NYT Opinion Piece on DRM And P2P

bsartist writes "The NYT is running an opinion piece written by a working musician who has a pretty healthy dislike of copy protection and DRM. From the article: 'As for musicians, we are left to wonder how many more people could be listening to our music if it weren't such a hassle, and how many more iPods might have our albums on them if our labels hadn't sabotaged our releases with cumbersome software.'"

Comments

Quit wondering and drop the label!

[CyricZ]

This musician should do what many others have done and start his or her own website. Make the music available there, free of charge or for a small fee.

If they were stupid enough to sign a restrictive contract with some media label, the just wait until the agreement expires. Then be sure to never deal with them again, due to the points mentioned in this article.

Re:Quit wondering and drop the label!

[TheRealMindChild]

Sure... hindsight is always 20/20, but you have to figure, most signed artists had no idea what they were getting into. They are hapless garage bands that some bastard feels they can exploit to make a bit of coin.

Sure, they SHOULD have known. But when someone is waving your dream in your face, it is hard to think logically.

Re:Quit wondering and drop the label!

[DoorFrame]

I think the even bigger problem is that you haven't heard of 99.999999% of non-label bands. You at least have a shot when someone's paying you to put out an album. When you're on your own, you're out of luck.

Re:Quit wondering and drop the label!

[CyricZ]

There are many independent bands who do just fine for themselves financially. They're not pulling in millions, but they're living decently. And they usually have a very loyal fanbase willing to support them out to some extent.

And then there's this very issue of freedom. Would you trade your freedom and integrity as an artists for money? A true artists, one who puts his or her work above all, most likely would not.

Re:Quit wondering and drop the label!

[Steve525]

This musician should do what many others have done and start his or her own website. Make the music available there, free of charge or for a small fee.

How many musicians have succeeded in making a living this way? Without the exposure the record labels can give you (through their lock on radio) you aren't going to sell many songs. There may be one or two exceptions, (Ani DeFranco come to mind) but it's pretty rare.

If they were stupid enough to sign a restrictive contract with some media label, the just wait until the agreement expires.

Perhaps, but some contracts don't ever expire. I believe the contracts are usually based on # of albums, not a set amount of time. And guess what, the record company gets to decide when to release the album. So they can sit on it as long as they want, and you're f**ked.

And if you did get out of the contract, what are you going to do, get a better deal from a different record company? Unless you are already successful, it's not going to happen.

Re:Quit wondering and drop the label!

[shawb]

But a true artist might be willing to trade freedom and a percentage of album sales to get more people to listen to their music. The recording industry can be a very efficient marketing force, getting music played on the radio, getting CDs placed in stores, getting tours booked and so on and so on.

I really don't see integrity coming into play. Most musicians really don't care about DRM one way or another, or at the very least are ambivalent. For most people "integrity" means having a code of ethics that matches theirs.

I can answer

[flyinwhitey]

"how many more people could be listening to our music if it weren't such a hassle, and how many more iPods might have our albums on them if our labels hadn't sabotaged our releases with cumbersome software."

A few more maybe, but my experience is if someone wants the music, DRM won't stop them from buying.

I'm sure there are a few people who get fired up about it, but I suspect most people don't care all that much.

Re:I can answer

[sgant]

I'm sure there are a few people who get fired up about it, but I suspect most people don't care all that much.

I suppose you didn't hear about the Sony DRM debacle did you? Ok, was being sarcastic there as you'd have to be living under a rock not to have heard about it. Then would you mind revising your statement above as obviously MANY people cared a bunch about that and it put DRM right into the limelight...which the RIAA doesn't want it shown. It doesn't want press about DRM or anything like this. They want the people not to "care all that much". But obviously this isn't going to happen as many people got fired up about the rootkit AND the DRM crap.

And as you see, now there's even editorials in the frickin New York Times!

Re:I can answer

[ajs318]

There's a powerful incantation specially designed to deal with shopkeepers:

Sale of Goods Act 1979, as amended.

The mere mention of the phrase is enough to send a shiver down the spine of even the hardest retailer; junior sales assistants have been reduced to gibbering wrecks by a particularly powerful rendition. Goods must be of merchantable quality and fit for the purpose described. If you explicitly mentioned at the time of sale that you intended to transfer it to an iPod and were not advised that this would not be easy, then the album is not fit for purpose and you are entitled to a refund. Even if not, if you were given reason to expect that this would be easy, then you might have a case.

But in any case, you can rip DRM-protected "CDs" to an iPod. You might need Slax if you aren't already a penguin-shagger. Even if your PC is infected by the Sony rootkit, Linux has its own set of drivers and will see the audio tracks just fine.

This practice is legal as long as you don't get caught. If you are unlucky enough to get arrested, insist to go to Crown Court. As long as there are two people on the jury who have ever taped an album, you'll walk free -- and establish a precedent. The case is most likely to collapse before it gets to trial, so don't bother booking the day off work.

Labels Miss the Point

[Trip Ericson]

I found that piece to be quite interesting.

What was said at the end, in particular, about the record labels feeling that because it targetted college students with the best access to P2P was the reason to put the DRM on it.

But the labels obviously don't see that that would only drive college students to download. If one person buys the CD in the college setting and it won't get on his iPod, he'll inform his friends and they won't buy it, no matter how great the CD is, and will instead go onto a P2P service and download it from a Linux/Mac/Shift-key user who ripped it in 10 minutes anyway.

