Slashdot Mirror
Music Industry's Future Foretold in China?
sapphire writes "An article today in the International Herald Tribune provides a look at music piracy from the point-of-view of pop stars in China. China is a country forced to deal with the reality of unchecked piracy of digital media products. Will their experience lead to new business models for the world-wide recording industry?"
just about any chinese music will cause my groove thing to shake more than today's pop music does.
is the printer-friendly version
Any sufficiently advanced libertarian utopia is indistinguishable from government.
<:
Copyright © 2003 The International Herald Tribune | www.iht.com
Pop stars learn to live with pirates
Thomas Crampton/IHT International Herald Tribune
Friday, February 21, 2003
SHANGHAI Dimpled good looks and saccharin-sweet love songs may have made him an idol to millions of teenagers in China, but dark passions emerged at an album-promotion party recently when Wang Lee Hom brandished a sword to slash an oversized compact disk marked with the Chinese character for "theft."
In case anyone missed the point, the normally demure Wang announced that his favorite track on the new album was "Why," a pop-music diatribe against piracy.
"Pirates have already killed China's music industry dead," Wang said. "It frustrates my life and destroys China's creative future."
That may be an overstatement. Record companies say that what piracy has really done in China is to cause fundamental shifts in the way the country's music industry operates. It has simply forced Wang and his fellow stars to change the way they live, work and play. ''There is no income from the royalties, so artists in China record single songs for radio play instead of albums for consumers,'' said Lachie Rutherford, the president of Warner Music Asia-Pacific. ''Stars need to look elsewhere to finance the rock-star lifestyle.'' Industry executives say this reality also is beginning to draw attention in Europe and the United States, where music companies face falling revenue from compact disk sales as Internet piracy increases. ''The financial effect is the same for record companies whether people get illegal compact disks for $1 on the street in China or download a song for free from the Internet in Europe,'' said Jay Berman, chairman and chief executive of the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, a London-based group representing 1,500 record companies worldwide. ''Record companies everywhere find that they not only need to fight piracy, but also develop alternate revenue streams.'' Piracy -- which accounts for 95 percent of music sales in China, according to Berman's organization -- has forced multinational record companies serving the world's most populous country to abandon classic-style album contracts, drop development of formal distribution channels and eliminate any possibility of a top-40 list based on sales. ''China is the ultimate example of industrial-scale piracy and its impact,'' Berman said. ''The business model for the record industry worldwide is moving toward resembling what we see in China today.'' Alternative sources of income tapped by top Chinese stars include paid appearances, sponsorship deals and extended concert tours through the nation's vast hinterland. ''In the United States and Europe, stars have it easy if they make a hit record,'' said Han Hong, named best female artist this year at Channel V's China Music Awards, and whose renditions of Tibetan songs have become nationally popular. ''In China, we have to give so many concerts that we do not have time to rest our voices.'' To add to the concert revenue and combat piracy, Hong slashed the price of compact disks sold at her concerts to 15 yuan ($1.80), compared with 5 yuan for pirated disks and the 70 yuan that she formerly charged. ''You cannot fight piracy, so there is no point in even getting angry,'' Hong said. ''We must adapt to the environment.'' For Wang Lee Hom, that involved advertising campaigns and an intensive series of personal appearances. ''Until they pirate my body, I can rely on personal appearances,'' Wang said. ''I am forced to view albums only as a promotional tool.'' Concerts themselves have also become pure promotions, with corporate sponsors underwriting the entire cost and passing out tickets for free. Several singers usually take to the stage to maximize the revenue from sponsors. In China's mixed-up musical world, Wang considers his big break to be the day a national bottled water company, Hangzhou Wahaha Group, put his face on its products. ''They sent my face to every corner of China,'' Wang said, adding that other sponsorship deals soon followed for sneakers, sunglasses, shampoo and clothing. ''These deals support my fame, but they do not pay for my music.'' Fame may finance Wang's designer clothes, but the lack of revenue from music sales cripples record companies. ''Our survival strategy required switching to a talent-management business model,'' said Zorro Xu, managing director in China for Warner Music. ''As piracy increases in other countries, this is what record companies elsewhere may have to try.'' While classic record-company contracts are built around albums, record companies in China now sign up to manage all aspects of an artist's career. In exchange for a percentage of the earnings, the record companies arrange promotional events and negotiate product endorsements. Berman of the phonographic industry federation cited a groundbreaking deal made late last year between the British singer Robbie Williams and EMI Group PLC as an example of China-style recording contracts moving westward. The record company signed up to take a share of all profits linked to Williams's next six albums, including merchandising, touring and music sales. In China, the scramble for sponsorship often results in the pre-selling of songs to finance production costs. The hard-edged Beijing-based singer Pu Shu, for example, wrote a theme song for the launch of Windows XP. Payment for the song, ''Out of Your Window,'' covered the cost of album production, and each time he performed at Microsoft Corp.-sponsored events, Pu and Warner collected a fee. Epson Corp. selected a song by Zhou Xun, a singer and actress, to promote color printers in a deal that financed the song's music video. ''Sponsored videos and songs must not be too obviously commercial,'' said Xu said. ''They need to fit a concept and set a mood.'' Warner Music soon plans to begin a talent search for members of a five-girl band to be called Mei Mei, with the winners signed up for a two-year contract to promote M&M candy. Reliance on advertising and the inability to measure consumer response through sales figures makes it difficult for artists and record companies to determine hits. ''China's music industry is driven by institutional sponsorship instead of consumer preference,'' said Andrew Wu, head of Sony Music China. ''Piracy prevents record companies from properly reaching new consumers through in-store promotions.'' Although pirates offer an efficient means of distributing hit albums, the thousands of pirate stalls across China discourage record companies from promoting new artists. ''These stalls are poorly lit, difficult to find and mostly run by old ladies totally out of touch with modern China's music scene,'' Wu said. ''There is no way for record companies to connect with consumers in order to promote new artists.'' As a result, Wu said, there are fewer than 20 professional-quality albums produced per year in China. This lack of large-scale music production inhibits the entry of talented newcomers. ''I know I have the talent and ability,'' said Wang Jue, the son of one of China's first pop stars who studied music at the prestigious Berklee College of Music in Boston. ''Since the record companies just don't have any money to invest, I had to put up the money myself.'' Relying on investors rounded up by his mother, Wang spent 100,000 yuan promoting his album by plastering posters along a fashionable Beijing street and paying to have his song played as the hourly jingle on radio stations. Wang's rhythm-and-blues-style album, largely self-financed but released under the Warner Records label, became a radio hit thanks to the song ''Tomorrow'' and won him the award for best hit and best new artist at the Channel V China Music Awards last month. ''Not everyone can be so lucky as to have the support of a famous mother,'' Wang said. ''I just hope this album will bring enough sponsorship deals to pay for the investment from her friend.''
Copyright © 2003 The International Herald Tribune
So people can't get rich playing music anymore. I guess they'll have to find another reason to play.
You pirate music!
Which means that
In Capitalist America
Music pirates you!
Calling Hillary Rosen and the RIAA, we've cracked your code...
I think that quote sums it up best. They must "look elsewhere to fund the rockstar lifestyle".
I don't fucking pay artists to fund their 'rockstar lifestyle'. I pay them to make music. If they get the intense rich/famous shit going on because they sell loads, well, that's a bonus. If they make enough to live on and keep producing, then they're with the rest of the population.
To me, that keeps what they say in their lyrics all the more relevant to me.
Pop stars learn to live with pirates
The sooner we can get some of our 'pop stars' off shore onto pirate ships the better. May I reccomend the vicinity around Bermuda as a suitable anchorage.
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
Sorry, but it really gets to me when a "band" only does their stuff for the money.
I know plenty of bands that just thrive to hear a live audience, no, they're not big and they don't have a flash Porsche but they enjoy what they do and get to pay the bills.
All pirating means is that people that expect that when they get into music that their life is sorted and they can go round smashing up hotel rooms and stuff.
Bah! They don't even usually write their own songs.
No no no!
it's
1) deprive people of human rights
2) pirate music
3) ??????
4) PROFIT!
Talent-management? You mean, for an artist in China to actually be successful, they have to have some form of TALENT?! Yes, I DO hope other record companies elsewhere try this, yes indeed!
In China, artists don't recieve royalties for CDs. Needless to say, this makes it a damn sight better than the U.S. where most record contracts will leave the artist in debt.
Down with the RIAA!
In soviet russia, human rights violate YOU
I'm using Mozilla 1.2.1 on Linux and I can see it fine....
Steve
Same Mozilla version on WinXP works fine too....doh, busted.
One of the interesting results of the Chinese experience is that consumers no longer pay for the music. This would seem on the surface to be a good thing, after all informationm wants to be free. Of course the musicians are still paid - but by a few large corporate sponsors rather than individuals.
This is certainly a different business model than the one in Europe and the US. Is it better? Perhaps: the artists still get paid and consumers get free or very cheap music. But it may have a downside. Instead of the economic power being in the hands of the people who want the music it is transfered to large corporations.
Are we just trading one set of large corporate interests (the RIAA) for another (corporate sponsors)?
Sailing over the event horizon
Mozilla 1.2.1 on NT and it shows up fine.
"For every expert, there is an equal and opposite expert"
And they make more tours. A singer complains about her voice, but OTOH it means people do not have to travel a lot, more total audience, and after all singers in the past had not mics, like good opera singers (they just take care of it).
The worring thing is the vision of a future of excessivly maketed pop drones designed to build a valuble brand...oh, wait...
"To any truly impartial person, it would be obvious that I am right."
This page comes up with what looks like a framework of a page, but zero actual content in Mozilla.
It's working OK for me (using Moz-based NS7.0/Solaris)
In a band? Use WheresTheGig for free.
I like how you included the copyright in that copy paster :P
Just read between the lines:
''Stars need to look elsewhere to finance the rock-star lifestyle.''
Everyone who claims that they are pirating music "because its good for the artists" had better consider carefully the consequences. Sure, the extravagance of some pop stars may lead some with a Marxist bent to argue that they don't "deserve" their wealth, but the fact is that in a market economy, merit is rewarded with wealth, and the motive for any person to work hard is the possibility of this reward. This article is very clear: Unchecked and tolerated copyright violation destroys most of the market for recording music.
People who constantly argue that "record companies should adapt their business model to piracy" are missing the point. They shouldn't have to: It's their intellectual property, not yours, and they have every right to dictate the terms of its distribution under existing law in every civilized country, even in Red China. Right now Americans enjoy much more freedom to innovate and achieve their own dreams then those in Communist China, and mainly it is because of impartial and fair laws which promote respect for private property, including intellectual property, and allow markets to function. But if we allow these laws to be desecrated, we could fast backslide into a world like that envisioned by the Soviet commisars, where wealth is stolen from those who are capable and worthy and forcibly redistributed to the benefity of the lazy and dishonest.
