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U2's Manager Calls For Mandatory Disconnects For Music Downloaders
sleeplesseye writes "In a speech at the Midem music industry convention in Cannes, Paul McGuinness, longtime manager of the band U2, has called on Internet service providers to immediately introduce mandatory French-style service disconnections to end music downloading, and has urged governments to force ISPs to adopt such policies. McGuinness criticized Radiohead's 'In Rainbows' pay-what-you-want business model, saying that 'the majority of downloads were through illegal P2P download services like BitTorrent and LimeWire'. He also accused ISPs, telcos, device makers, and numerous specifically named companies such as Apple, Google, Yahoo!, Oracle, and Facebook of building 'multi billion dollar industries on the back of our content without paying for it', and of being 'makers of burglary kits' who have made 'a thieves' charter' to steal money from the music industry. The full text of his speech has been posted on U2's website."
Aside from that, Paul continues to show his disconnection from reality by using Radiohead's example. Radiohead made far more money distributing it this way than they ever did with a record label. His entire speech was nothing more than a "oh noes! Please help me save our dying business model."
Talk about profitting off the backs of other's work- he's using U2's name (and website) to push his agenda!
Belief? Hope? Preference?The Existential Vortex
I'll only do it if you u2 do it. *waves good bye to karma*
So basically, -1 troll/offtopic is really slashdots way of saying "I hate that you thought of something before me."
Why should ISPs lose profits to protect another industry's profits?
Hardly
...are always the one who scream loudest.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
U2's good stuff would be public domain by now if we had reasonable copyright lengths, like we used to.
With all due respect, Paul, Fuck you.
I've bought U2's albums, t-shirts, concert tickets and other crap. Over the years, I've easily spent several hundred dollars on your band's products. Same goes for hundreds of other artists: Concerts, posters, tshirts, albums, box sets, fan club-only items. Hell, some albums I've bought multiple times in multiple formats over the years.
I've got a huge DVD library, and it keeps growing. I'll happily pay premium prices for Criterion editions, I'm a hardcore movie geek who's always loved going to the cinema, sometimes even repeat fucking viewings for movies I really like.
So when you come out with this ignorant, self-serving tripe and try to pass it off as a moral issue, I look at you and get sick to my fucking stomach. I'm terribly fucking sorry I downloaded your band's last album just so I could get my hands on that lame "quatorze" single. Fuck, I can't even remember the last time I listened to that song (I sure as shit didn't bother with the rest of the album).
Hell, if it makes you feel better, I'll delete it when I get home tonight. Not really any skin off my nose. I've got my $120 Led Zep Box set to keep me warm at night. I've got the Joshua Tree and Rattle & Hum, 2 albums I've paid full retail for more than once.
Big big fan of U2, at least until Pop, anyway. Shame they're on the decline. Shame you're a douchebag.
One last thing. Facebook? Apple? Get some meds, man. Even the worst **AA shill isn't that shrill.
Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
I'll disconnect my internet connection if in turn you stop making music with that whiny Bono guy.
For the record, U2 has always sucked. Whiner music.
I downloaded and paid for In Rainbows. I'm going to sell my U2 CDs online. Screw U2.
Wow, there are legal P2P download "services"? Are they only in Canada?
I love how he talked about SDMI being restricted as cartel behavior, but now he wants the ISPs to do the dirty work SDMI couldn't do.
SDMI bombed, and there are bitstrippers out there which have <buzzphrase>substantial non-infringing uses.</buzzphrase>
As if forcing another business to do the things you couldn't do due to antitrust reasons makes it any better...
Please shut up. Just because people like your music, does not mean that they care about your politics. In fact, until you feed all the starving people and help your numerous other causes do not spend another dollar on press releases.
Thank you.
has felt like they were the only one in the room who "just didn't get it"
well now is the time for you to relish, jeer, or commissurate (condescendingly)
for here we have the experience of "just not getting it" playing out on someone else's dime, on a much larger scale, to a much larger audience
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
And in a 4Q Earnings reports, ABC ISP has reported lower earnings because of this great idea to do manditory disconnects. Because of this ABC ISP has lost 200,000 subscribers. Als in a 4Q Earnigns reports, XYZ ISP has reported an increase in subscriber base. Like the ISP's are gonna let this fly. American greed, bottom line, $$. To France: Go crawl back in that hole you came from so we can rescue you in 100 years.
There's no Freedom like UFP-dom
then I think I deserve to not have the internet or any other form of communication/social interaction. Their older music is good but have they made any music worth downloading in the last 10-15 years?
return EXIT_SUCCESS;
but this sounds like a reasonable idea.
You break the law, your service gets terminated. Simple, to the point. I'm sure breaking the law violates your TOS with your ISP in the first place. All we need to do is make the repercussions of that TOS violation clearly defined. Download illegal music, no more Internet.
I'll probably get modded down by the "music wants to be free", let's steal everything we can groupthinkers out there, but whatever. Some of us respect intellectual property and the artists who created it.
Make CD prices reasonable.
Make CD last more, invest in the technology that promotes your sound.
Make Copyright time frames reasonable.
And don't forget if we didn't listen to your crap you'd be a broke begging musician.
Shush you greedy F...s.
Life takes interesting turns, but the most interest is when you're off the beaten path.
He also accused ISPs, telcos, device makers, and numerous specifically named companies such as Apple, Google, Yahoo!, Oracle, and Facebook of building 'multi billion dollar industries on the back of our content without paying for it'
it's true, we all know that the first 2340896234578913465 searches to hit google's and yahoo's engines (interestingly it was exactly the same number of searches) were for "u2"...
and who hasn't stolen one of the new apple iBono's...?
i guess i don't have anything clever to say about oracle or facebook...
The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.
-Oscar Wilde
There's more exciting music being made and more listened to than at any time in history. Cheap technology has made it easy to start a band and make music. This is a gathering of managers; our talented clients deserve better than the shoddy, careless and downright dishonest way they have been treated in the digital age. Yes, they deserve the shoddy, careless and downright dishonest way they have always been historically treated by their record labels and managers.