I begin to wonder if the labels understand cause and effect. And that quite a number of college students are tech-savvy enough to use Linux/Mac/etc. anyway, more so than in the home setting.

Cory on DRM

[CaptainZapp]

No DRM discussion is whole without a link to Cory Doctorows excellent speech on that issue.

I wish some of the entertainment industry execs would click that link and get a fucking clue.

skip the hassle

[digitaldc]

"As for musicians, we are left to wonder how many more people could be listening to our music if it weren't such a hassle"

Ok, go here: http://www.okgo.net/music_music.asp

Best of luck to the band!

Re:Also Wonders

[CyricZ]

If your music is good, then people will give you donations (especially if you ask). You most likely wouldn't make millions, but you'd be more than able to get by.

Lairs and Cheats.

[AlohaWolf]

If you always treat people as if they are out to lie to you and steal from you, they WILL lie to you and steal from you.

Re:I love the Slashdot slant

[ettlz]

Slashdot will post a million articles and opinions from anybody on the Internets that hates DRM, yet never post any opinions that defend it.

Well, you're here now. So you tell us: what's good about DRM? What's good about taking control of someone's computer? What's good about encumbering CDs with vulnerable, untrustworthy software, surreptitiously installing it, and having it run in Ring 0 so that people can listen to a crude, lossy approximation of the music for which they have paid? What's so damn good about selling broken CDs?

Re:Registration - BugMeNot

[DoorFrame]

Eh, ButMeNot.

They should have done some research.

[CyricZ]

Some very basic research, even just a few Google searches, would have made them aware of the risks of dealing with these labels. It's no secret that they royally fuck over a lot of artists.

I don't feel bad for people who sign an agreement with somebody without researching the other party's background and history. A quick Internet search would have revealed 20/20 hindsight as recorded by others who have been screwed over by the major labels.

Re:They should have done some research.

[91degrees]

Okay - so what's the choice?

You sign a restrictive agreement with a cartel that has absolute control over all marketting channels, or you wallow in obscurity forever. Are you surprised that some people go for the restrictive contract? It's the best they can get.

Re:They should have done some research.

[Richard W.M. Jones]

You sign a restrictive agreement with a cartel that has absolute control over all marketting channels, or you wallow in obscurity forever.

I think you really hit on it there. The cartel has control over all marketing channels, except one -- the Internet. But they're desperately trying to gain control over that one.

Think how much better a situation we'd be in if we just had compulsory licensing for Internet trading. In effect you'd pay a small tax on your broadband connection, and share files without limits. A rights collection organisation would be responsible for periodically analysing the sharing traffic and working out how to apportion the revenues of the tax to the artists, in proportion to how many people are listening or sharing their music.

Bands would actually compete to make better music and try to get as many people to share and listen to it as freely as possible.

Rich.

Re:They should have done some research.

[quanticle]

Think how much better a situation we'd be in if we just had compulsory licensing for Internet trading. In effect you'd pay a small tax on your broadband connection, and share files without limits. A rights collection organisation would be responsible for periodically analysing the sharing traffic and working out how to apportion the revenues of the tax to the artists, in proportion to how many people are listening or sharing their music.

So why should I pay the tax then, when I'm not sharing any music? I don't think that we should tax every new medium for carrying music in an effort to prop up the recording industry's aging and outdated business model.

Re:They should have done some research.

[geoffspear]

The objection is that people who "share" little or no copyrighted music/text/video would be forced, under your plan to subsidize those who "share" lots and lots of materials.

I'm happy to pay the distributors for the few songs I want to download to put on my iPod (most of what's on there I ripped from my own CD collection, which stopped growing years ago. I have no real desire to have very much new music); I don't want to pay for every teen in the country to fill their own with 4000 crappy pop songs and to download every new movie that comes out of Hollywood.

Re:They should have done some research.

[Shakrai]

They may not be a household name, but they'll still get by financially.

And while they are "getting by" some other artist will have become a national name thanks to the RIAA marketing droids and ClearChannel. His music may not be (probably isn't?) as good as your guy -- but he's the one with the North American tour that pulls in a cool million or so at each stop.

Is it really that hard to understand why RIAA has the power they do? If you could sell a small number of CDs/mp3s on a website and collect all the money -- or sell a large number of CDs from a label and collect little to nothing but become a big enough name that you can go on tour and make millions -- tell me, what would you do?

If we all think RIAA is as bad as we say (I do) then let's do something about it. The Indie artists should get together create their own label that makes fair contracts with the artists and treats the customers like customers and not criminals. Hire a few disillusioned marketing droids from RIAA labels, make some contacts at ClearChannel. If you run the business properly then in a few years you'll have the same marketing power that RIAA does and they won't have everybody (artists and consumers) by the balls like they do now.

The talent is already there. We just need the business sense.

Where is Karl Marx when you need him?

[$RANDOMLUSER]

I can almost hear the speeches about "...when the musicians control the means of production"...

I can't help but wonder

[aussie_a]

I can't help but wonder, how many more people would have RTFA had it not been encumbered by an account system.

Re:I can't help but wonder

[Rhoon]

I'll repost this, since the AC got pushed down into the threshold basement.

Travel to http://www.bugmenot.com/ and you'll find that registration is never required again!

