The Chumbawamba Factor

putko writes "Chris Dahlen has written about BigChampagne, a company that looks at peer-to-peer downloading to provide marketing data to record companies. By analyzing what folks are downloading, when and where, BigChampagne can tell the record companies what people like, what other records they like and other information critical to deciding how to allocate marketing dollars. As mentioned in the article, record companies started using this information (secretly) even as they were trying to stop filesharing via the courts."

Comments

Whoops, no time!

[Willeh]

I'd comment, but i have to download some Wesley Willis. Did you hear that, BigChampagne people? WESLEY WILLIS. http://www.alternativetentacles.com/bandinfo.php?b and=wesleywillis

Oh yeah, down with the RIAA!! How dare they profit from something illegal! Rock on Chicago, Rock on London, Rock over RIAA.

Re:Whoops, no time!

[mmkkbb]

"Rock on Chicago, Rock on London, Rock over RIAA."

Shouldn't that be "RIAA sucks a llama's nuts"?

Re:Whoops, no time!

[decipher_saint]

He kicked Spiderman's ass 'cause his keyboard got damage... or something.

Re:Whoops, no time!

[freewaybear]

Fuck with him, and find out! (He'll shoot you with his BB gun.)

Re:Whoops, no time!

[freewaybear]

75th post! Get On The Bus!

Re:Whoops, no time!

[Anonymous Coward]

RIAA got on my nerves
They were running me amock
They ridiculed me calling me a bum
I whooped RIAA's ass

RIAA thought they were bad
They were fucking assholes in the first place
They got knocked to the floor
I whooped RIAA's ass

RIAA beat the hell outta me and knocked me to the floor
I got back up and knocked them to the floor
They were being such a jackoff
I whooped RIAA's ass

Rock over London
Rock on Chicago
Wheaties, the breakfast of champions

Re:Whoops, no time!

[Anonymous Coward]

Llama nuts don't hang so sucking might prove quite difficult.

What am I saying, the RIAA are master suckers...totally doable with their expertise.

Re:Whoops, no time!

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd rather not ask how you know that little factiod...

Re:Whoops, no time!

[anaesthetica]

No, you can hear Willis clearly saying "RIAA tastes the panda's ass".

Re:Whoops, no time!

[Malyven]

How is the parent a flamebait, when the grandparent is +5 funny? Is it just me or does that make no sense.

Re:Whoops, no time!

[tyrione]

The idea of the comical song is commendable. Don't quit your day job when it comes to actually being a lyricist. At least parody something Weird Al would do.

Re:Whoops, no time!

[KillShill]

only if the llama finds it pleasing.

Re:Whoops, no time!

[davestar]

I'm guessing the parent isn't familiar with "I Whooped Batman's Ass" from the late, great Wesley Willis?

Legal Action

[Krast0r]

"..and other information critical to deciding how to allocate marketing dollars" i.e. information critical to prosecuting as many people as possible. Who here really believes that they will stop at monitering the tracks downloaded?

Re:Legal Action

[mmkkbb]

Right. If they were really interested in what people were listening to, they'd invest more time in AudioScrobbler.

Re:Legal Action

[AndersOSU]

I read "..and other information critical to deciding how to allocate marketing dollars" as information critical to pushing out the next Britney Spears album...

I get knocked down

[Alex P Keaton in da]

Well, I guess we get knocked down, but we get up again! They ain't never ever ever gonaa win!

Re:I get knocked down

[mysqlrocks]

My Karma gets knocked down, but it gets up again! They ain't never ever ever gonaa win!

Re:I get knocked down

[fm2503]

We get a whiskey drink, we get a cider drink, we get a lager drink, we get a soda drink.........

Re:I get knocked down

[kilodelta]

Indeed, Pandora's Box has been opened and there's no changing it.

But they'll keep trying to defend a dying distribution mechanism until they ultimately succumb because they were distributing crap.

Here's what I don't get. The overhead costs associated with net distribution are much less than CD media distribution. This is why I don't understand the pricing scheme for things like iTunes and Yahoo Music. True track cost should be ten to twenty cents, not seventy-nine cents or ninety-nine cents.

Then there is the elephant in the room. Apple crows about it's iPod but to be honest - who is going to pay thousands of dollars to fill their iPod. Nobody, that's who. Much of the music on iPods is more than likely illegaly downloaded tracks. Recent rulings would come down and say that Apple enables copyright violation. But curiously nobody touches them.

Lets not mention iTunes and the MyTunes Redux application. Nothing like snatching music while it's being streamed to you.

My point is that copyright violations have been occuring on a regular basis for the past 30 or so years. I can't count how many albums I recorded to tape when I was a kid, each time violating the sanctity of the RIAA. I'm pretty sure those of us that came in at the beginning of the digital revolution did much the same. But now the RIAA sees fit to persecute. Note the choice of the word.

Instead of cultivating a potential market that makes their lives easier, they'd prefer to litigate. It is high time to put the lawyers against the wall.

Re:I get knocked down

[Anonymous Coward]

I take a whiskey drink!
I take a vodka drink!
And when I have to pee,
I use the kitchen sink!

Re:I get knocked down

[dmaxwell]

The record publishers still get to ding artists for things like "breakage". In the early days, you could reliably count on about 9% of the stock being broken in shipping. Recording company contracts charged the artists that fee. As shipping methods grew more reliable, the artists continued to be charged for "breakage". When vinyl was replaced by CDs which are hardly ever damaged in shipment, yep you guessed it! The artists still get dinged.

Physical distribution systems offer the labels a million ways to skim off the top. I think they fear that they won't be able to bring their scams into the 21st century if they discontinue physical media.

Re:I get knocked down

[tbone1]

who is going to pay thousands of dollars to fill their iPod. Nobody, that's who.

I didn't. I filled it up with MP3s/AACs ripped from my legally-purchased CDs, with a smattering that I've purchased from iTMS.

Re:I get knocked down

[shmlco]

So many assumptions in one place...

1) So, if they're distributing crap, then why are you filling up your iPod with it?

2) You only think you know the costs. Somebody is maintaining a large and expensive web site. Somebody is maintaining a bank of servers. Somebody is paying for bandwidth. Somebody is paying the credit card company 20-30 cents per transaction. Somebody is paying for the music. And Apple and the record companies and the artists are all (god forbid) making a profit.

3) Most of the content on my iPods, and my friends, for that matter, come from ripped CDs we already owned. The rest comes from iTunes and Audible. The "most is illegal" assumption strikes me as the standard "everyone else must be doing it" rationalization. Somebody bought 500,000,000 songs off iTunes.

4) "Copying to tape" has been sanctioned almost since the reel-to-reel was invented. I know you enjoyed feeling like a rebel, but your sanctity in that regard is safe.

Re:I get knocked down

[MayorDefacto]

...I sing the song that reminds me I'm a urinating guy...

Props to Homer J.

Re:I get knocked down

[kilodelta]

The whole record industry set up stinks to high heaven.

There really isn't any reason the average band can't record and digitize their stuff themselves these days. What they can't do is front themselves the money for touring.

Hmmm... how about a financing company that finances tours for a reasonable cut of revenue, instead of gouging the crap out the bands.

Re:I get knocked down

[jc42]

4) "Copying to tape" has been sanctioned almost since the reel-to-reel was invented.

Only after battles much like the current battle. The recording industry objected to retail sale of tapes from the beginning, and their argument was the same: People would use tapes to copy each others' records, which was a copyright violation, stole money from starving artists, and all the rest of the litany.

This was especially blatant when cassettes first came out. The recording industry really fought these tiny tapes. People would just use them for criminal copying to avoid paying for music.

Some countries even added a tax to the sale of blank cassettes that was supposed to go to the artists to compensate them for lost sales. Of course, few if any of those artists ever received a penny of that money. What it really meant was that musicians who made (and sold) their own recordings had to pay the tax to the recording companies to compensate the companies for the lost income from artists that hadn't been signed.

It's an old, old scam ...

Re:I get knocked down

[sandman935]

Their response to cassettes was nothing compared to their response to DAT.

Re:I get knocked down

[Anonymous Coward]

It's cider, not soda.

Here are the full lyrics.

Re:I get knocked down

[jc42]

I think you're right, though it can be difficult to put the meager data from various decades into proper perspective. The extreme reaction to DAT was probably because it introduced something really new: A digital format can be copied repeatedly without introducing any further errors. The Nth generation can be the exact same bits as the first. So an important reason for wanting the first generation product had been eliminated.

Of course, history since then shows that DAT really didn't effect sales much, if at all. Similarly, sales seem to have grown after the introduction of the earlier tape formats, despite all the warnings that everyone would be driven out of business by piracy.

Anyway, the long history of these campaigns against "consumer" copying technology, none of which materially affected sales, should tell us that the current campaign is probably also totally bogus. They've cried "Wolf!" so many times that we should be demanding to see the teeth and claws before we believe them this time.

Let's face it; MP3 has been around for a decade or so, and the recording industry isn't dead yet. But maybe we'd be better off if it were.

Maybe what we need is a collection of quotes from the past about how the recording industry was going to be killed by piracy because of whatever was the latest recording hardware. Every time we read a story on the topic, we could post the long list of dire warnings, to educate readers on how the industry has always behaved.

Textbook example

[Anonymous Coward]

A classic case of "Do as I say, not as I do", methinks.

Re:Textbook example

[goldspider]

It's more like "making the best of a bad situation".

Re:Textbook example

[Iriel]

The only problem with that idea is that it makes another point for the RIAA to look hypocritical. The record companies KNOW that a good number of P2P downloaders buy CDs from artists they download (I'm not saying everyone does to defend them, so don't flame me for all the actual media pirates). I just think that our lawsuit craven culture supports more excuses to sue little Cindy-Loo-Hoo out of her lunch money.

If the RIAA was really serious about getting rid of all p2p, they wouldn't have ANY part in it. You can't fight to abolish something while getting kickbacks on it (at least not ethically, but that doesn't seem to stop too many people lately).</toungeincheeck>

Re:Textbook example

[pianophile]

Cindy-Loo-Hoo

This should be spelled "Cindy Lou Who", actually.

I know you were just dying to know that.

Re:Textbook example

[Chosen Reject]

Don't wanna make waves, can't you see?

Maybe they should become alligator wrestler's and get their ears bit off.

My apologies to those who know who I'm quoting. And to who I'm quoting.

Re:Textbook example

[fshalor]

How could you catch that... and miss the open tag for the ?

He's right though. p2p is an issue. But it's one that's kind of more symptomatic of a larger problem.

The other news on this same /. day, of the artists providing a howto to circomvent the DRM on their own cd from Sony is a bit closer to the crux.

Manufacturers aren't listening to *either* artists or listeners. Which really sucks.

Re:Textbook example

[techno-vampire]

The other news on this same /. day, of the artists providing a howto to circomvent the DRM on their own cd from Sony is a bit closer to the crux.

It's appropriate, though. Today is Tlk Like A Pirate Day. Arrrgh!

Re:Textbook example

[deathy_epl ccs]

I'm not so sure the recording industry could EVER have been considered the least bit ethical... even in the early days, it sounded like they took advantage of everybody and everything for a buck.

Music servers

[rawwa.venoise]

Do they contribute with some of the music servers?
And do they download music in order to generate traffic?
And then they sell it as vital information to understand the market.

Do they erase the downloaded songs after? I wouldn't mind working there i guess ...

Re:Music servers

[InfiniteWisdom]

If they're the copyright holders or working on behalf of they copyright holders they don't need to

Re:Music servers

[Anonymous Coward]

Lets see.

