EMI Caught Offering Illegal Downloads

Hypocricy, LLC writes "While the RIAA is swift to punish any person caught offering illegal downloads, they're not very swift with outrage when a member company like EMI offers illegal downloads. Not only did the band King Crimson's contract never allow digital distribution to begin with, but band member Robert Fripp claims that EMI offered their music for sale even after their contract ended entirely."

Comments

TFA proceeds on a false assumption....

[idontgno]

It's not illegal if a corporation is doing it. Or The President (same thing). Or the CIA. Or if the Attorney General or Secretary of Homeland Defense say it's OK.

Good for King Crimson.

[The Iso]

Contrary to common practice, KC owns the copyrights to their work.

But since

[JamesP]

this is "official piracy" there is no DMCA, there is no "thousands of dollars lost per song", etc, etc

Record companies do this ALL THE TIME.

Thay will most likely get a slap in the wrist and carry on with their criminal activies as usual.

Re:But since

[hyades1]

They need to reassemble the court/jury that convicted that woman and fined her a gazillion dollars. See whether they'd have the parts to go after somebody who can fight back.

Re:Seriously,

[lawrenlives]

Actually, this looks like a case for the Court of the Crimson King. Yeah, I said it.

Re:Seriously,

[Sancho]

It was also, almost certainly a mistake. Compare to most copyright infringement, which is almost always willful.

The band absolutely deserves every cent that EMI made selling their music. They might even deserve a bit extra. But to suggest that this was intentional without knowing for sure is really pretty silly. "Never attribute to malice that which is easily attributed to stupidity," and all that jazz.

What's more interesting to me is the intellectual masturbation that this can generate. The customers didn't know that they were buying illegal songs. They expected, due to the distribution mechanism, legal downloads.

What about people on p2p? They tend to expect illegal downloads, but some bands such as NIN have released music on these networks. How can anyone differentiate between legitimate and illegitimate downloads?

Utter fiction (mods please note)

[Anonymous Coward]

(RIAA) invented the name to catch the bad PR so the evil things they do wouldn't reflect badly on the record labels themselves.

The above statement is complete and utter fiction.

The RIAA was formed in 1952 as a technical consortium to create standards for compatabililty for phonograph recordings such as the RIAA equalization curve.

What they later became is another matter altogether.

I Talk to the Wind...

[jumperboy]

RIAA:

Get thy bearings, practice some discipline, or you're in for one more red nightmare. Learn to eat your own cat food, great deceiver, before your coda is a requiem for a fallen angel. We'll let you know if we lament your passing in an epitaph. You may be walking on air now, but soon you'll have only the sheltering sky to protect your easy money, you dinosaur. One big happy family? It is for you, but not for us. If you think the fracture you get when Neal and Jack and me beat you with no warning will leave us sleepless, well, we'll let you know. You should be happy with what you have to be happy with.

Re:Seriously,

[Stormwatch]

The band absolutely deserves every cent that EMI made selling their music. They might even deserve a bit extra.

Wasn't there recently a woman who shared a bunch of tunes on P2P and was fined in some dozen thousand dollars? This company should pay in the SAME proportion. That would be, what, enough to bankrupt the company?

Re:Anything is okay if the "Decider" says it's oka

[Torvaun]

If I can find Iraq on a map, will you stop lumping all Americans together as morons? If I send video of a protest, will you stop lumping us all together as murderers?