Where CD's only cost a few bucks instead of $13-15.
If you really look at the article all you really get out of it is that some artists expect to make a few hit songs and be able to live in luxury for the rest of their years off the millions they supposedly make. Whenever I hear artists complain about how they are suffering from the effects of piracy, I just laugh. They are making lots of money doing something they supposedly love to do and they get made when they aren't making millions?
This article deals mainly with music theft, but in reality, all manner of digital information is finding ways to slip through industry fingers as media becomes cheaper and the internet becomes popular.
I once spoke to a Russian programmer on Odigo who claimed that he had never met anyone in Russia who had paid for windows; according to him, all copies he had ever seen were pirated.
Though I don't have anyone to bear testimony, a similar trend seems to be occuring in China as well. Not too long ago I remember an article posted right here on /. about Microsoft offering the Chinese government large sums of money to use Microsoft products (primarily in eduction, I believe) as well as attempt to crack down on high levels of piracy. Did China ever accept that money; was the deal even real? Though I never heard the end of that tale, the "Chinese government officially adopts linux" announcement came, ironically, shortly thereafter.
The bottom line is that people just won't pay for something if they can get it for free, be it software, music, or what have you. While piracy is not as blatant in America (ie you can't just walk into your local supermarket and buy pirated Windows CDs), the problem continues to escalate.
However, there is economic light being shed on the subject. As the article points out, it isn't destroying musicians, but just changing the way they operate. As record sales decline, artists need new sources for revenue (god forbid anyone should have to go out and actually play their music).
In software, there have always been little tricks to combat piracy, but they don't always work as well as intended. I believe that the software industry will be hurt by, and therefore change more drastically as a result of, piracy more so than the music industry.
The real question is, what changes are going to come about as a result of this fact? To me, only time will reveal the answer.
Couldn't an artist give away the music and make money from live performances and shooting commercials for Pepsi?
- keep all of the money and give none to the artist
- have an efficient distribution system, but one that does not promote enough new talent
- make it so that the musicians have to make most of their money by concerts and commercial sponsorships.
This is clearly not fair. In the United States, artists are protected by the member companies of the RIAA, whoyo.
What scares me about this though is that from what I know of the Chinese music scene, is it's pretty much all pop garbage. There is very little diversity in mainstream music as compared with what we have in the English speaking music scene. I hate the RIAA with a passion and I'd like to see them die a gruesome death. But I just hope that we don't end up with a music scene that is only fincially viable for boy bands & Britney Spears look alikes.
-- Knowledge shared is power lost. -- Aleister Crowley
1) deprive people of human rights
2) pirate music
3) ??????
4) PROFIT!
That would work better if you started with underwear.
Perhaps, 1) Underwear that deprives people of human rights
make sure you submit your story quick
go grab a story now, everyone cool is doing it !!!!
I think your point is excellent! It's the very same thing that leads to the bancrupty of NHL teams (too high salaries, tickets too expensive, etc.): the league is getting out of touch with the market. Who can afford 4*$100 tickets + parking and burgers to bring the family to a hockey-game? This might seem off-topic, but my point is this: a "rock-star lifestyle" is ridiculous any way you look at it. Also, why on EARTH do the Friends "actors" make ~$1M per episode?? This is what I'm talking about: overpay. Get real and be happy with a couple of hundred thousand dollars a year. That's many times more than what most of us make.
China is a country forced to deal with the reality of unchecked piracy of digital media products.
Those poor, poor babies, having to deal with the horrors of unchecked piracy! Thankgod for the conservative ascendency in the American government!
Are you suggesting that we actually start paying celebs what the're worth? You've got to be kidding!
While I would be filled with glee to see the RIAA and it's parasitic minons take the fall they so richly deserve, there are severely negative aspects to a culture that pirates everything, and pays for very little. The Chinese situation is a unique one in that the primary form of piracy is commercial - I perform a song, and tommorrow my work is being sold on the roadside for a slight markup over blank media. It's the situation before copyright existed - when musicians (like Beethoven) would write knockoffs of their own work at a fever pitch to beat out the guy down the street who was copying his stuff.
Basically, the scenario is diminishing returns where grubby knockoff businessmen with better promotional/distribution networks get to make money off the creative people... which is pretty much exactly the same situation witht the RIAA here, except that here it's legitimized in restrictive contracts that forbid competition.
What's the main difference? With the RIAA, they have an incentive to take care of their master works (master tapes, for film, master negatives) in order to profit from them in the future. The grubby merchant on the corner could give a rat's ass about preserving art/information - he's just out to make a buck, just like those bootleg T-shirt merchants you find at sporting events, and in downtowns everywhere.
In the end, what does this mean? It means that monopolies as we know them would be broken under the Chinese scenario. It also means that the focus would be on production, rather than milking assets. It also means that assets would be worth less than they would under the current system, which might make licensing information easier (faced with making something vs. making nothing, and losing control of the material anyways, I'd think they'd choose making something.)
This poses problems in that a devaluation in the asset means you can't borrow against it (one way companies expand is to leverage their existing library to buy other properties.) If your star dies (ie, Elvis), you can't bank on that property, because of all the ripoffs that will devalue any records/products you put out. This means a big shakeout in terms of overhead - no longer can you support lawyers on staff, etc.
It also depreciates intellectual capital - if you can't bank on the performance of a particular group, then they're worth less to begin with. Instead of getting $250,000 to do a deal, they get $25,000 to do a gig. I can't decide if this means that they'll use more or less marketing to sell product in the face of all that piracy... I'd say at a certain point, they'll just cut back and go local. If that's the case, then they have nothing to lose by opening up their back catalogs, because that material is no longer competing with their big acts, because there won't be any big acts anymore.
Arrgh. Basically, if the Chinese model happens here, a shitload of people will be laid off (some for the better - ie, bloodsucking lawyers and parasitic promo/marketing people, some for the worse - ie, recording engineers and packaging people.) For that reason alone, expect both artists and the existing business interests do whatever it takes to make sure widespread COMMERCIAL piracy stays illegal. As for widespread downloading, that's another issue entirely...
The music industry makes a killing in the U.S.
They support the artists that they think will be the most profitable and then overcharge for stuff like CD's (I mean, who actually believe the piece of plastic music is burned on is worth $13-15 a piece?).
Imagine a world where CD's only cost a few bucks and new artists were able to promote their music for free over music-sharing programs over the 'net.
You do realize that these "bands that only do their stuff for the money" are just going to work everyday like you or I. I am a professional musician and have played many a gig just to make money, not because I particularly liked the music I was playing. I definitely do not live the "rock-star lifestyle," but not one of us can say that all that money wouldn't be nice. We definitely can't blame these rich artist for enjoying their money. As far as the article goes, it seems like a good idea in general. Musicians get paid for appearances, companies license songs for ad campaigns, and, most importantly, record companies basically act as talent agencies. This is one model that the RIAA could look into. Most of these agencies skim a huge percentage off the top for booking gigs for artists. The record companies could make much more money from this method than their current model, which is probably why they aren't doing it yet. Easier to complain than change.
To be honest I don't listen to pop music at all. It's the auditory equivalent of "My Mother the Car". I am far more interested in music as art - and from what I've seen here China is failing miserably in producing anything that I would want to listen to.
I couldn't give a rat's behind whether or not the latest Devo album cost $2 or $20. But I do care if the music industry and where it is headed is going to make it impossible for me to get a DVD-Audio recording of the works of somebody who actualy making a real contribution music.
The prediction that the music industry is heading towards the current situation in China does not please me at all.
At least the "work for hire" relationship is clear.
Reminds me of way back when, when kings and other rich patrons paid for the music.
I just hope the RIAA doesn't come crashing down on this.
and not funny at all! Who says pop stars should be millionaires?
Recording is ultra cheap now with PC-based studios. Record your stuff, put it out on the net and make money charging for seats at a show. Let the masses decide to make you big instead of a label with deep pockets for payola.
'The financial effect is the same for record companies whether people get illegal compact disks for $1 on the street in China or download a song for free from the Internet in Europe,' said Jay Berman, chairman and chief executive of the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, a London-based group representing 1,500 record companies worldwide.
This is a pretty cheap shot and consistent with the music industries tendency to blame all their woes on downloaded music. Personally, I often "download a song for free" but if I like it, I buy it (although I know not everyone does). I doubt very much the Chinese buying pirated CDs then go and buy the genuine CD.
Read reviews of shopping cart software
"Where CD's only cost a few bucks instead of $13-15.
If you really look at the article all you really get out of it is that some artists expect to make a few hit songs and be able to live in luxury for the rest of their years off the millions they supposedly make. Whenever I hear artists complain about how they are suffering from the effects of piracy, I just laugh. They are making lots of money doing something they supposedly love to do and they get made when they aren't making millions?"
Well I certainly hope you never aspire to leave that minimumn wage job of yours. The American dream notwithstanding.
This article agreees with what David Bowie has been saying. The money (for most artists these days) is in the personal appearances (mainly concerts), not the royalties. It takes a HUGE-selling artist, or one who sells well to the non-downloading crowd, to get rich on royalties these days.
Still, I wonder about the 'intensive persnal appearances' this artist mentions. (Insert your own Natalie Portman jokes about the 'pirate my body' part).
"For Wang Lee Hom, that involved advertising campaigns and an intensive series of personal appearances.
"Until they pirate my body, I can rely on personal appearances," Wang said. "I am forced to view albums only as a promotional tool."
I weep when I read "Stars need to look elsewhere to finance the rock-star lifestyle." NOT. Impoverished singer whines she can't afford Vera Wang designer dresses anymore. Tough shit.
Poverty is the real source of piracy - furthermore bussiness strategies that work for people making 2$ a day will very likely not work for people making a 100$ a day and viceversa.
The Raven
I don't see this happening in the US any time soon. Information piracy is like the national pasttime over in China (Despite government control over the Internet, which shows how much that matters.) We're amateurs by comparison.
At the same time the damn RIAA needs to take a clue before stuff gets that bad over here. Gouge 19 dollars a CD? Don't think there is no alternative. I'd buy, if they were fairly priced, and I doubt I'm alone.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
You asshole loving shithead, why dont you go put a bullet in your head while masturbating to images of tubgirl blasting shit into goatse's ass
at only breif flickers in history has there been a middle class that could support the arts through small sales commerical routes. Troubadors may have made aa living but they were not stars, whose offerings were trades to others. Perhaps breifly in egypt there was a middle class. Perhaps briefly a few art centers, like venician glass makers held brief monopolies on desirabel art. but never for long.
it is only the rise of the ubquitous middle class, and a widespread media that has created the commerical conduits for art we have today. there is nothing to suggest these channels should or will be enduring. We as a generation or two grew up and thought these the norm but we were wrong.
