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Artist Suggesting Ways Around Copy Protection
fanboyslayer writes "Switchfoot's new album Nothing Is Sound shipped from Sony with copy protection software on the CD, much to the dismay of thousands of iPod-wielding fans. The band posted a response on their official forum apologizing for the protection and detailing ways to circumvent the protection and rip their songs to PC. Switchfoot linked to open-source program CDex's download page with instructions on disabling the autorunning protection and ripping the files to MP3. Many of Switchfoot's fans have been upset by the copy protection measures, and it's nice to know the artists seem to care about the issue."
Wow, I wonder how Sony will respond to this. After all, bands usually have to give away all their freedom (and their souls) to the record companies when they sign.
Respect to Switchfoot. Oh, and down with the record companies, who don't give a damn about the artists or their music.
Okay folks.. My first thought was: "How cool! At least not all artist's (I'm looking at you metallica) are all about money and not the art". But here's another thought. Most artists only make around $2 profit (I've read that somewhere, sorry I can't source it) per album. The rest of the 15 bucks go to production, marketing, studios, and guess who? The RIAA! So this could be the first case where the RIAA sues AN ARTIST! With all the P2P music trading lawsuits... I think the RIAA has the grounds here. The Artist could be called pirates for detailing how to bypass the DRM. Plus the OSS software is now at risk of a RIAA lawsuit. I'm no lawyer so I may be off base here but I do think the next Slashdot headline will be "RIAA Sues Switchfoot". -Digital Madman
A bullet sounds the same in every language. So stick a fucking sock in it...
So, let me get this straight.
The record labels ARE the bad guys, and the band themselves probably didnt have a say when their record label decided that the CD should have copy protection, right?
The artists did realize that by putting copyright-protection on their CD, the piracy of their CD would increase, and not decrease - like the record company propagates - because everyone wants to listen to their music not just on their CD player, but also on their mp3 player, car stereo, and whatnot, right?
I really salute these guys for doing that they did, by putting out these instructions. It doesnt even matter to me that this smells a bit like a PR stunt - The thing that matters is that maybe more artists will follow this example, and soon "UNPROTECTED AUDIO-CD" will be a treat, just like "Limited Edition" is today.
As a long-time fan of Switchfoot (when they were a 3-piece band and doing some rather creative, but still cheesy videos for the Christian music scene), I'm fairly sure he did. The Foremans (Tim and his brother Jon) are a few cuts above the average rockers out there, and a bit deeper as well. They're also one of those bands who will stick around a venue for a while afterwards getting to know their fans, and to this point, have yet to let stardom cloud their eyes about what's really important, the fans. They'll stick by their guns on this one.
I wonder how many of the Sony bashers here have paid-for Sony products lying all over their abode? Just thinking out loud. Before this becomes a "Switchfoot sold-out" bashing thread, some of us might want to consider that we've done the same thing. Kudos to Switchfoot, Tim Foreman in particular. I'm sure they're aware that this will bring the Sony hounds on top of them, and they did it anyway. Oh, and if it's that easy to bypass the, ahem, "copy protection," Sony should get back to the corporate drawing board...
they're a "christian" band, not indie. which, for some reason, only adds humor to the situation for me...
It is also unfortunate when bands such as ourselves, Foo Fighters, Coldplay, etc... (just a few of the new releases with copy protection) are the target of this criticism, when there is no possible way to avoid this new industry policy.
This is bull. The artists are the original copyrigth-holder for their work. They choose to license it for publication by some record-company, or not. They are free to set whatever demands they want for this publication. (with the risk that if their demands are too stiff, the record-company will say: "no deal")
Especially famous, well-selling artists have considerable leverage. If say Madonna (more realistically, her manager or whomever representing her) walks into a record-company and say she'd like to publish her new record with them, but one of the conditions is that it be released in standard CD-format, that the company would refuse to negotiate a contract.
Artists do have a way of influencing record-companies. It may not be easy, and it may be that not all artists have a lot of negotiation-leverage all the time. But to claim, as he does here, that they have "no possible way" to influence things, is bullshit.
Microsoft designed Windows (this really *is* a feature :) so that you could bypass pesky autorun software by holding the SHIFT key (or just turning off on a per-drive basis)
/me paranoid first thing on a Monday morning
What's the odds that in Vista, the Autorun feature will be "improved" so that it's more like, "to disable Autorun, hold down SHIFT, unless it's a copy-protected disc in which case it WILL auto-run regardless of any key-presses or registry changes you make"?
The vast majority of their clientele will have Windows, with the CD-ROM Autorun feature switched on. The fact that the technology does nothing to prevent copying by the tech-savvy demographic indicates that they know that there is nothing they can do to prevent "cracking" of their protection schemes. They would love a universally uncrackable scheme, but they know that such a thing is not achievable. So they have settled for a scheme that nets them more money from a demographic that they can push around, and pointed the finger of blame at "those dirty smelly hacker pirates".
