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RIAA Forgets to Make Royalty Payments
theodp writes "NY Attorney General Eliot Spitzer agreed with the RIAA on one point - artists WERE being deprived of money that was rightfully theirs. But Spitzer managed to find $50 million for performers without shaking down grandmothers. Spitzer's culprits? A Who's Who of the nation's top recording companies - members of the RIAA - who failed to maintain contact with artists and stopped making required royalty payments."
Oh well. Good that they caught this. The artist do deserve their money.
Better the money in New York State's coffers, where it will be of benefit to the public, than with the record companies, where a relatively small number of shareholders benefit from money that isn't theirs.
I don't understand why the government has not seen the RIAA as an orginization that doesn't adhear to the rules that it's set for everyone else. They have such deep pockets, they can make the effort to locate the artists and pay the royalties. Don't be surprised that this has happened. There's much more to come out of this...
"Standard Industry Practice."
RIAA members ripping off their artists is nothing new - it's been documented over and over and fucking over again. I'm sure some slashdotters can point to half a dozen articles written by artists who point out that, by the time the RIAA gets done doing the math on a "standard" industry contract, an even moderately sucessful artist winds up OWING a few thousand dollars to the label and is pretty much an indentured servant, because they can't jump labels to find a better deal by the terms of the contract.
What we REALLY need is for some court ruling to take all those fucking provisions, and declare them illegal. THEN when the RIAA cries about "artists" being deprived of money due to file sharing, I might give a rat's ass about their bullshit argument.
I find it completely unconsionable that the RIAA failed to protect the artists rights and make payments when due. Claiming they couldn't find the artists involved is a fabrication of the most fraudulent kind. It's not like David Bowie has fallen off the face of the earth.
I've hit Karma 50 and gotten a Score:5, Troll... I win!
Does this mean that since the RIAA is out 50 mil... (that THEY diddn't think to give to the rightful owner).... the 50 mil will be deducted from the amount of money made through cd sales so they can whine a bit more about file sharing?
Except that the artist doesn't always know that they are owed the money. Do you think they keep track of the sales of every one of their songs (both written and recorded)?
Prominent artists who were owed royalty payments included: David Bowie, Dolly Parton, Harry Belafonte, Liza Minnelli, Dave Matthews, Sean Combs and Gloria Estefan.
Ummm....how exactly do you lose track of your prominent artists? And for that matter, why aren't the agents of these artists banging down the doors at Sony, BMI, Vivendi, EMI, and so forth to get the royalties? IOW, the agents conveniently forgot to collect? Something doesn't sound right here -- when in the history of business has someone not aggressively pursued their debtors?
Rule #1 -- Politics always trumps technology.
Some artists do not even know they are subject to reimbursement or royalties from the RIAA, they just happen to sign up with a small company (which is part of)^n an RIAA member...
Trolling using another account since 2005.
According to CNN, sales dropped about 7.5% from 2002 levels of 32.2 billion to 2003 sales of 32.0 billion. RIAA blames "rampant piracy" for this.
Therefore, according to RIAA, piracy accounted for 200 million in sales loss. Therefore (unless artists get 25% or more of retail) with this announcement of withholding 50m in royalties from artists, the RIAA itself is personally responsible for more monetary loss to artists than piracy.
I didn't know you had to 'agree' with a law before it was applicable to you. Interesting.
I, well, by RIAA's logic actually, also suggest prison time - hey, it's only fair, they did benefit financially from this.
The RIAA is going out of there way to correct a royalty problem that may/may not have entirely been their fault.
The RIAA was collecting money on behalf of the artists. If they kept it without making much effort to track down the rightful owners, then that's theft as far as I'm concerned. Especially if they insist on calling 12yr old children thieves for swapping mp3s.
Kind of reminds of me of some bigger (cough - Catholic Church) examples (cough - US war effort).
I'm sure that last bit will get me slammed. There goes my karma =D
I think that goes to show that if a canditate has a good record and doesn't show partisanship, then he/she can be popular across the board. Here, you have the AG, who shouldn't be partisan in his position, working for the people, and with the approval ratings, it shows the public appreciates it. I really thinks it comes down to, he was doing his job (fighting for the citizens of NY) and he was successful in what he was elected to do.
What I don't get is your reasoning. The RIAA is at fault because by contract they were required to pay royalties. Again I quote "Spitzer's culprits? A Who's Who of the nation's top recording companies - members of the RIAA - who failed to maintain contact with artists and stopped making required royalty payments." If you have a problem with people associating the RIAA with all those record companies, you should remember that while prosecuting pre-teens and grannies, the RIAA has constantly reminded us that they are the representative of all those record companies and artists. You can't have it both ways. Either they are the representative of all those record companies and OK to prosecute people for alleged violations of the law, and it's OK to say they are to blame for this lack of payment to artists *or* they are not really responsible, you're right, we should lay off the, *and* they have no right to sue anyone. Which is it? You say the recording artists are at fault for the record company not paying them their royalties due. I'm sure then you'd be perfectly OK blaming yourself if your employer suddenly stopped giving you paychecks.
Grrliegeek
Did you read the list of some of the artists they lost contact details for, they included long forgotten one hit wonders like "David Bowie, Dolly Parton, Harry Belafonte, Liza Minnelli, Dave Matthews, Sean Combs and Gloria Estefan". Now if you believe they couldn't contact these people then you'll believe anything. It's just a typical out of court where the guilty party pays up and in return get to deny all blame i.e. the RIAA are good guys stuff in document is only for the consumption of the legal system and fools.