(Also comes complete with a firefox plugin)

Flawed Logic

[AC5398]

**Record company executives reasoned that because we appeal to college students who have the high-bandwidth connections necessary for getting access to peer-to-peer networks, we're the kind of band that gets traded instead of bought.**

This is a stupid argument. EMI's "protective software" overwrote my sound drivers when I tried to rip a purchased Leahy CD to mp3 so I could then listen to the music on my portable mp3 player. The lesson I learnt? Don't purchase EMI and/or Leahy CDs -- I didn't really need the CD or the hassle in the first place.

If I absolutely have to have the music, I now know it's far safer to download EMI mp3s from the flavour of the week p2p program than it is to purchase the CD.

EMI's "protective software" encourages piracy, not discourages it.

And at least Sony's "protective software" gave you some sort of a heads-up that there was 'extras' on their CDs; EMI didn't tell me a damn thing. I had to figure out what in hell happened to the sound card on my own.

Re:Please copy our stuff!

[dwandy]

The poor guy is just conflicted, and wants the best of both worlds: he wants it free for people to listen to, but they gotta pay for it to make him rich.
I find it interesting that the more I read on music, the more apparent it is to me that there are a very few (dozens, maybe hundreds) out of the millions of bands that actually make rock-star kinda money.
For the rest: it's just a dream the label sold them.

I guess what I'm suggesting is that most bands are not giving up much 'fortune' without a major label. Most bands can probably make just as much money w/o the label as with, and this would leave the band to make their music, their way, and reach their fans which most claim to be the reason they started in the first place.

...and the shocking answer to who makes all the money? the middleman of course, the one selling this pipe-dream to the artist. The one putting locks on the music that keeps the fans from listening.

See the lil' secret that all middlemen don't want people to know is that they have no discernable skill of their own, other than profiting off the backs of others...(see patents & copyrights -- it's the middleman fighting for protections). The creators don't need middlemen, but middlemen sure as hell need the creative...

one solution

[Red Flayer]

"Luckily, my band's recently released album, "Oh No," escaped copy control, but only narrowly. When our album came out, our label's parent company, EMI, was testing protective software and thought we were a good candidate for it."

Problem: Major record labels (or their parent companies) want to force copy protection onto the albums of their talent.

Solution: Don't sign with one of those labels, or make sure your contract includes stipulations that your albums will not have copy protection.

This opinion article is indicative of increasing artist awareness of how copy protection will hurt them -- the difficulty is that the labels still have more bargaining power for upcoming talent.

This is a great opportunity for a well-funded indie label to step up and fill the void, to attract talent by guaranteeing no copy protection.

If someone demonstrates to the major labels that it's beneficial to not require copy protection, they may follow suit -- though I'd speculate that copy protection is all about making sure the record-buying public still sees free copying & downloading as 'wrong.' What they'd really hate to see is most musinc 'consumers' feeling that it is normal and 100% acceptable to get all their music from filesharing.

Re:"how many more people could be listening..."

[Red Flayer]

" Um, we are listening to your music. We're just not paying. That's the point. "

No, that's not the point. The point is that the less net-savvy people are not listening to the music, since they can't download it to their iPod due to copy protection.

Did you read TFA, or are you just spouting garbage because you feel so proud of yourself for getting songs for free?

Backfire!

[Anonymous Coward]

From the article:

Luckily, my band's recently released album, "Oh No," escaped copy control, but only narrowly. When our album came out, our label's parent company, EMI, was testing protective software and thought we were a good candidate for it. Record company executives reasoned that because we appeal to college students who have the high-bandwidth connections necessary for getting access to peer-to-peer networks, we're the kind of band that gets traded instead of bought.

You know what? It was hearing "A Million Ways" on NPR, then a P-2-P download of the song, that CAUSED me to purchase the entire album! If I had not been able to dig the whole song a couple of times, I would have never have purchased it. "Oh No" was the first CD I've bought in 2 years. (I just haven't found a lot of music lately that appeals to me.)

So the very avenue that the record companies fear, generated a sale. How many others has it generated?

Price Fixing

[Ilex]

The real cause of music piracy is because a CD with 12 tracks isn't worth the money the labels are asking. Why anyone buys a CD which costs almost as much as a DVD is beyond me.

The labels needs to get a clue and realize they need to provide a value service to their 'customers' (not consumers). Not alienate them by crippling their machines with DRM'd malware which can be defeated and ripped by someone with a marker pen, sticky tape or shift key.

Download a movie off the net you just get to watch the movie. Buy the same movie from a shop and you get all the extra bonus material. Download an album off the net you get an album buy the album in the shop you get the same album. This is the real reason why the movie industry hasn't been clobbered by piracy to the same extent as the music cartels.

I really believe DRM free FLAC quality music downloads and streaming services are the way to go. They need to build a business model around that. Much like Google, Red Hat and MySql give their products away free and make money on providing services.

I tried telling a karaoke executive drm sucks

[t0qer]

I was pitching the idea of an online karaoke store to a karaoke label. Conversation went something like this;

me: "DRM will always be cracked, folks will find a way around, why bother?"
him: "It makes the labels comfortable"
Me: "Yah but the cats out of the bag, its open season on the net for filesharers"
him: "I like to quote my locksmith friend, locks aren't supposed to keep criminals out, they're supposed to keep honest people in"

I should have come back with "Oh so you think everyones dishonest do you?", but nah, I liked this guy.

Not that it will ever happen in our lifetime for audio files, but there will be some advancement in audio that will only be avaliable on DRM, it's only a matter of time. Maybe it will be some newfangled 42 channel lossless surround sound that we haven't even concieved of yet.

