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What The RIAA Gets Out Of File Sharing
ChrisPaget writes "Wired have a fascinating article about a company called BigChampagne which sells regional P2P download statistics to most of the major record labels. When the labels know what people are downloading, they know what to put on the radio, and sales in the area increase. The record industry's lawsuits against file- sharing companies hang on their assertion that the programs have no use other than to help infringe copyrights. If the labels acknowledge a legitimate use for P2P programs, it would undercut their case as well as their zero-tolerance stance."
Seriously now, they lose a lot too.
Sure, Joe Shmoe (haha it was funny on spike tv...but the guy looks handicapped so you feel guilty for laughing at him) anyways Joe Blow downloads some obscure song and buys the album...and it increases sales
But 100 other people download albums and burn them instead of buying the CD. It is quicker for me to download and burn an album then to go to the store...and cheaper...so there isnt even much of a reason NOT to (aside from morals...but we all lost those a long time ago).
Lucky I am Canadian...and pay that fee with my blank cds thats lets me more legally do that.
The recording industry is losing a TON, just based on common sense and my personal practices, as well as those I know. "Dont buy that cd! I have it! I will burn you a copy in 30 seconds!"
So, lets still feel a bit guilty, like laughing at the handicapped looking Joe Schmoe...but not guilty enough to stop doing it.
[I can picture a world without war, without hate. I can picture us attacking that world, because they'd never expect it]
If the labels acknowledge a legitimate use for P2P programs, it would undercut their case as well as their zero-tolerance stance
Right, and insurance companies get info on which vehicles are most popular, based on the ones that are stolen more frequently. They can adjust insurance rates accordingly.
Therefore it undercuts their case when an insurance company goes after a thief or vandal to recoup damages they've paid out.
Quit trying to justify widespread copyright infringement. Stations get the same info based on surveys and call-in request hours.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
There are certainly other benefits for the music industry from P2P sharing. For the artists, especially those who aren't part of the small handful of superstars who get massive marketing, it allows their music to be heard. Typically only a few songs by smaller artists are available via P2P, so if there if a downloader who likes the music, they must purchase a CD if they want to hear more. This theory is based only on my own experiences for a dozen or so smaller artists whom I "discovered" through Kazaa and then bought CDs for.
I always save my last mod point to mod up a good troll. You people are too serious.
This would be more akin to using data about which cars are stolen most as marketing data about which cars are most desirable.
The RIAA is launching these lawsuits, not the RIAA. This is like saying that Microsoft wants to know which of its programs are most frequently pirated, therefore it is hypocritical of the BSA to try and stop software piracy. Not quite.
....
Also, this could turn out to be somewhat of a "self-fulfilling prophesy." People tend to search out and download the latest tunes they hear on the radio, so the radio plays more of those tunes, so more people share and download them, so the radio plays
Like woodworking? Build your own picture frames.
Just let people download all the music they want.
Then, market CDs as gifts...nothing says "I love you" like a new original CD, instead of a home-burned one with a Sharpie-scrawl label. They could even go for the Hallmark market share, or perhaps go into Valentine's candy boxes with a CD inside, surrounded by chocolate. Employees can be rewarded not with a simple "You're #1!" keyring, but a "You're #1!" keyring which is also a mini-CD single with their favorite song!
"Say it with a CD," that's the ticket. Just watch out for proper etiquette: an "I'm sorry honey" CD-bouquet should not include the song "Oops! I Did It Again."
...
The RIAA is getting it both ways. They can use P2P as their own little advertizing mechanism and for demographic research aswell. Plus they can use it as a way to rake in money from the lawsuits that follow.
Have they sued any Time-Warner Customers yet?
See the Pictures of the Flood of '08
i can see how they can get indexes of what is being shared by who, but how (do you think) they are able to monitor the queries. i was thinking one of two:
a) sniffing traffic
b) they have deals with kazaa (etc) master servers and get their logs
any other ideas - or facts?
What I find interesting is the list of top file swaps. Seems more hip-hop than pop are being swapped (although there is now some overlap). Does this mean that Radio stations should look to change their formats (words in a lot of the songs might prevent that). How many pop stations are in your area vs. true hip hop unless you live in New York or L.A. The top ten list was:
50 Cent P.I.M.P.
Chingy Right Thurr
Black Eyed Peas Where Is The Love
The Ataris Boys Of Summer
Lil' Bow Wow Let's Get Down
Lumidee Never Leave You
Beyonce Knowles Crazy In Love
Christina Aguilera Can't Hold Us Down
Smile Empty Soul Bottom Of A Bottle
Lil' Kim Magic Stick
How'd they tie the usage to a 12-year-old anyway?