To the extent that artistis are conduits of expression and the exchange of ideas, is this good or bad? its not clear. there are commmercial forces to tow the political norm on all artists whether they have patrons or must please the masses. Indeed one might claim that given the financial independence offerec by a patron is what frees the artist to challenge popular norms. You would not see many commercial artist these days advocating buttfucking small boys, but certainly many poets in greece spoke well of the idea. I know thats a bit gross, but I say it to make the point that stong ideas can come about when you dont have to please everyone.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Are you suggesting that we actually start paying celebs what the[y]'re worth?
Well... I don't think anyone here is *that* cruel. Besides, we have enough people on welfare in this country already.
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
So even if we enforced our own anti-piracy laws "China style", it wouldn't work?!
Hillary, you better start taking language classes. How do you say "I'm a total failure" in Chinese?
Chinese people might be free to copy and share music they enjoy with their friends? Unless it's political, then they shoot you and the band. Here they just put you in jail. How's that for killed dead?
Someone in China was complaining about having to work so hard? Say it ain't so! ''In China, we have to give so many concerts that we do not have time to rest our voices.'' It must be true.
My fingers are sore, and so are my sides.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
And the music just gets worse. There hasn't been much original music released since Nirvana and the Smashing Pumpkins broke in the early 1990s. It's not because the artists suck. It's because the record companies only invest in sugar-pop acts that are too watered down to be interesting. Is there a band that has artistic ingenuity or a political point? They won't get a contract, because the record company won't take a risk.
I'd pay about a dollar per song for a CD today. If I could find one I was interested in.
The whole music thing is overrated anyway. It's all just entertainment. In the end, you can get too much entertainment.
The big record companies have dug themselves into a deep hole. They're too big to release innovative or strongly artistic acts. They're too large and bulky to move nimbly. The giants are going to fall. Both music and art in general will be better for it.
I open a store and sell a million of "whatever" I get paid for a million of them, hence larger profits. A busy restaurant makes more money. I sell more books I make more money. I sell more software, or maybe if I am an accountant, my services are in demand.....the more people who want what I have to offer the more I make. The more I am rewarded.
But apparently if I sell a million records it's okay if I make squat while you pay diddly for something I created that you want.
It's funny how when a British company tried to sell some "linux source code" that they had used in a product of theirs that the community here cried out that they were breaking the Open Source copyright agreement. Yet when the topic of mp3's comes up the consensus seems to be that breaking the copyright laws are fine.
It's quite ironic.
"In the United States and Europe, stars have it easy if they make a hit record," said Han Hong, named best female artist this year at Channel V's China Music Awards, and whose renditions of Tibetan songs have become nationally popular. "In China, we have to give so many concerts that we do not have time to rest our voices."
Am I supposed to feel sorry? Since when is it news that musicians, for the most part, have always been largely poor? It's those "posers" and "fakes" that somehow strike it rich are now bitching. They've been a part of the "corporate pop" machines for so long that they've forgotten what it meant to be creative in the first place. They've been given songs to sing and now get paid to sing a song that someone else wrote just because teens these days need to hear a new song from the same old cookie-cutter pop star.
Let's get real people. Music is good this way, honestly. We want to be able to choose for ourselves who is and who isn't "in". I'm tired of the radios force-feeding me the same old shit. I want something new, fresh, or maybe not-so fresh. Something raw but honest is way better than a "polished" whore/hottie who can sing. It's about time the fans demanded honesty in a musician's musical expression. After all, music isn't about honesty, it's about one's unique interpretation of a song, genre, or otherwise. Music is about allowing those who truly love it to choose what they love. The musician is the one who must also love music enough to effectively stress how much appreciation he or she has for music. Let us all live well together and with music, we can all continue our sanity.
I bet the pirates making ship loads of bootleg CD's i'm sure have a pretty good clue to what's popular. What seems sensible here would be for China to mass produce a POS device that can register CD sales at pirate stores, the UK has a similar device handed out to stores that don't have electronic tills. The device can be cheapily mass produced and the music industry could sponsor usage to encourage pirate disk sellers to use the devices.
Not completely. The magic word is "recoupable." The record label gives you X amount of dollars to record your album, to hire outside players, to live on while you dedicate your life to music, etc. Usually they will say that this money is "recoupable." Recoupable how? Through record sales, mostly. Basically, whenever a record sells, the record companies takes your cut and puts it back toward your "debt."
However, this debt is not like a loan from the bank. If you end up never making enough money to pay back the full costs that you owe through record sales and the ilk, then that's it. Some guy in dark shades won't show up on your door asking you for more money, no bankruptcy, etc. The company eats the loss.
The real debt comes with long term deals. Let's say Band A records album 1. The album costs $20K to make. The band ends up making a cut of $15K on record sales. They're $5K in the hole. The record label could drop the band and just eat the $5K loss, but they tell the band that they want to do a second album (generally, the label has the option to force the band into another album or drop them at their free will). However, this time, since the band did ok last time, the label decides to spend a bigger budget on the band with hopes of a bigger return. Even though it has to eventually come out of the band's pocket, the record label will have a lot of say in how much gets spent. So Album 2 has a budget of $50K. The album goes out, the band recoups $30K back in record sales. So that's another $20K in the hole.
Since the company took an option for the second album, now they have to do a third album (options often come in pairs). They say "We're not wasting anymore money on this band than we have to since they're not recouping." They make a back-to-the-roots Album 3 with a $10K budget. The album is technically a hit. The band recoups $40K in record sales. But guess what? You still owe $5K from the first album, and $20K from Album 2. From your first hit record, you get a grand total of $5K. And now that you're a hit, the record label may not let you leave...
This starts a vicious perpetual cycle in which an artist can potentially NEVER see cash back from selling albums. If I had to personally say that there was a way to fix this system, I would say: spend less money on albums. Only sign naturally gifted talent and cultivate grassroots appeal rather than hiring talentless hack pairs-of-breasts and spending millions on their production fees. I'll bet John Mayer, who writes his own stuff and performs fairly simple music, saw some profits from his MTV hits, though I can't say for sure.
BTW, performance royalties for getting your song on the radio or performing live can never be used to recoup expenses for the album, partly because these are paid out by a different organization. This is why musicians usually need to perform to see any money for themselves. It's quite possible for a musician to make a half-decent living playing music while the label is losing money on him. If you walk up to a musician and tell him you paid to see his gig because you downloaded his music off the net, he may not be too peeved at you.
Libertarians somehow believe that private businesses should be stronger than governments but weaker than individuals.
Hmmm.. I wonder. The article doesn't seem to take an
objective tone. I would be interested in the flip side. Don't tell me there isn't one.
Warner Music soon plans to begin a talent search for members of a five-girl band to be called Mei Mei, with the winners signed up for a two-year contract to promote M&M candy.
The corporate sponsorship trend has already started here. M&M has already found their North American spokesman. It's all subliminal, baby.
-a
Of all the record companies out there, do any of them have the wherewithal to really skirt the problem? Specifically, do you think anyone will actually start to work towards a virtual star?
It's certainly not inconceivable now. You hire (on salary) an actor to provide a body-motion template for the mocap; you also hire (salaried) vocalists and songwriters to provide the music. Never let any of these people meet, keep their contracts separate. Real human backing bands are easy enough to hire. Also get yourself a floor full of Dicreet Logic stuff, and a fully outfitted music video soundstage, and you could basically render yourself a rock star.
It's funny - we talk about how backwards and tech-challenged the record companies are, because they cannot deal with the likes of P2P... it's almost inconceivable to imagine one of them taking the initiative like this. Well, one of the old ones, anyways....
If Jesus wants me it knows where to find me.
I wonder -- does the fact that shes singing "renditions of Tibetan songs" imply these songs are in the public domain? Are they infact "traditional" songs, as are some songs in the United States, wherein no royalties are paid to anyone, and can be in fact "pure profit"?
Wonder how the IP guys would feel, what with no innovation in the songwriting industry. Sorta like Disney et al.
Well as I pointed out. What will happen is a greater emphasis on the "physical" part of the wheel. Note the common element between the alternatives. That's right they all are in the "physical" realm. Sell this product, Sell that product. Even the concerts depend on the "physical" element. The part of the wheel that's not easily copied. Also if you read the article, there exist the possability of trading one master, for another. Remember the Music and Film industry wern't always the way they are.
Come on. I have known this ever since I witnessed a record company busted in New York and almost the same company in Cambridge in 1996. The whole store was raided for bootlegs. Where were they manufactured most commonly? All over the world. Rio, Portugal, Italy, South America to name a few. So few were from China, though there may have been recordings from there too.
George Bush is behind this. Bush hates China or has a grudge against the leaders (who are overly brutal, I admit it). He has said that Chinese "all look alike". I suppose if you've never been to the largest place on earth, you might think that. If your agenda is to make certain Chinese smoke and look sophisticated! So that your tobacco company stock will rise! Come on.
I suggest you read Slashdot
The record companies could make much more money from this method than their current model, which is probably why they aren't doing it yet. Easier to complain than change.
Ahh yes... the miraculous money making machine. It's amazing:
-a
No matter how rich or poor these Mega-Celebrities become, there is one thing you can't take away from them and that's millions of idolizing fans ready to hop_in_the_sack with them on sight. Pay me in poontang, I'll sing for my supper!
Everyone in this country is paid what the market will bear. EVERYONE.
Mac OS X and Windows XP working side by side to fight back the night.
Sorry, but it really gets to me when a "band" only does their stuff for the money.
You know what bugs me? When hookers only do it for the money. I remember when they used to do it for the crack.
But seriously, what does the
-a
No, everyone in India is paid what the market will bear. In America, we have unions.
Please note that this comment does not come down either for or against unions, it's just a statement of fact.
If you sell your records at $20 a copy, you will not sell a million of them. Anymore. But if you sell your records at $10 a copy, you might. And if you sell them at $5 a copy, it's that much more likely.
So, yes, you can get paid. But in the current economic environment, the substitute goods (Economics 101 terminology) mean that you can't charge monopoly rent for it anymore. That is to say, music downloaders would rather have the convenience of an audio CD than the poor audio quality of MP3, as long as the audio CD isn't priced too high. The current price of 15 to 20 dollars is too high.