At some point, all these files floating around for free on the net are going to start sounding pretty crappy, and the DRM files will be the only ones that will be the MUST HAVE rage.

I sort of picture christmas with the family. I'm sitting there showing off some non DRM linux based audio juke that I can ssh into, compile my kernel on and browse the newsgroups, and my grease mechanic uncle will pull out the "Microwhore pocket media" device that straps to your chin and transmits 52 channel DRM audio through your jawbone. No matter how cool it is to other geeks I can run seti@home on my linux based juke, it won't matter to the other family members all pressing the micropoop to their chins and salivating from a near orgasmic audio experience.

This has been brought up a lot of times about OSS, GNU, linux stuff in general. We're going to be assed out when it happens, back here on slashdot complaining about the lack of linux driver support for playing back these drm audio.

DVD Jon will fly in wearing a blue leotard, red boots, red cape, and a tux logo in a diamond on his chest. He'll break the DRM again, we'll be happy for a while, but the rest of the consumer market will go on.

Smart people, tech savvy people are in the minority. I hate to say this, but it's true. Most of the world buys what the TV tells them to.

Re:I tried telling a karaoke executive drm sucks

[iainl]

"Not that it will ever happen in our lifetime for audio files, but there will be some advancement in audio that will only be avaliable on DRM, it's only a matter of time."

It already happened; the copy protection on neither SA-CD nor DVD-A have been broken to my knowledge. Certainly I've never seen illegal download versions of them. However, the majority of people have decided that the music they can already play (whether that be purchased CDs or mp3 downloads) is "good enough", and the formats have been pretty stillborn.

But then, my system isn't exactly the worst I've ever heard (NAD player, Pioneer amp, Celestion speakers) and I think my CDs sound perfectly good enough as well.

Re:I tried telling a karaoke executive drm sucks

[scheming daemons]

At some point, all these files floating around for free on the net are going to start sounding pretty crappy

Why? The human ear is not going to improve in its ability to discern nuances in sound in the near future.

We've pretty much maxed out on providing lossless sound already (as far as the human ear can tell) with current non-DRM formats.

When you're already at the 99.9% level of hearing the sound on playback as it sounded live, there really isn't anything that can improve on it.

Sure.. some suckers will buy a "new" format that claims to be more lossless, and they will insist to everyone that they can really "hear" the difference. But the truth is, unless they have some canine in their ancestry, they won't be able to hear the difference.

We've damn near maxed out on improving sound quality in file formats, as far as any human ear can tell.

DRM is dead. If you can hear it coming through your speakers.. you can record it. At 0.001% loss.

Re:I tried telling a karaoke executive drm sucks

[StrawberryFrog]

Not that it will ever happen in our lifetime for audio files, but there will be some advancement in audio that will only be avaliable on DRM, it's only a matter of time. Maybe it will be some newfangled 42 channel lossless surround sound that we haven't even concieved of yet.

Wrong. The new format is the portable music player, iPod et al. And it's worse quality. People bought it because it did things that big, high quality stereos didn't do at all, like fit in your packet and play any song in your collection on random.

If a new stanbdard in sound quality did emerge, and was truly in demand, sooner or later an open-source version would follow. And rippers to remove the DRM. Look at .ogg and .flac. Look at DVD to .avi software.

Re:I tried telling a karaoke executive drm sucks

[poot_rootbeer]

At some point, all these files floating around for free on the net are going to start sounding pretty crappy, and the DRM files will be the only ones that will be the MUST HAVE rage.

I think you place too much importance on the general public's desire for Quality.

Yes, DVDs can provide a higher-quality audiovisual experience than VHS tapes. This doesn't mean much when people are still hooking up their players to their Plain Old TVs with a composite cable, and listening to the sound through the TV's 4-inch mono speaker.

DVD supplanted VHS because of convenience, not quality. DVDs don't need to be rewound. They're random-access. They take up less space and usually come with bonus features and content.

  The industry has tried several times to sell a next-generation consumer audio format with higher quality -- DAT, DVD-Audio, SACD -- and invariably they've been relegated to small corners of the market. Oddly enough, the move from CDs to MP3s is a huge step BACK in quality. But the market doesn't mind, because MP3s offer far more CONVENIENCE. You can't carry 250 CDs with you in your pocket.

Accountants?

[Anonymous Coward]

...our accountants can tell you that we're not real rock stars yet.

WTF? Accountants are judges of rock stars? What happened to the music?

There There, Labels

[Bob9113]

It's OK labels. Don't cry now. There there. Yes, stop sniffling. It's OK. I know your customers and your vendors hate you, but it's OK. The politicians, lobbyists, and, well, you still love you.

Re:Please copy our stuff!

[DoorFrame]

If you don't think middlemen serve a purpose, then why, do you suppose, do producers not simply sell directly the consumers?

There's a service in delivery and there's a service in filtration... both of which the music industry provides. Just because someone is a middle-man doesn't mean they're not providing a service. If they weren't providing a service, nobody would ever hand them any money.

Re:I love the Slashdot slant

[kamapuaa]

So you tell us: what's good about DRM?

Here in China everybody downloads music and movies, even though legit CDs are maybe $1.50 and legit DVDs are maybe $2-$3.50. It has absolutely destroyed the industries. Slashdotters love to blame the quality of movies and music for problems in the industry, but the truth is that both Hong Kong movies and more especially Mainland movies are way better than the silly shit they used to have 15 years ago, even as less and less movies are getting made. Johnny To and Wong Kar Wai are the two best directors in the world, and HK actors are as charasmatic as anybody in Hollywood or Bollywood. (On the other hand Chinese pop more or less sucks, but that's always been true).

