CEA President Slams RIAA Audio Flag

Grv writes "The president of the Consumer Electronics Association isn't happy with the RIAA. According to Ars Technica, Gary Shapiro accuses the RIAA of trying to shut off fair use by pushing for laws like the audio broadcast flag. Apparently the RIAA is all talk and no action, however, as Shapiro laments the fact that the organization has failed to come up with an implementation plan or even attend meetings with the industry. This has angered electronics companies and radio stations who have pressed ahead with digital radio plans only to see the RIAA backtrack on its support for home recording."

Comments

Professional recording is still expensive

[mangu]

It used to require expensive equipment to record music, but now near professional recordings can be had with equipment in the sub thousands of dollars range.

When you do professional level recording, as opposed to talented amateur level, the biggest expense is not equipment, but studio. A studio suited for recording must have sound insulation and acoustics that are as expensive to get today as they have always been.

Basically, sound insulation needs double or triple walls built of materials that are sound dampening at all frequencies, which means high mass. Building two ceilings and two walls of concrete or solid brick, plus a double layer of concrete floor that rests on high density urethane foam isn't cheap. And then you come to the acoustics part. All the above mentioned room needs to be big enough to have acceptable reverberation times. Or else the walls, ceiling, and floor need to have a thick layer of echo dampening material and the reverberation added digitally. Not cheap either.

However, having said all that, I agree with you that the RIAA business model is dinosaur carrion today. What I cannot imagine is how backyard "pirates" can compete will industrial scale production. For instance, let's compare music with a traditional product: steel nails. Anyone can make a nail at home, with less equipment and time than it takes to copy a CD. Get a piece of steel wire, a hammer and an anvil. Flatten one end of the wire to make a head, pinch the other end to make a point, and there you are: a nail! But why would anyone make a steel nail at home when any hardware store will sell you nails by the barrel at a reasonable price? The common sizes of nails are so cheap that they won't even sell them by the unit, the smaller amount of nails you can buy are boxes with twenty or so.

Generalizing from nails to all kind of fasteners, counting nails, screws, bolts, rivets, etc, there are more standard catalog types of fasteners in the market then CD titles available. So, why can't I get a 1/8"x1/2" round headed screw from the street vendor? Because hardware is priced according to the traditional free market rules. Calculate what your investment will get you at the bank, see if you can get a better margin selling hardware, price your fasteners slightly better than the bank will pay you, taking into account other factors such as risk and liquidity.

The error in the media and software industries is that they forgot capitalism and the free market and tried to invent their own rules. Their prices aren't based on the traditional formulas, they are trying to price their products based on the extreme outliers. If anybody at all is willing to pay $25 for a CD they assume that's the right price for all CDs.

The correct formula, under the capitalist system that has been working for centuries would be, if it costs $0.90 to produce and sell a CD, if the bank pays you 6%, then selling the CD at $1.00 is an excellent business proposition. Multiplying the price by 25 will lower the market by a factor of more than 25, it's not worth it.

defeating dem new fangled copy protection measures

[gsn]

All the music piracy told me is that a lot of people will happily accept a lower quality version of some content if it comes to them free. Why - because the actual content doesn't have the right value for money - its DRM laden and doesn't respect fair use, or its not as portable as a digital file or even *gasp* the actual content is just not worth enough to merit buying outright.

Lower quality as in someone buys a nice recording setup, and a nice set of speakers and records something the completely analog way - stick one next to the other and hit record and play at the same time. If the sound reproduction in this digital era is supposed to be so damned good and we get better and better at making recordings - after all someone has to record the artists themselves at some point - then you can end up with a decent sounding copy without drm in whatever format you like with no copy protection.

And thus you defeated the audio broadcast flag.

(BTW please stop any of you who want to preach about me not needing any content I don't consider worth buying-the whole point of whats happening is that this era enables you to have things you don't aboslutely love but do want like that Phil Collins song you get in the random mood to listen to once in a year)

Thats not the answer and I don't suggest doing that though it is guaranteed to work. All I want is content thats high quality, respects fair use, and is cheap enough that its not worth my while to engage in piracy. Yes you will still get ripped CDs but that may not translate into distribution, because frankly I've better things to do with with the time I spend on my computer than hunting down Phil bloody Collings mp3s ;-)