As an alternative, put out a mega-album with 2-3 CDs, a big booklet filled with lyrics, photos, art, and interesting notes. Put it all in a quality sleeve/jacket/jewel case. If the music is decent, you could probably charge 35, 40, maybe 50 dollars for it.
The days of easy money for musicians, groupies, executives, and the rest are over. Period. No more cutting a record for five weeks that makes millions. From now on, if you want to be a musician, you're going to have to work for your money.
As for the musicians who still want unlimited money, furs, diamonds, private airplanes, giant mansions, and all the illegal drugs they can inject in their ears, from now on they're going to have to work a lot harder to get all that dough.
The real winner in this will be that art form known as music.
According to the article, Han Hong, named best female artist this year at Channel V's China Music Awards said:
"In China, we have to give so many concerts that we do not have time to rest our voices."
Maybe that's why Chinese pop singers have voices that sound like cats being scalded.
Having spent some time in Vietnam, Philippines, Thailand, China and India, I believe the model for young artists to follow in these countries is the Grateful Dead model. More and more kids are going online in Asia. China already has a good broadband infrastructure. Give away your music. Join with other artists to set up local gigs. I have seen some of the campus gigs in these countries. They are so much full of life. This region has such a large population (and geographically large). I am sure the artists can sustain themselves. All we need is some entrepreneurs to come up with localised event management companies.
Did you see this line?
As a result, Wu said, there are fewer than 20 professional-quality albums produced per year in China. This lack of large-scale music production inhibits the entry of talented newcomers.
Unbelievable! Granted China is a poor country, but with their population they must have millions of talented musicians. Yet only 20 professional albums are produced per year. I can't think of a sadder commentary on the effects of universal piracy. Let's hope we don't end up in the same state here in the West.
You clearly are not familiar with the laws of your own country. The intellectual property that you speak of... the stuff that's not 'ours'.. it doesn't belong to the artists who created it. Recording is done as a work for hire for one of the few huge corporations that control the flow of music from the artists to the listeners. Those impartial laws you speak of, they weren't concieved by some grassroots movement. No one marched for this shit. The laws were the results of lobying by the RIAA. The politicians we elected to protect our rights sold us out for Sony and Time Warner. Very little, if any of the money made by the average artist comes from royalties. If piracy were to become the accepted standard by which the public obtained their music, artists on average would actually make more money. Why? Because the primary source of their income(concerts/public appearances) would be increased by their increased exposure. Forget about the benefit to the public of not having the recording industry decide for us what is good. Copyright laws serve more to protect the corporate stranglehold than anything else. You seem to be a fan of capitalism, but we've failed to realize one of capitalisms most important goals: promote competition. Don't kid yourself, the RIAA and the MPAA are monopolies. When was the last time you saw a movie in the theater that wasn't produced by a member of the MPAA? When is the last time you heard a song on the radio that wasn't being marketed by a major record label? I say pirate until we have the option of buying from the people who actually made the music.
My Blog
I personally have paid for 3 software packages, and multiple artist who i have had fully functional copies of each. I did it soley because i had been using theire products(cracked) and thought they were so damn good i needed to pay. FOr music, ill generally chip in 5 bucks per album to fairtunes. And i always try to contribute to paypal tipjars, i tend to read webcomics extensively, and am quite happy contributing a couple of bucks a month, at random.
WHY? Because unlike most people i dont think someone else will take care of it. I know it comes doewn to ME ponying up the cash to continue womething i enjoy. Feel free to ignore th rest of this post as its mostly a rant.
Why do i do this? I goes back to something my father taught me. Whenever you see an accident, or a fire or something like that, call it in YOURSELF. DOnt expect someone else to do it, Everyone else is expecting the same thing. "Oh, the house is on fire, im sure someone called it in." Nope. ME. The buck stops here. I report fires, fender benders, stranded cars and i always try to look and find out the source of the screaming, because it comes down to me. The same thing applies to downloaded things, and music. Did i pay for the copy of bryce 3d i downloaded and used once? No. becaue 500 bucks for something i toyed with once is stupid. Did i pay for the app that i downladed compelet wit hcrack and have used everyday for a year and can afford? HEll yes. If i cant or wont pay the full price for somehtin, i send them something. Or in some cases i WONT. THe last microsoft product i bought was flight simulator 1.0 back in 1990. I WILL NOT give those assholes money.
This is a great example of how piracy is ultimately good for music in general. Fans get more opportunities to see their favorite artists live at concerts, they get to buy CD's at a reasonable $1.80, and the artists still make a profit. Ever better, the artists make less money than before, resulting in more good music being produced before the money ruins the talent.
Music is a calling, not an industry. Thank heavens the record companies are being squeezed out. Now a musician can reach his audience without being shrink-wrapped first.
The piracy of music in China is really ridiculous. My friend wanted to collect all of Faye Wong's CDs while in China, but ended up quiting after realizing that half of the CDs were just random assortments of her songs with (sometimes) new cover art.
We as voters have given up essential liberty. We hoped to purchase a little temporary safety. We in fact deserve neither
Hmm, best reason yet I've heard for socialism. If we had that kind of scheme in the US, maybe Celine Dion would have stayed in Canada. Maybe Briney Spears would go to Hong Kong.
What can you say? After decades of the abuse of consumers by the RIAA and the record companies production of 'pop' stars, the crows are coming home to roost.
/. knows about karma. I guess RIAA is in for an education.
When they (recording industry) continue to make ever-unreasonable demands on us (the consumers) how much longer do they think we will put up with it? Just like open source, the will of the masses will become reality.
It's sad that in the China example, artists again get the shaft by the recording companies, blamed on 'pirates' (or is that terrorist? I'm no longer certain.)
Everyone on
"You're gonna need a bigger boat." - Chief Brody
I couldn't give a rat's behind whether or not the latest Devo album cost $2 or $20.... But I do care if the music industry and where it is headed is going to make it impossible for me to get a DVD-Audio recording of the works of somebody who actualy making a real contribution music.
Are you suggesting that Devo isn't contributing to our musical heritage? Or were you just saying that you'd be willing to pay any sum for their new album? Or perhaps you meant that their contributions are more literary than musical. That I could understand.
I'm a speed racer and I drive real fast;
I drive real fast - I'm going to last.
I'm a pirate and a like to kill.
I like to steal, so here's your bill.
Let's not stir that bag of worms...
The Rolling Stones Australian tour sold goodwill, and fair priced tickets. Public rewards em by buying, and playing to kids - endurance factor. compare with 16 year old one hit 3 year max wonders
The problem with the "rock-n-roll" lifestyle is that people are fed up with supporting it: if they want to listen to something they might as well download it (pirate it! argh!) because the product is not worth the price when it could be had for free. This isn't a "class warfare, these people make too much and hold us peons down" problem - this is a failing business model that isn't keeping up with the times (think: buggy whips).
That still does not give you the right to take it for free because you don't want to spend the "mythical" $20 for it. If you don't want to spend what they're charging, do the fuck without the product. But don't steal the product and tell me everything is fucking sunshine and roses.
It's intensly hypocritical to condemn copyright infringement when it suits you (GPL Violation) and condone it when it get's you something you want for free (Downloading MP3's)
What decade are you living in? Have you heard the new New York Dolls album?
Behold. In the minor labels is competition; in competition is quality.
Hmm, well, the music experience in China/Hong Kong is slightly different. Virtually all the music is pop, and while many of the artists are quite talented, they are essentially interchangable. All they have to differentiate themselves is the amount of style, flash, noise, etc they can generate. This implies a certain lifestyle, which costs a lot of money.
You bring up a good point that our current system is relatively new and seems to allow the middle class to shape the culture. That sure seems like a good thing.
Many seem to fear that a model like what is happening in China strengthens Corporatism because they would likely be the most common patrons. So we would end up with all 5 girl groups called "Mei Mei" performing songs which extoll the virtues of M&M candy. But don't we already have that? Look at Britney Spears and the Pepsi commercials. But patronage isn't the only way to make money under a free distribution system. Endorsements would be another way. Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods didn't get rich by being sponsered to play sports. In the same way, popular musical artists could become fabulously wealthy.
I think true artists, even the starving ones, can survive under such a system but they need something in return for the loose distribution of their works, if nothing else then at least name recognition. What if an electronic signature could be worked into the data format not to use for restriction but for positive identification. If free distribution were allowed then consumers would have no reason to strip that information off. This header could contain copyright, license, and contact info, the date of the performance, and the names of the patrons who paid for the performance thus freeing it for everyone.
PS. In regards to your sig, in Fascism the government controls industry but in Corporatism government is controlled by industry.
Pssst...the reason your hear so much bad advice is because there's essentially two things one needs to understand in order to construct a viable system. Be it a form of government, or an economic system. People and the world. If you look around at all the people saying "those rich musicians are getting what's coming to them", then you compare that to the reality, and you go, hmmm. GIGO in action.[1] And the other part, the human part. A lot of people seem to be confused there. But I'm not too hard on people about that, because that's the hardest part.[2] ;)
:(
[1] If people are saying so and so, is true about such and such, ask them were did they get that particular impression? TV, magazines, radio, talking with the actual person? Walking a mile in their shoes?
[2] But at least you think they would make the effort.
Americans enjoy much more freedom to innovate and achieve their own dreams then those in Communist China, and mainly it is because of impartial and fair laws
You spoiled son of a bitch...
Yeah, mod me down I can take the karma hit, I want the karma hit. Anonymous cowards piss me off. And that one got modded UP for this nausiating trolling...I'm hoping that the modding down will come from the same moderators that upped that twisted fuck's post.
Fair and impartial? How drunk are you? The DMCA is fair and impartial? The tax cuts for the disgustingly rich are fair and impartial?
the Soviet commisars, where wealth is stolen from those who are capable and worthy and forcibly redistributed to the benefity of the lazy and dishonest.
You arrogant bastard.
You lying, dishonest, hypocrite! I'm choking on my own rage here!
Yeah, Lance Bass deserves his millions of dollars more than the men, women and children who worked 10h days in sweat shops to make his shoes! They are so damn lazy! Working themselves to death just so they can scrounge enough money to keep their children barely fed and clothes! How dare they not pay as much as his highness demands for his crappy music?
I'll be modded down as troll or flamebait for loosing my temper, but fuck it. I would jam dollar bills down your throat until you choked if I ever got the chance. You don't deserve the air you breath if you're going to pollut it so when you talk.
Someone needs to show you true pain and suffering, to get you out of your ivory tower and make you smell the sweat and the blood that the poor have to shed to make people like you so damn comfy.