I haven't heard any artists speaking out about their royalties drying up. Maybe because they made 10 cents on the dollar before and now they make 10 cents on the quarter now since it's all digital?
Funny how he starts with "We've been used to bands who wrote their own material since the Beatles
Is he complaining that Steve Jobs pulled the $1 per song price out of his ass? No, he's pointing the finger at file sharers. This guy is losing his income and his bands are probably curious as to how they can get that $1 per song from iTunes without having to pay their manager 40 cents for
Earth to U2's Manager: take your cut of the work you actually do like arranging concerts and press coverage and then shut the hell up and let the artists do their thing and make money.
My work here is dung.
SCO et al. found this out the hard way. AT&T does not seem to be picking up on this either.
Calls for reform will only be taken seriously when they are financially feasible.
42
I love it when the truly retarded stand up, and for all the world to see and hear, reveal, in fact, that they are, truly retarded. Its not like I ever buy U2 albums, but I'm going to download their entire discography, just out of spite now. Its not like shaw doesn't randomly disconnect me already, and this guy wants them to sift through my downloads and disconnect me if I download *.mp3? To quote a great man: "Never trust anyone over thirty" --bono
Hi, I Boris. Hear fix bear, yes?
Maybe then, finally, U2 will stop making music! *crosses fingers*
About my old cassette tape copy of "Under A Blood Red Sky" I had made back in 1983?
The problem with socialism is that they always run out of other people's money. - Margaret Thatcher
Seriously, someone needs to call the waahmbulance for this guy.
That's the brunt of the problem here anyway, these people are more than willing to disrupt every, every internet connection in the world in order to protect thier profits.
Litigate! In Rainbows was just released, topping all the album charts and getting universally positive reviews. Where's the latest album by U2? Riiight.
"He also accused ISPs, telcos, device makers, and numerous specifically named companies such as Apple, Google, Yahoo!, Oracle, and Facebook of building 'multi billion dollar industries on the back of our content without paying for it', and of being 'makers of burglary kits' who have made 'a thieves' charter' to steal money from the music industry."
Hmm... you mean the same apple that designed and marketed a custom ipod under U2's name? *GASP!* Those thieves!
Where was Paul McGuinness when the record companies were taking over 80% of the profits during the last few decades? He didn't have a problem with that form of robbery, eh?
The guy is off his rocker, clearly.
How much you want to bet that U2 sees the problem with this line of reasoning and it totally fucking over their fans and fires this guy? I mean does U2 really want to become the next Metallica?
If they continue releasing such crappy records like their latest ones, it will come a day sometime soon when they won't have to worry about anyone downloading their music anymore...
Yeah Paul, just like all those ingrate thieving pirate bastards were stealing those $250+ concert tickets over the past few tours!! And on a side note - for a band who's very carefully crafted their public perception as being a band for social justice and sticking it to the man, do you really want to draw more attention to the fact that U2 are extremely rich and wealthy individuals who really are even more "the man" than some of "the man" they like to point their preachy fingers at from time to time? Do you really think whining about the fact that your giant pile of money used to be a lot bigger is going to endear U2 to it's fanbase?
When was that? It used to be life of the author, plus 20 years. So U2's stuff would still be theirs.
Best Slashdot Co
sure .... oh yeah, totally .... wait, what did you say? Hello, Paul?
Odd, seems he got disconnected.
<shrug>
Plus side - as a response, this is proportionate. No multi-million dollar lawsuits for sharing a handful of songs.
Minus side - You need a right of appeal, it involves an invasion of privacy, it passes the expense onto the ISP.
...but I'm paying less than $0.27USD per song on eMusic. I could pay less per song if I chose to. Now, if that business model starts to eat into this guy's house payments, is he going to campaign for eMusic to increase it prices? Or would he just advocate for a surtax? He's skipping over this whole 'free market' thing that we're supposed to be operating under, so what would stop him from taking the next logical step?
It's about time we recognize that what it going on here is _not_ an attempt to reform capitalism. It is an attempt to replace capitalism with _mercantilism_. Remember that minor North American rebellion in 1776? It had in part to do with British plans for how the colonies would buy imported crap ad infinitum, regardless of how they felt about the matter.
My fellow conservatives, allow to me scream 'wake up!' in your general direction. When an industry owns a market, it's no longer a _free_ market! Duh!
(sigh).... Rant over. Thanks for your patience.
Let's be honest here (snicker), *nobody* can stop the digital progression of humanity. Not even music. You can't shut off someone's electricity because they were watching a pirated Blue-Ray disc on their PS3. Internet access is becoming utility.
As much as they'd like to, they're going to have to figure something else out.
We're all hypocrites. We all have hidden parts, it's the contrast between them that make us more a hypocrite than others
U2 started using Stage Crew Services, a non union shop, back in the '90s. Seeing as how they were born working class and still tout their so-called activism, that smells of hypocrisy to me. I haven't bought a U2 album since. Funny thing, everyone is so up in U2's ass, you can't find much about it on the web. I was part of a protest against them, we got a chance to talk to them, and Bono was the biggest piece of shit ever. Basically said, "Do you know who I am, and what I've done? I'm the biggest activist in the world, who are you peons to criticize me? I'll hire whoever I like."
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
The consumers will get their way.
"I only speak the truth"
Karma: null(Mostly affected by an unassigned variable)
"Start pirating U2 Music because there's not a CD worth buying any more."
That's about the same translated statement Metallica made at the time.
The price is always right if someone else is paying.
Still hasn't found what he's looking for. (Ducks) Thanks, folks, I'll be here all day...
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
Take a look at Machinae supremacy for a moment, they've been releasing their stuff online for ages, that and their latest album overworld "mysteriously" got leaked a month before release, I'm sure as hell buying it, Another example where p2p has boosted sales is uplink and darwinia, the developers leaked a version that flagged itself up as being a pirate, and left a message on your screen saying something like "This is a pirate, we hope you enjoy it. Now go buy the full version". Get your act together and come up with a solution that doesn't involve shoddy DRM or other people to fix! the era of everyday technology is here already stop trying to flog us CD's at rip off prices.
