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2002 MP3 Winners and Losers
An anonymous reader writes "MP3newswire.net is running their annual losers and winners list in digital media. Each has 8 finalists with the big winner KaZaa for becoming profitable and doubling Napster's peak traffic despite setbacks like getting briefly booted from Download.com. The big loser? No surprise, it's the RIAA who despite several wins in court have failed in their quest to stem file trading. Lawrence Lessig and Dmitry Skylarov also made the winners list, though as the article points out it wasn't exactly a great year for Dmitry."
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I'm not sure Kazaa being profitable is that good of a thing for the 'net in general.
Remember, Kazaa is a Spyware/Adware-filled program which brings along with it a lot of annoying programs that pop-up ads while users are browsing sites other than their own, redirect click-through commissions from sites other than their own, and spy on users when using programs other than their own.
Kazaa simply has no morals. They're not just stealing from the RIAA, but if you run a website they're stealing from you too. If you haven't noticed, they don't have much respect the laws of the U.S, Canada, Mexico, U.K... or anywhere else that says stealing is wrong.
Kazaa should just go away... the online world would be better off without them. Them being profitable is a very scary thing...
The problem is, they not only own the content, but they also own the "distribution channels" that control what content is pushed into the marketplace.
The RIAA's MP3 fear is not that they won't be able to make money off of MP3s, but that people other than the existing RIAA members can as well. What's more, it'd be possible for an artist to gain popularity without needing the help of an RIAA label's publicity machine, therefore the artist could make 100% of the money off of the recording, and not have to give the RIAA members any cut of the action.
That's why the RIAA is trying desperately to block the progress of 'net-based music distribution in any file format by anybody. The fact that some people are surcomming to illegally transfering music that the RIAA owns the copyright on just makes their illogical case easier to argue. What they want is for the music distribution system to stay as it is for as long as possible, because if we ever transition to an effective electronic system of any kind, they will be written out of the story.
"An acquaintance recently purchased the new Peter Gabriel CD. It played fine on her standard CD players, but would not play on her computer at work where she regularly listens to music to pass the tedium of her job. What did she do? She simply downloaded the files from the Net onto her PC and played that instead. The problem is she was still angry that the CD she bought was intentionally disabled, preventing her from using it as she wished. Do you know what she did next? She returned the CD. A perfect example of a dissatisfied consumer who (had) already committed to the purchase and was completely discouraged by the intentional hampering of the product. Scariest for the music industry was when I heard her angrily mutter these words..."I won't make that mistake again."" Did you hear that, RIAA? Your antics are really pissing off your customers! Oh wait - I forgot...you don't call them customers, do you? You call them thieves and pirates!
What I want to know is: why would they choose Kazaa as the number one winner?? That makes absolutely no sense. They talk about how great it is that they are profitable, and then in the same breath explain how they got that profitability: "by stuffing the app with adware, spyware, and most notoriously Brilliant Digital's Altnet, a distributed computing program covertly placed on users machines when KaZaa was downloaded." What is the author trying to do, promote such underhanded moneymaking techniques? When other developers and companies read this, they will undoubtedly make a connection. "How can we be more profitable? Well, Kazaa did it with adware, spyware, and lying to its customers." All those things should of course be mentioned, but in the Losers list, not the Winners. The adware, spyware, and covertly placed programs were the reason I never downloaded Kazaa, and never will. If Kazaa is going to be number one, they should be there because of the FastTrack network, which I think is wonderful. My vote would have gone to Kazaa Lite, which should definitely be up there on the list. It connects you to the FastTrack network without spying on you or lying to you.
Kazaa Lite is the real winner, not Kazaa.
Lack of eloquence does not denote lack of intelligence, though they often coincide.