Sure, the extravagance of some pop stars may lead some with a Marxist bent to argue that they don't "deserve" their wealth
Call me names all you want (Marxist? I do have a goatee...) but britney spears does NOT deserve her money. She works hard? Well so do many other whores, and they don't make as much money as her! Sure she got a better deal (duh!), all she does is tease the Johns and they give her cash without her ever needing to deliver the goods. Most other whores don't get that chance; they do it the old fashioned way. Her pimp is better than most pimps, but he doesn't deserve his cash anymore than that little bra stuffer does.
Are you so totally devoid of basic human decency that you really think that Ozzy deserves his wealth more than any other burned out drug addict with a bit of musical talent? You think that most LSD horror story deserve to slowy rot while their unemployability prevents them from earning a living, but that one married into money (he did, Sharon's dad was quite wealthy), so he deserves it?
he fact is that in a market economy, merit is rewarded with wealth
FUCK YOU
What kind of god-given bullshit are you using to justify that insane bit of rationalisation?
99% of people with money never did anything to merit that money, they were born with it. No, being born into money does not merit immense wealth.
The french had it right in 1789: Cut off their heads.
The very rich do NOT deserve or merit their wealth. They kill and lie and cheat to get it. They get liposuctions while other starves.
They
make
me
sick.
No, I'm no red commie, I don't think that a bureaucracy would be better equipped to manage the mind-boggling riches that vast industrial nations can generate, yes, I enjoy freedoms. Including freedom to earn and spend varying amounts of money. Yes, some people are lazy, and some are freeloaders...but povrety and lazyness are VERY DISTINC ISSUES. Don't you DARE tell me that there are no rich freeloaders out there...don't you dare.
merit is rewarded with wealth, and the motive for any person to work hard is the possibility of this reward.
You disgust me.
No, no and no. I have done very hard work in the past for the sole purpose of benefiting others. I give my time to charities, I volunteer and do hard work, not only for money (gotta eat, gotta work to get the money to eat), but also to help my fellow human beings. Why? Because I know I'm incredibly lucky to have been born in a rich country where its possible to do hard work for good money, and I want to be at least a tad helpfull to others who might be doing hard work for bad money...or for good. I just like to help people (and unlike you, I don't mind if I get nothing in return, a good action is its own reward...sometimes).
Money can be a great motivator, but to worthwhile persons it is not the only one. To sleezy jerks like you it is, but I don't think of people with such low morals as yours as human. More like meatbags (spoiled meat).
Lazy people might have gotten that way by being born in a world where no matter how hard you try, you'll never get out of the hole you're in. Maybe they got a learning disability and never got diagnosed because the fucking bastard of a doctor wouldn't see him without first seeing the green stuff? Maybe? Huh? Maybe a billion other stories like that...
You can't take the sky from me...
Well, if absolutely no one is going to say, I guess I will:
.
"you cannot condone pirating or downloading music, even if the piece of crap pop musicians getting taken arn't worth the lint from my bellybutton, because *sigh* stealing is wrong."
If some backdoor boy sings "baby-girl-baby" over and over again, and all your little daughters run out and buy it, then they deserve the money. The basis of capitalism is that your ability to make money is limited only by the demand for your product. If you want it, buy it. If you don't . .
shut the hell up already.
This almost makes me not want to download 10 albums a day every day like I have been doing for the past 2 years. You know with the artist suffering and all, but then again who gives a shit? no one forced them to sing.
Ummm, I really like stealing music and . . .
ummm . . . the artists are getting the money the should be so . . . therefore the obvious conclusion is that if I just continue to steal their music . . . somehow they will then eventually get paid their due share.
Does that about summarize your argument?
Fucking mind boggling.
goombah99 wrote:
> coroporate sponsorship of media is the norm if you take
> a historical view. Indeed for all known history the arts
> have been almost exlusively supported by patrons not
> the masses
Yep, if you ignore most of the entire history of music from the first flutes 10,000 years ago (how much support from royalty does it take to poke a few holes in a bone one winter's day when one is back from hunting and bored?). Sure the royals hired a few musicians to live in the lap of luxury (as long as their heads were allowed to remain intact). But the rest of the world's music is folk music: music of the people.
From the songs of the hunt in the distant past, to religious hymns, to the songs in taverns and inns all over the world; songs of the sea, songs in the fields, songs in the evening when the work is done (and TV yet uninvented). Songs on May Day (which the kings and especially the priests hated), songs at war, songs of slaves in southern fields longing to be free. From almost every time, nation, and creed (save those believing music to be of the devil), from slaves, serfs, peasants, and commoners, music is the near universal expression of the human heart.
Far from requiring royal patronage, even slaves could make music, with or without their master's consent. How do you think Spirituals came about? No royal patronage or lap of luxury there, only cruel inhumanity that should have never been allowed in the first place.
> To the extent that artistis are conduits of expression and
> the exchange of ideas, is this good or bad? its not clear.
Well, if you are trying for a repressive government or a commercial monopoly, those things might be considered bad. But normally expression and exchange of ideas are good. That's why the US has a First Amendment.
> there are commmercial forces to tow the political norm
> on all artists whether they have patrons or must please
> the masses.
There are commercial forces only where art is commercialized. Otherwise, I can sing as I please.
> Indeed one might claim that given the financial
> independence offerec by a patron is what frees the artist
> to challenge popular norms.
Good King So and So is mighty particular with his music, and will take your head off if you do not please him. Pepsi will fire, and perhaps sue, you if your "act" does not conform to corporate image. I'm not feeling the freedom here.
> You would not see many commercial artist these days
> advocating ########ing small boys, but certainly many
> poets in greece spoke well of the idea.
You are not going to see most sane, intelligent people, in public, advocating the commission of a crime (sexual abuse) against children.
> I know thats a bit gross,
A bit?!?
> but I say it to make the point that stong ideas can come
> about when you dont have to please everyone.
A) "Strong ideas" are like Dr. King's "I have a dream" speech. What you mentioned was a disgusting and reprehensible idea, which I can do without.
B) I can sing anything I please. A recording artist with a major label, or a Chinese artist representing a corporation had better please their label/sponsor, or the money will stop.
"They bind our hearts: 'Let's sell them again and again!'
Our plan understands the sea; we can wait for her coming."
From the song "Infanto no Musume" in the Japanese version of "Mothra" (1961).
I notice that the article didn't suggest that the record companies lower their prices to match that of the pirated CD's---though one singer was doing just that. After all if the pirates can somehow make a profit why can't the legit record companies? The only difference is the cost to produce the music in the first place. Both then have to make the CD's and distribute them.
Guess the record companies aren't interested unless they can make obscene profits.....
To me what it comes down to is does someone have the right to create, distribute, and claim ultimate control over all subsequent uses of a thing. The thing being a song, a computer program, a book, a thought, ...
I don't thing they do. People should have the right to do whatever the hell they want to with the things they buy. If someone wants to stop someone from sharing a thing with their friends and cutting into their profits, they'd better figure out how to lock that thing up or hire some goons to follow people around and make sure they follow their rules... Oh, wait. That's kinda what the RIAA is trying to do...
Who says I don't have a right to listen to, look at, or read whatever the hell is out there for me to see? The law? Just because something is the law doesn't mean it is the truth.
If I sing a song, do I have the right to force people to plug their ears because they didn't pay to listen? They are putting the stuff out there, they either need to figure out a way to control it or adapt to a new model of doing business. Hopefully they don't end up convincing those goons.
"that one man's gain is another man's loss."
This is a misleading phrase. It seems simple enough on the surface: if I have my property, then clearly you don't have it. However, life is not the zero-sum game it appears to be. I don't own the high-rise I work in, but I still get some benefits of its existance because my employer pays rent to the owners. I don't own the apartment I live in, the restaurants I eat at, or the radio stations I listen to. The people who own these things, are millionares on paper, and may even live a lavish livestyle, but I'm benefiting from their investments too even though I don't own their property.
Wealthy people don't sit around on piles of food and clothing laughing at the poor people who can't afford them. They re-invest their wealth in whatever way will grow it the fastest. Sometimes they even spend it.
It's true that when you pay $100 for a hockey ticket that you don't have that $100 anymore, but it's not true that you don't get $100 worth of enjoyment or SOMETHING out of it, otherwise you wouldn't pay it. If you don't get more than $100 worth of whatever from it, don't make the transaction. The real growth in an economy stems from the fact that normal transactions benefit both parties. The goods and services exchanged are worth more to the parties who recieved them than to the parties who paid them.
So, "one man's loss is another man's gain" only applies when the transaction is not voluntary for both parties. This is called stealing, and it requires force or deception, both of which are illegal except when practiced by the government or those with good enough lawyers.
Don't be jealous just because some people can afford to live the rockstar lifestyle. Remember to separate the ends from the means. Being rich is not destructive, stealing is.
lol that's good
:)
"Wang said, "It frustrates my life and destroys China's creative future."
There goes ol' wang, destroying creativity again.
come on up, you hoser.
The "Friends" actors get a million of dollars per episode because the television network makes several tens of millions of dollars selling advertising on that show.
... er, I mean, "my" ... money on.
So the better question is, perhaps, why the hell any advertiser would pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to advertise on "Friends."
And perhaps the best question is to ask why we support companies that waste so much money advertising their products on cheezy-ass shows like "Friends."
(My excuse: I don't watch television, so I have absolutely no idea what the companies I support are wasting their
--
Don't like it? Respond with words, not karma.
Ummm... Yeah. I remember the last strike by the union employees at my local McDonald's.
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
Leave it to slashdot to try to put a positive spin on an anti-piracy article. Musicians and record labels shouldn't have to struggle because people pirate their music. Of course this is ok in China. That's the nature of socialism. History and reason both show that socialism is doomed to fail. Let's not take cues from societies that steal the freedom of the individual for the good of society.
Vote for Pedro
What gives you the right to dictate other's motives for making music? People should have the right to profit from their work. Otherwise, you're saying their work is worthless. By priating a song you are saying to the artist, your song is owrthless, so I am taking it and giving you nothing. In capitalist systems, this is theft. Trade occurs only when the producer and consumer reach mutually agreed upon terms for the exchange of goods and services.
Vote for Pedro
I am an ever-struggling student of China, and am continually amazed by the quality of music I hear coming out of the Beijing rock scene. Beijing is without doubt one of the most vibrant places for cutting-edge rock and roll, perhaps because no one expects to get rich off CD sales. Even relatively old artists like Cui Jian are still producing great music.
Western record producers can gripe about piracy all they want, but it is simply a fact of life in China, and not just in music. A friend recently gave me a VCD of "Hero" - the new Zhang Yimou / Jet Li film. It is clearly a pirated copy, but is so visually stunning I plan to see it in theaters when I hit Beijing in two weeks (I don't know when it is scheduled to be released here....).
