. As I've said several times before, a very efficient way to ellicit a change in behavior is to change your own. Stop playing the game. Walk away. Forget the music produced by the RIAA members. Don't buy it, don't steal it...just forget it. What can the RIAA do? Can it pass laws forcing consumers to purchase a certain number of CD's per year? No...the fact is that it can't do anything but change its business model. Rest assured, the current m.o. of stealing and justifying it with a heavy dose of rationalization will accomplish nothing.
You say "monopoly" I say "trust", you say "cartel" I say "conglomerate". Let's call the whole thing off.
- Stop buying music from the big 5 members of the RIAA (Sony, etc.) that essentially belongs to popular but truly "garbage of the month" purported to be hip, fresh, etc. --from any source.
- Only buy CDs where there is quality music (your definition not mine) throughout the whole album.
- Buy independent labels that have good reputations for how they treat their talent, or better yet
- see if you can find a way to buy from the artists directly or through a direct distribution medium -- i.e. artist to distributor to you, no big five profit
- Send a snail mail to any local radio station playing crap music from the big 5, suggesting that they play the better music indie labels and suggesting that you'll change your listening habits to their competitor's station if they don't.
Want to make it hurt even more?- Send a copy of each one of the radio station letters to the big 5 studios every time your selection has caused the indie labels make money and the big 5 didn't make a nickel.
- Send a copy to MTV explaining that you change the channel every time the crap music's video comes on.
- Maybe send even more copies to the NYT, LA Times, Washington Post etc. Bury the RIAA companies with exposure in the mass media via snail mail barrages and see if they can maintain the same kind of cartel pricing and crap music peddling in the glare of major media. Then you might just get their attention.
Still interested? or is standing up to the corruption just too much bother?...Open Source isn't the only answer -- but it's almost always a better value than the alternatives...
stealing still has cost. Most notable is time cost -- it takes time to locate and download a song you want.
Hmm. Another interesting point.
Now, for accounting purposes, what dollar value do we put on that time? How much does your average computer-literate thief charge per hour anyway? Do you have to withhold taxes?
You are partly right that they will "compete with piracy on a price level" when the cost of the disk is less than the "cost" of the other methods. However, people often value their own time very cheaply; and, technically, stealing is against the law, so merchants shouldn't have to out-compete it. I know you're speaking in practical terms, not legal. I'd like to see how much online custom disk-ordering would costs (the quality would be higher), esp. for legacy stuff with a current promotional budget of $0.00.
Also, is there a Netflix for music CD's? (Besides my local public library, which has a surprising variety of stuff. Support your libraries!)
Just out of interest, why 1550?
What happened then to change things?
Advanced users are users too!
The interesting thing here is that as the RIAA members' sales decline (if that is really happening), it's pretty obvious that independant labels' sales may be increasing. In fact, I think it's quit likely that that is what is happening.
As independant labels are selling more, RIAA members are selling less, and the RIAA is telling everyone that 'sales' or 'profits' are off, without qualifying that with "RIAA members'".
And the absolutely stunning thing is this quote:
How could they possibly prove that?
Hello little man. I will destroy you!
A couple of trivialities:
I learned about "paddy wagon" in Chicago, which is well-known for St. Patrick's Day drunkenness. With that and spades, I figure if I'm going to insult someone, I want to do it intentionally.
On gems -- the aluminum oxide base is called corundum and can be either ruby or sapphire. The tidbit I know about domestic corundum is that it was used to make the finishing touch on the National Monument, a cap made of aluminum, at the time the hot new metal and expensive as heck.
On Al and corrosion. (I'll read most anything.)