Has anyone considered that this announcment could be made with the full cooperation of Sony? The label wins by having "underground" artists who supposedly don't buy into the corporate ethos - angst and pseudo anti-corporatism generates a lot of sales. Anyone worth their salt would find a way to circumvent copy protection this easy anyway, so the label doesn't really lose out.
/., so it has worked to some extent.
The artist gains from having that warm fuzzy feeling of "speaking out", and generating sales of course. They also have a shared voice with their fans, without lifting a finger.
I'm not saying they don't care, i'm just saying this could easily be a publicity stunt. It's on
I sucessfully returned a CD (Kasabian) to Amazon.co.uk
My main argument in returning the CD was that the CD attempted to install unknown software onto my pc without my consent when I inserted it, and said software did not come with any way of unistalling - after taking advice from geeky friends, I uninstalled this driver by reverting to the last system restore point.
Also at the time there was no indication of any copy protection on Amazon's product page.
If everyone did that, they'd soon get the message.
My Karma: ran over your Dogma
StrawberryFrog
It's nice to see bands standing up for their public against the wishes of their labels.
Yeah, while still taking Sony's money and saying that it is "impossible" to change the system, and therefore supporting its continuation.
Let's be honest here. They don't WANT to change the system, because they like Sony's cash too much.
If they were genuine about being pro-fan, there is a hell of a lot that they could do about the situation.
For a start they could tell Sony to sod off with the copy protection, or they'll go with another publisher. If Sony threatens them with litigation on the basis of the contract signed, then get together with other artists in the same situation and run a class action on the basis of such contracts being in restraint of trade.
Sony (and other labels) are just distributors and promotors in this day and age when you can have a billion-track studio at home for peanuts, and hire in your mastering experts for a session. Yet, the labels want to own it all, for eternity. Bollocks.
It's time that bands did something about it, or be branded money-grabbing hypocrits. The power to bring down the system is in their hands. Currently the majority just have no interest in using that power and getting rid of the old machine.
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
They did give up all their principles, if they ever had any, when signing for Sony. You're either part of the problem or part of the solution.
This is the same logic that Bush used. You're either with us or with the terrorists. It's just fallacy. Empty rhetoric. It just sounds good.
Sony are not a "problem" they're a symptom. They're a company, created by commerce-based culture. If they go under, another company will form to take their place. Your problem is with the system that created them.
Also, comparing a bunch of entertainers to mother Theresa and Gandhi is downright laughable, and only serves to reinforce my perception that these guys are some sort of PR hoes.
Why? They're just human beings in the pubic eye. Look at Bob Geldof. He's an entertainer and he helps people. Just because you have them categorised into neat little boxes doesn't mean they have to conform to your definitions.
Oh, and good_press != heaven so there goes the rest of your argument. Go get some sleep, fanboy.
I'm going to ignore your childish insults and explain again.
You are *assuming* that these musicians are doing this for PR reasons. If they are doing that then, although your label of "karma bitch" might be valid, you have to apply that label in some places you might not expect in order for you critisism to be consistent, and hence for you not to be a hypocrite.
For example, the Catholic church (amongst many others, I apologise for using the easy target) preaches that if you don't follow their ways you will go to hell. It follows that people become Catholic to avoid going to hell. So, a catholic who performs a charitable act could be said to do so under the threat of hell. The same label of "karma bitch" could be applied, it's just that the reward comes in the afterlife instead of at a celebrity record launch.
Personally I disagree with your label of "karma bitch". I think that performing charitable acts in your own interests is perfectly acceptable. In fact, think that performing charitable acts is actually usually in your own interests, even if it's only to satisfy your conscience or to appear generous.
If the Apple and Windows userbases suddenly became equal, you'd see copy protection for both platforms. Why spend an equal amount of money for copy protection that's only going to affect 3% of your consumers vs 95%?
same idea as spyware.
i've got a question, though (being as I don't use windows and I've had the opportunity to rip several protected CDs for other people)...
One of the main problems with windows, in terms of reasons for lack of stability and the like, is that there is so much crap being installed on a regular basis (spyware, adware, and not to mention actual real software), what's to stop all this crap from conflicting and bringing down the system?
at my job, they just locked down all of the windows computers. Software cannot be installed without an administrator password. hell, you can't even look at the built-in calendar without loggin in as an admin (doubleclick the time in the taskbar).
how are office peons supposed to listen to music, now?
this also brings up another issue. Earlier on slashdot, there was an article about the 6 stupidest ideas for security. the author proposed a whitelist for executing software on a machine, rather than a blacklist. Having audio CDs require installation of software just to listen to music completely shatters his idea of keeping a clean system. Suddenly, you go from knowing exactly what you need to run (excel, word, minesweeper, adobe reader, etc) to saying "sonydrmdaemon32.exe? columnbiaprotect_win32.exe... wtf is that crap?"
I can see it now. in 2 years when nearly every audioCD comes with their own flavour of software DRM, the next wave of security exploits are going to involve that software.
the future looks pretty dark.
...spike
Ewwwwww, coconut...