Heaven forbid that U2 might rig their website to enable them to profit off the creative output of other people.
http://twitter.com/onion2k
I was planning on buying a couple of U2 albums this Friday when I got paid, but you know what? Screw them.
Uh, "if it looks roughly mouse-shaped according to my infra-red sensitive pit, eat it"? --Chris Burke 09-08-10
So, let me get this straight, Apple, who sells (that is SELLS) millions of songs providing revenue record labels steals music without paying for it. Did this guy forget to take his Meds this morning?
Am I hallucinating or did this band wilfully advertise (and directly profit from) the device that is supposedly killing them? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YiV4jzWitnA
This is why I paid $10 for In Rainbows, and I don't even know the name of the latest Metallica album. I refuse to listen to music by those who shit on their fans (performers or managers) and U2 just got off my list. Thank God Trent Reznor is sane.
It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong.
Can I mod this Paul down to "-1; Blatant troll", please?
Listen guys, if the throngs of evil, seedy music thieves are not stopped immediately Bono might no longer be able to afford to fly to Africa periodically to personally bathe doomed, starving children, and where would the planet be then.
I mean, if the royalties slow down he might get kicked out of his ritzy Manhattan co-op and would surely be so shattered as to be unable to accurately and legitimately speak on behalf of the underprivileged. Oh....wait, excuse me.
of the music industry.
Whether or not there is some sort of god, I'm not supposed to say/god is a word and the argument ends there-Smog
Paul ain't due much respect. U2 has been on the forefront of anti-fair-use since the incident involving Negativland in 1991: The Letter U and the Numeral 2
The track parodies the whole top-40 industry by sampling the backbeat of "Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For", and punches in bits of Casey Kasem going apeshit!. It's not just hilarious, it's one of the single most important cases in the history of sample-based music. Long story short, after a multiyear legal battle, Negativland won. By this time, most physical copies had been recalled and/or destroyed, but you can download the MP3 from their website.
In 1998, the last few chapters of the legal battle played out, also to Negativland's favor, and RIAA rewrote its rewrote its guidelines on sampling, fair use, and parody.
Which brings us back to our next top-40 hit - it's no surprise that U2 and RIAA are back in bed with each other, working ever diligently against any form of fair use: they still haven't found what they're looking for.
> I've got a huge DVD library, and it keeps growing. I'll happily pay premium prices for Criterion editions, I'm a hardcore movie geek who's always loved going to the cinema, sometimes even repeat fucking viewings for movies I really like.
If we could only find someone like Casey Kasem ranting like that off-mike, the war for fair use would be over, and we geeks would finally have won.
I have a good excuse to buy one of these. Never got round to it during Live 8, and worried I'd missed the bandwagon. Pretty sure it'll come round again now!
Mark
Liked this comment? Why not buy me something nice
First off, a long-time principle of the FCC in this country (when did this change???) has been that content carriers (ISPs) cannot also be content providers. That helps keep monopoly and censorship wannabes out of the equation. Court decisions have repeatedly held (see stories here int the past recent days) that if carriers control the content of what they are carrying (ANY content), then they assume responsibility for that content. Which leads to this interesting scenario:
In the U.S. at any rate, if an ISP tries to filter out "copyrighted content", then they automatically become liable for any "copyrighted content" that subsequently gets through. I am quite sure that is not what they want to do. This issue was discussed here at length just the other day.
I think it's safe to say that U2 has a larger-than-average following amongst the kind of people against whom Mr. McGuinness has leveled this diatribe.
I hope this becomes a case study in how to destroy a loyal fan base. Since I'm not a fan of U2 or their pretentious personalities, I would not be sad to see this happen to them.
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
"building 'multi billion dollar industries on the back of our content without paying for it'" This really doesn't carry much weight coming from the lips of somebody's who's basically an agent; IMO, the pinnacle of parasitic business models. Wake up: If you're business model is based on being an intermediary or owning a channel (neither of which adds any value to the product or service)- guess what? It's time to get a new business model. There's an internet now- nobody needs intermediaries or monopolistic channels.
[dons flame proof suit]
The principle behind what he says is correct. There is an attitude that because people can do things that they should do them and that by downloading music etc illegally for free that they are sticking it to the man.
The techology companies have paid lip service to trying to solve the problem. They offer up solutions but their heart isn't really in it. The ISPs find illegal media downloads profitable especially on capped tariffs. The hardware makers are happy to have music etc on their systems as its another reason to buy/upgrade. They want it to be as easy as possible to get stuff onto them. They will do the minimum possible to ensure that the lawmakers don't feel compelled to legislate.
Blaming the problems on a poor, or outdated, business model might work to salve people's conscience but the weasel words still don't hide the fact that what is being done is illegal. From a ethical point of view they are taking the product of fellow human beings endeavours without paying for them. Somewhat of a moral dilemma.
I fully expect people to heap derision on my simplistic view of the world but in the end the above is the truth of the matter. Anything else is just an exercise in smoke and mirrors to justify theft.
As a final thought. Its now possible to buy music, on a track by track basis, for a reasonable amount of money, without DRM. Has this made a dint in illegal filesharing?
[/removes suit][on second thoughts dons suit again, this is slashdot afterall]
You may think me a tired, old, cynic. I'd have to disagree about the tired bit.
May I assume that they musicians who play some sort of popular dance music? Is there an accordion involved?
Best wishes,
Bob
"McGuinness criticized Radiohead's 'In Rainbows' pay-what-you-want business model, saying that 'the majority of downloads were through illegal P2P download services like BitTorrent and LimeWire'." In addition, I don't see how this statement makes sense.
Let's for a second assume that Limewire, et al were "illegal download services", how does that reflect negatively on Radiohead's distribution strategy? Radiohead said: "Hey, download it HERE and pay what you want for it"; So some people downloaded it "THERE" and paid nothing for it. How is this any different from someone saying: "Hey, buy it in stores, and pay $15 for it" and then seeing people downloading it "THERE" and paying nothing for it?
If anything it shows proves that it's not just about the money. It's about how people prefer to access music. Radiohead offered it for free "this way", and people took it for free "that way". It's about a delivery mechanism that is not being provided by the industry.
