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RIAA Hires Artists, Then Sends In the SWAT team
cancan writes "The NY times is carrying an article about how the RIAA is hiring hip hop artists to make mix tapes, and then
helping the police raid their studios. In the case of DJ Drama and DJ Don Cannon, they were raided by SWAT teams with their guns drawn. The local police chief said later that they were 'prepared for the worst.' Men in RIAA jackets helped cart away 'evidence'. Just the same, 'Record labels regularly hire mixtape D.J.'s to produce CDs featuring a specific artist. In many cases, these arrangements are conducted with a wink and a nod rather than with a contract; the label doesn't officially grant the D.J. the right to distribute the artist's songs or formally allow the artist to record work outside of his contract.' " This is more of the shenanigans that we've previously discussed on the site.
This is an old policy. Frank Zappa was commissioned by some pig or other to do some sex tapes - get a girl and record heavy breathing, simulated sex etc - then busted him for breaching obscenity laws. I think it's because the police are so on top of all the other laws, and have little else to do. Also, they're less likely to get their asses kicked by a bunch of musicians.
I don't see anything in the article about them being hired then being busted for doing the thing they were hired to do.
Seems to me they had been hired once, but that wasn't anything to do with the raid.
Mind you, the raid itself seemed a bit extreme.
They found none of the stuff that made them think they should go in armed. Still, I don't know what percentage of raids of this type do turn up arms/drugs, or how many they have to do, the gun toting could simply be policy.
The suppresion of semi ligitimate music outlets is all part of the RIAAs remit, so this shouldn't be surprising. They aren't defenders of law, they are defenders of a business model, and have worked to change laws to protect that business model.
It reminds me of something....
Seems they also use Hollywood Accounting.
Be carefull, next time it's gonna be a MPAA bust, afterall DJ's are using hollywood's trade secret !
The RIAA has way too much power, just like our own government. You, RIAA, are PURE SCUM and the earth needs to be cleansed from things like you!
Yes, this is a seperate mixtape apart from the agreed upon earlier releases. Depending on who those DJs deal with, they may have just figured they would do another mixtape, then discovered (with guns pointed in their faces) that that was not part of the agreement.
As something of a fan of hip hop, it's kind of scary to see that the RIAA is going to clamp down on mixtapes. mixtapes are where trends start. It's a vital part of the cycle of hip hop production.
If producers, rappers and DJs don't have the freedom of the mixtape to test-market beats or styles or even simply as a means to promote themselves or their labels, this is going to hurt hip hop on the national level. And it will drive money away from the RIAA, which is the opposite goal of the RIAA (at least, I think it is- it's hard to tell these days).
<Batty> Euch, rap is just missing one letter. c. ...
<zeep> rapc?
<Batty>
<Batty> Crap you idiot. you put the c on the other end
<zeep> oic
<Batty> Though you could also say it's missing an e
<zeep> wtf is erap?
* Batty bangs his head repeatedly against a wall
http://bash.org/?329292
I am so sick of hearing people misuse "entrapment" as a defense.
To be entrapment, two important things must be true:
1. You must be "convinced" to do something that you normally would _never_ do. (And it's your burden to prove this)
2. The person doing the convincing must be an agent of the State.
That is what "entrapment" means.
What other laws are the "police" on top of? According to CNN Money [http://money.cnn.com/], Atlanta, GA, is listed as having a personal crime rate FIVE times the national average - and the "police" (Influenced by the RIAA) have the time and resources to bust people for selling unlicensed MIXES? It looks like some organizations need to have their priorities straightened, and perhaps that involves ignoring the RIAA when it comes calling for an entire SWAT team. "Guns drawn"? "Prepared for the worst"? What were the rappers going to do; bust a cap in they asses wit' a Mac book and some jewel cases? I don't think anyone is going to start a fire fight over a bunch of CDs; least of all a couple techies in a recording studio.
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200009/file-sharin
Unless you are Cher or Elton John, you are not going to do well with the current copyright situation. You'll see your music sell a million albums and yet make a mysteriously small amount of money.
This is the meat but it goes into quite a bit of detail.
From the article:
Last year the worldwide sales of all 600 or so members of the Recording Industry Association of America totaled $14.5 billion--a bit less than, say, the annual revenues of Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance. As for the tiny labels at South by Southwest, many of the dot-coms in attendance could have bought them outright for petty cash.
After the show I asked Cleaver if he was concerned about the fate of the music industry in the Internet age. "You must be kidding," he said. With some resignation he recounted the sneaky methods by which three record labels had ripped off the band or consigned its music to oblivion, a subject to which he has devoted several chapters of an unpublished autobiography he offered to send me.
(He had nicer things to say about his current label, Checkered Past.) Later I asked one of the music critics if Cleaver's tales of corporate malfeasance were true. More than true, I was told--they were typical. Not only is the total income from music copyright small, but individual musicians receive even less of the total than one would imagine. "It's relatively mild," Cleaver said later, "the screwing by Napster compared with the regular screwing."
Although many musicians resent it when people download their music free, most of them don't lose much money from the practice, because they earn so little from copyright. "Clearly, copyright can generate a huge amount of money for those people who write songs that become mass sellers," says Simon Frith, a rock scholar in the film-and-media department at the University of Stirling, in Scotland, and the editor of Music and Copyright (1993). But most musicians don't write multimillion-sellers. Last year, according to the survey firm Soundscan, just eighty-eight recordings--only
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
In the dentists case, it looks like the county routinely uses SWAT teams for search warrants. In any case, the officer that shot Mr. Culosi was a 17 year veteran, so his carelessness should get him charged with negligent homicide rather than manslaughter.