First No. they have no music servers.
Second No. They download nothing.

Finially they delete nothign because they download nothing.

Their program is actually nothign more then a statistics analasys program that harvets data from result sets returned by P2P searches.

It is complicated as fuck, don't get me wrong. But no music data ever trades hands.

Re:Music servers

[saigon_from_europe]

It is complicated as fuck...

Being /.-ers, we must admit it is then extremely complicated...

Re:Music servers

[terrymr]

oh no ... you bought into the BS The record co is not the copyright holder usually. They're just a licensee ... check a copyright notice on a CD. Says something like "Copyright 2005 Band Name here. Published by very big music corporation".

Re:Music servers

[rawwa.venoise]

Cool. So if they don't download nothing what stop people from floading the search with fake file servers?
Better yet they can't actually prove the files on my computer are from any RIAA associated artist, since they actually didn't test for the file content and i can have any file named Mariah Carrey for my thesis document if this make sense :)
So people should try to locate these searchers and flood them with shit !!! Shouldn't be much difficult since they don't take nothing. It's like the cops, they ask too much about the drugs and don't buy any ...

Re:Music servers

[Drakonite]

oh no ... you bought into the BS The record co is not the copyright holder usually. They're just a licensee ... check a copyright notice on a CD. Says something like "Copyright 2005 Band Name here. Published by very big music corporation".

Funny thing... You are wrong. I decided to be nice and take you up on your challenge, and every CD I checked was marked as copyrights being owned by the record label. Though on a few it wasn't easy to find.

Of course, if you've paid any attention to the bitching artists have been doing for years over how the labels treat their music you wouldn't have these dilusions that most signed bands still own the copyrights to their music, because it simply isn't so.

Re:Music servers

[Anonymous Coward]

In theory it would work but the cross checking of the MD5 and the other error handlers would make it start to look odd and the data would be either discarded or treated with less weight in the final calculations.

In reality, while there may be many million of copies of a song on a P2P network, most of them are just that, copies.

Things like file size checking, MD5 checking and ip cross matching stop this in practice. In the end, it is a very accurate way to see the traffic on P2P networks without violating ANY current laws.

Re:Music servers

[terrymr]

Maybe I just buy music from bands who won't sell their copyrights then.

Although ... if the labels had bought the copyrights ... why did they try to get congress to assign them ownership of the rights a few years ago.

Re:Music servers

[terrymr]

They could be mislabeling too ... during the napster case, there was a lot of talk about misrepresentation of copyrights because the labels claimed ownership of works that they'd licensed. Some bands even went as far as to demand that labels allow their music to be downloaded on napster because as artists they had not granted online distribution rights to the labels and therefore retained that right themselves.

Re:Music servers

[FransUNC]

The record label owns the right to the recording. Regardless of who owns the copyright on the lyrics and the music, any recorded music by the copyright holder is owned by the record label and royalties are paid to the artist per contract.

Secondly, most artists also sell their publishing rights. They do this because it is the easiest way to get money up front, and the publishing company's sole job is to push the music to more venues of revenue. So when Joe buys a CD or a company pays to use a song for a TV commercial, the record label and publishing company get paid. They then pay the artist royalties, per contract. Some artists hold out on publishing, and then are able to get incredible deals. I believe I remember hearing of one successful John-Mayer-type artist who debuted in 2003/4 had held onto his publishing rights through his debut album, and was looking at a million dollar publishing deal prior to recording his new release.

Artists that do not get fairly negotiated contracts lose money because they naively give labels and publishing groups the ability to pay out less or no royalties in certain situations.

Re:Music servers

[shark72]

"Funny thing... You are wrong. I decided to be nice and take you up on your challenge, and every CD I checked was marked as copyrights being owned by the record label. Though on a few it wasn't easy to find."

The GP is correct; he just wasn't very clear.

You're correct that the copyright notice on the outside of a CD refers to the copyright that the record label holds -- that is, on the recording. The songwriters and composers hold the copyright on the words and the music. This is often referred to as the publishing rights. Check the liner notes... if lyrics are printed, you'll often see that below the lyrics you'll see a statement similar to what he wrote: "Copyright yadda-yadda publishing company." This "company" is often just one person, or a writing partnership (I don't have one handy, but I believe Lennon and McCartney went by something like "Northern Songs"), or it can be a larger publishing outfit that handles the publishing rights for the composer and the songwriter.

"Of course, if you've paid any attention to the bitching artists have been doing for years over how the labels treat their music you wouldn't have these dilusions that most signed bands still own the copyrights to their music, because it simply isn't so."

Both of you are correct. You are correct that record labels typically own the copyright to the recording. He is correct that composers and songwriters typically own the copyright on the words and the music.

Owning the publishing rights is important because it allows the artist to make money on things like radio airplay, jukeboxes, and use in movies and shows. It also lets them do things like perform the song live without getting permission from the record company, or to give permission to let somebody else cover the song (although I believe these are often handled through mechanicals -- but the point is that the composer and songwriter get paid, not the record company, when you cover somebody else's song), or even re-record the song for another record label, once your contract has expired with your current one.

Of course, I'm aware that many Slashdotters think that the record companies hold all the copyrights. However, this isn't true. There are many thing that every Slashdotter "knows" but which are not correct.

Win win situation

[wlvdc]

Both users and providers get what they want, illegally.

Re:Win win situation

[demachina]

For this to be really effective RIAA just needs to take the next step, which I hear they are working on, and Clearchannelize P2P.

- Filter out all the innovative, creative interesting tracks leaving only Britaany, Celine and the boy band of the month

- Create some sort of graft system to reward file sharers who only share the crap they want to make people listen to, you know free tennis shoes if you fill your sight with nothing but Jessica Simpson

- Monopolize the P2P airwaves by monopolizing all the servers and snuffing out or buying out all the independent file sharers

- Loading all the tracks with bad DJ's, weather and traffic reports, and LOTS and LOTS of commercials.

Re:Win win situation

[Red Flayer]

"Create some sort of graft system to reward file sharers who only share the crap they want to make people listen to, you know free tennis shoes if you fill your sight with nothing but Jessica Simpson "

I have no problem filling my sight with Jessica Simpson... it's my hearing that doesn't like her.

I'm surprised that recording industry doesn't pay people to promote 'illegal' filesharing of new albums... oh wait. They have. Through third parties, so they could claim ignorance.

Re:Win win situation

[fastfinge]

Dude. It's called fasttrack; where ya been?

Eat Your Cake

[mfh]

First off, for those of you who have no idea, or only a vague memory; "Chumbawamba are a band from the UK who use their music to promote anarchist ideas."

So the RIAA et al are trying to put an end to P2P, while hypocritically using P2P stats to know what's hot; they have crossed the threshold from tyranny into absurdity. What judge, knowing this, will still side with the RIAA in the future? Does this not set a precedent that the RIAA sees value in P2P?

The RIAA is reacting to a market change; P2P. They are learning that P2P has value to them, perhaps more value than loss, in that they can get a real consensus on what people want. Furthermore, the RIAA can no longer deem P2P as an immoral behaviour that corrupts society, because the fruit from the tree has poisoned their self-professed purity.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[gallondr00nk]

Surely not. That would suggest realism, or at the very least sanity. We cannot let our betters make rational decisions, civilisation will crumble!

Re:Eat Your Cake

[kamapuaa]

Huh? Obviously if the record companies felt the information was worth the loss in sales, they wouldn't be complaining about P2P in the first place. The record companies are protecting their self-interests, they're not idealogues against online music sharing. If offering free music over P2P made business sense, they'd be right there hosting their own torrents, and including little stickers on the CD case, saying "just download the FLAC off torrentspy, instead of wasting your money!"

And why would this have any effect on what a judge would say? Judges apply law, they don't review businesses' profit margins and force companies to shift legal strategies to maximize their profits. What planet are you from?

Re:Eat Your Cake

[garcia]

So the RIAA et al are trying to put an end to P2P, while hypocritically using P2P stats to know what's hot; they have crossed the threshold from tyranny into absurdity. What judge, knowing this, will still side with the RIAA in the future? Does this not set a precedent that the RIAA sees value in P2P?

Because they are gaining stats in something that's not acceptable in the United States? Would a judge not side with the police getting stats on drug users to see where they congregate and what kinds of drugs they prefer?

It's the same thing to them.

To us, yes, it's shady and yet another reason you shouldn't support them or the music they promote.

P2P as an immoral behaviour that corrupts society, because the fruit from the tree has poisoned their self-professed purity.

They can claim whatever the fuck they want to claim as long as no one stops them. Unfortuantely no one will stop them because they have started to win the publics' (and the courts') opinion that this is "wrong".

Sad but true. Listen to free music by bands that don't need the RIAA.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[Andorion]

Would a judge not side with the police getting stats on drug users to see where they congregate and what kinds of drugs they prefer?

The RIAA is the one selling, so I guess they're the drug dealers with the bought police in your analogy?

Re:Eat Your Cake

[garcia]

The RIAA is the one selling, so I guess they're the drug dealers with the bought police in your analogy?

Thanks for clarifying the obvious.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[Sponge Bath]

Chumbawamba are a band from the UK

Thank you. I thought it was the sound Ewoks make.
You explanation makes more sense.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[ArsonSmith]

So cops shouldn't use the number of bank robberies in an area to judge how many police should patrol the area? I mean they are useing illigal activity to plan their stratigy? Come on, that aguement has no merit what so ever.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[sabernet]

the cops' goal in that case would be to prevent further crime.

the RIAA is using the fruits of a network system they aim to destroy to profit themselves.

this is akin to the police using the money stolen from those banks to increase their annual budget.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[Anonymous Coward]

Please. If I own a store and I keep a running tally of what has been shoplifted in the past month does that mean I should just allow it to happen?

The Recording Industry makes its money selling recordings. So how exactly does known what recordings are popular help them when they're giving the recordings away?

Re:Eat Your Cake

[dR.fuZZo]

First off, for those of you who have no idea, or only a vague memory; "Chumbawamba are a band from the UK who use their music to promote anarchist ideas."

And, for those of you who are interested in why Chumbawamba might actually be mentioned when it comes to P2P music downloading: Chumbawamba were a one hit wonder. Their one song came out, people ran out and bought the album, and then got pissed off that they spent so much money on one song they liked and a bunch of crap they didn't. When people have the choice to buy/download just the songs they like, they'll do so. They won't get 15 Chumbawamba songs if all but one of them are crap.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[arkanes]

You mean like how the money for speeding tickets goes directly into police department funds, and how the property siezed in drug raids is auctioned off, with the funds going to police funds?

Re:Eat Your Cake

[ArsonPerBuilding]

Because they are gaining stats in something that's not acceptable in the United States? Would a judge not side with the police getting stats on drug users to see where they congregate and what kinds of drugs they prefer?

Your analogy is flawed.
The police and RIAA both have different profit incentives.
The RIAA is charged by record labels to not only enforce copyrights but also get info about music, as well as help distribute said music.
Police are essentially a protective force that is charted by citizens through social contract theory.
One is interested in your safety, the other your wallet.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[Rei]

I dunno... At first, I just knew of their one song, but I kinda got to liking Jacob's Ladder (v.2) recently, so I wonder if I'd like some of their other stuff.

Even if you don't care much for anarchist politics, an anarchist-leaning band seems a lot more likely to give away free music and support p2p. ;)

Re:Eat Your Cake

[ArsonSmith]

No no, he specifically said money stolen from banks. this is a completely diffrent thing.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[R2.0]

Rather, it is as if the beer companies were collecting statistics on underage drinking so that they could better market their product.