Near the end he proposes something that is actually somewhat logical. Tack on an additional fee to ISP bills (he doesn't name a price but the idea is not new). I'm not sure about everyone else but I wouldn't mind paying an extra $10/month if I had unlimited music downloads.
Excuse me while I gather the virgin sacrifice and assemble the pentagram required to solve your problem
Is Oracle big into the illegal downloads? When did that start?
I have said it before, so I will say it again...
U2 can bite my shiny metal ass...
E
Eric Aitala
www.f1m.com
How about music companies and ISPs send a little shock directly to our cerebral cortex everytime we even THINK about downloading something for free off the internets? I bet this would once and for all stop people from stealing from starving artists like U2.
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
from TFA "We were never interested in joining that long humiliating list of miserable artists who made lousy deals, got exploited and ended up broke and with no control over how their life's work was used, and no say in how their names and likenesses were bought and sold." Is this aimed at the RIAA labels or what?
"You have to be trusted by the people that you lie to
So that when they turn their backs on you
You'll get the chance to put the knife in.
You gotta keep one eye looking over your shoulder
You know it's going to get harder, and harder, and harder as you get older
And in the end you'll pack up, fly down south
Hide your head in the sand
Just another sad old man
All alone and dying of cancer.
And when you loose control, you'll reap the harvest you have sown
And as the fear grows, the bad blood slows and turns to stone
And it's too late to loose the weight you used to need to throw around
So have a good drown, as you go down, all alone"
Now fuck off.
U2 thinks they are still relevant?
This reminds me of that wining that the music biz "suits" got Metallica to do ealier his decade... "we work hard for our money, and you're stealing it by downloading.." bullshit!!!!
What happens when you write some little piece of nifty code and give it away? It grows and gets better and you give it away some more. Eventually everyone is using it and likes it. You offer up a really nice version of it with support for a price tag one day. Guess what, if it's good people will pay a REASONABLE amount for it.
Music is the same way. Radiohead is getting it right. I paid them $10 and downloaded their music LEGALLY!!!!!!
The brick and motar days are over!!
If I wanted my mind made up for me, I'd do it myself!!
And I quote...
There is technology now, that the worldwide industry could adopt, which enables content owners to track every legitimate digital download transaction, wholesale and retail.
This system is already in use here in Cannes by the MIDEM organisation and is called SIMRAN. Throughout this conference you will see contact details and information. I recommend you look at it. I should disclose that I'm one of their investors.
I think that puts it in context...
I know first hand that the iTunes sales are extremely strong. It also gives equal opportunity to every record label beyond the "top four labels", which is the real problem for the major labels. They're used to being able to throw their weight around and putting a can of spaghetti-o's on the shelves for 3 months and have it turn into gold. Things are different now. Music & Movies can be successful, but requires true talent and overall good entertainment value.
This guy is completely oblivious and ignorant of the current generation of consumers. The consumer market is still extremely strong, but the average consumer wants to be able to try before they buy, high quality, cheap, and they want it immediately. Overnight shipping is too expensive for this generation along with it's not immediate.
Ignoring the generation's desires along with the technology at the finger tips is completely ignorant. I don't mean to come across as a "fan boy" but Steve Jobs single handedly rescued the music industry. He had given the current generation the ability to satisfy all the needs of the current generation with technology of today.
I have always felt that piracy was the entertainment industry's excuse for making poor investment choices. Putting out bad bands and bad movies results in low sales. Piracy has always been around, and there have been people renting videos and copying them to VHS tapes for EVER. People used to make Mixed tapes for their friends. People used to sit around recording the radio onto tapes.
If you think about it, piracy is another form of "airplay". The record industry pays hundreds of thousands to get your song "radio airplay", because it helps create buzz and get your album noticed and then people buy it. This is the trend that has been going on for decades. There will always be people who buy albums and people who don't. There's a small group of consumers on the fence who don't buy music because it's too easy to get through some other means. I think this is a small group, because the larger group consists of people who had never bought an album, and never would buy an album, but have TONS of music because they enjoy music. But these people would rather listen to radio than buy music, but since they can download stuff for free, they do. You can find these types because they have gigs and gigs of music, and they have their music players on 'random' and don't care what is being played. You can identify a music "buyer" by their numbers of playlists and/or how frequently a specific album is played. These people are the "music buying" people.
The music industry is a tough one. But not impossible. You need spectacular talent and incredible foresight to work with musicians who are wanting to be their own thing and not ride the coattails of what is already popular. Individuality rewards a lot greater in this kind of market, where as being a "me too" band is a waste of time and money.
rm -rf mp3-dump/u2
When I read stuff like that I just lose all sympathy for these guys. Gee Paul, I guess you're going to have to downgrade to a Gulf Stream 4 now.
I also enjoyed this:
I think that's a major part of the problem, he (and alot of the Record Execs) think's there's something they can do about it. They're trying to control an uncontrollable distribution medium.
this post is now diamonds!
1) 8,000 bce to 1885 ce - Musicians traveled the countryside playing music in bars and taverns making a modest living. 2) 1885 ce to ~1995 ce - Musicians record music and national record companies sell recording for enormous profit. Record companies make most of the money but smart musicians still make a boat load themselves. Record companies have a monopoly on making the recodings becasue the process is expensive and cumbersome. 3) 1995 ce to present - Having switched to a less expensive and less combersome process of creating recordings the record companies find themselves making less money and not more. This is because the same technology the companies use to record and copy the music is available to anyone with a personal computer. Record companies want to keep their monopoly but hardly anyone wants to switch back to the old-style recordings. 4) The future - Recordings are still made (probably directly by artists because its cheaper) and distributed (probably via the internet becasue its cheaper). Artists probably make a modest living. The real question Bono is not how the recod companies can regain their monopolies but on how you, sir, will make your money in the future. "I'm on an island at a busy intersection I can't go forward, I can't turn back Can't see the future It's getting away from me I just watch the tail lights glowing"
Here will be an old abusing of God's patience and the king's English.
Mod that funny, it's certainly not troll
Paul McGuinness, longtime manager of the band U2, has called on Internet service providers to immediately introduce mandatory French-style service disconnections to end music downloading
Should read "Paul McGuinness, FORMER manager of the band U2...."