It was my understanding they the RIAA essentially sued whoever's name was on the internet bill. I know when I was 12, I wasn't paying the internet bill, (hell, if I remember correctly, I was just setting up back-to-back free net accounts with the local ISP).
Anyway, did they ACTUALLY sue the 12 year old, or did they sue the mother? I know it ends up being one-and-the-same, but I'm curious.
The RIAA will not take a step back with th rhetoric because they have gained too much power to turn back. With the power they now possess they will soon be a new goverment bureaucracy entitled "Ministry of Sound Sueing".
/.'s only. I'm talking about Joe Average. Everyone will start to boycott and our representatives will also get involved because they will see it as an opportunity to get new votes. The RIAA will have to back off and come up with a "fair and balanced" (don't sue me Fox) approach for copyright infringement.
We all know that everything they have been saying is in direct opposition of what's actually occuring with cd sales. Yes p2p plays a role but it isn't anything near what they claim it to be. The point is the RIAA will take this as far as they can or until the backlash is so severe that they have no choice other than alienating consumers and pissing off the goverment even more.
I will make the following prediction...
Due to the RIAA calous and careless approach on p2p and their so-called loss of sales they will continue to piss off consumers who will then come together in a massive boycott. I'm not talking about
We will beat the bad rap and the RIAA will continue to do business but in a goverment imposed andfair/legal manner.
The goverment has spent billions on the war on drugs and it hasn't done a thing so does the RIAA really think a few lawsuits will stop p2p? As the RIAA's tactics on finding, pursuing, and prodding p2p users come out in the open it will only help coders take it more underground and guarantee our privacy. The RIAA had their chance to make p2p work with Napster in a centralized server setup but they blew their chance and with it the centralization of p2p. Decentralized servers, new anonimity, and a general interest in going more underground are the way now.
The RIAA better enjoy these days because they are the best they're going to have. Reality is going to bite their ass pretty soon...
You aren't free to do anything, until you've lost everything.
The RIAA is USING p2p networks to determine which files are popular. USING.
A more appropriate anology would be for General Motors to hire some criminals to hang out with other criminals to figure out which cars are the best and use that aquired data as a marketing tool. ("We spent 3 days with Jimmy Fingers, and man do those dudes love stealing our cars!")
Doing that would be, in part, sanctioning theft by associating with those that commit it.
Thats effectively what the RIAA is doing, if we are to believe their argument that file sharing is theft and not copyright infringment. They're HIRING somebody to use and observe a community and activity they deem is highly criminal.
Then again, the RIAA has acted as if they have been above the law for awhile tho, so this shouldn't really be a surprising development in the whole file sharing issue.
"Old man yells at systemd"
IIRC, the original argument for pricing CDs at triple the going rate for LPs back in the early '80s was that the manufacturers had to recoup R&D costs. And shouldn't 20+ years be sufficient to recoup those costs? Seems to me that the "industry" has been charging grossly inflated prices for years as a group effort...
"Obviously, I'm not an IBM computer any more than I'm an ashtray" (Bob Dylan)
Is there a law that we can use to smack the RIAA around for pretending to be a law enforcement agency? The RIAA has absolutely no right under the law to offer amnesty for a crime, and they ought to be smacked to hell and back for trying. Why in all hell isn't the FBI/government all over their ass for this? I mean, if Microsoft said they would offer amnesty to all software pirates, it would pretty much be the same thing. WTF?
Auto theft is already profitable for the auto industry. A car is stolen (and presumably chopped up for its parts) means the owner gets a fat cheque from his insurance to get - a NEW car from the auto maker. Why else are cars so easy to steal out from the factory with only a slim jim and perhaps a screwdriver? There is no business case for making cars harder to steal for the auto industry.
Well I was always for P2P since I grab a lot of things other than music, however I would occassionally snag a Supercharger or Hellbillies mp3. But it seems that the majority of people dlowding are grabbing the SHITTY music they keep complaining about. Looking at the site it seems to prove this with the top 10 listed songs/albums including 50 Cent, beyonce, Lil Kim, and every other bullshit artist on MTV. If people stopped lsitening to crap and started only dloading songs from GOOD non-commercialized bands or at least bands that were not the latest-and-greatest-company-endorsed-sings-through -a-voicebox-shows-their-ass-whore "musician" the RIAA wouldn't be sueing 12 years olds or college kids.