Realistically though, until someone explains to me why Chinese popular music is BETTER in quality and inventiveness than the stuff being played on MTV, I'll remain suspicious of arguments that tight copyright controls provide for better end-products.
p.s. Anyone hunting for good Chinese music should definitely check out Cui Jian. There was a really good documentary on China on PBS about a week ago that can be viewed here. It has a pretty decent soundtrack as well.
That's why anyone who can sell one million albums gets a platinum record embossed by the RIAA.
Michael Jackson is the only artist to go platinum many numbers of times. "Thriller" sold over 21 million copies, a world record.
An average band sells maybe 1/5th of that # of copies if they are famous.
Super Mario Bros. 3 is special because it sold almost 8 million copies of that game in the individual package and in the collections (source). It's very rare that games actually sell that many, and the recording industry is supposed to clear more titles because the albums themselves are usually 1/4th the cost of a video game.
So, no, there is no such fiction as a large number of sales which allow anyone to survive on the small fraction of a royalty they actually receive from one purchase.
--
Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
Making a sale is all about deception and force. Visit your nearest used car lot, Circuit- City, etc. and chat with a sales-puke for awhile. I'll bet at some point the sales person bends the truth. It is too easy to justify a transaction because the consumer made the decision to purchase the product. Selling has been become a science. Consumers don't stand a chance against merchants. I don't know how many times I've groaned at a commercial because of ridiculous claims. I know that somewhere in fine print is the "legal truth" which protects the company from lawsuit. So I'm cynical and don't buy the claims and so is most of the population. Big deal, it just takes that 1% to make it all worth it for merchants. So is it the job of the consumer to wade through all the B.S tossed at them and discover the truth? I don't think so. Sales tactics need to be regulated far more than they are. But nobody wants to mess with business.
I'm all for successful companies and individuals. What I'm not for is screwing your neighbor. I will probably never be rich because I like to apply this simple principle: When doing business, treat everyone like your best friend/mother/whatever. If you wouldn't sell it to your mother for that price, don't sell it to anyone. I'm convinced that the majority of rich people don't apply this principle.
Somebody was willing to give Lance Bass his millions of dollars for his crappy songs. I'm not sure what his infraction is. Is it his job to stoop in the gutter beside you to clothe the starving children of some starving parent somewhere? I'm sure you're a very kind person, but I don't want my children to have anything to do with someone who will fly so far off the handle every time someone posts anonymously.
Call me names all you want (Marxist? I do have a goatee...) but britney spears does NOT deserve her money. She works hard?
This notion that someone doesn't deserve their money because you said so is just ridiculous. She works hard enough to convince someone to give her some cash, just like anyone else. What do you want her to do, just not accept a check because it's too much and she's not working hard enough? Feel free to disagree with me here, but I know for certain that you would do no different.
And goatees suck!
The very rich do NOT deserve or merit their wealth. They kill and lie and cheat to get it. They get liposuctions while other starves.[sic]
Once again, it's nobody's job to decide who gets the wealth of the very rich. I can only assume that you have a computer. Even if you don't, most of the people I know do, and we didn't get them by lying, cheating, or (ha!) killing babies. I have a lot more than I need, as does anyone with the time to post on ./, and the notion that it's my fault that it's a terrible world where people die; well, fuck it.
So if they had just co-opted the napster, business model, and sold songs for $.25 - $.50 based on quality, there would be a future for the record companies.
Stupidheads!
Unions are part of the market, too. As is everything, in the big picture.
The article says that the result is that there are no more than 20 commercial quality albums per year produced in a country with more than four times the population of the US.
Maybe musicians will still find another reason to play, but unless you're in the audience when they do you'll have to satisfy yourself with recordings made by someone with a smuggled in walkman recorder who was.
"Those who have never entered upon scientific pursuits know not a tithe of the poetry by which they are surrounded."
It was crap. A bunch of Chinese posers whining how they don't have the money to snort an 8 ball a day like Kid Rock.
A bunch of people whining through the whole fucking article. Don't read it. Read some scientific journal about radiation or electricity. Skip this som'bitch.
finally!!
The only reason actors gets paid more is because they are the part people can see and idiots can idolize. I'm not saying good actors cannot be paid more then bad actors. But they are still only doing a job. Why should you pay them more because you can see them.
Finally, a good story can make a mediocre actor famous, but a good actor cannot do the reverse. Tell me why the mediocre actor should get paid more then the good one? Because he's lucky?
And goatees suck!
/. account's records to verify that fact. But I'll spare you the trouble: I have a mac and it is my precioussss.
./, and the notion that it's my fault that it's a terrible world where people die; well, fuck it.
Its not like its a tatoo...
This notion that someone doesn't deserve their money because you said so is just ridiculous.
Your logic does not ressemble our earth logic.
She doesn't deserve the money, not because I said so, but because unfair prices and wages were had all around. I'm pointing out the obvious, and its only due to a shared dellusion that others do not see it as such.
She works hard enough to convince someone to give her some cash, just like anyone else.
Indeed, and she's very good at what she does.
And thanks to her hard work, others who are also very good at what they do get to make money doing what they do (printing album covers, making sexy stage costumes, etc). But she doesn't deserve all the millions. Others who are equally talented and hard working (and who don't deserve millions anymore than her) deserve shares of those millions that she hogs for herself quite selfishly. But she works hard at the hogging, and she's good at the selfishness.
I'm not sure what his[Lance Bass] infraction is.
I grok his wrongness. Maybe in time you will too.
Once again, it's nobody's job to decide who gets the wealth of the very rich.
Tell that to their accountants.
Its allways someone's job to decide how to spread the wealth, the question is accountability, greed and fairness. We disagree on those, but I'll call you a blundering retard if you keep pretending that no one is paid to make those choices.
I can only assume that you have a computer.
No, you could spend sometime going through my
I have a lot more than I need, as does anyone with the time to post on
I have more than I need, but less than I want.
Well, the sheer overwhelming pain of the world is too much for anyone to bear, so I get why we resort to self-induced delusions. Ignorance is bliss. But to actually revel in it is obscene. If I was given millions, I wouldn't give it all away to charity, but I would be a much better tipper.
The thing is, I do what I can to make the world a better place (I pick up other people's trash, smile politely, and make people laugh (again, check out my many +4funny)), and it sickens me when others willingly make the world a worse place.
Is it his job to stoop in the gutter beside you to clothe the starving children of some starving parent somewhere?
I don't think that's anyone's job.
I don't want everyone to be dirt poor. I want people to stop engaging willingly and conciously in actions that profit from or create abject povrety.
I don't mind that Lance Bass makes a living off getting prebuscent girl's panties wet (well, I do, but its all consensual and shit, so live and let live I say...at least he's not touching them...as far as I know). I mind that he is a tool of a much greater wealth that does this willingly, on purpose, and with great effort, in order to get themselves and their friends so rich that they need to pay lots of other people to figure out exactly how mind-bogginly rich they are. Its greed in action. Unchecked, uncontrolled, unbalanced greed. Its an abuse of power, and to top it off their schemes require total public exposure, wich means I'm exposed to that stuff against my will.
If they had limited financial ressources they could not afford to hound me like that, and the world would be a better place for you and me.
What do you want her to do, just not accept a check because it's too much and she's not working hard enough?
I know she works hard, I never said otherwise. She's good at what she does too.
And I can't ask her to do something I couldn't. If I was offered that dough to do something I'm good at, I'd take it. It does bother me that that dough is in the hand of a few soft-core porn publishers that call themselves by other names. It does bother me that the sheep commonly refered to as "the public" take part in this, but what bothers me most is the rationalisation that its a good thing. It is not. It is, has been and will continue to be, but its not good. Capitalism has its good sides, and should not be thrown out the window. It is, however, deeply flawed and will have to give way to something better (or worse) at some time.
Communism has its good sides too (they build their machines to last, not to break down within 5 years to be replaced by newer models), but its past and current forms are even worse than our capitalism (not allways, but often), so I don't want it here. But its profoundly stupid to throw THAT away too because it didn't quite work on the first try (and second and third...at some point someone might get it right, wait and see).
you have a computer. Even if you don't, most of the people I know do, and we didn't get them by lying, cheating, or (ha!) killing babies.
Lies.
You had to tell countless lies to get your computer. Most of wich were probably worded as "have a nice day", but even a ritualised politeness is a lie when you don't mean it. Its just a socially required, accepted and normalised lie. Don't mean that it was true everytime you said it (I say it to people I would gladly watch break their bones sometimes).
Honesty is in short demand, and even shorter supply.
I'm sure you're a very kind person, but I don't want my children to have anything to do with someone who will fly so far off the handle every time someone posts anonymously.
I can be very kind, or very cruel. Depends on the circumstances.
And you can go and count the number of times I've done that. You'll see its very rare.
Its not the anonimity that launched me off the handle, its the...well, read it again, I was quite clear on what got me mad. The cowardise was just icing on the cake.
You can't take the sky from me...
Who the hell said I was pirating any music?
;)
The majority of bands I listen to are live and local , basically just because that's the kind of music that I like and I like feeling the whole atmosphere of going to a gig. I'm not talking a pop gig where they real off a ton of songs, dance and have pyrotechnics. I'm talking where the band get to know the audience, get them to buy drinks etc
It just annoys me when the pop stars whinge because they're not getting enough money. Oh, come off it. You have more money than I'm likely to make in the next ten years!
There's a difference between making a buck and making a hell of a lot of buck.
I think the money paid to so-called 'artists' could be much better spent.
Branson Missouri calls itself the "Live Music Capital of the World". They have more than 30 theaters and over 60 shows. Many of the theaters are owned by the musical performers. You may not have heard of it because it is primarily a mecca for country music and not pop or rock. I think a place like Branson can succeed even if music is freely downloadable or sold at cost on CDs.
Some mega-rockstars complain that their major tours simply break even. That is probably true for some stars who have large entourages and extensive light-video shows. But a fixed theatrical location saves significant amounts of money. The rotund version of Elvis made millions singing in Las Vegas. The Branson model probably will not work for all genres of music, but music creation and innovation will continue even without CD sales.
I open a store and sell a million of "whatever" I get paid for a million of them, hence larger profits. A busy restaurant makes more money. I sell more books I make more money. I sell more software, or maybe if I am an accountant, my services are in demand.....the more people who want what I have to offer the more I make. The more I am rewarded.
:)
:p
;)
To be honest, I have no problem with you working to make a fortune
It's these manufactured bands that the UK scene is rife with at the minute, they don't write their own songs, they don't really perform live and they're as replacable as a ink cartridge. Why the hell should they be paid millions of pounds for standing on a stage when there are more important people such as police, doctors and fire who get paid a hell of a lot less?