There, I fixed it.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
Like I needed another reason to not listen to u2, but SWEET! Now I have another reason not to listen to u2! My day just improved by an almost imperceptable amount.
My debut novel AMITY now available: http://jeremydbrooks.c
Recently I saw some South Park episode in which Bono played quite a big role (episode 1109: More Crap). I assume it's thanks to all his previous activities and so.
And it appears to me that maybe Mr. McGuinness is kind of jealous of that and wants to appear in South Park too.
Well, Mr. McGuinness, keep up the "good work" and maybe you'll be worth making fun of in the South Park quite soon. :)
hany
For that matter, does U2 even own their own records, or do they belong to the record companies? U2 may be demanding actions be taken on things that aren't even theirs.
But then again, who expects wisdom from a rock band and their management?
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Is that U2's manager is not at all happy with the amount of money he is being paid. So every one else is bad to the bone because he is not rolling in cash.
All content in this message is copyright (c) 2008. All rights reserved. RIAA is prohibited here.
Am I buggin' ya? I don't mean to bug ya.
U2 jets don't fly anymore and the band is now a shadow of its former self.
When Metallica filed the lawsuit against Napster a coworker of mine in San Jose actually organized a boycott of Metallica at the office. He offered put his entire collection of Metallica CD's on loan in the company kitchen 'for listening' and after a few months put them up for sale on Ebay.
I would change the radio station every time one of their songs came on. I figured there was no way I was going to give the radio station my ad dollars for playing the enemy. I haven't listened to a single song since 2000.
I don't know if I'll be changing radio stations because U2's music is much better, but I definitely won't be buying any more of their albums until Paul is gone.
This rant is some hideously dishonest marketing for a product that will generate profit for him, personally.
I don't see U2 sending checks to the many blues, folk and rock (and other) artists still alive from whom U2 "stole" so many lyrical, topical, sylistic, musical, production themes and techniques.
U2 wouldn't even have to send out "free money". It could just make an album of songs they cover that were written by other artists who influenced them, which would automatically pay those artists with songwriter royalties. Of course it's not really "automatic", but the royalty agencies have guilt multi billion dollar industries on the back of all that content without paying for it, and often without paying the artists they owe. And I don't see U2 complaining about that.
Of course, none of that is really U2's obligation. The way we make music, especially pop music, is to "steal" from previous artists. Picasso said "all artists borrow; great artists steal ". Without that "stealing", we wouldn't have any art except the "original" cave paintings. U2 wouldn't have had records to listen to from which to "steal" when they got their turn.
And since U2 is far from starving while others make their "billions" too, this complaint rings especially false. There goes their sainthood.
--
make install -not war
I hit "contact us" and posted the following under "Query/Suggestion about site content"
You should not let Paul McGuinness post ANYTHING on this website ever again! After reading that article "Online Bonanza?" I feel like I'm going to puke. Why does he think that by screwing over fans of U2 that he will make more money? He is just afraid of new distribution methods for music and it ignorant of the direction the music industry is headed in. It's not about piracy. People have copied music since cassete tapes came out. This didn't make sales of music go down. It's about giving people the distribution they want. It's about cutting out the middle man so fans can pay a fair price. Pauls mention of the Radiohead album and the ability for fans to choose how much to pay just shows how out of touch Paul is with reality. Radiohead made MORE money not less from this venture. I'd go so far as to say that U2 should fire Paul and be done with it.
I will not go and see the 3D concert that is now playing in IMAX theaters.
You can go to their websites and Myspace pages and archive.org and download their stuff. Because hey, they're indie. Joe Frew's told me he wouldn't touch a major label contract with a ten foot pole; he's been offered contracts and turned them down.
The trouble is first, I don't know what the law is in Ireland but here in the US downloading is legal. It's uploading that's not legal.
And even where unauthorized downloads are illegal (how could anybody tell?), downloads authorized by the copyright holder are legal. Now, say you search your bittorrent client for "The Fog", a tune by The Station (some more friends of mine). Do you know how many tunes there are with that name?
In short, this is a stupid idea. I now no longer like U2. They can kiss my ass.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
See? This is what happens when you stop producing music for the love of spreading a message and creating unity and start producing music solely for the purpose of becoming as rich as possible. I can fully understand why someone would be angry if random folks by the thousands and possibly millions were acquiring works without paying for them. I'm not saying they are wrong for thinking that; it is important to be recognized for your work.
Personally, if I'm rich as hell from my music or movies, DESPITE people pirating my work...why wouldn't I want that? I'm rich, people are seeing/hearing my message, and everyone is happy.
I'm not trying to justify music/movie piracy. I'm trying to understand why it is the most successful (i.e. richest) musicians screaming the loudest, while fledgeling new and broke bands are begging for people to download torrents of their work. Don't be pissed off because young people now have an easier avenue to getting their work out than you did. Change with the times, stop being old wrinkly bastards, and just be happy that people enjoy your work so much that they want to steal it on a mass scale.
True, those new bands have to build a name for themselves whereas you old-timers already have legions of folks who know who you are...and you know what? That is all the more reason why at this point in your life, you shouldn't care. Those people MADE you into what you are today. Don't you think it's time you gave a little something back that wasn't motivated by the (not-so-mighty) dollar?
Living With a Nerd
Well now I'm gonna go download the complete U2. Funny how sometimes people get the complete opposite of the intended reaction to the idiotic things they say.
I have nothing compelling to say
We, the technically savvy, will always be able to get around whatever they try to impose. We adapt and move on. It has happened before and will again.
I for one, have no intention on slowing down my sharing. However, based on all the articles I have been reading over the last 3-4 months it seems to me that our current model of sharing will soon be coming to an end, including Bit Torrent. I could be wrong on that. The technology might be robust enough to accept a slight change and continue gladly along.
Does anyone have any insight on new technologies or sharing models that are in the wings? Any links I might want to check out?
