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Australian Record Industry Has Best Year Ever
Hecatonchires writes "ARIA (Australian Record Industry Assoc.) had their best year ever, but are fudging the figures because they run counter to their anti-filesharing arguments."
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What the RIAA and the MPAA and their foreign counterparts don't understand is that people are less willing to spend their money on crap. Look at Gigli, where the movie industry blamed movie go-ers who text messaged their friends that the movie was bad. Or the latest Tomb Raider movie, where they tried to blame the latest Tomb Raider video game. Consumers are simply not willing to waste their money on things that suck.
The same is true with music. I for one prefer to download the entire CD to listen to all the tracks. Most online music sites have the first 30 seconds of each song. I really don't feel like I know enough from those 30 seconds to decide if I like the CD. I can usually decide that I don't like the CD. Think of how many people get upset because there's the won good single on the radio and the other tracks are all crap? I will happily go out and buy a CD if I feel it is worth the cost. I have bought more CDs because I listen to the whole CD and decide if I like it enough to buy it.
The cynical answer is that P2P is never about artist royalties or piracy it's about the fact that one P can be the artist and the other P can be the customer with no sign of ARIA or RIAA anywhere between the two. These big music industries are not fighting for the survival of music and musicians, they're fighting for their own survival at the cost of artists and consumers.
This is a similar analogy to how some bars in the area around Wrigley field were charging patrons to watch the ball game from their roofs where they could see it. The MLB/Cubs sued them claiming that they were somehow stealing baseball from them. In the end the bars were forced (mainly by the expected cost of the litigation) to settle and pay some kind of licensing fees to the MLB/Cubs. I don't think this analogy applies to music but it definitely shows the extent that entertainment companies have turned "intellectual property" into something almost indistringuishable from real property in terms of end result of all these laws and the cost of defending against frivolous actions by entertainment giants/monopolies like the RIAA and MLB.
Posting anon for obvious reasons:
My friend used to work for one of the big 2 record companies. He wasnt particularly senior, but he wasnt a complete chump either, think middle sales [ie keep the stores happy] kinda role.
Every friday his boss would give him about $100 AUD from petty cash to go into the bigger record stores in the City [the way the charts work is that the more popular a store, the more weight each sale has in the charts].
He would be instructed to buy maybe 10 singles of the cheesy artist said large record company was trying to plug to bring them up the charts.
The funny thing is, when I had this conversation, its one thing to assume it happens, but its another entirely for it to be completely confirmed. And its not just 1 guy, his entire department was in a similar chart-pumping scam paid for by said record company.
I always asked him what the 18year old behind the counter would say when a mid 20's guy would walk in and buy 10 of "Cheesy teen pop star latest single".
"oh its for my daughters gift bag for her birthday"