But then agian, that would be in a fair world
Excuse the ranting
Because they're the actor and 'who cares about a writer?' Basically.
I would paraphrase this to make it my own, but the original pretty much explains it the best. From the Straight Dope:
What Michael Jackson bought for $47.5 million in 1985 was the publishing rights to 159 or 251 Beatles songs, depending on who's counting. To maybe oversimplify a complicated business, publishing rights are basically the sheet music rights. When Paul McCartney wanted to print the lyrics to "Eleanor Rigby" and other Beatles classics in the program for his 1989 world tour, he discovered he'd have to pay a fee to Michael Jackson. The owner of the publishing rights (hereinafter the publisher) also gets a royalty when someone plays a Beatles song on a jukebox or the radio or does a cover version of a Fab Four tune. Particularly in the case of elevator music, to which, let's be frank, a lot of Beatles tunes are well suited, this can earn the publisher some serious cash.
But there are a couple things the publisher can't do. The first is to mess with, or license the use of, Beatles recordings. Michael Jackson agreed to license the words and music of "Revolution" to Nike for a 1987 shoe commercial, but he had to persuade Capitol Records, owner of the tune's North American recording rights, to allow use of the actual record. Most likely he'd have to do the same to overdub said record with his own voice, although he might get away with including a snippet in a musical collage, something even John Lennon did that has now become impossible to control.
Another thing the publisher can't do (in the U.S. at least) is prevent somebody from recording a cover version of a song the publisher owns. Usually the would-be cover artist and the publisher work out a deal on royalties. However, if negotiations fail, U.S. law allows the cover artist to make and market the recording anyway provided he pays a stipulated (and fairly stiff) royalty to the publisher.
The point is, being a publisher doesn't give you all that much control over the songs you own; mainly it gives you the right to the profits they earn. You don't even get to keep all of that; typically you have to give 50% to each song's composer(s), one reason not to feel too sorry for Paul McCartney and the estate of John Lennon. Another reason is that McCartney, despite having gotten skunked out of his own songs, contrived to buy the rights to 3,000 others, including the Buddy Holly catalog, and reportedly is worth $600 million. Not that he's happy, of course. Paul's mad at Michael Jackson not merely because he lost control of the Beatles library but also because Jackson won't discuss giving McCartney a higher composer's royalty for the old tunes.
The last reason not to feel sorry for Paul is that if he got skunked it's his own fault. In the 60s, to avoid confiscatory British taxes, he and Lennon turned their publishing rights over to newly-organized Northern Songs, a publicly-held company in which they owned sizable but apparently not controlling blocks of stock. In 1969 music mogul Lew Grade launched a takeover bid for Northern Songs in which he offered seven times the stock's original offering price. Lennon and McCartney, feuding as usual, were unable to organize an effective defense and the company was sold out from under them. This made them even more fabulously wealthy than they already were, since their stock was now worth seven times as much. However, they were still pissed on account of, you know, the principle of the thing. The Teeming Millions can surely sympathize.
Bloody hell, why do you people not understand that Slashdot has a lot of posters with conflicting opinions?! Fucking hell, how hard is it to realise that the people condeming Castle may not be the ones condoning copying music?
Most of these people will be out of work eventually. It is the collapse of an entire industry. There will, I predict, be less musicians making less money. No more session musicians as the potential upside to a pop record is having zeros lopped off. No more full time engineers. No more expensive German microphones and Nieve consoles.
Pop music will probably get better (it can't get worse than 2003) but there will be a lot less of it, and much of it will be made by part-timers who mess around with hard drive recording.My hope is all these unemployed media people (as publishing and advertising are going down the drain) learn linux and start writing open source software and make sure they never buy software without immediately distributing it on a p2p. I see Adobe going the way of Warner Bros Records.
Physics is like sex: sure, it may give some practical results, but that's not why we do it.
...as what happened in the US.
They will rip off everybody else's intellectual property while they are developing, and then impose their own draconian copyright/patent laws when they have something to protect.
And of course, once these laws are enforced, they will sit back, and not bother to release any decent stuff.
None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.
Did you look at how much they said they were charging? Doing the math, the prices quoted by Han Hong: 70 yuan -> $8.40, and she's whining about having to slash her prices to 15 yuan ($1.80).
I'm no expert on China, but it's my understanding the average monthly income is about the equivalent of $100. Would you really pay almost 10% of your monthly income for one CD? What if they charged $200 per CD in the US? How many do you think they'd sell????
Writers are inherently more replaceable than actors. If you change the writer, nobody notices, and there's nearly as big a pool of wannabe writing talent in Hollywood as there is wannabe actors. If you change the "star", that's unavoidably noticeable and might be the kiss of death to the show. People can demand $1M per episode on a show that brings in much more because both they and the production company can do the math on that one.
Yes I do.
Love,
Mariah
We really need your help
http://www.gofundme.com/help-sherry
this thread is about the funding and sponsor ship of music. anyone is free to make their own music. this thread is about the contrast in funding of artists by various channels: sales of music, endoresments, patronage, corporate sponsorship and commisioned word. Your response is only considers people making their own music and has nothing to do with funding. next time read the freakin article. but please do continue singing what you please.
I like your comment about my sig. But of course you are arguing with mousilini, and he ought to know fascism when he seems it.
It seems that in the first part of your post, you are saying that economics are fair, and I agree with you there.
But then you go on to justify the music industry because it creates/sustains jobs. I don't know why just because a market creates jobs, it is thought of as a good thing economically.
The heroin market creates jobs. But not only is that normally considered not good for society, it's not even good for the economy. Heroin users can be assumed to be less productive members of the workforce, if they work at all. Also, they are more inclined to steal money from other people to buy heroin.
The same way that we don't buy a new TV to support the economy, markets don't work to create jobs and help the economy. Markets work to sustain their own existence, like any entity.
-------
Incite and flee.
This comment was moderated as troll... I am not sure what to say about this. Perhaps people are now deploying randomized modding scripts when they get mod points. This is almost as good as when I was moderated as overrated before my post had any other moderation.
Maybe short and simple = troll?
-------
Incite and flee.
I've seen children picking up knives and attacking their parents if they don't get them that stuff, and these children can't take Ritilin before the age of 5 so the Parents just have to withstand that behaviour. This is because a cartoon creates a reality within children's minds, and any advertisement becomes "reality" as a child cannot make a Capitalist judegement call ie. is it worth the money?
A popsicle stick with a picture of the Spice Girls can sell for $100, because it's worth $100 to a parent with a child jumping up and down. If you don't have kids, then you don't have any authority to flame any reply to this post; Parents are genetically willing to die for their children, and thus will obviously be willing to spend an infinite amount of money to fulfil their needs. They are using this business model:
1. Create advertisement to impress child
2. Screaming child at 100dB is louder than an aircraft engine and will damage Parents' hearing. The child is now your advertisement
3. Sell product at a price equivalent to the market price of the value of the Parents' hearing.
A caveman dreams of being us, the incalculable power and riches. We dream of being Q, then what?
... is not just due to piracy, although it certainly has something to do with it. Just what kind of pop music tradition, not to mention alternative music tradition, did China have in the 1960's? The answer is, none at all. The government controlled all expression and pop music was considered Western and bourgeous. Anyone who wanted to listen to it HAD to pirate it on smuggled cassette tapes and they were taking a chance of getting caught. In short - it's not a case of an already established record industry being destroyed by record piracy - it's a case of a new record industry trying to make its way in a culture where record piracy was the only way to distribute music. Of course, they're going to have a great deal of trouble establishing themselves in that situation.
Saying that China's current state of the industry is our future state of the industry is comparing apples and oranges. We have thousands of bands who perform without any kind of corporate sponsorship at all, or even record contracts - it's a well established network of enterprise, one that extreme piracy would not eliminate. China has nothing like this and it's not going to be built up in a few short years. The music industry in China has a long, uphill battle - the music industry in America is facing a long, slow downhill slide. Quite a difference.
There's a difference between not being able to make money because there's no money to be made and not being able to make money because when you do, someone takes it...
As for Abba, they were offered a BILLION dollars to reunite and tour - they turned it down because they knew it would be a travesty of their old popularity...
During the height of their popularity, Abba was one of the largest corporations in their country...
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
I've seen children picking up knives and attacking their parents if they don't get them that stuff, and these children can't take Ritilin before the age of 5 so the Parents just have to withstand that behaviour. This is because a cartoon creates a reality within children's minds, and any advertisement becomes "reality" as a child cannot make a Capitalist judegement call ie. is it worth the money?
I hope you don't have kids....
The problem isn't the cartoons, it's the parents that decicde to babysit their kids with cartoons. If you just spent a little time teaching them the difference between right and wrong, you wouldn't have kids running around trying to "kill their parents with a knife".
"There is no income from the royalties, so artists in China record single songs for radio play instead of albums for consumers,''
If you only have one shot at airplay you cut the song that is most hit-worthy. Your best song... not filler. The "10 song" album, as a product, is simply the result of technology i.e. when the lp format arrived (after the 78rpm and 45rpm) record companies/artists needed to fill the space with songs. Mostly crap. Very few artists/writers can put together great albums. Especially the ones signed for their breast size. But with technology today we don't need the delivery/distribution of a disc with one or two good tracks and the rest filler. Technically we can DL the best individual efforts, find what we like and burn it.
Technology shift has killed the prepackaged 10 song album. It is up the music industry to find creative-entrepenurial ways to make money. It's not up to us to support their old business model.
Today we are back to the single model. I don't want to buy 10 songs for the 1 song I want. I want a convenient checkout and burn kiosk environment. Where I can assemble the music I want for a fair low price.
(And the price should be low because quality recording is becoming low cost and trivial.)
Corporate sponsorship of kiosks could make the product free. You know like the Miscosoft kiosk with dull silly boy bands and the Linux kiosk would be cool stuff and Budweiser could have light tasteless product (but funny ads) and Guinness would have the dark and heavy sounds... and so on. (of course in this view it looks like the big companies still win)
"Don't Follow Leaders." Bob Dylan
"As we can see from the article on China, it's not exactly a musician's paradise."
As if China's a paradise for anyone other than the ruling elite.
Actually, the basis of capitalism is that your ability to make money may be constrained by demand, but demand is constrained by the general market - i.e, all the other needs and desires compete for limited resources with your product. The free market directly addresses each need and desire and establishes the "actual" value of those needs and desires against all others by counting the profit.
IOW, the market is always "right" - not in an absolute value sense, but in a "teleological" (i.e., relative) sense.
OTOH, if humans were rational, the market would reward technology even more over art than it does now...