I buy pirated DVDs & download movies. Everybody does. But I can't help but feel that as a whole, more and better movies would be made if movie companies were able to restrict the unlimited copying of their movies.

Re:bands don't make music to make money

[Red Flayer]

"but you don't need 50 cent's money to live large (heh), heck, a couple hundred thou a year from touring gigs is fine

And how many artists are successful enough to make six figures touring? Not many.

"so the future will be the same even with 100% music piracy: bands will just make cash from touring gigs and advertising"

And what about everyone elso who is involved with producing the music? All the people who work in the studio, all the people who work on distro, all the people who make an album happen? Do you think that only musicians who self-finance should be able to succeed? How about all the money it takes to get a band to the point where touring becomes profitable? Because the jump from playing small bars to big venues is a huge one, and requires some serious capital.

"it's not morality, repeat IT IS NOT A QUESTION OF MORALITY TO PIRATE MUSIC"

Well, that depends on your morals, now doesn't it? If your morality doesn't account for all the people who worked to make the product you want to listen to (sound engineers, etc), then sure, it's not a question of morality. If your morality doesn't account for the validity of the marketplace, then sure, it's not a question of morality.

Me, I don't like concerts. I can't frickin stand the crowds or the volume. The only way I can support an artist I like is to either send them money directly, or purchase their album (yeah, I know they make crap off album sales).

DRM is about to run into a big problem.

[CFD339]

DRM is "workable" so far only because it really impacts a minority. A growing minority, but a minority anyway. For most people, iTunes is seen as a "reasonable compromise" and they assume some unknown group they call "hackers" probably still "pirates" music.

Joe six pack couldn't care less.

Soon, however, you'll need a special monitor or a special TV to watch high quality video. That crosses the line. The industry as a whole is going to find out that you DO NOT MESS WITH THE TV. That, in the US, is sacred. Mess with the TV and you're a "damn govm't commie".

I predict that the requirement for special viewing hardware to "Close the analog hole" will go over about the same way Microsoft's attempt to tell I.T. directors they had to upgrade within 6 months or pay full retail. Anyone else remember that mistake?

All its going to do is wake up people who presently don't care to how over-reaching the policy is. The backlash will be fun to watch.

Re:"how many more people could be listening..."

[Red Flayer]

"ip-synchers in search of landfall profits, maybe their "clients" wouldn't feel so cheated when they paid $15+ for a CD that contains one good song. Good bands/artists are becoming a rare commodity and are being over-shadowed by glitz and glamour."

Absolutely, though we've been down this road before. The reason it's worse now, in the US, is because radio no longer has any variety. The internet may be able to replace the traditional role of radio in exposing new artists, but I find myself looking to the past to find new (to me) music. I have no desire to listen to whatever crap Clearchannel is pushing... now get off my lawn ;)

Re:"how many more people could be listening..."

[danielk1982]

No, that's not the point. The point is that the less net-savvy people are not listening to the music, since they can't download it to their iPod due to copy protection.

Both my sisters know nothing about computers and apart from MSN, email and Word don't really have any use for it...oh yeah.. they both have a collection of music spanning hundreds of tracks (started with Napster and continued on with Kazaa and Limewire). I haven't seen either buy a cd in a long time, and its not because of DRM.

Point is, I think the article is wrong in this respect. Napster ushered in an era that made it easy for regular folk to download music. If you could check email you could get any song you wanted. Whatever else, I think P2P has affected negatively sales of CDs (although the jury is out how much exactly). And certainly if the people are not listening to the musician in the article its not because of DRM. And yes, he should have known that big labels like Sony or EMI are against P2P sharing.

I do agree with one sentiment though. Customers who do go out and buy a cd are punished for it. They are treated as potential thieves even though they already shelled out money for the CD. They have to deal with DRM and rootkits, while the 'pirates' essentially get a nice DRM-free nohassle mp3 off illegal P2P networks. Thats just bad business.

/. OPED piece

[foniksonik]

Not being a working musician or even a musician at all, here's what I'd do if I were. Even if I was just starting out...

It's very simple. I'd find a non-label corporate sponsor. I'd take my tracks around to Ad agencies and PR firms... talk to the people there about providing some low-cost background tracks or something... find out who their big clients are and approach someone at those companies using my Agency contact as a name drop to get in the door, then try to negotiate a direct deal with them to provide music for whatever they need.

I'd become their 'musical consultant' and 'musician of record' much like an attorney or specialist in IT or any other field would do.

I'd negotiate a 2 year contract to provide my services at a living wage with a little bonus for my special skills. For this, they would get all the loops, soundbytes, jingles, elevator music, whatever they want. In return, I'd get to practice my skills, receive a decent paycheck, spend all my free time in a studio and release my personal creations with any license i want and any distributor who I think will do a good job.

Few corporations would have any incentive to want to keep me for much more than that but if they did, so much the better when I shopped around for a new sponsor with a better contract. The better I got at providing them with a musical brand, the more valued I'd become. After a few corporate gigs, I'd hopefully have enough saved to release something that would do well on the charts and could decide to go independent.

In the meanwhile, I could supplement my income with agency work directly... seeing as how I'm good at providing corporate musical brandind now... agencies know I can perform and get the job done.

Maybe I'd never be a media superstar, but I'd probably make a lot more money in the end and have creative control of both my music and my reputation.