Or tobacco companies collecting statistics on underage smoking so they could market their product.

Even betetr would be if the maker of Oxycontin was to gather statistics on Heroin users so as to better market their (legal) product to the addicts in question so that the will buy Oxycontin instead of Heroin.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[eaolson]

Would a judge not side with the police getting stats on drug users to see where they congregate and what kinds of drugs they prefer?

The ironic part about what you said is that the police would be collecting statistics on how to better deter drug use, while the RIAA is collecting statistics on how to better provide the very thing they are complaining people are getting illegally.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[Gen. Rasputin X]

Closer to the mayor getting the police drug statistics and figuring out which drug rehab clinics will provide the best publicity with the lowest operating costs.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[Anonymous Coward]

Its those little guys from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, or the knockoffs on Futurama/Family Guy. Chumba wumba dumbildy do, we have a special message for you.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[rob_squared]

Yes, completely different, because companies are more important than people, everybody knows that.

I really wish there was a +1 Sarcasm tag.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[ModMeFlamebait]

Yes, completely different, because companies are more important than people, everybody knows that.

If the police gets money from speeding tickets, the _offender_ pays, if they keep stolen goods for themselves, the _victim_ pays.

I really wish there was a -1 Moron tag.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[wingsofchai]

in the analogy the RIAA would be the police he was talking about. you would be the drug dealer. try thinking longer than two seconds before posting.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[sabernet]

If the police gets money from speeding tickets, the _offender_ pays, if they keep stolen goods for themselves, the _victim_ pays.

beat me to it;P

Re:Eat Your Cake

[el americano]

Enough people have pointed out that monitoring an illegal activity, while maintaining that it is illegal is not immoral nor hypocritical.

I'd like to further remind you that some people have made the argument that one reason people download music is because much of it is no longer available in stores. They can now show that they are attempting to analyze which songs those are in order to make them available in the future.

I don't know where you got the idea that they are pretending to be pure. They are just a bunch of rich corporations covering all the bases. I wouldn't expect anything else.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[danila]

The article isn't about the fact that RIAA realised the value of P2P and accepted the change. No, this isn't so yet. The article is about the fact that the music business has already experienced a drastic, profound and irreversible change that can no longer be ignored.

This is not a victory for common (business) sense yet, but it's a sign that rules of the game have changed. Treating customers as criminals is always stupid, but the RIAA was doing it out of desperation - trying to retain the control that they grappled for with the consumers. Now the labels are gradually realising that MP3 players are a reality, that downloads are a reality, that playing music on multiple devices is a reality, that consumer wants more freedom to consume the consumables in any consum^H^H^Hceivable way. They are gradually changing their approach, even though they are still trying to clutch at straws of DRM and lawsuits. Changing the approach is not saying OK to piracy, it's slowly adapting to the new world, where piracy is also part of the game (just like it was with the cassettes).

Re:Eat Your Cake

[dickrichardv8]

Ain't the legal equivalent of that the defence of "unclean hands". IANAL (I am not a lawyer) ICSE (I can't spel either)

Re:Eat Your Cake

[Thuktun]

I thought it was the sound Ewoks make.

http://www.geocities.com/woodpush85/EwokDictionary .txt

Re:Eat Your Cake

[elemental23]

They won't get 15 Chumbawamba songs if all but one of them are crap.

Where crap is defined as music I don't particularly care for. I'm quite fond of Chumbawamba's earlier stuff but I thought Tubthumper was absolute garbage. I don't remember what the rest of the album sounded like, but this lack of any impression whatsoever is telling.

Re:Eat Your Cake

[Mean Ass Troll]

this is how really rich business works....
attack what threatens you. may or may not succeed
study what threatens you. steal. steal. innovate...
chumbawumba will have little bearing in most legal decisions. RIAA doesnt need p2p to see whats popular. they can look at album sales. the bottom line here is controll. monopolist control over music. what most people dont undeartand is the members of the riaa are also a monopsony. this allows them total controll of music to push. to be able to realease your own record for a total cost of under 1000 bucks (pc bandwidth, studio etc) and release this to hundreds of millions of people scares the chit out of them. they do no give a fuck about the deadbeat that pirates cd's. he will never pay anyway, even in court, as no court can order a broke ass basement dweller to pay when he has nothing.
but if a massive internet (non Riaa, so they could not say anything about it) hit was ever to happen, or a site that was famous delivering such hits it would be a cartel breaker.

I'm sorry...

[GoatMonkey2112]

that data is protected under the DMCA. Please wait patiently for your court summons.

That explains so much

[Walkiry]

Lots of crap music that sounds mostly the same keeps being marketed by the suits. One of the most heard phrases when it comes to justify downloading copyrighted music off the net: "I just download the crap that's not worth paying for."

Hmmmmm...

Re:That explains so much

[StarvingSE]

I usually download, and then upon listening to it realize its crap I'm glad I didn't spend money on first.

Like many others on here (I believe, at least), I download first, listen to it, and buy later if its any good.

Re:That explains so much

[the web]

That's what I've been saying since napster. They actually think I would've bought the stuff I downloaded? The record companies would be in the same shape if Napster existed or not. The percentage of people that actually download INSTEAD of purchasing are slim the way I see it. Probably about the same number that used to shoplift music back before those fancy detector gates were put in. The only difference today is that they don't lose any tangible product inventory now. (i'm certain there's still store theft today)
 
Truth be told, I have made many wiser (and less) purchases as a result of file sharing, but that's a very very dead horse.

Re:That explains so much

[Anonymous Coward]

The percentage of people that actually download INSTEAD of purchasing are slim the way I see it

AS YOU SEE IT IS VERY WRONG THEN.

I personally have over 12GB of music I will never purchase now. My car stereo plays mp3's as does my home stereo, as does my protable music player.

Why spend the money.

Re:That explains so much

[the web]

Umm, exactly...

I personally have over 12GB of music I will never purchase now.

Would you have bought every song if you couldn't download them? If you we're never going to buy it, then you cannot substitute the action of downloading IN THE STEAD OF the action of purchasing. I believe the the phrase you're getting it confused with is 'rather than'.

Spoke much english does you?

Re:That explains so much

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, a lot of it I woudl have purchased and had planned on purchasing.

Whiel I woudl not have purchased the 12Gb worht of music I woudl have purchased the same amoutn I did the prior year, (about 50 albums)

Charts

[WebfishUK]

Does this mean that at last we can get charts which really reflect what people are listening to?

Re:Charts

[screevo]

I think the sad fact that you are missing is, the Billboard charts do accurately reflect what people are listening to.

Let us weep together for youth.

Re:Charts

[ArsonSmith]

replace "are" with "want to" then. Just because they are spoon feed crap doesn't mean they want crap.

Re:Charts

[SimonCoxUK]

You can get charts on exactly what people are listening to: http://www.last.fm/charts/

Re:Charts

[screevo]

The reason the charts dont reflect what you want is simply this: The same people who rage against the machine and complain, they are the same people not buying CDs, not listening to the radio and requesting songs, etc. So they complain and complain, but never really do anything.

Meanwhile, it's the fans of mainstream music who ARE buying CD's, watchign MTV, listening to the radio. They participate in the advertising mediums, so they get listened to. They want the "crap", and they are vocal about it. So they get it.

While I may be sad at what is popular, I don't complain because, really, I don't care if my favorite band is on the charts. If they are, rock on. If not, does it make me enjoy them any less? No.

Re:Charts

[uacheesehead]

I don't know if it ever popped up on /. but Audioscrobbler is a great way to see what people REALLY listen to. It's a free plug-in for lots of media players that uploads data about what you listen to. You can see what the community as a whole listens to, or you can see what people with similar tastes as you listen to. It's a great way to find new music.

Re:Charts

[techno-vampire]

...the Billboard charts do accurately reflect what people are listening to.

Replace "listening to" with "buying" and you have it right. People might want to hear an older song on the radio instead of newer junque, but if they've allready bought the CD, it's not going to stay on the charts and it's not going to get much airplay.

Re:Charts

[Guppy06]

At best, it's only about what a plurality of people are listenin to. Like the old Onion article said, "Majority of Americans Out of Touch with Mainsteam America."

Re:Charts

[romeo_in_blk_jeans]

As I understand it, the billboard charts accurately reflect only what songs are played the most on the radio.

Consider the implications of that for a second. The charts may or may not reflect what any specific region actually wants to listen to. It seems like there should necessarily be a causality in all cases but apparently that's not always true.

It seems logical that the radio conglomerates would want to play the most popular songs. After all, the music is being played by companies that want only to maximize profits for stockholders. The music only matters as much as it sells commercial airtime and if you can't afford to miss the song coming on after the next commercial break, you can't afford to tune out during the commercial for fear of missing that song.

Anyways, my point: Some funky statistical skewing goes on behind the scenes when the record labels purchase commercial time to play a song that's just been released by one of their "hot new artists" (tm). This results in an artifically high numbers of plays that forces the song up the charts into a position it doesn't actually deserve. The radio execs, seeing a song so high on the chart, start scheduling it for more frequent circulation. If enough record companies do this...see the feedback loop?

Re:Charts

[screevo]

Soundscan is the chart that reflects music sales. I used Billboard up above because it's the chart that most people think of immediately.

Re:Charts

[Threni]

> Audioscrobbler is a great way to see what people REALLY listen to.

A great way to see what a statistically insignificant number of people REALLY listen to, anyway.

Let me just say that...

[eno2001]

...I was never a big fan of "Tubthumping". Look at one of my latest posts (Sunday night) in a friend's JE about the worst music evar.

I'll also say, why in the hell is the music business so fired up to make nothing but hit records instead of providing people with access to music with artistic integrity? Yeah, they should make money, there's no doubt about that. They are, after all a businesses and they exist to make money. But, don't they also exist to give artists a voice? Whatever happened to that part of the equation? When did they discard the idea that popular music can also be truly artistic expressions of a musician's mind, body and soul? I don't even have a problem with there being people who make million dollar incomes when they do nothing more than pencil pushing in the whole cycle of musicial distribution. But, the musicians who actually create the stuff should be making at least as much as they do because without the artist, the business is nothing.

Re:Let me just say that...

[doublem]

Today's music industry would never have given Hendrix, The Dead or most the popular artists of the 60's and 70's.

Re:Let me just say that...

[Threni]

> But, don't they also exist to give artists a voice?

That's it, just like Microsoft exists to allow programmers to release their code to the public.

Re:Let me just say that...

[FLEB]

That's consolidated radio for ya'.

Centralized playlists mean there is no competition between radio stations any more. Take away even the role of the DJ as more than a programmed talking head, and there's no chance for anything else to get sent down the pipes.

Radio always was, and still is, the way most music gets sent out to most people, it's just that the landscape of radio has changed.

Re:Let me just say that...

[Illserve]

They are a corporation and therefore charged with the sole mandate to make money for their stockholders.

Do not blame them for this, it is reason that they exist. What you're doing is getting upset at a shark for eating fish.

As for why they choose to artificially create popularity, rather than letting it flow naturally from the talents of the artist, the answer is simply that it's more efficient for them to do so. Betting on artist talent is a huge gamble, and that was how the business used to behave.

By obtaining control of marketing and distribution channels, they have figured out that they can turn what used to be a gamble into a (more or less) fixed rate of return on their investment. It's good business on their part to do so, and you shouldn't be surprised that these companies are trying so hard to do what they are supposed to do: make money.