The fact of the matter is that art is valued less by most humans than technology, food, sex, etc...
The notion that art is somehow privileged over everything else is an artist's view not shared by the rest of the species...
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
- Making a sale is all about deception and force.
I'm reminded of a line by Dean Martin in the move "Bandolero". Deano and his gang enter a bank where a farmer is proclaiming that the bank are thieves because they are charging him excessive interest on his farm loan. The bank clerk tells him that nobody forced him to take out the loan. The farmer proclaims that with six kids and a mule, he had to and all the fool clerk can say is "force".
Deano shoves him away from the teller window, pulls out his gun and says, "This is force, mister."
What you are complaining about is not force, it is the stupidity of the average human - on both sides of the sale.
Humans are stupid, ignorant, irrational, malicious and fearful. While capitalism is the inevitable result of these conditions, it's better than Deano's alternative.
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
- In capitalist systems, this is theft. Trade
- occurs only when the producer and consumer reach
- mutually agreed upon terms for the exchange of
- goods and services.
The mutually agreed upon terms throughout human history usually include that the purchaser has complete control of his property - including the ability to give it away, or reproduce and distribute it (if they can - Mercedes Benz isn't really concerned about that since a BMW is hard to replicate - at least now, pre-nanotech). The IP industry wants to change that. They want to extend contract law over the basic definition of property for the purpose of giving themselves control of your property - the sole purpose for this is not some "moral right of the artist" but simply to allow them to charge you more money and make more profit by replacing the concept of property with the concept of monopoly.
And they want to do this by state fiat, i.e. law, i.e, at the point of someone else's gun.
THIS in capitalism is theft.
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
Parents are genetically willing to die for their children, and thus will obviously be willing to spend an infinite amount of money to fulfil their needs.
I mostly agree. However, you are wrong where you draw the line between needs and frivolities like a popsicle stick. My father had no problems telling me to go soak my head whenever I asked for something stupid. That's all it takes.
Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
"Case-in-point: Among other music genres, I'm an avid fan of Telugu folk music (heck, I'm part of an acapella-sort of group and we're about to record our first song). I used to download a lot of Telugu mp3's two years back; I don't download anymore, not because they're not freely available on the net, but because their CD prices have come down sharply, currently costing about $3-$4. The Telugu experience with the piracy has been waay better than most other regional music industries; first they lost a lot due to piracy, then they made the CD's dead-cheap and now, sales are so high that the music companies don't seem to mind selling mp3 CD's of their songs."
Yes but a form of extortion was used to accomplish that end. Instead of a "will you please lower your prices?", or "I will leave you to an end of your own making" Basically the pirates said that if the Telugu industry didn't release their product under their terms (the prices they wanted), they were going to use stealing (iwith the implied threat of being forced out of business) to make it happen. Does the fact that the pirates now shop there mean that the everythings OK?
"I do realise that producing mainstream American music might cost more, but no way I can afford $20 for every person who thinks she can sing [google.com]. "
You do realize that people have the right to be stupid, and in some cases do stupid things. Now does society have the right to use illegal, and amoral means to make someone "not be stupid"?
In other words the ends don't always justify the means.
So is it the job of the consumer to wade through all the B.S tossed at them and discover the truth?
Yes. It's called scepticism. Try it out some time. It does wonders in fereting out the truth.
Sales tactics need to be regulated far more than they are.
<sarcasm>Yes, that's what we all need: more government intrusion.</sarcasm>
Why is it that whenever a problem arises that is even remotely challenging to ones intellect, most people instantly call for government intervention? "Please Government, we don't want to think for ourselves, make our decisions for us!"
Ignorance is a choice, and if you make that choice then you should suffer the consequences when you get shafted. Don't make me pay for it and limit my choices by calling on the government to make decisions for everyone.
Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
-1 Troll
Oh wait, that was in the article :)
Yeah I know. And if Il Duce were around today I would set him straight. :)
... if the lament wasn't coming out of the mouths of the SAME DAMNED MEDIA CONGLOMERATES.
Look down the article a bit and you find it's mostly quoting Warner and EMI. A press release perhaps? And who owns and operates the International Herald Tribune, in which it was published? The New York Times, as of January 2, 2003.
Oh, dear! Piracy is so rampant that we - I mean the artists - can't make any money on royalties. So they have to sign up with us - I mean the media conglomerates - who run their tours and take a percentage of everything else they make in their entire carreers.
Sorry. But you guys already fed me so much baloney that the taste is stuck in my mouth, and I can't tell if there's any trace of truth in this latest helping.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Well tell me... how should the money be spent? Should a government panel appropriate all the money spent on album sales and distribute it among the musicians based on artistic merit?
Face it: pop music may be widely abhored, but it is also widely liked. Folk music has a smaller following, but the rest of the population largely ignores it. If 10 million people want to buy a Britney album and 40 thousand buy some critically acclaimed folk album, why should Britney be punished?
-a
So,
Could someone provide me a link (starting point) to download chinese pop music ?
Thanks.
Get real and be happy with a couple of hundred thousand dollars a year. That's many times more than what most of us make
I remember seeing Jello Biafra on Politically Incorrect, and he made an interesting point along these lines. He said that there should be a law enacted that limits how much money one person can make in a year. I don't remember the number he gave, but I think it was $300,000. I thought at the time it was a bit low, but lets face it: I will NEVER make $300,000 a year, nor will most people I know.
Is that a real poncho? I mean, is that a Mexican poncho or is that a Sears poncho?
Don't bank on it for much longer Wang... we'll have that taken care of soon with one of our "spezial macheens"
ôó
here we have bands that are "created" by the record companies to create music that someone thinks we "like" which is sort of funny.
I read through the entire article and the only thing I could think was, this would be good for america, maybe we would actually find the talent now that it is not all about being rich and passion for the art is what drives it..
Yea, this is our future hopefully..
We can all just hope we end up more like china in this regard.
anime+manga together at last.. in real time.
I agree that ignorance is a choice and the fault of the ignorant. However, this does not justify a person that exploits the ignorant.
Companies spend millions to give consumers very specific knowledge about a product/service. Anything they would like to hide, but cannot because of big G, they bury in so much fine print that you need a legal degree to understand it. In this case, is the consumer ignorant? No, the consumer is deceived.
Rant all you want about more government involvement and limiting your freedoms: It's easy. I maintain that providing more information to the consumer and providing it in a form that an average consumer can understand is a good thing.
What are you doing bringing up things like basic economics and imply that the music industry adjust when they think they can just keep suing people and buying legislation?
Lying is generally immoral, no question there. Not everything that is immoral should be illegal though.
There are plenty of magazines out there that review new products that appeal to their demographics. Read the reviews, avoid the bad products. If the magazine is bribed somehow by the company, you should be reading many different reviews and compare, as well as researching comments by individual consumers. Occasionally, you will get shafted. Then it's your turn to notify others of the company lie. Once this becomes standard procedure and people let companies know that lies will not be tolerated, it will stop or at least decrease to an acceptable level.
No legislation necessary. Just a little thought and a little effort.
Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
I thought at the time it was a bit low, but lets face it: I will NEVER make $300,000 a year, nor will most people I know.
So in other words, as long as you and your friends aren't hurt by a law, you're all for it???
Sweet! Your revulsion is the world's. Worry not, however, as they broke up around the time you were at Syracuse. (Their horrorshow simmered into two derivatives -- The Sex Pistols, who were a controversial band for a few months in the '70s; and the one-hit-wonder Buster Poindexter. But I digress.) We here in future-land are free of that plague, and of Devo as well. (The glorious Rushmore soundtrack is the closest thing to a "latest Devo" album.)
Bah! You're still going with whatever Alan Lomax or NBC Radio spoonfed America. (And the only good Basie was Straight Ahead, which was all Sammy Nestico.) If you're really looking to boil the gristle out of the flesh, as it were, then start listening to the real stuff (created and celebrated by the populace, back when they controlled U.S. popular music), instead of mass-market derivatives like Copeland.
Before Milli Vanilli, there were The Archies: a cartoon group whose "Sugar" became a number one.
__
Men with no respect for life must never be allowed to control the ultimate instruments of death.
GW Bu
> As an alternative, put out a mega-album with 2-3 CDs, a big booklet filled with lyrics, photos, art, and interesting notes. Put it all in a quality sleeve/jacket/jewel case. If the music is decent, you could probably charge 35, 40, maybe 50 dollars for it.
There's no way I'd buy something like that! Try this... Compile two 5-6 song EPs and maybe some remixes onto a CD. Put this CD into a cardboard sleeve with the artist's names and song titles printed on it. Sell it all for $3.
A caveman dreams of being us, the incalculable power and riches. We dream of being Q, then what?
A caveman dreams of being us, the incalculable power and riches. We dream of being Q, then what?
You are completely right. If musicians don't want to sign over their copyrights they can always go to organizations other than record companies to get their works distributed. It's not as if the RIAA controls the entire distribution chain from start to finish.... oh wait, strike that. They do. Artists have one choice if they want their works heard by anything other than a local audience, and that is why they sign up. As far as 'technological resources', what are you talking about? If you're talking about the CD's themselves then it makes no sense whatsoever since they press the damn things as cheap as they can. If you're talking about actual production of the music, the costs are covered by the artists themselves. The record companies get the songs played on the radio, that's all, and for that they take the vast majority of the money made in music sales. Most musicians don't make any money off the sale of their music. When it comes to the recording industry, America is not a free society.
My Blog
At least the so called theft of the artists music contributes to a change in the model by which they are systematically raped by the recording industry. If the record companies can no longer control distribution of music the artists will have options by which they might get paid. If you really gave a damn about fairness you would steal the songs and send the artist a check.
My Blog
Behold.
can be found here. The real problem with debating this is that the terms "fascism" and "corporatism" are vague terms. Furthermore, our definitions of these systems may be different from Mussolini's.
"Whatever happened to fair use?"
-- Duff-Man
heh, true, true
At that point you say to yourself, "Yeah, I like this. I think I'll go hunting around at record shops to see if anyone even knows who this band is so I can pay fifteen bucks for the same CD I could burn myself and a little bit of cover art. I'd pay to see them perform too, if I ever find myself travelling through, uh, Waukesha, Wisconsin."
Riiiiiight... You're a regular philanthropist.
Get real. You'd burn your own CD-R, leaving out a track or two you didn't like and tossing in a few more tracks since there's room, or a couple hundred more tracks if your player handles mp3 disks.
What happens after that, well, it may help the band gain popularity in some way... but quit using that lame old line about mp3's making you want to go out and buy the CD. Nobody should believe that.
what an interesting read that was. thanks.