I'll try anything once. Twice if it tastes good
Why exactly do musicians such as "rock stars" feel as though they are entitled to be rich and famous? All they freaking do is play music that people like, right? I have yet to understand why all the sudden when their industry undergoes change they try in every way possible to fight the change that is going to happen no matter what. While I don't feel that it is fair to steal and mass distribute music, why do they feel that their industry shouldn't ever undergo change? In this case actually they are still making off quite nice, as opposed to the 99.999999999% (repeating of course) rest of us that work in industries where when the company hits trouble we just outright lose our jobs....
He flat out said it. Kudos for the balls, dude.
"We own it. We will own it for ever. You will pay us and our children, forever, for work other people did decades and soon hundreds of years ago. We will, ourselves, produce none of the human expression you pay to "access". But you will pay us. With that money we will buy laws that require you to continue to pay us. And your children, who see us for what we are and treat us with the respect we deserve (and in fact have for ourselves), we will call thieves."
As always, all IMO. Insert "I think" everywhere grammatically possible.
maybe he should first read the law? They can only disconnect if someone proves they dl'd illegaly. Then it's a 3 strikes before your ISP cuts you off. There is no blacklist so you take another isp and be more careful next time. After having done all the isps you just take an account with the first one and do the merrygoround. In other words, it's law to appease the moneymakers with no actual power.
If his purpose was to stop people from buying their music entirely, it may have worked.
Songs Downloaded this month - 0
CD bought at a pawn shop this month - 5 ($10 cdn)
Money you received from me - 0
????
Profit - I saved a whole bunch and I didn't even use Geico.
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
I wasn't planning on buying (or downloading) any of your music, but you can rest assured that I will now purposely avoid giving you another penny of my money. P.S. You should have your internet connection permentantly disconnected for posting such flamebait on your site.
This guy must've wrote his speech the way Edge plays guitar - just pumped a couple sentences into his delay pedal and let it reverberate for 20 minutes.
In all seriousness, I lost interest in U2 with the whole "Popmart" bullshit they did back in the 90's, and I think even the most hardcore U2 fan would have to admit that the band has gotten a bit pretentious in recent years. I think what Bono does for charity and awareness is great, but having this manager deliver far-reaching, accusatory speeches (and uploading them to the official band website, no less) does nothing to combat this "Number Two" image that Bono's cultivated in recent years.
Unrelated to this, a fun experiment: Next time you're in the car with your buddies, and a U2 song comes on the radio, sing lyrics from a different U2 song and see if your friends notice. Dollars to donuts they won't. This experiment works best with "Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For"/"Where The Streets Have No Names"/"With Or Without You" and "Pride"/"With Or Without You".
"You and your third dimension."
Unions are just as crooked as anyone else. Just try to change a light bulb in New York.
Blessed be technology. As another post noted, the current business model for making money off of music (making recordings and selling them) only came into existence a little over 100 years ago with the invention of the phonograph. Prior to this invention there was no "right" to be able to sell recordings (the technology to make them did not exist). Now technology has changed. Everyone/anyone can make recordings easily and distribute them instantly to a large potential audience. The technology that enabled the business model has been supplanted and the business model must change. Recording companies now no longer have a reason to exist, anybody can make a high quality recording. Artists need to find other ways to make money than selling recordings, like they did for the 8 or 9 thousand years prior to the phonograph. What we do not need is to have a right to make money the old fashioned way encoded into law. This should be abhorrent to both those who value personal freedoms and those who value the decision making and resource allocation power of free markets.
What a laugh! Are you somehow required to hire overpriced union workers at whatever amount of money they decide to extort from you in order to show how much you really care? Non-union workers are equally valuable humans too.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
after lars, the yellow "cash" nightingale ulrich, this time an old rock band goes down the drain after cash. u2 either fires this douche, or we rock fans fire u2. their choice.
Read radical news here
I read the article speech, and here are a few points of contention:
1. He states that the band (U2) is making more money than ever on live shows. Why not do more live shows then? Why bitch and moan about record sales, when your bread and butter is performances?
2. He promotes a DRM-mechanism called SIMRAN, and then states that he is an investor in the company that created it. Does this not seem self-serving to anyone else?
3. He claims that the Radiohead initiative "backfired". It strikes me that Radiohead received 100% of the profit, instead of 5% of the profit, from sales of their last album. I wonder if Radiohead thinks that this backfired?
4. From TFA:
Kids don't pay $25 a month for broadband just to share their photos, do their homework and email their pals. Hrm. It strikes me that the kids aren't the ones paying for the broadband access. It also strikes me that their parents are often the ones that shell out the money for the albums they do buy, be it from iTunes or from a record store. So does this mean that the parents should stop paying for the Internet? Or does it mean that the parents should stop paying for the albums? Or does this mean that we need a revolution in the music industry, one that focuses on live performances, with record sales being the gravy?5. He argues that the ISPs that claim they should not have to police the Internet are "relying on outdated excuses from an earlier technological age" to avoid responsibility. Well, it strikes me that the police deal with Criminal offences, not civil. If we want to have anyone 'police' the Internet, should it not relate to criminal offences? The last time I checked, copyright infringement was a civil offense, not a criminal one.
6. From TFA:
A simple three strikes and you are out enforcement process will see all serial illegal uploaders who resist the law face a stark choice: change or lose your ISP subscription. Hrm. Well, how do you determine what a strike is? Is it using p2p software? Is it downloading a U2 song? Is it uploading a U2 song? How do we define a strike? For that matter, how do we determine when someone has violated these policies? With data encryption, is there any sure way to tell, aside from criminally hacking into the end user's computer to determine what files are being shared from their hard drives?7. From TFA:
To me, prosecuting the customer is counter intuitive8.
When the volume of illegal movie and music P2P activity was slowing down their network for legitimate users recently in California, Comcast were able to isolate and close down BitTorrent temporarily without difficulty. And then they got sued. 'Nuf said.9. He goes on to say that ISPs can filter content easily, citing Google blocking BMW when BMW started 'playing games'. I think this guy needs to learn the difference between a search engine and an ISP!