If you want to get upset at someone, get upset at judges that allow this sort of behavior. THEY are the ones responsible for curtailing this sort of stupidity and keeping the corporations under control.

Re:Let me just say that...

[rufty_tufty]

I've been kind of wondering this myself, why is the only viable buisness model at the moment to make a record that makes a million?
Are there record companies out there that don't want to make a number 1, but instead just promote as many bands as possible (say with the aim of getting into the top 40).
There must be a reason they don't make money through this, otherwise they would (maybe they do)

I just don't see it.

Re:Let me just say that...

[BovineSpirit]

You've obviously not been listening to Chumbawamba. Their first release was an angry reaction to Live Aid called
  'Pictures of Starving Children Sell Albums'. Everything they've done before and after Tubthumping has shown little regard for what the market demands. There's lots of decent music out there, you just have to look beyond the mainstream media.

Re:Let me just say that...

[Kazoo the Clown]

It's quite simple, really. Say for example, you are a company with a 200M promotion budget. If you spend 40M on 5 bands, you can afford to a) produce and promote some videos, b) saturate the channels with ads & videos, etc. c) payola the crap out of the radio stations, d) pay to get them into some TV appearances and soundtracks of feature films. The resultant overexposure generates gobs of sales and the projects take off. On the other hand, if you spend that 200M as 5M on 40 bands, you can barely afford to pay for anything, they don't get much exposure and consequently, nothing takes off. You've spread the money too thin.

The quality of the music is not as critical as the quality of the marketing, which takes lots of money. You don't want to be wasting those gobs of money on bands the success of which you are unsure of-- the money is being spent to help guarantee success. Also, note that most new bands are young and naive, and are easy to fool into working for peanuts, which is why they rarely get much of the take, and why long term contracts are so popular with the corporations-- it locks them in before they've had the opportunity to wise up.

Chumbawumba factor?

[benjcurry]

Check this out for maximum Chumbawumba Factor: http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/features/weekly/05-0 8-22-the-chumbawamba-factor.shtml I assume the title came from this story?

Re:Chumbawumba factor?

[benjcurry]

LOL...that was the story linked to...I guess I assumed it linked to something else because I read that story a month ago...*burp*

Re:Chumbawumba factor?

[screevo]

I do believe that would be a safe assumption... Wait, let me try something... RTFA! Did I do that right?

Re:Chumbawumba factor?

[benjcurry]

*deep bow*

no

[Anonymous Coward]

They can't guarantee they own what we like.

Have their cake and eat it too!

[GecKo213]

Sounds like something I heard someone on TV last night say. There is a group of roomates that live in a rather large house. One guy and a girl really like each other. She's fallen for him completely and he "wants his cake and wants to eat it too." Explaination, he wants this girl as his backup in case he can't find another girl to bring home from the bars or whatever.

With the RIAA using filesharing while trying to shut it down seems a bit odd to me. Recording artists for example are being "ripped off" by downloaders. Right? Well, the very same companies that are supposedly trying to stop the illegal downloading of music are using that data as a way to market or create new media.

Something else I'd always wondered about is why pirating Adobe producs was so easy. I'm using the GIMP now, but back in the day all you had to do was download and get a key-gen and Boom! You're in business. I almost wonder if Abode looked the other way in order for people to get used to using their product so that later or in a business type arena, the artist/developer would request that the company chose Adobe's products. I've got to get back to work.

Re:Have their cake and eat it too!

[Txiasaeia]

Sounds like something I heard someone on TV last night say. There is a group of roomates that live in a rather large house. One guy and a girl really like each other. She's fallen for him completely and he "wants his cake and wants to eat it too." Explaination, he wants this girl as his backup in case he can't find another girl to bring home from the bars or whatever.

Believe it or not, we do know what that particular cliche means; the long-winded explanation using some TV program wasn't necessary. In fact, that particular proverb was recorded in 1546 by John Heywood.

You can tell that our culture is dying because historical phrases that everybody used to know are now seen as original and brilliant bits of television writing. Sigh.

Re:Have their cake and eat it too!

[bakuretsu]

Actually, you're exactly right. I wouldn't doubt that Adobe looked the other way when it came to private individuals pirating their software.

It is a matter of public record that Autodesk (when they were still Autodesk) honored very old (read: version 10, 11, 12) serial numbers in later generations of their AutoCAD software (read: Windows-based). The general consensus was that they wanted to get the knowledge of their software out there so that it would have a continued life cycle in the corporate world where site licenses cost much more.

In other words, they made piracy of their products by "regular people" almost TRIVIAL so that the software would have greater value in the long run. Who would buy a site license for software that nobody knows how to use?

Re:Have their cake and eat it too!

[ultramk]

You can tell the culture isn't dying because people have been saying stuff like that since the dawn of history.

To quote The Mikado:
"Then the idiot who praises with enthusiastic tone,
All centuries but this and every country but his own." ...face it, ignorance has always abounded. There's always been some kid who discovers something for the first time.

It proves that the proverb in question is a powerful one, no?

m-

Re:Have their cake and eat it too!

[P3NIS_CLEAVER]

Many times people would have special plugins and configurations that they would need to share with others so they could open a file. If you had an aftereffects project you would send it to the other artist with your install. Back in the day, people would almost always send their quark install to the press, and that was how the print shop would print it. Probably one reason quark went down the drain, their copy protection is horrendously intrusive.

Re:Have their cake and eat it too!

[sd_diamond]

Believe it or not, we do know what that particular cliche means; the long-winded explanation using some TV program wasn't necessary.

Except that it's almost always said the wrong way. I never used to understand the point of this saying, until someone pointed out to me that it was originally "Eat your cake and have it too". That captures the meaning much better. "Having your cake and eating it too" makes perfect sense; you have to have it before you can eat it, after all. Unless, of course, it belongs to someone else and you eat it without their permission.

Market Data

[mysqlrocks]

On top of tracking who swaps what from what location, BigChampagne also searches the libraries of everyone who's online.

So it looks like whether you're paying for it or getting it for free somebody is using this data for their profit. This is why I don't, for example, use those supermarket discount cards. The data they collect from me is more valuable to them then the money I save.

Re:Market Data

[screevo]

So you will abandon a benefit just because someone else might benefit more?

Thats like turning down a charitible donation because you dont want the other person to get a tax break. Kinda petty.

Re:Market Data

[mysqlrocks]

It is not just about giving up a benefit so that somebody else can't benefit more. Companies use this data to figure out how to market to me. They then use this marketing to attempt to take more of my money. Just one person not buying into this won't make much of a difference but it's a start.

Re:Market Data

[screevo]

And how exactly does this - a company gathering a better understanding of which products and services you would be interested in - hurt you?

Re:Market Data

[mysqlrocks]

As I said in my last post, they use this data to market to me in an attempt to take more of my money. I think of myself as pretty immune to the influence of marketing, however, it is impossible to be completely immune. So, I do the best I can. I am not saying that marketing is evil or that these companies are trying to "hurt" me. I am simply saying that I want to be fully aware of what is influencing my decision to make a purchase.

Re:Market Data

[AgentPhunk]

I find the $$ savings by using the card can be significant, especially if you use the discounts to stock up on regularly used products. I usually 'save' $10 - $20 on an $100 - $125 per week grocery bill.

What I do to foil those data-mining bastards is this: get SEVERAL of the cards, put down fake addresses, swap cards with friends (so one week your buying habits are tofu, green tea, and soy milk, the next week (when you friend has the card) its nothing but Coke, Doritos, and frozen pepperoni pizzas.)

You get the $, keep your purchasing habits (somewhat) private, and drive some poor intern crazy trying to decipher what the $!*%! is WRONG with this person?! :-)

 

Re:Market Data

[AvitarX]

If the SuperMarket down the street tried to take more of my money (by stocking things I wanted) I would save an hour of my time a week.

Hell, I would give them the info for free in exchange for them seeing what I want.

Things like gee this preson buys green chiles, celantro, and garlic all at once, lets stock some cumin, tumeric and cardomon so they can complete there dishes, and they live 1.5 blocks away. If they like enthnic food maybe getting some other stuff will work too.

But instead for spices and middle eastern ingredients I must drive 15 minutes each way.

I have not filled out one of the applications (my SO does), but I would think that if they were to ask people their address, race, country of origin, time in the US, and favorites foods they could better stock things for their customers (including you).

Of course my store probably accuratly serves the demographic in the area so I shoudn't complain, I am just pointing out that getting represented at the place closest to your house lets everyone win.

Everyone can win from good marketing too. Learning about new products and getting a discount for them can be great. Getting a discount as they try to woo you with better more expensive products at the lower prive is not too bad either.

Re:Market Data

[AoT]

At most of the supermarkets around here you can just input your phone number in lieu of actually having the card. I just give them different peoples phone numbers every time.

Stop profiting or stop lobbying

[aussie_a]

I'm sorry, but either the RIAA should stop actively profitting from p2p or they shouldn't be allowed to put people through courts and pressure their congressmen into creating laws to outlaw it.

The fact that they can profit from p2p while hassle their customers, to me, seems to be a perversion of the law and shouldn't be allowed.

In fact,

[i_should_be_working]

I oughta sue the RIAA for tracking what songs I'm sharing (my playlists are my intellectual property you know) and using that info as part of their business plan.

They owe me. But I'll consider the debt paid after my next several downloads.

Re:In fact,

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course, after you download new songs, your playlists will change to include those songs, and the whole cyles starts again...

Heh

[Otter]

At one meeting, a famous producer turned down an urgent call from one of his biggest stars so that he and Garland could keep talking about computers. "He turns to me and says, 'Hey, kid, when was the last time somebody told you you were more interesting than Axl Rose?'"

Uh, sorry to burst your bubble, guys, but in 2000 I was more interesting than Axl Rose!

At any rate, I'm at a loss to understand what today's round of fake-ass outrage is about. Record labels tried to shut down illegal filesharing but also tried to get what value they could out of the data. That's wrong why, exactly? This is even lamer than yesterday's fake-ass outrage over "OMTFG, they're suing single mothers!!!"

Re:Heh

[Deanasc]

I liked what Dennis Miller said about Axl Rose. "He still has a great singing voice. I hear him every wednesday skimming out my pool."

Don't forget the recent past....

[Anonymous Coward]

... when (even today!?) you could not listen or audition before you buy simply because of the RIAA's and record store policies and practices.

I have educated my children specifically *against* that behaviour and hold up the RIAA and "artists" as example of a bad deal, done in poor faith (the chumbawumba factor) And that they should keep their money for more tangible rewards.

Does it threaten their lawsuits?

[ValourX]

If the RIAA is profiting from P2P, doesn't that threaten their lawsuits against file sharers?

Re:Does it threaten their lawsuits?

[slushbat]

Not at all. The whole point of the lawsuits is to be so intimidating nobody will dare contest them. Being a bunch of completely immoral hypocrites just makes them more scary.

Re:Does it threaten their lawsuits?

[rkhalloran]

It might if any of them ever got to trial. SOP has been to threaten the parents of the teenager accused of downloading with a six-figure fine if it *does* go to court, settle for a mere $3-4 thousand, then show them off as PR against downloading in general. Lather, rinse, repeat. The cases like the 70-ish grandma get dropped ASAP to avoid bad press.

That's why this single-mom case where she's calling their bluff and insisting on a trial is interesting. If they can't prove their case to the judge, their tactics collapse.

wrong correlation

[airuck]

Wouldn't this market analysis reveal which music people are willing to pirate rather than purchase?