Re:I love the Slashdot slant

[rkhalloran]

The interesting points in this are (a) it's appearing in The Gray Lady, which gives it a certain weight over a mere web post, and (b) it's coming from someone in the music business, even if a small-time player, vs. one of us tech-types simply bemoaning the eee-vuls of DRM.

Re:I love the Slashdot slant

[arevos]

Unfortunately, DRM doesn't prevent people from making a copy of a file. What it does do is make it more difficult and illegal to make a copy; neither of these are sufficient barriers to stop a person from copying the file if they really want to. Thus, DRM does not prevent piracy; that's a myth.

However, DRM is very good at preventing legal copying of files. You can stop a customer from copying the music from their CDs to their MP3 player, which means that the customer will have to buy their music again in MP3 form - all the more profit for you. Similarly, you can use DRM to prevent your competitors from accessing your online music service, and use it to prevent free markets arising.

DRM is an excellent tool for restricting consumer freedom and choice. But that's all it's good for.

Support Artists, not labels

[dlc3007]

My recent strategy has been to purchase CDs directly from the artists at their shows. Not only are they making some cash from me at the shows, but frequently they have their older albums on sale as well as cases of their current work. Does this mean the label is totally out of the picture? Maybe not, but sometimes. I have purchased "pirated" CDs from the artists themselves because the f'ing label didn't think it worth their time to make more. Sure this won't work for the FOTM pop bands, but I don't listen to that junk anyway. Big bands like the Rolling Stones? Local used CD stores and discount racks, baby. I plan on doing all I can to give as little as possible to big labels.

Re:Please copy our stuff!

[billybaloney]

The poor guy is just conflicted, and wants the best of both worlds: he wants it free for people to listen to, but they gotta pay for it to make him rich. I find it interesting that the more I read on music, the more apparent it is to me that there are a very few (dozens, maybe hundreds) out of the millions of bands that actually make rock-star kinda money. For the rest: it's just a dream the label sold them.

Aw, come on now, give us musicians a little more credit than that. Some of us, like Damien, are educated, motivated, quick-thinking folks who are trying to make a *living*, not necessarily millions, from playing music. Does that make us stupid? It shouldn't, not if music fans still want music to listen to.

This is clearly a two-way street: musicians should be figuring out the best way to produce good music and get it to fans and potential fans, and fans should be concerned about whether the system encourages the good musicians at the bottom to rise to the top.

One facile answer is to say, "Give the music away for free and make your money from playing live. If you can't play a live show, you shouldn't be trying to make a living this way."

The problem with this argument is you'll lose out on all the great musicians who (a) construct amazing music using the studio itself as an instrument (vide Radiohead, who still put on a great live show, Praxis, you name it -- even Mingus overdubbed a bass solo from time to time), and who (b) have something to offer you but for one reason or another can't tour. Ever tried touring? Ever tried it with kids? With a job that doesn't let you take more than a few days off at a time? With a bad back?

The easy answer is not the right one, not in a situation where we want good music from both the well-known and the obscure. And don't think that indie labels are somehow the be-all, end-all; any musician on an indie label can tell you plenty of stories to put an end to that fantasy. Some indies have their hearts in the right place, but no money to realize their intentions; some are little people trying to be industry players; and others, a very few, do it right.

The labels owe it to the musicians and to the fans to put out music in a format and at a price that makes sense. The fans owe it to the musicians to support them financially if they like the music. One positive model for P2P is this: download some tracks by a band you've never heard, or from an album you don't know; if you like the music, go buy the album. If you don't like the music, you won't those tracks on your hard drive anyway, so erase them.

The question for my model, and for many other similar suggestions, is this: can we all trust each other?

It's the pensions, dummy

[Kombat]

The reason for this is that both Ford and Chrysler have killed off nonperforming brands

So has GM though. Chrysler killed off Plymouth, GM killed off Oldsmobile, and as far as I know, Ford hasn't killed off anything yet, have they? The pundits are saying Mercury is on life-support, but to the best of my knowledge, Ford hasn't officially announced the final nail yet.

Simply put, GM is having so much trouble meeting its pension obligations because no one will buy their cars without a deep discount.

The Chevy Cavalier was the #1 best selling car in Canada for several years running, yet GM was unable to parlay that marketshare dominance into huge profits. Don't get me wrong, I'm not here to defend GM's products. I think their vehicles are all cheap, flaky crap (with the notable exception of this one, which is just freakin' amazing). But it's been selling just as well or better than their competitors. So they should be in a comparable financial situation. Yet they're not. Why? Because of the pensions.

I'm not alone in this opinion; the pros all back me up:

"Now, as we all can see, pension and health care obligations are eating GM alive."

Washington Post

"The carmaker is saddled with a $1,600-per-vehicle handicap in so-called legacy costs, mostly retiree health and pension benefits"

Business Week

They're losing money because they're paying out benefits to employees that don't even work there anymore at a rate proportionally higher than their competitors.

The problem IS the DRM

[Bilbo]

Did you read the article? The point the ARTIST was making is that DRM, no matter how "well" it is implemented, prevents people from sharing the music with other people, which in turn limits the wide distribution of the music, especially to people who haven't heard your work before. OK, so if you're Madonna or KISS or some other huge name, then pretty much everyone had heard of you, but for every big name band that could really use DRM to protect them from massive piracy, how many thousands of other small time bands are there struggling to get their songs out? I don't even mean "garage bands". There are plenty of established bands who just aren't in the top 0.1% that get a lot of air time on the big corporate owned radio stations. They would love to have 10,000 more people downloading their music and actually listening to them. Downloads still drive real sales, both of CD's and concert tickets. You may only see receipts on 1 out of 10 copies of your songs out of there, but that's still better than ZERO sales.