STOP MTV MUSIC NOW
Ave Molech Setting
currently:
- album sales are driven by radio play.
- radio playlists are determined by album sales
obviously this doesn't leave very much room for direct consumer input. if p2p offers the big-5 some direct data about what people want, they'll be happy for it!2 1337 4 u!
If the Major Lables start reacting to what the public is actualy listening to, instead of trying to convince people to buy a product thaey have produced.
The major problem with most music lables is that they have become manufacturers of music instead of distributers of music.
The RIAA at al. knows that P2P could become the next radio, and they know that p2p is not the real reason for bad music sales. But the RIAA is not really sueing people beceause of loss of sales, it's sueing beceause of loss of control over what people listen to. The RIAA loves radio for the very reason that they can control it (and actualy own it in some cases).
The RIAA/Lables can't "own" p2p or force it play what they want, so they choose to shut it down. I have always thought that the RIAA/lables have been more worried about loss of promotional/playlist control then profits.
Prior to P2P a label could promote the shit out of an artist/group with out them having to be any good, and still be SURE it was going to make a profit. Now the Major labels have to wait and see if the public actualy LIKES the music before it can make a profit.
Support Brianna LaHara
Everyone... go download some Right Said Fred and Spice Girls. Let's see if we can get them back on the radio!
I did RTFA. (Read the Friendly article.)
Unless I misunderstood something, the picture I got was that they were relly looking at what people were searching for, not what people were downloading.
There was a description of a green screen of text scrolling by in a blur. BigWig asked if they could freeze the display. Tech drone froze the display. You could see searches, from certian IP addresses, for various phrases. Article remarked that a lot of people were also searching for pr0n.
I think all you would need is a bot to send reasonably frequent search requests for, say, Goatse, in order to get this onto the radio. In fact, by manipulating the network, such as gnutella or fasttrack, you could possibly arrange it such that your search requests mostly only ended up going to BigChampagne so as not to hog bandwidth of other filesharers.
Taken to its logical conclusion, a network of friendly bots, with a web driven front end would allow anyone in a certian zip code to request what they want on the radio.
Something with a very similar effect could be implemented with low tech. A radio station could have a telephone line to accept requests manually, and then such forward looking free thinking radio stations could actually play what people are asking for.
I don't know. Maybe such a far-out idea is just going way too far. After all, the article did say that their mantra was "We don't need no research, just play the f***ing song.", and they must know better than we what we want.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
"This is Casy Casum's top 40 (tm) and the number one hit in America today is 'carat open parenthesis star backslash' by the new breakout band "percent twenty""
Ah yes, Casey dirtymouth.
"These guys are from England and who gives a shit"
"alright I want a concerted effort to not come out of an up-tempo record when I have to do a f***king death dedication."
etc. Casey is responsible for a song being banned (U2 was upset at first but don't care anymore - Casey, however is worried about the effort on his career of his obscenities reaching a wider audience.) Check out:
http://www.negativland.com/audiogadgets.html
It sounds like you don't know how freenet works. It routes requests through other nodes, so that you (or anyone) never knows where the request actually started. If I get a request from Node A, I don't know whether it's Node A's request, or a request through them from Node B, or a request through Node B from Node C, and so on.
The RIAA has the same problem as you. They think of downloading songs as the equivalent of stealing cars. Apples and oranges. File sharing can be made to work for the record industry. There is no way to make auto theft profitable for the auto industry. If the record industry is willing to make some heavy changes to their business model they will survive.
Well let me then suggest that you have the same problem as a lot of
You say that file sharing can be made to work for the record industry. Fine. That's your opinion (and a pretty common opinion around here). But keep in mind that 5 years ago there were a lot of business cases that were pretty commonly espoused on
In the last couple of years, there is a quote that I see in a lot of people's sigs: "It is better to die on your feet than live on your knees." It seems to me that it's like that with companies too. The RIAA may know they are in trouble, but they are not prepared to merely roll over and accept the fact of piracy. They would rather go down fighting. And you know, I kind of admire them for that.
-a
Natural--Laws against theft of property and murder. Unnatural--Slavery laws. "Intellectual property".
-Libertarian secular transhumanist
Here's an interesting read on the canadian view of this mess.