Re:wrong correlation

[hackstraw]

Wouldn't this market analysis reveal which music people are willing to pirate rather than purchase?

Yes, but this is raw data. Essentially the cost of all of the music is the same, so the only variable is the user's desire to download the particular artist, album, or track.

High downloads indicates something regarding the tracks, and low downloads should speak volumes :)

Re:wrong correlation

[hungrygrue]

No. It will just cause a recurring cycle: Currently they stock stores with nothing but rap and hip-hop. This study will show that downloaders are looking for *ANYTHING* else to listen to, so they'll just stock less rap and more music. Of course then it will be the hip-hop kiddies that are downloading everything and things will shift back the other way again. The basic problem is that a business has to focus on where it sees the most profit and can't please everyone - right now they are only focusing on teenage brats who wear doo-rags, have more of their underwear exposed than hidden, and have weapon-grade car stereos.

Re:wrong correlation

[Ugly American]

I prefer to have my collection on the computer; it saves wear and tear on my disks, and I can just skip around through my library as the mood strikes me. So in my case, it would be a good representation of what sort of music I'll pay for.

Of course, god only knows what they'd make of the fact that roughly half of my collection is soundtracks.

Re:wrong correlation

[Anonymous Coward]

Not to mention people downloading things they don't know if they like yet. The whole point (most of the time) is to "try it out." Just because a million people download Band X's new album doesn't mean they don't all delete it within 24 hours, or never listen to it again but keep it around just because hard drive space is so cheap.

Re:wrong correlation

[l1_wulf]

Prejudge much? I'm sure there are worse posts out there, so you don't qualify for a reward, but that was an amazing attempt at expressing a skewed view without explicitly saying "I hate rap and hip-hop, anybody who listens to this music should be killed and left unburied on a remote island."

Your logic regarding the "recurring cycle" is pretty flawed as well. That's like saying that your local grocery store will only stock chicken if they see that people are buying more of it. Soon thereafter the customers will start seeking beef in alternative avenues because all that is available is chicken.

If your local music store only stocks rap and hip-hop, then go find a different fucking music store, you're obviously in a specialty store. Actually, skip the music store and just head to your shrink, maybe he will be able to figure out why you feel so much hostility towards an entire group of people with musical tastes that differ from your own.

In case this is all too much for you, let me break it down for you.

This study will show that downloaders are looking for *ANYTHING* else to listen to
People download all types of music, INCLUDING rap and hip-hop. If the world felt the same way you did, according to your statement, they would only be downloading music that did not fall into either genre.

then it will be the hip-hop kiddies that are downloading
I'm sorry to break the news to you, but adults also listen to hip-hop as well as rap. I know, it just has to be hard to imagine that another adult would listen to something that does not coincide with your discriminating tastes, but alas, it happens all too often.

right now they are only focusing on teenage brats who wear doo-rags, have more of their underwear exposed than hidden, and have weapon-grade car stereos
Ahh, now where to begin? Ok, teenage brats? See the response above. Regarding how other people dress, I'm sure you were responsible for some serious faux pas yourself, Flock of Seagulls hair styles, paisley print vests, and tucking your slacks into ankle boots maybe? Or perhaps you're a boomer who used to wear long hair, beaded necklaces and bracelets, tie-dye t-shirts, et al. Every generation has their own fads. It's the nature of being alive these days. And wrapping things up are the stereos. I can't say much about these, if they are louder than local ordinances allow, they are in the wrong. If not, I would suggest either taking an active role in your community politics or moving to a retirement home where these decisions are made for you.

On a final note, you mention that a business will concentrate on where they make the most profit. This is probably the soundest statement in your whole brief post. This leads us to an interesting observation. Perhaps you should spend MORE money on the genres you like and convince people in your specific clique (oh sorry, does that make you sound too juvenile?) to spend more money as well. Don't be bitter because you are not a member of the most powerful demographic (in this circumstance). In the end, life goes on, the musicial flavor of the decade will change and you'll have something else to bitch about.

ps. I am not a member of this demographic either, nor can I claim rap and hip-hop as my primary musical interest. Figured I would put that on the table now before someone starts telling me to pull my pants up and turn my car stereo down, hehe.

marketing tool?

[zmollusc]

So they are seeing what appeals to downloaders so they can tailor things that they are trying to sell? Isn't that a bit like (yeah yeah copyright infringement!=theft. I said LIKE!) seeing what shoplifters steal in order to find out what people will buy?
"Well, it seems that small, easily concealed items will be the big sellers, guys! Nobody will be buying big bulky stuff, so don't get any more freezers or beds in stock as we will never sell them."

Chumbawamba

[joebutton]

In case people get the wrong idea from the article, Tubthumping is *not* the only good record Chumbawamba have made, and it's not even very different stylistically from some of their other stuff.

In particular my I recommend "Give the Anarchist a Cigarette", "When I'm Bad" and "This Girl".

Also a great live act.

Re:Chumbawamba

[aug24]

Cheers for the heads-up. I'll download them tonight, have a try ;-)

J.

Re:Chumbawamba

[I confirm I'm not a]

Some fine choices, sir!

Chumbawamba make a huge collection of back catalogue stuff and oddities available for free download. If you liked Tumbthumping you probably won't find much of interest ;-) Likewise, mainstream politicos may be offended by what's on offer here. <voice type="outraged">these guys are like... anarchists!</voice>

Re:Chumbawamba

[Anonymous Coward]

The album "Slap" is fantastic. I don't even like their big hit, too poppy, too catchy. older stuff is much better.

Re:Let me just say that... In response...

[GecKo213]

why in the hell is the music business so fired up to make nothing but hit records instead of providing people with access to music with artistic integrity?

You happen to have answerd part of your own question. They are, after all a businesses and they exist to make money.

Regarding artist integrity. When was the last time you heard an artist really singing about artistic impression and look at the lyrics of any popular song and hear or feel any of that? The new hip-hop artist of the day for example. All they sing/rap about is how many Hoes they can or have slept with and how much money or "bling" they have. Most of the music out there is about the same things. Why? Because that's the kind of music people are interested in.

musicians who actually create the stuff should be making at least as much as they do because without the artist, the business is nothing.

Have you seen how many of the artists out there write their own songs? Not too many. Artists are the expendable part of the business. You've got song writters and producers that are doing all the behind the scenes work. The artist themselves are just the pretty face that has to go on tour and loose their "private life" to people like the you and me that want to know everything about them. I'd like you to find a songwritter (mostly nameless and faceless to the general public) who has done songs with popular artists that donesn't have any money. If Brittney Spears decided never to return to music, they'd just find another pretty face to sing all the same songs.

Ahh, my rant is now over. That's my 2 cents for what it's worth.

Welcome to October 2003!

[__aailob1448]

I'm pretty sure I got this link from slashdot:

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/11.10/fileshare .html

Same with Anime

[dogolopee]

The companies that licence anime in america do roughly the same thing. They watch the fan sub community for what is popular, then licence it and sell it.

Re:Same with Anime

[zalas]

So tell me how they can start negotiations, etc., before airing? There's been a surge of series licensed before airing, such as Geneon USA's latest announcement at AX in July, in which they announced the rights to at least four shows which have not aired yet. It may or may not be true that anime localization companies look at fansubs, but even if it were true, it wouldn't be the major factor, since we get all sorts of random shows that didn't even have that many fansub watchers.

Re:Same with Anime

[dogolopee]

Not all anime licenced is done like this, and some of the licencing deals are a package deal. For example the Gundam series (iirc) was a package where the licencing company had to aquire all the gundam shows or none at all. Shows that are licenced before they ever air are generally either part of a package deal or were seen by the people incharge of licencing at a trade show or through another preview opportunity (such as a dvd of the show sent to them).

You fools!

[msormune]

P2P software are clearly a clever way for RIAA to get people to listen more music, because it's "cool" to stick it to them! In the meantime the RIAA has a perfect tool to spy on people's musical tastes! In order to really hit them where it hurts, you MUST immediately stop all P2P activity and continue to purchase your music legally, thus ending this mind probing!

The Chumbawamba Factor

[ayjay29]

The Chumbawamba Factor...

He gets a Manics song
He gets an Elvis song
He gets a Roses song
He gets a Beetles song
He rips the songs that remind him
Of the good times
He rips the songs that remind him
Of the better times:

Ripping the night away
Ripping the night away

I get DCed
I get on line again
You aint ever gonna keep me down

I get a trojen
I get installed again
You aint ever gonna gonna keep me down

I get Metalica threats
But I get wise again
You aint ever gonna keep me down

I get RIAA email
I get IP Spoofing again
You aint ever gonna keep me down

'Don't cry for me
RIAA...'

Re:The Chumbawamba Factor

[The Lynxpro]

"The Chumbawamba Factor..."

Great lyrical work! Might I suggest you encourage Stallman to sing that live on *Call for Help*? :)

Re:The Chumbawamba Factor

[Anonymous Coward]

That song (the original, that is) has got to be one of the worst ones I have _ever_ heard. I'm thinking top 10 material, maybe even top 5.

Is this wise?

[Nom du Keyboard]

...BigChampagne, a company that looks at peer-to-peer downloading to provide marketing data to record companies...As mentioned in the article, record companies started using this information (secretly) even as they were trying to stop filesharing via the courts."

Sounds like Big Champagne is working with someone intent on putting them out of business. After all, no P2P = no Big Champagne.

Re:Is this wise?

[Pelops]

Wise? well why not? It just shows that either RIAA thinks they can make the best of the worst right now or that they don't expect P2P to disappear.
It is just a matter of proportion. Sue enough people, and many will be scared enough to buy tracks online.
After all, you can buy a fake cd easily. It is just a matter of balance, shift the balance enough towards the legal download and you are back in business, while still being able to profit from the data of illicit p2P networks.
Plus if you have read the article, Big champagne tries to track also legal downloads. But, i suspect it has more to do about offering a complete service about online music.

Re:Is this wise?

[Mr2001]

Sounds like Big Champagne is working with someone intent on putting them out of business. After all, no P2P = no Big Champagne.

They know, just like we know, that P2P will always be around. Stopping file sharing is as impossible as stopping drug use or prostitution - it's a consensual crime, so there's no one to report it in most cases.

The Drink

[Nf1nk]

Remeber folks before it was band Chumbawamba was a drink..
it is a cider drink..
it is lager drink..
it is a whisky drink...

6oz hard cider
6oz lager beer
1oz whisky
mix in a pint glass, with no ice.
It tastes better than it sounds

Ebonic Spelling Nazi

[Anonymous Coward]

All they sing/rap about is how many Hoes they can or have slept with...

Unless you are talking about gardening tools, that should be "ho's" not "hoes." Ho' is short for "whore." You can leave off the ' for the silent leading "w" but it really belongs there in place of the "re" at the end, and you certanly should not add an "e" when you make it plural.

You also should not have capitalized it in the middle of a sentance. Wuzzup wi' dat, dawg?

Re:Ebonic Spelling Nazi

[Anonymous Coward]

Sounds like the original poster is not from the street! seems also that he's not all that interested in having his Ebonics spelled correctly. That being said, take whatever hoe,or ho that you would like and shove it.

Re:Ebonic Spelling Nazi

[Anonymous Coward]

I must disagree... according to Ice Cube from the song "Who's The Mack?" circa 1990...

"You wanna do it but you feeling like a H-O-E"

I think both versions are acceptable...

Art does not a majority make...