Return the CDs

[Rob Riggs]

I returned the latest Santana CD to Borders Bookstore, where I bought it, after discovering it installed crap without my permission on my company-issued laptop. I was direct with the manager about the problem and they accepted the return with very little hassle.

Re:Locks are not safe

[91degrees]

No lock available on any consumer-grade car, truck, minivan, house, garage, shed, or toilet (don't ask) is capable of keeping criminals out.

Yes they are. Most of the criminals round here are kids who wouldn't know where to start attacking a lock. Locksmiths know how easy it is for a locksmith to break in. Most criminals aren't that skilled. The ones that are are probably going to go for richer pickings.

Here's a fun fact: If the locks on your home were made by Kwikset, I have a key to your house.

Good job they're not then.

Here's another fun fact - About half of unlawful entry through doorways occurs when the doors were left unlocked. And most criminals will spend less than a minute trying to break in.

My favorite so far...

[Ath]

So I bought a DVD the other day, popped it in my DVD player, and sat down with my wife to watch it. However, I was first subjected to a 3 minute commercial telling me that I should not pirate movies. And to add a layer of frustration to the silliness, the "commercial" was operation restricted so that I could not skip it and must watch it every time.

Now, where was the common sense of someone during the production process saying that it makes no sense to make an actual paying customer suffer through this insanity? I mean, if the copy actually was pirated then it would no longer have any restricted operations and the whole damn portion about piracy would have been removed. So the only people that are forced to endure such garbage are the very people who the commercial is not intended to address.

And that is why media companies are losing it. Copy protection and usage restrictions are nothing more than hassles for actual paying customers. And every time the content providers, whether it is music, movies, or videogames try to introduce another technological solution to their market problem, they only alienate paying customers. The actual people who are unwilling, uninterested, or unable to pay for the content just go out and get versions without the protection.

Great model.

Article Text (for those too lazy to register)

[Anonymous Coward]

New York Times


December 6, 2005
Op-Ed Contributor
Buy, Play, Trade, Repeat
By DAMIAN KULASH Jr.


Los Angeles


THE record company Sony BMG recently got in trouble after attempting to stem piracy by encoding its CD's with software meant to limit how many copies can be made of the discs. It turned out that the copy-protection software exposed consumers' computers to Internet viruses, forcing Sony BMG to recall the CD's.

This technological disaster aside, though, Sony BMG and the other major labels need to face reality: copy-protection software is bad for everyone, consumers, musicians and labels alike. It's much better to have copies of albums on lots of iPods, even if only half of them have been paid for, than to have a few CD's sitting on a shelf and not being played.

The Sony BMG debacle revealed the privacy issues and security risks tied to the spyware that many copy-protection programs install on users' computers. But even if these problems are solved, copy protection is guaranteed to fail because it's a house of cards. No matter how sophisticated the software, it takes only one person to break it, once, and the music is free to roam and multiply on the peer-to-peer file-trading networks.

Meanwhile, music lovers get pushed away. Tech-savvy fans won't go to the trouble of buying a strings-attached record when they can get a better version free. Less Net-knowledgeable fans (those who don't know the simple tricks to get around the copy-protection software or don't use peer-to-peer networks) are punished by discs that often won't load onto their MP3 players (the copy-protection programs are incompatible with Apple's iPods, for example) and sometimes won't even play in their computers.

Conscientious fans, who buy music legally because it's the right thing to do, just get insulted. They've made the choice not to steal their music, and the labels thank them by giving them an inferior product hampered by software that's at best a nuisance, and at worst a security threat.

As for musicians, we are left to wonder how many more people could be listening to our music if it weren't such a hassle, and how many more iPods might have our albums on them if our labels hadn't sabotaged our releases with cumbersome software.

The truth is that the more a record gets listened to, the more successful it is. This is not just our megalomania, it's Marketing 101: the more times a song gets played, the more of a chance it has to catch the ear of someone new. It doesn't do us much good if people buy our records and promptly shelve them; we need them to fall in love with our songs and listen to them over and over. A record that you can't transfer to your iPod is a record you're less likely to listen to, less likely to get obsessed with and less likely to tell your friends about.

Luckily, my band's recently released album, "Oh No," escaped copy control, but only narrowly. When our album came out, our label's parent company, EMI, was testing protective software and thought we were a good candidate for it. Record company executives reasoned that because we appeal to college students who have the high-bandwidth connections necessary for getting access to peer-to-peer networks, we're the kind of band that gets traded instead of bought.

That may be true, but we are also the sort of band that hasn't yet gotten the full attention of MTV and major commercial radio stations, so those college students are our only window onto the world. They are our best chance for success, and we desperately need them to be listening to us, talking about us, coming to our shows and yes, trading us.

To be clear, I certainly don't encourage people to pirate our music. I have poured my life into my band, and after two major label records, our accountants can tell you that we're not real rock stars yet. But before a million people can buy our record, a million people have to hear our music and like it enough to go looking for it. That won'

read his original, much angrier article about drm

[slashdoris]

Damian had a harsher version of this article on music industry blog coolfer.com. Read it here. Looks like he was forced to tone it down for the ny times...