Sympatico Globe and Mail
"I'm using this program to steal your stuff, which gives you valuable marketing information as to what stuff of yours I like!"
Except that the car chopped for it's parts hurts the automaker. You see that stolen toyota camry means that there is one less engine, transmission, head lamp assembly, hood, windshield, etc. that toyota can sell. Car companies make obscene amounts of profit selling parts to cars. Some time just for grin find the cost of buying parts for your car, and start adding them up. You'll quickly come up to a sum much greater than what you paid for the car.
Jack Valenti and Orrin Hatch will be first up against the wall when the revolution comes.
I was thinking these artists should be appraised of the lawsuit against the little girl, as well as her eventual settlement. We should ask these artists how much of that $2000 they'll actually be seeing, and how it feels to be cracking down (or to support an organization that is cracking down) on 12-year olds. (For those of you who are too dense, yes, I know that the artists are probably getting diddly squat, but ask them anyways, okay?)
s k Joe": http://www.joewalsh.net/ask_joe/index.htmlr a Records: http://www.elektra.com/
p /ask_ludacris.lasl as?site_num=29
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"A
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I wonder if the worry of the RIAA over file sharing is its effect on the purchasing habits of the current generation of teenagers. I may download a couple of songs off an ablum to see wether an alblum is worth buying and I know I have increased the number of alblums I have bought in the past year.
However, my younger brother and sister have had napster, kazaa, etc available since before they ever started buying CDs. So the don't buy anything as they were never used to buying CDs.
It would be interesting to see any sort of statistics on the number of CDs bought by people 12-17 or 18-24 before widespread file sharing and after. It would easily show if file sharing is helping or harming the industry.
Something with a very similar effect could be implemented with low tech. A radio station could have a telephone line to accept requests manually, and then such forward looking free thinking radio stations could actually play what people are asking for.
Over here, the morning show on the radio is always logged into Yahoo IM, MSN IM, and AOL IM. They actually accept requests this way as well. Though I'm never in front of a computer when listening to the morning show, but they always talk about it...
You have a very good point. During the late 90s in Atlanta, GA there was a huge spree of air bags being stolen from Honda Civics. Turns out the dealer cost for the replacement was in the neighborhood of $500, so many "independant" shops were paying thieves $100 for a stolen one.
From one report that I read a qualified thief could smash a window and take the airbag in something insane like 20 seconds.
Still, with a plan, you only get the best you can imagine. I'd always hoped for something better than that. -CP
On the radio this morning (KROQ, Los Angeles), there was a lawyer for the RIAA talking about the recent lawsuits being brought...
She specifically stated that "while there are valid and legal uses of p2p file sharing..."
It seems like when it suits them, they are willing to accept the existence of P2P programs...
If I am looking at a new car and I take into consideration the amount I am going to be paying in insurance when making my decision, I may choose a car based on insurance rates.
;-)
Since part of the rate determination is based on where said car ranks on the most stolen list, I could buy a $30k BMW (not in the top 100) instead of a $22k Toyota Camry (ranked #1 for 2002) and end up spending the same amount monthly.
In which case I am going to opt for the BMW.
YMMV. No I haven't done an extensive study on this
Old school, 1980s software pirates will remember the golden rule: the Feds don't give a fuck about software, they will run your ass through the ground over porn.
Does that still hold true? I think to a large degree it does. Nobody steals software forever and it had a social benefit of educating a large segment of society. Beyond that, nobody cared because it was done largely among small private groups.
Remember download ratios? It's "keeping it expensive" as Nixon referred to his decision for banning biological and chemical weapons. You need nuclear to be in an elite club. 99% of the idiots downloading today would not have a chance if sysop didn't break the unwritten law of download ratios. Industry wouldn't care about piracy. Neither would the Feds.
*Unchecked* and easily accessible piracy is the problem that industry has, not piracy itself.
Hatch's comments are indicative that the government *still* doesn't care about piracy. They don't want people looking at porn. Porn leads to jackasses acting out and committing crimes. This ain't a troll. Anyone with friends in law enforcement has heard stories of punks that clearly got their cues from porn on the net.
Laws are for people with no friends.
There is a very basic flaw in this car theft = file trading. I don't see MILLIONS of car theives sitting around trading cars with out each other. I don't see these, generally lower income, car theives being potential cusotmers. I also don't see these car theives showing what the actual public demand for any particular automobile.