[rmdyer]

I don't know about everyone else here, but as an artist I don't create a work based on what other people want. Art is a personal expression and a desire to bring your dreams to life. If others like your art then so be it, otherwise art is being used as a drug to only make the viewer feel good. This has the effect of developing a habit, which is exactly what the music companies want.

Re:Art does not a majority make...

[Anonymous Coward]

Hammer meet the nail head. Its not the responsibility of the RIAA (or anyone else in the distribution model) to dictate what we listen to. Their job is to release as much music as they can find and let us (the consumer) decide who makes them rich or not.

How accurate is this?

[Nom du Keyboard]

Think about it. Do P2P downloads indicate what's hot (and what is to be spoofed next)? Or does it just indicate music people won't pay for otherwise?

refund

[netcrusher88]

Wait - if RIAA is benefiting from P2P, let's get together and bring a class action lawsuit against them for defamation, with them saying that P2P harms the music industry. Oh, and let's get that 12-year-old girl's $90 million back.

chart hyping

[zmollusc]

Hmmm..... if there are music charts in print media of which tracks are being shared on-line, it won't be long before the music labels are funding server farms with virtual filesharers to market their product.
"Hey Kids, have you heard about the latest hot new band *insert manufactured band here*? Their debut single is being torrented by 156,463,372,346,589,521,455,878,978,357 seeders online and you can buy the whole album for only £20 in your local store. Hurry now and look kewl in front of all your friends!!!!"

They're just being pragmatic

[gr8_phk]

You can use a technology even if don't like it. They're trying to ban the P2P stuff, but until then why not collect marketing data from it. Sheesh, these two activities are probably handled by different parts of the organization. If you think any use of P2P (even looking at usage stats) is an endorsement of the technology, then you should also support the RIAA on most of their claims - i.e. that technology xyz is infringing copyrights. Or that since some guy in BFE would have bought a song if it weren't available for free, we may conclude that all downloads are lost sales, etc...

Think before you type.

Just Business

[Chiperdean]

So the secret plan is to sue just enough people to keep it in the news and get everyone hyped up to download more files. Then they get their marketing analisys from the company and can try to market to which way people are leaning. BRILLIANT!!! don't take on the world, just enough to make people hate you enough to do it out of spite....ôô

The RIAA is not a record label.

[Anonymous Coward]

The RIAA is not a record label. They have no artists, catalog, or anything directly to do with music EXCEPT that they are the trade organization for the music industry (think of a union for businesses). Music labels pay the RIAA dues, and the RIAA does various functions from lobbying to certifying platinum and gold records.

As far as suing goes, most labels have little to do with it, except that they are a member of organization who has made that a part of the agenda. Most of the good people at labels are more concerned about ensuring that their artists (their responsibility!) is being heard by the largest audience possible. Lawyers are concerned about piracy, the remaining ~99.9% people at a label are concerned about the wellfare of their artists.

Statistics that indicate an audience is how things get spins on radio and finally into stores. We're not talking top 10 records here (they already have an audience); we're talking new artists with often very localized audiences. People at labels are fighting to expand the audience of these new artists, who may only sell a hundred CDs a week, incontrast to a top 10 record that sells 1,000-50,000K/wk.

Please realize that nearly all people who work at a record company care about only one thing: the artists. Its a very personal thing. Potentially lost sales from piracy is the last of these people's worries.

[ot] lyrics

[wild_berry]

/me drinks to remind me of the good times.
/me drinks to remind me of the better times.

The large music companies are dinosaurs

[stefanlasiewski]

You can clearly see that BigChampagne is only looking from a mainstream perspective. From their limited point of view, Chumbawamba is a "one-time punk band".

Reality is far different-- Chumbawamba is one of the most successful punk bands in existance. They've been around for 25 years, released 20 albums & EPs, individual members released another 20 or more and have one of the largest followings of any non-mainstream bands. Their styles range from English Rebel Songs from 1381 to their modern pop-punk hits.

BigChampagne makes the same mistake as the big record companies-- they only look at the most popular bands, and are completely ignorant about the success of smaller bands and smaller labels.

The small band segment of the music industry is growing, and the mainstream music industry seems to be shrinking -- they keep complaining about reduced sales every year.

They are a dinosaur.

DUPE!!! 1st posted in 2003

[HavokDevNull]

ahhhhg this just proves I'm sick in the head, by remembering this crap from 2 years ago!!!

http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/09/10/154122 2&tid=141&tid=187&tid=98

Re:DUPE!!! 1st posted in 2003

[Kaellenn]

I must be almost as bad since the first thing I did was go looking for the first "DUPE!" post!

I didn't figure I'd be the only one.

How RIAA Thinks

[ackthpt]

I'd comment, but i have to download some Wesley Willis. Did you hear that, BigChampagne people? WESLEY WILLIS Oh yeah, down with the RIAA!! How dare they profit from something illegal! Rock on Chicago, Rock on London, Rock over RIAA.

RIAA Guy 1: "One Wesley Willis download? An aberation. A blip, doesn't count."
RIAA Guy 2: "But if there are 10 downloads?"
RIAA Guy 1: "Then that means by our reckoning that there were at least 3 illegal downloads which happened somewhere and we need to prosecute!"

Re:How RIAA Thinks

[squidfood]

RIAA Guy 1: "One Wesley Willis download? An aberation.

"Can you imagine 10 people a day, 10 people a day, walkin' in, downloadin' a bar of Wesley Willis, and walkin' out? People might think it was a movement. And that's what it is, the Wesley Willis Download Anti-R-I-A-A movement, and all you have to do to join is download a few bars when it comes around agin on the P2P.

With Feelin'.

Re:How RIAA Thinks

[Anonymous Coward]

haha! that's exactly what i was thinking. i wonder how many people in this tech community have ever heard "alice's restaurant?"

Re:How RIAA Thinks

[Mr Z]

*raises hand*

And with Dubya in office and two slots for the Supreme Court open, it really makes you think twice about the Group Dubya Bench.

The "Chumbawumba" factor?

[Recovering Hater]

So am I to infer that someone is "pissing the night away"? I keed, I keed. I don't need any explanation of who they are either...

But it's Old News and a Dupe!

[AEton]

If it really "explains so much" for you, then I guess you weren't reading Slashdot two years ago when it was covered on at least two separate occasions.

It's dupetacular!

Rush...

[Anonymous Coward]

"Glittering prizes and endless compromises shatter the illusion of integrity"

As to rap, somebody finally made a rap song I like. It's called "Gold Digger" and AFAIK it isn't for sale, only for download.

So take that, GWB and RIAA!

Re:Rush...

[TripleE78]

Uhhh, that "somebody" is Kanye West.

If you don't know who he is, you haven't been paying any attention to the news lately.

~EEE~

Re:Rush...

[semiauto]

Yeah and I dont see anyone even cares what Kanye West thinks. Just becasue he's a rich rapper doesn't mean his political opinion means anything more than mine or yours. I dont see why celebrities feel they need to speak out on political issuses all the time.

Re:Rush...

[Anonymous Coward]

Kanye West is just a ghetto child that came up quickly because another ghetto worthless individual made a record and got enough ghetto individuals to buy it so that had enough money to help him out. If you listen to that type of music there is really nothing to it. (Yes I listen to it. Every now and then I want to get mad at the police, start drinking before noon, slap my bitch, shoot some guns and chill with my homies!) Turn on a drum machine, keyboard sounds, a few gunshots, women moaning about how great and wonderful they are, and then start rhyming a bunch of gibberish. I've always said that the true test of a band, performer, or artist is how they do it live. There have been few bands that I was just blown away with live. Dave Matthews, Soul Asylum, Def Leppard, Boys 2 Men, 98 degrees, 3 doors down, Yanni, Rusted Root, Ziggy Marley, Kenny G, Journey, and some performers that have appeard with the local live symphony to bring to mind a few were awesome shows! Sounded great! They were mostly say 95% as good as the record/CD which has been edited etc. On the other hand I have been to more than 500 concerts (music reporter up until recently) and none of them sounded as bad as the hip-hop and rap shows I'd attended. They just have a loud beat and all start yelling into the mic like they've got something to prove. Don't get me wrong, I listen to 50 cent, Dr Dre, Snoop, Mike Jones, Bone Thugs, and on and on. I consider myseld realatively well rounded as to my musical tastes, but hip-hop and rap shows have been the worst shows I've seen period. I'll add a few whtie bands just so no one gets thinking that this is about race. Red Hot Chile Peppers, Sevendust, Mother Love Bone, Poison, and Seven Mary Three were all terrible live. Anyone want to guess my race? (Yup, you guessed it, not white!) Cause it's not race, I've seen Eminem, wasn't that good either. I was just glad i didn't have to shell out my own cash to attend those concerts. Otherwise I may have sued to get my money back. I mean, c'mon, Jesus walks and now Kanye is a hero!? Give me a break. Just cause some looser didn't die when he got shot for being in the wrong place doing wrong things (he wasn't on his way to church when he was shot you know) he sings about Jesus, makes a lot of money and now he's da man? Again, c'mon.

L.L. Cool Lips eerh, I mean, L.L. Cool J. said -- Man made the money, money never made the man.

Great--Now they know what to make in order to sue.

[Noksagt]

Record companies should be in the business of selling music. They already have all the data they need about what music sells well. The only reason they have to be interested in P2P stats is to see what music is traded (persumably illegally). Thus, they can now make the music that gets stolen & be in the business of lawsuits.

Like ADT using neighborhood crime statistics

[TrueJim]

This would be like ADT using neighborhood crime statistics to help market home security systems.

No wait, there's nothing wrong with that. You can use the crime statistics and still be against crime.

So why are we outraged by this?

Re:Like ADT using neighborhood crime statistics

[Overzeetop]

No, as has been pointed out earlier (drug dealer analogy, I think) This only holds if ADT is in the business of robbing homes as a corporate endeavor.

There is no good analogy. The key here is that the P2P "market" is one where the cost of an item is zero, and therefore the demand is unfettered by the need to exchange money. There is no (effective) limit on how many P2P transfers (sales) occur.

This allows them to determine the raw desire for an artist/genre/title in the absense of financial restrictions. It's more akin to a music survey.

The rub is that this typ eof survey happens to be infringing. The fact is that that they publicly state this to be true, and are suing people over their participation in the system. The news that they are monitoring and using the transfer data for montary gain is what is so ironic. A person with a scrap of moral fiber would not engage in such a practice. QED

Re:Like ADT using neighborhood crime statistics

[dickrichardv8]

It's more like the EPA using the old East German Trabant to drive to their inspections.

We'll know this is true when...

[halr9000]

the next new sensational pop band is called "Britney Nude Celeb Lesbian Sex.mp3.avi.mpg"

Re:We'll know this is true when...

[Rob Riggs]

This would be moderated +5 by now if there were a "+1 Sad, But True" moderation option.

Assumptions

[TheRain]

Did someone mention the possiblitiy that the RIAA would use this information to determine what music and in what demographics NOT to bank their efforts on? These are the people who are not paying for the music after all.

Everyone repeats the same fallacy...

[Anonymous Coward]

Which is "nobody will buy it if they can get it for free!" Ever heard of bottled water?

The reality, supported by numerous studies, is that people who use P2P buy MORE music than those who don't.

The RIAA's problem is that their music sucks. People download it, puke, and delete it. They download indie music, like it, and buy it.

THIS is why the RIAA is so pissed off.

Re:Let me just say that... In response...