Re:Dork

[jimicus]

OK, I'll bite, troll.

By that logic, no-one has a god-given right to transfer their music onto an MP3 player. Nor do they have a god-given right to play it on a high-end CD player (yes, some high-end ones digitally rip the music), nor even on a DVD player (same story there), nor an in-car CD player.

If I interpret your POV to mean "the record industry is allowed to use whatever means it deems necessary to protect their property", it therefore follows that CDs with intentionally-broken error correction, which by definition are more susceptible to damage are perfectly acceptable. No-one has the right to play a CD which has acquired a minor scratch.

Now, in theory, the free market could work this one out. But there isn't a free market in music. There are a small number of players which control 98% of what's out there, and these players collude to maintain the status quo. My instinctive guess is that we'll continue to see such asinine copy protection schemes until computers and music players either use such radically different means of storage that a means of getting the music to the computer simply doesn't exist (cf. dreamcast discs); or the need to sell music in chunks of 10-15 tracks on a physical medium goes away, perhaps to be replaced with a subscription model or something micropayment based.

A well written op-ed

[garylian]

From talking to my brother (a musician who sells his own CDs via his website using CDBaby), most musicians hate the DRM crap. They also want to get paid for their hard work. It becomes a Catch-22.

New artists that have just signed their first record deal are not making a ton of money. If you think the record labels take draconian measures to try and stop piracy, you should see what they do to a new artist on a contract. The band usually has little leverage to negotiate with. Even if other labels are sniffing around, they are still not proven over a big market.

So, the new artist desperately wants to get their music heard. And the author of TFA makes a good case for that. A new artist isn't making a ton of money until they really become a name, and often get a new record deal. So if music is getting pirated some, they could care less.

It's when a band has become really successful that the members can say they are making some serious money. That 2nd and future contracts are much more band friendly than before, because the label can't afford to lose that band. And when that happens, the band is a little more interested in getting some of that money.

As the author of TFA mentions, artists often put everything into their music. Once they hit the road, their lives often suck, outside of maybe some groupie action, and until they are big names, they are all skanky looking pieces of shit. Also, many bands write all of their own music (unless they are Country, in which case they write little, and just perform.) So, they want to reap some benefits from that.

If they are a typical musician, they have put most if not all of their eggs into that music career. If it fails or they don't make good money doing it, all they have to look forward to is a life in the fast food industry, or going back to college after leading a life that isn't condusive to studying hard. Not a very attractive outlook.

So, yeah, they want to be heard, and they want to be paid. And it is usually between the 2nd and 3rd album that they finally realize that they aren't being paid that much. Then, they change sides in the file swapping wars.

The author is right about one thing, though. It's better to get a portion of .99 than to get zip. CDs cost too damn much for how much filler music is on most of them.

Reward Sensible Musicians: Buy their album!

[BrianWCarver]

Everyone on Slashdot, regardless of whether you like this band, should buy their album to signal to musicians and record labels that we agree with this editorial. (You can find the album on Amazon, but where possible, support your local independent music stores!)

Even if you don't like the band, it's the holiday season, so buy it for someone who might like it and if you do like the band, buy two copies, one for yourself and one for a friend.

If this album suddenly sold 50,000 copies this week, it would send quite a message.

Nerds and performers think very differently

[schnell]

There are many independent bands who do just fine for themselves financially. They're not pulling in millions, but they're living decently ... And then there's this very issue of freedom. Would you trade your freedom and integrity as an artists for money? A true artists, one who puts his or her work above all, most likely would not.

With all due respect, you just don't get it. IT nerds and performers think very differently about their careers, and it is probably useful to understand this difference if you want to understand the choices that each make.

It is a generally accepted principle in our capitalist world that there is a correlation between risks and rewards. The riskier a venture you undertake, the higher the rewards need to be, or else no one would undertake these risks. So far, so good.

Sysadmins, programmers and other nerd types typically follow a medium-risk, medium-return path. You won't make as much as the CEO, but in most cases you won't starve, either. You do a job that is fairly well respected in society and there is (generally, again) a reasonable expectation that you will be able to get a decent job.

Performers - actors, musicians, etc. - follow a high-risk, high-return path. Only a small percentage of people that want to make a living as performers are ever able to do so (imagine if 80% of CompSci graduates could never find a job programming but had to do it on the side while they worked at Starbuck's). They spend years waiting tables or playing in crappy local bars hoping to get their big break. So, when that chance does come, they grab onto it and they feel (rightly, I believe) that they deserve their success. Actors don't work crap jobs for years so they can turn down a $1 million paycheck in a big movie and say, "I don't want to work for a MPAA-affiliated studio!"

The same - by and large - goes for musicians as well. They are performers that (probably) busted their asses to get where they are, and they aren't going to give up a shot at the big time because of what DRM technology is put on their CDs (which generally isn't up to them anyway). It's like this for pro athletes as well, and many other professions where only a tiny percentage of those pursuing it will ever achieve success. (Interestingly, the only place where IT nerds typically do intersect with this world is those who start up their own companies - another high-risk, high-reward path. But these types are arguably a breed apart from most IT folk.)

So you, Mr. Programmer Guy, can talk all you want about how these people are sellouts and should be perfectly happy to just get by with a living wage, etc. However, if you are actually interested in understanding this phenomenon, then you need to understand that performers generally come from a mindset that is 180 degrees away from yours. Even if you don't empathize with this, you should make an effort to understand it.