10. Here is my last point. From TFA:
Cheap technology has made it easy to start a band and make music. Well, that same 'cheap technology' has allowed these bands to distribute their music and get heard, which most artists are quite happy with. The money is made from the live performances, and I will happily pay to see a good band live rather than listen to a mediocre band on a CD. I will even pay double, triple, or quadruple the price of a single CD to see one live show!Well, all that being said, does anyone have any thoughts?
.sig
I cant believe the news today
Oh, I cant close my eyes and make it go away
How long...
How long must they steal our songs?
How long? how long...
cause tonight...no sales of our song "One"
tonight... they're all downloading "One"
Tonight...
Broken models of our business bleat
Record execs thrown out on the street
And we won't make our earnings call
It puts my back up
Puts my back up against the wall
Pirate bay, bloody pirate bay
Pirate bay, bloody pirate bay...
There are 2 kinds of people in this world. Those that can keep their train of thought,
So, i have to disconnect myself?
What the hell is this guy smoking?
-- I am the NRA, enough said...
U2 and everyone involved currently seems to be on an ego trip unparalleled with anything else. NO, not EVRYONE likes your music. NO, google does NOT exist because of you, NO Bono, you are not going to save the world, and you can't actually fly (though I'd be more than happy to see you try). So stop spreading your wings and try a little modesty once in a while.
Unions as they exist today are a mixed bag, neither the saviors of the working poor nor the blight you make them out to be. Reform is needed, but that's been true of unions for over 100 years. I volunteered with the Industrial Workers of the World, otherwise known as the Wobblies. Most people don't know about us outside of history class, but the IWW still exists. Here's how the IWW is different: no mandatory union dues taken out of your paycheck, complete and total democracy, and only one paid (and democratically elected) position. Also, instead of seperate unions, everyone is in the same union, but a different branch. That way, when the janitors at a plant strike, the electricians do too.
I uphold that anyone should be able to hire whoever they like. But I and my friends should be able to bargain collectively, and we will point out, quite vociferously, when you as a business owner are trying to screw us over. That's free speech, and the Wobs used to read from the Constitution in town squares across the US just to make that point. That's one reason the IWW was suppressed so hard. Even to the point of being literally massacred.
We are NOT like other unions.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Wow, he's like the Tom Cruise of the Music Industry!
After reading 75% of the article, I got tired of reading half truths and personal propaganda.
(begin sarcasm)
I'm glad to know that he's using U2's name and website to push a service that he's an investor in.
(end sarcasm)
Paul McGuinness, I think it's time that you realized that your old money-scamming business model is finally coming to an end. It's hard to swallow that your friends (with families) can't afford their lavish lifestyles anymore, but that's what happens when the public realizes that the music industry has been scamming them all along for many years.
People CHOOSE not to buy your inflated music, and you're a sore looser about it all because your music industry buddies weren't smart enough to develop a profitable way to do what iTunes does or what Amazon offers. Deal with it.
A black cat crossing your path signifies that the animal is going somewhere. -- Groucho Marx
I see that another music business genius with the foresight to not fire his best act has stood up to the internet fiends and cried "Foul!"
Where was this genius of integrity when the customers paying for U2 albums were being raped by the music industry they licensed their music to? Silently cashing the checks, I imagine. I don't recall U2 making a public speech about how bad the CD price fixing scandal was.
Not so very long ago Sam Walton of Walmart fame demonstrated that if you give the customer what he wants at a fair price, you will become rich beyond the dreams of ordinary men. Henry Ford did the same. The ubiquitous convenience store, with its over priced soft drinks shows that customers will pay more for convenience.
Arrogant businesses on their way towards a serious market crunch treat their customers like thieves. Walmart lost a lot of customers over checking receipts at the door. After a decade of price fixing, literally stealing from their customers, the recorded music industry is in a slump. The economy is in a recession, gas, food, electricity are all up, and yet it is the internet that is the source of record music's woes? What about suing customers, producing fewer and crappier albums, attacking the general populace at large by calling anyone with an internet account a thief? Yeah buddy, I want to patronize your business.
The music business got soft and lazy and forgot about the customer to focus on price fixing, and shoving shitty albums on the market. Innovation is the antithesis of monopoly and the solution to problems that a monopoly is too busy making money to care about. Music lovers want music: quickly, easily, cheaply. They'll pay a fair price. It's up to the music makers to deliver. Pissing about not being able to deliver what the customer wants is a blatant demonstration of stupidity.
The complete history of recorded music is a mere 130 years. Songs have been written through out the thousands of years of human history. Music is a human experience and no amount of digital down loading will destroy it. Sure, Bono and company won't necessarily be able to sell billions of CD's and make billions of dollars, but is this the end of recorded music? As the guys says: Concert revenues are up. Duh. A couple hundred years ago, live music was the ONLY game in town. Music thrived. So "dude" your business model isn't in recordings, its in making music people want to hear and putting on a great concert.
It's a damn shame that the only response so far is: "Stop thief!"
An just an FYI, Mr U2 manager man, internet accounts don't cost $25 bucks a month, more like $50, and the parents are paying, not the kids.
If your so hot at business, why haven't you adjusted for the changing times? Hmmmm? Maybe you're not so hot. Anyway, you guys have just joined the same list as Metallica. I don't buy U2 anymore. Thanks for calling me a thief, you slanderous bastards.
Creative Spelling Copyright (2002). May use without Persimmons
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
They suck. Don't they come with their own iPod(red-u2) suppository edition? Lars thinks that Radiohead is stupid, but admits that they made money on it. The days of the 'old model' are numbered.
I will NEVER download a U2 song either. Their 'Intellectual Property' rights are safe, and will likely remain that way...
( oh btw, I have know Lars Ulrich since we went to High School Together. )
I think he should lose his car if he ever goes over the speed limit. Sounds about the same to what he's suggesting.