[beowulfy]

Record lables dream of finding the next Britney Spears or 50 Cent, low grade horse shit that 13 year old girls will eat up. These kinds of artists take a minimal investment and have the largest returns. Which means that they do not like to nurture new artists who take more than a couple albums of investment in, to start seeing returns. This is why the indie lable market is so important because it creates a space for emerging artists to develop their art. The problem is that the RIAA has such a strangle-hold on mass media, (in conjucntion with clear channel and the like)that these indie artist are not able to find exposure, and people are not able to find the music they want through normal channels. What we have is an industry catering exlusively to 14 year olds. Un-established artists that do not appeal to that sales demographic, are basically left hung out to dry if they are not an istant sales success with the lables. We have a lot of good musicians in this world making really good music. Unfortunatley due to the recording industries current business model, it becomes very hard for people to find the music they are truly looking for. It is hard to see an industry built upon so many problems lasting for too much longer without serious changes in the way it opperates. This should be about THE MUSIC! making beautiful works of art! You should be able to make some decent money at it too. But suing the shit out of people who don't have the ability to fight your legal jugernaut? Thats about as far from the beauty of music as I can imagine.

what about b-sides, bootlegs, and back catalogs?

[The Lynxpro]

If BigChampagne's is so rock-solid, why aren't the labels rushing to get b-sides, unreleased covers, bootlegs, and out-of-print back catalog material up on iTunes and other commercial services? For me, that was the greatest thing about the Napster of old...material that wasn't commercially available for one reason or another. There's a goldmine to be had on that stuff and even Steve Jobs has mentioned how much material the labels are sitting on and haven't done anything with yet complain about declining sales and blaming piracy for their woes.

Instant Karma

[Deanasc]

Can I get a +5 Informative if I link to every link in the story writeup? Shouldn't that be a -2 Redundant?

I know I'm going to get -2 Modappeal for this.

Their Cunning Plan...

[kcarlin]

Please. If I own a store and I keep a running tally of what has been shoplifted in the past month does that mean I should just allow it to happen?

The Recording Industry makes its money selling recordings. So how exactly does known what recordings are popular help them when they're giving the recordings away?

You may have touched on something here. RIAA could be buying the data to shore up their legal position when they go after Bill Gates for publishing "unsafe" file copy software. The ability to make potentially illegal file copies cannot, of course, be tolerated. That court stay to prevent sales of Windows and the settlement, requiring all copy logic in Windows to determine the intellectual property circumstance for each bit prior to write authorization, is right around the corner.

Of course, what RIAA hasn't counted on is the estate of George Boole, with his bit patent, ready to swoop down and clean up after RIAA has done the heavy lifting.

In preparation, I am trying to get the 2.6 kernel to boot on my abacus. (If you would like to contribute an old device driver you aren't using....) Otherwise I'll have to wait for the world to recompile for trinary (but only after a very thorough patent search).

What's not to like?

[soupdevil]

Record sales are up, profits are way up, costs are down, due to reduced numbers of artists, and slashed budgets for artist development. P2P tools offer unmatched statistics for targeting songs and artists with marketing dollars. For the record companies, what's not to like? Well, they had already lost their monopoly on recording studios and on album duplication. P2P tools mean that they no longer have a monopoly on distribution. As soon as a few more major label artists figure that part out, record companies will shrivel up like grapes in the sun. The ones that survive will morph into artist promotion and representation companies.

Re:Let me just say that... In response...

[crabpeople]

"The new hip-hop artist of the day for example. All they sing/rap about is how many Hoes they can or have slept with and how much money or "bling" they have."

educate yourself

http://www.astralwerks.com/kos/music.html

http://www.kanyewest.com/

http://www.outkast.com/

One hit wonder? How dare you!

[evilandi]

"Chumbawamba were a one hit wonder"

How very dare you! I spent many a happy evening as an indie student dancing to "Timebomb", "Enough Is Enough" and "Homophobia".

Seriously though, whilst they may be in the one-hit-wonder category in the USA, in the UK they had a string of indie-chart (roughly synonymous with the US "Alternative Chart") hits in the early 90's (throughout which I remained a member of the Young Conservatives, so obviously their political aims were significantly less effective than their indie-chart abilities). I would have thought that all of their releases from about 1991-1995 would have been in the UK Indie Top 20.

Re:One hit wonder? How dare you!

[Anonymous Coward]

throughout which I remained a member of the Young Conservatives, so obviously their political aims were significantly less effective than their indie-chart abilities

That's OK, lots of their fans had their eyes opened enough that they would have seen you as that young Tory cunt, while having admitted to subversive and anti-family tastes in music would bar you from any real power in a (purely hypothetical if not outright imaginary) Conservative government.

Throw-away acts is what...

[rkhalloran]

The record companies have become even more the hit-centered PR factory than before. Their focus has become the quick hit vs. cultivating an act over time. They claim to be selling music while the focus is selling discs in little square boxes. Then when they see their market contract because of lousy acts and a lousy economy reducing disposable income, they point at "those meddlesome kids and their downloading" and ignore the data that tells them to update their business model.

P2P not living up to hype

[TheSkepticalOptimist]

I am finding P2P 2B more annoying then anything. I recently looked to download a video of a popular science fiction show based on a remake of a science fiction show that no channel in Canada is running yet. Expecting there to be a slew of people out there doing this, I figured I could get this video in a few minutes or at least a few hours, especially with my 6MB internet service.

What followed was just days of dissapointment and a bad taste left in my mouth concerning P2P.

First, using Limewire there was barely enough unsers that had this file to register it as even possible to download. In the few hours I left that app active, I downloaded about 10 mb of 300mb. Limewire is an example of why JAVA should never be used for a desktop application. The Java based UI of Limewire simply drives CPU usage to 100% and slows down anything else running on your computer.

Scrapped Limewire and tried eDonkey, eDonkey could only see about 30% of the completed file, I downloaded that in a few hours, but when your entire network of people have all downloaded the same 30%, you're waiting for that 1 person to connect long enough for the full file. A day later an nobody connected with the full file, so I scrapped eDonkey.

I thought I would try BitTorrent. The creator of BitTorrent's application is pure crap, period. A fine example of HOW NOT TO WRITE an application! I tried a few others like Bit Tornado and BitLord, both not very polished applications, and for the most part despite the Torrent I found supposedly being seeded by over 2000 users (according to TorrentSpy), I couldn't download any file faster then 10kbps and connect to more then 10 seeders regardless of which settings I used (like unlimited or super-seeder mode).

In ALL cases, when I provided a few files for uploading (to share the wealth), my uploading bandwidth was ALWAYS maxed out while my downloads were always a trickle. With Bit Torrent, I was uploading up to 10 times more then I was getting.

The bottom line is, P2P is still filled with mostly leachers looking to suck any file off your hard drive but either disconnect when they have what they want, or simply don't share files/bandwidth. Even the supposedly advanced P2P like eDonkey or Bit Torrent still favour leachers.

That, and the fact you can't do a search without gobs of porn being force fed to you your search list because someone wrote some script or bot to stuff porn into any keyword search pretty much turned me off P2P software. Torrents are a bit better because you have to find the torrent first before downloading, but Limewire and eDonkey simply cater to pornography.

Sorry, I will continue to buy my music and video and unfortunately wait for Canadian Television to show me that series I want to see. I can't be bothered to waste my time with P2P and sift through the crap the immature brats post on it.

Re:P2P not living up to hype

[alex_delarge]

BitTorrent doesn't favour leechers, quite the opposite. The more sharing, the better the better the result. It sounds like you were encountering a problem that is related more to the nature of some types of broadband internet connections than an inherent problem with BitTorrent. Home broadband connections are designed to download, not to upload, so when the upload is saturated, it usually brings the download to a standstill. I'm not sure why this is, but someone more knowledgeable than I can explain how this relates to the asynchronous nature of home broadband connections. Throttle your upstream, you'll find things work much better.

Re:P2P not living up to hype

[Anonymous Coward]

Check out: EasyNews.com.

For $10 a month (10 gigs worth of downloads, which rolls over if unused) I can grab just about anything that's been uploaded within the last 30-40 days on any of the binary newsgroups.

They've got an experimental global search: http://members.easynews.com/global4/search.html (once you sign up)

Their web service even automatically decodes RARs, so multi-part, hour-long sci-fi shows, etc., can usually be downloaded with one click.

Re:P2P not living up to hype

[ln -sf head ass]

Shhhhhhh!

What about the vodka?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm pretty sure vodka is mentioned...

Re:What about the vodka?

[Nf1nk]

you are right I skipped the 1 oz of vodka that my playboy bartenders guide calls for

MOD PARENT DOWN

[Anonymous Coward]

Insightful my ass, your analogy sucks. RIAA is hypocritical because they're the police AND the drug dealers.

Not necessarily

[Curmudgeonlyoldbloke]

http://www.last.fm/charts/

There's some crossover there, (e.g. Green Day) but no Mariah Carey.

The poster of the previous comment above mentions Audioscrobbler, and this reply was really prompted by that.

If you're not familiar with either - Audioscrobbler works out links between different artists based on what people play (via music player plugins) and last.fm is an online radio station that uses that information.

As an example:
http://www.last.fm/explore/?artistname=chumbawamba

Re:Not necessarily

[Anonymous Coward]

Audioscrobbler, while an excellent tool for finding new music, is not useful for statistical extrapolation to humanity at large, having a wildly self-selected population. (You gave one of the most obvious examples of this yourself: the people who listen to pop music that is widely ridiculed and considered "unhip" generally don't use Audioscrobbler). I'm afraid people do listen to Mariah Carey.

Re:Not necessarily

[a8o]

Amen, but it's a good indication of what people who listen to music on a computer listen to...14-30 year old internet users.

Welcome to 2003

[Anonymous Coward]

Is BigChampagne's doings news to anyone ? I read an artticle about them in Wired a couple of years ago. Zzzzzzzzzzz....

Not the UK charts...

[splanky]

I'm guess from his nickname, that he (she) may be from the UK... The UK charts are not as "accurate" as the US charts. Their charts for the most part are like the US charts pre-Soundscan - which means pay-offs can push a record falsely up the chart.

Re:Not the UK charts...

[WebfishUK]

Yeah that's an interesting point. I had kinda assumed that most were the same.

It's about time!

[RiotNrrd]

I've *never* understood why the record companies weren't all over this the minute that Napster hit big.

Talk about targeted demographics!

When I worked in radio years ago we were asked to keep a log of every song that was requested during our shift.

I asked the PM what was done with the logs - he told me that the record companies used them as part of their metrics! If you are familiar with commercial radio then you probably know that the guy/gal in the booth is not the most reliable person. When we discovered this, we all started screwing with the reports.

"Yes, 25 people called in to request 'Muskrat Love' last hour. See? It says so right here in this log! Yes, I know that we are a cock-rock station targetted at the 18-35 male demographic - who knows? Maybe it's that new retro thing that the kids are all going nuts over."

Seriously - if some kind of anonymous stats could be generated and sent to the record companies from Shoutcast/Icecast servers then maybe we'd get some better music.

Suuuuuuweeeeet!

[gnovos]

Unclean hands, my friends, unclean hands...

This is the third time I'm seeing this.

[assert(0)]

Why does the board s/w insert a in the url text of HREF's?
I have figured out the url[goatse.cx] deal, but this one still escapes me...

Re:Let me just say that... In response...

[babyphatman]

very good choices...may I also add...

Little Brother

and

Common

Re:obligatory Simpsons quote

[fafaforza]

I get knocked down
I get knocked down again
You're never gonna knock me down.

[...]

I take a whisky drink,
I take a chocolate drink,
And when I have to pee,
I use the kitchen sink.