I'm betting that filer-sharers are mirroring the ACTUAL demand, since the ratio between honest and dishonest is smaller, or nonexistant. Maybe if cars were easier to steal there would be a simular ratio. Cars happen to be physical though, so I doubt thats going to happen.
If your going to make an analogy and stick with it, please find one that FITS. Or better yet, discuss the actual issue, since all analogies are flawed.
A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government. -edward abbey
hi,
isn't intercepting and monitoring communictions which were not intended to be sent to you illegal under current wiretap / monitoring statutes? i.e. is what big champagne doing illegal (unless, of course, the P2P networks are allowing them access to this information)?
sTc
Most things worth doing are worth doing twice. -- me I think or was that my boss' methodology?
Not that I think the RIAA's stance is a good one, but I'll take a questionable RIAA over a bad metaphor any day.
The CB App. What's your 20?
yes if you can track the WHOLE NETWORK(ie. own the internet, i guess sco owns it) you can make assumptions on where the data originates, and what the data is(you fetch something, see where it is most likely coming from on basis of traffic you know is not related to your query, of course, i don't know really shit about freenets workings but this is how i would have it, and this method is ridiculously stupid since it would easily be impossible to implement in reality).
but networks like waste are coming with possibilities of saturating your inbound and outbound lines to something pre-set even if you're not transferring anything, so it's impossible to tell if you're transferring anything at all for the network for outside(and inside, unless all the rest of the network is compromised) observer on your crypted connections. sure even then they can make such guesses on where if they can control significant part of the network(most of it), but real proof of that you did anything wrong wears thinner and thinner(actually waste isn't quite worth much as a PUBLIC big system but for private little group it's pretty good).
and then there's systems like earthstation5 uses that use public(open) proxies for sends(so you won't know who is the real sender of the data, iirc you can also choose to use harder to find proxies for receiving as well), sure even then if you can control the network you can nail few of them(es5 doesn't seem very sophisticated at what it does, but hey, they have naked news for free).
so, in majority of these even moderately sophisticated systems they(riaa & equivalents) would have to be able to be in majority of the users to have anything real to work on and even then it would end up not being worth it at all.
heck, you could probably harness spam as part of this too.. or organize music swap nights like that's an original idea.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
"There is no business case for making cars harder to steal for the auto industry."
There's also no human case for it. The harder cars are to steal, the more likely that somebody who wants one will hijack it, rather than steal it when it's left parked.
Given that most people would prefer to come out of work and find their car gone, compared to someone jumping out at them with a knife and demanding the immobiliser key, many manufacturers decided to limit the amount of security on a car.
The RIAA may know they are in trouble, but they are not prepared to merely roll over and accept the fact of piracy.
We don't want them to accept piracy. We want them to face facts of market demands.
The market demands convenience and instant gratification. This is America, for Pete's sake! People want to be able to think, "Hey, I want to hear a new song!" and a few clicks later, it's playing. The RIAA is so stuck on their old business model that they won't face up to the new reality of the market. And any business-minded person knows what happens to companies that don't follow changing markets.
The irony of this, what I find very funny in fact, is that it's getting worse for the RIAA the longer they wait. Had they provided online music downloads a long time ago, when the demand was first visible to the rest of us, then P2P would never have become such a haven for illegal music traders. But by quashing Napster instead of setting up a legit music download service, they caused lots of new P2P music trading to spring up.
Now, because they've waited so long, there is a well-known P2P music trading infrastructure. This means that they may feel the need to use DRM. Had they not given P2P a chance to spring up (by offering their own, legitimate and well-advertised service), then they would have never needed DRM. File sharing wouldn't be commonplace. You wouldn't have 12 year-old girls thinking that paying for KaZaA makes it all legal.
But they didn't, and now it's too late. Who knows what else they may lose if they keep waiting?
I have my own theory. I think that the next thing in line for them to lose is control over the bands. People are getting tired of RIAA-pushed ISO9000-manufactured everything-sounds-alike pop artists. Previously, since the RIAA controlled the radio, that was all that people got free samples of. But P2P provides a new first-sample distribution channel for independent artists. If the RIAA doesn't watch out, they'll lose their chokehold on which artists are coming to the public ear. And then, they'll have some real problems.
That brings up an interesting theory. What if we renamed our collection using say, the chinese language pack? Made a key availible, It'd be awhile before the RIAA Figured it out.