Howto improve BT speeds

[kcb93x]

Because when you send a packet of data (in this case, a chunk of a BT file) the other machine sends a response saying that it recieved it. When you don't cap your upload, and you have a limited upload (like residential DSL/Cable connections) it sends as fast as it can, and at this point there's no outgoing bandwidth for you to send a response on the incoming data.

So this isn't a problem (usually) on BT's side - it's the user not understanding and allowing for this. I figure it out by testing the bandwidth - find a torrent that I'm seeding, don't set an upload limit, and watch it. Then I back it off 5-15k depending on wether I'm going to be doing any other surfing or not, or if there are other users/computers making use of that connection. Bandwidth tests will also work.

bittorrent zeitgeist

[Anonymous Coward]

i recently saw something similar on a bittorrent site. torrents.to shows the most popular search terms but i don't know when they get updated or if they are real at all. Kind of reminds me of technorati ;)

Absurd

[Anonymous Coward]

Totally and absolutely absurd. The RIAA has once again been proved to be nothing more than hypocritical thugs. Them using P2P stats to push sales of certain albums/artists/etc is no different than someone suing one local weed seller while following the customers of the other so that they can set up 7-11 near those customers to gain money from those customers case of the munches.

Re:what about b-sides, bootlegs, and back catalogs

[allenw]

... because they need that material to produce a few hundred more box sets with 'unreleased songs'. Spread out over a few years, the collectors more than make up for any profit loss.

Re:I get knocked down... by spyware

[Evergreen98]

As soon as I hit that lyrics page (in Firefox, with NoScript enabled) Symantec AntiVirus comes screaming up:

Scan type: Auto-Protect Scan
Event: Threat Found!
Threat: Adware.CDT
File: C:\Documents and Settings\Jake\Local Settings\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\za0bac6t.default\Cac he\34CD2AA7d01
Location: C:\Documents and Settings\Jake\Local Settings\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\za0bac6t.default\Cac he
Computer: CHARCOAL
User: CHARCOAL\Jake
Action taken: Pending Side Effects Analysis
Date found: Tuesday, September 20, 2005 12:22:39 AM

For those of you who want the lyrics without the ownage, here they are (slightly modified to avoid getting ruined by lameness filter):

We'll be singing
When we're winning we'll be singing

I get knocked down
But I get up again
You're never going to keep me down (x4)

Pissing the night away, pissing the night away

He drinks a whisky drink
He drinks a vodka drink
He drinks a lager drink
He drinks a cider drink

He sings the songs that remind him
Of the good times
He sings the songs that remind him
Of the better times

Oh Danny Boy, Danny Boy, Danny Boy

I get knocked down
But I get up again
You're never going to keep me down (x4)

Pissing the night away
Pissing the night away

He drinks a whisky drink
He drinks a vodka drink
He drinks a lager drink
He drinks a cider drink

He sings the songs that remind him
Of the good times
He sings the songs that remind him
Of the better times

Don't cry for me
Next door neighbour

I get knocked down
But I get up again
You're never going to keep me down (x4)

I get knocked down
But I get up again (we'll be singing)
You're never going to keep me down (when we're winning)

I get knocked down
But I get up again (pissing the night away)
You're never going to keep me down (x14)

Re:I get knocked down... by spyware

[Anonymous Coward]

For those of you who want the lyrics without the ownage, don't use Windows. I visited the site and had no problems.

Re:Let me just say that... In response...

[Anonymous Coward]

If Brittney Spears decided never to return to music, they'd just find another pretty face to sing all the same songs.

According to the trade mags, her name is Emma Roberts. She doesn't sound any better than (or different from) Britney as far as I can tell. Yet another manufactured teen queen.

My experience with the Chumbawumba Factor

[John Pfeiffer]

I see a lot of complaints about how crappy most American music is these days, and I totally agree. Here's a radical idea: Put this global network thingy to good use, and go find some music that doesn't suck. That's what I did.

I only legally own about 12 audio CDs. 5 of which I bought, the rest of which came packed with other stuff I bought. (Soundtracks that came with anime DVDs and games and whatnot.)

The five CDs I bought?

Well, let's see here... A long friggin time ago, when I still gave a damn about American music, I bought the following one summer day...

Silverchair - Neon Ballroom
Goo Goo Dolls - Dizzy Up The Girl
Garbage - Garbage
Garbage - Version 2.0

What do these all have in common? (Besides the fact that they all had big radio hits at about the same time.) They all have between 10 and 14 tracks on them, absolutely no more than 4 of which are really any good at all. And they each cost way too damned much.

Today, I got a CD that I've been wanting for a while now. ASIAN KUNG-FU GENERATION's latest album, Sol-Fa. 12 tracks, all awesome. I listen to a lot of Japanese bands, and their albums tend to be more completely great. That is, the albums are made up of nothing but good songs. Not a hit here and there, and $20 worth of aural packing peanuts like American albums.

I have lost absolutely all interest in American music, because I know that even if I like a song, I'm going to have to buy a bunch of crap I don't want, too. And I can't justify that kind of expenditure.

i cant b arsed to think of a subject to the chumba

[adetorre]

wot a load of psuedo/psychobabble/marketing tosh.. hats off though i spose to bigchampagne for getting paid to tell a bunch of idiots what they should be getting paid for knowing in the first place - anyone with half a brain could tell you that btw - word to the wise.. chumbas have been around for 20 odd years chumbas signed to emi germany to get the (then) new album done radio1 (uk) picked up on the single not realising who the band was (cue - er am i really hearing chumbas on radio 1, have i really heard mike scott say please do the radio bank holiday beach thing ?) chumbas soak prescott at brit awards therby getting more press tubthumping then gets worldwide play from bizarre places like canadian hockey games et al - (if youve ever seen the chumabas play at the islington rocket club (a pub really) you really do sit back and wonder what the f**k is going on but laugh at the same time) i guess its very easy to label this a chumbawumba thing but then it would surely be more honest to label this a "i heard the single of [insert most bands this year] i liked it, bought it, but having listened to the rest of the album its er not quite like the fantastic single i heard on the radio and i wish i hadnt bought the album" labels killed this and brought this whole thing on when they started doing advance radio play of album tracks before the album was out how can you complain that ppl are d/ling and not buying when a week before album release you are giving listeners the chance to hear the friggin thing!! however after that rant i still think that the more "music" is in the press, papers etc etc the more ppl will maybe find an interest and get invovled - and maybe buy more ipods, subscribe to ridiculous online d/load attempts etc etc if anyone knows where this [free data] is going to go you'll make a fortune...

Re:I get knocked down... by spyware

[Anonymous Coward]

Without getting into a debate over the choice of operating system, would it not be better if the referenced site was free of malware in the first place, and that users had a warning before they chose to follow the link?

Just saying...

"Indie Chart" my ass; #56 in the proper charts...

[Dogtanian]

Seriously though, whilst they may be in the one-hit-wonder category in the USA, in the UK they had a string of indie-chart (roughly synonymous with the US "Alternative Chart") hits in the early 90's

Yeah, but none of them were hits in the main UK singles chart; in fact, before Tubthumping, their best position was #56.

And let's bear in mind that unlike the US, the main UK singles chart doesn't include an airplay factor, so it's not as biased against indie/dance/whatever stuff that's popular, but isn't suitable for Homogenous Clear Channel FM.

In other words, their early-90s "hits" in the UK weren't, and I never heard any of them.

throughout which I remained a member of the Young Conservatives, so obviously their political aims were significantly less effective than their indie-chart abilities

William Haig? Is that you?!

If it is, I'd say *your* political aims were also significantly less effective than your indie-chart abilities. Not that I'm saying you ever had any indie-chart abilities.... :)

Re:"Indie Chart" my ass; #56 in the proper charts.

[evilandi]

In other words, their early-90s "hits" in the UK weren't, and I never heard any of them.

Hmm. Although your analysis of the UK Indie Chart is factually correct, I think you are significantly underestimating the power of the UK Indie Chart on popular culture in the 1980s and 1990s.

The UK Indie Chart couldn't include radio airplay, because of the strict regulation of UK radio stations during the 1980s and 1990s. All stations other than Radio 3 (classical/jazz) played either mainstream music or no music. There was no XFM, no Kerrang! FM, no MTV2 etc. The closest we got was John Peel. Ergo your statement, although accurate, is highly misleading.

The Indie chart was based purely on sales of records from independent record labels, because that was the only data available at the time.

Chumbawamba were achieving consistent top 5 Indie chart status as early as 1985, and this consistency of performance continued for a decade before "Tubthumping".

The Indie chart was highly reflective of, and influential upon, the nightclub scene. Chumbawamba's "Timebomb", "Homophobia" and "Enough is Enough" received huge play at indie nightclubs throughout the UK. The Indie chart was also a massive influence on popular culture through youth music magazines such as the NME and Melody Maker.

To discount the Indie chart's importance is to discount a huge volume of work by highly influential arists, such as The Smiths, The Cure, New Order, The Sisters of Mercy, The Prodigy et al. In doing so you deny massive swathes of British popular culture including Punk, New Wave, Goth, Crusty, Shoegazers, Grebo, Jungle and others, all of whom were dependent upon the Indie Chart as their measure of success.

I'm not saying that Chumbawamba were as successful or influential as The Cure, but they were a significant band, and their Indie chart positions are evidence of such.

Recommended reading is Dick Hebdige's "Subculture: The Meaning Of Style" which is pretty much mandatory for anyone studying the sociology and roots of the British independent music phenomenon, from Punk to Ragga. The UK scene developed entirely differently from the USA; where the USA had radio stations devoted to genres, the UK, due to tight radio regulation, has those genres develop through underground magazines and nightclubs.

Re:"Indie Chart" my ass; #56 in the proper charts.

[Dogtanian]

Oh God, yeah. I remember.... Radio 1 before about 1993 seemed aimed at 30-40somethings instead of the teens/early-twenties it was originally aimed at, and full of MOR Radio 2-type DJs.

I mean, "I'd Rather Jack" (arf) was a crap song, but you could see where it was coming from.

I'd dispute that MTV2 is "alternative" or "indie". I've seen it, and as far as I'm concerned it represents the corporate assimilation and homogenisation of the above, turning "indie" or "alternative" into stunningly ironic terms these days.

(Though I found Slipknot to be so over-the-top silly scary that only a thirteen-year-old could take them seriously that I kind of liked them for that).

But back to the point. Just because an artist was "influential" or popular as part of a subculture, doesn't mean they're popular in the mainstream. I hear about all these bands that were supposedly influential, and all their famous singles and think "Hang on, I don't remember hearing that when I was a kid". And you look it up, and realise that the reason you don't remember it was because it wasn't a chart hit at the time(!) From that point-of-view, Chumbawumba are still an (almost) one-hit-wonder.

BTW, forgot to get the Tory boy jibe in :-)

Metamoderator here

[Anonymous Coward]

Note also that in linking to TFA, you also managed to mis-spell Chumbawamba, twice. "Redundant" is not even the half of it.

Funny they use Chumbawamba as an example...

[eetu]

I'm a regular reader of slashdot, but I actually stumbled upon this story via news.google.com when I was searching for news about Chumbawamba's new record ("A Singsong and a Scrap", which is to be released on early October in mainland Europe, not sure whether they've found a UK or US publisher for it yet).

It's also funny a funny coincidence that a company like that would use as an example a band which has put out a remix of their single which is a commentary on the whole filesharing debate (Pass It Along (mp3 mix) which is by the way available on the download section of their site).