Actually, it does. There is a great deal of confusion on /. about the difference between a crime an a civil offense, so perhaps you can be forgiven. /me gets up on soapbox
Copyright "infringement" is what we might call an actionable offense. It falls into the same class of issues as contract violations. Breaking a contract is not "against the law" -- the police aren't going to arrest you. The law says that if you copy something without the author's permission then the author can choose whether or not he/she has been maligned, and if so he/she may try to seek damages from you by bringing the matter in front of a judge who also has to agree that damage has taken place. And even if they both agree and the judge makes you pay, you still haven't "broken the law." (Now if you refuse to pay like the judge asked, THEN you will have broken the law.)
Copyright infringement is neither immoral, nor unethical, nor illegal. It's merely actionable. The very excellent reason for this is that it cannot be determined whether you damaged a copyright holder by copying his/her work except by examining each case as it comes along. As we see in this case, unauthorized copying does not necessarily damage the copyright holder. No harm, no foul as we used to say.
Our intelligent designer has never created an animal that we couldn't improve by strapping a bomb to it.
"Basically, it means listeners can't get that tune out of their heads - they probably downloaded it after hearing it only once - and radio stations ought to put the track in heavy rotation."
and
' "I threw it into my call-outs, and it was reactive, so we made it a subpower," a song that plays 40 to 50 times a week. '
And the labels just can't figure out why fewer and fewer people listen to radio? For every "Hit" there are 5-10 independents out there with mucic that is just as good. Where is this music? Well the inde's can't cough up $10K-1M to pay the radio stations to play thier songs. (Yea, songs really are not commercials for the album!)
"Allison built a program that sent anyone sharing a Toad song an invitation to join Phillips' mailing list, and they decided that if it looked promising they would start a business. "The opt-in rate was 20 percent!" says Zack's father, Tom. "A good opt-in rate is usually 2 or 3 percent." "
Humm, artists connecting directly with their fans? That means they could get rid of us! How am I going to pay for my new SL500? We must crush P2P! It's about control people, not piracy. The real pirates are stamping cd's and selling them around the world.
"File-sharing is notoriously difficult to monitor, especially since the IP addresses used to track it don't always map to individuals. Jay Samit, former digital media chief of EMI (he recently announced he was leaving to take a position at Sony), says he's skeptical of any reresearch based on IP addresses."
Well, is that an major label executive saying tracking a user by IP doesn't always work? Malfunction - Please report to the RIAA HQ for reprogramming.
"Because AOL works with dynamic IP addresses, Samit notes, the location of its users can't be determined. (The company says that AOL subscribers account for only 15 percent of its information and that it includes them in its national, but not local, data.)"
Humm, so the labels know that AOL customers are sharing lots of music, yet I'm not aware of a single AOL user hit with a subpena. Also, ISP's should switch to some kind of nationwide DHCP service. That combined witht the Boston rulings could keep the RIAA from filling its subpena in the right court. The ISP doesn't have to tell them where the subscriber is under current law. They could just keep saying, nope, wrong district court, try again. nope, not there, try again. Considering they are targeting users in the NE, that could be why AOL was left out. Somebody get this idea to Verizon!
BigChampagne - You don't track me.
Copyprotected CDs - One more reason for me to find a perfectly functional copy on the Internet.
Artificial scarcity is sometimes the only way that a publisher can justify a quality release. This ultimately gives the consumer a better product. Consider the new Eraserhead DVD; before it, there was nothing but an out-of-print pan-and-scan VHS release. People were willing to pay $90 for a used copy on eBay. In this climate, and arguable ONLY in this climate, David Lynch could justify putting so much time, care, and money into the new DVD. He would not have been able to recoup his investment if the scarcity did not exist.
Ok, this is a simple one...
Am I more likely to take two minutes to download a band I have never heard before, but was recommended to me. OR... am i more likely to shell out $20 for a cd I have never heard before and could be crap. Now, if you are really into music, multiply this by hundreds or thousands.
You see, us peoples that don't usually like only what you can hear on the radio or MTV, have no other alternative if we want to simply sample the band before we buy. To me its like have millions of friends that make me mixed tapes, then I decide which bands are worth supporting with my dollars!
How strange it is to be anything at all
I'm pretty sure that legally they could download Kazaa and pay a few people to run it on their computers with correctly sized files & ID3 tags that just feature loops of "do not steal" in the tracks? Then they're not doing a DoS or anything, but if people want to download files, they probably will get a bunch of the RIAAs versions.