You have the right to hire who you like, and I have the right to bargain collectively. I also have the right to free speech, so if you treat me or my coworkers like shit, I WILL be out in front of your place of business telling everyone what you've done. Like it or lump it, buddy.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
"""He also accused ISPs, telcos, device makers, and numerous specifically named companies such as Apple, Google, Yahoo!, Oracle, and Facebook of building 'multi billion dollar industries on the back of our content without paying for it',"""
Oracle and Google are making billions off of MP3's? I work for Oracle and I can say for sure that we aren't doing too much business in ye 'ol MP3 game, but databases do seem to be going OK for us. That statement is embarrassingly asinine, and he is obviously clueless about tech (ie. with the exception of Apple, none of the companies named are an "ISP, telco, or device maker", yet he seems to be treated as some sort of expert by the record industry. How can someone who obviously doesn't know jack about the subject be giving a speech on it and how can that person be taken seriously by his peers? Oh, that's right, his peers are just as clueless.
Hey record industry: Times have changed and you are @#$$ed. You no longer have the means to control distribution, so you better start charging less for your product so people won't want to steal it. Yep, you want to stop BT? It's simple: charge $1.00 for a CD.
If refusing to work on a wage below X is extortion, then refusing to pay someone more than Y for that work is also extortion. Given this, you may wish to rethink your statement a little.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
So people spent the last 30 years building the internet so they could steal music from him? Way to criminalize innocents and shit on peoples life work. Hell, he's not even an artist. As the manager he's just been paid by the band to... manage things, so he hardly has a right to claim his hard work is being stolen. I'll tell you what Mr Manager, make something. Design anything. Build something you're proud of so when we shit on it and tell you it's a tool for criminals you'll get an idea how we feel.
The music publishing industry has asked for a cut of all instrument sales to compensate them for all the people that hear a piece of music and then figure out how to play it without paying for the sheet music. An ASCAP press release states "Our members are losing billions of dollars per year on people freely pirating their intellectual property. If it weren't for our member's IP no one would ever purchase an instrument. The makers of those instruments have been getting a free ride on the back of our IP since time immemorial. We're demanding that congress enact legislation to ensure that we are fairly compensated. Please note, that while we are focusing musical instrument manufacturers with this proposal, it does not preclude us from going after other freeloaders, such as people humming or singing in the shower. The final, fair solution may involve some sort of tax on everyone."
The original term of copyright was 7 years, extensible by another 7. The interesting thing is this was apparently seen as enough back when distribution took a long time since it had to be done physically by ship, yet for some reason is too short now that we can do it globally in a matter of seconds on the Internet, they seem to think it needs to be protected for longer.
US copyright wasn't extended to life of the author + 50 years until 1976. From 1909 to 1976 it was 28 years and one 28 year renewal. From 1831 to 1909 it was 28 plus one 14 year renewal. The original 1790 terms applied until 1831.
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As I have said a dozen times before, the biggest thing is that 20 years ago, we had radio and TV and the odd magazine to tell us what's going in the world of entertainment, so we got force fed a paid for diet of trash that the big corps wanted to feed us. Now with the web explosion, I can jump across a dozen music sites using RSS/Atom and find out what the latest big underground thing is in my favourite music genre.
Sorry Paul, mate! The cat is out of the bag. I have way too many things vying for my attention and with the vast amount of information available to me, I can hone in on exactly what I like, very, very quickly. I don't don't need your corp BS rammed down my throat, I can often speak direct to the members of my favourite bands, buy their stuff direct from them, knowing I am getting a great product as they let me sample a few tracks for free legally, and I know the cash I send them will be used by them to help them to keep entertaining me. I might only buy them a few strings or a few gallons of petrol/gas, but I know it's got direct to them.
The day the majors finally realise that honest artists treated with care and consumers treated with respect, Old Nick will be skating to work!
Windows guys please stop pissing on everyone and the Linux guys stop pissing in the wind, hoping to hit Windows guys!
The old model is dead. Deal with it. You can no longer charge $20 to get that latest single surrounded by 12 songs of fluff. Radiohead may have had to deal with people paying $0 for their new album, but my guess is that they made much more on this album by bypassing the typical studio overhead of having to pay HR people, top dollar executives, and ridiculous marketing fees. Bands can now use Apple's Garage Band to record, mix, and master an album, and then sell it on iTunes without ever having to give up the copyright to their recordings. Welcome to the digital age.
What can one expect from a bunch of elitist rich pricks who made a fortune off pretending to be humble, working class folks "just like their fans"?
Caveat Utilitor
this is an old guy that has no clue on the modern age it seems, I hope his kids are DL'ing and thet he gets cut , that'll teach him to talk out of his as(especially managing a tax escaping band like U2 that TRY to look as if they care about poverty)
Live Electronic Music
I am a musician. I play mandolin and fiddle. But I all really getting pissed off at all these folks who are doing everything they can to lock up our cultural heritage with copyrights and other dodges as described in this story. Music has developed into its present form over many, many thousands of years. Nothing U2 or what any other musician is creating is anything other than an incremental twitch to what has gone before. Yet the content companies and artists are attempting to claim exclusive and complete control over musical expression without the recognition of the debt they owe to those that came before.
The real thieves are the RIAA and musicians who claim all content to themselves. It is very, very wrongheaded. It is like building your house on the town commons and then claiming you own the land and will allow no trespass.
Thank you Mr Paul McGuinness. As an ardent U2 fan, I now abhor their music and image, and will never, EVER, purchase anything related to their name again. I will also encourage everyone I know to do the same. Unless, of course, they make public amends, which I highly doubt they will. Thank you, for alienating thousands of potential customers over you're obscene control-freak values and lack of respect for those who support you - the FANS.
I call for all makers of coffee tables to have their business accounts suspended because coffee tables are offensive to me and my pursuit of comfortable and unimpeded walking!
I am uninterested in due process or the protection of anyone else other than myself. I am self-interested and also, I am king of the world. Everyone else should just get out of my way because "right" is defined as "what I want" and wrong is defined as "what I can't have" as "what everyone else does."
Copyright holders need to appreciate the fact that "copyright" isn't a "right" so much as it is a privilege granted in exchange for works eventually entering the public domain among many other things that they aren't delivering on their end of the bargain. And since these copyright holders are clearly in violation of the spirit of the copyright arrangement, I call on all copyrights to be null and void and all works are available to the public domain.
Did mention I'm king of the world?
But does he have a fountain?
What about the artists that put their own stuff out on P2P networks? You going to kill people's ISP accounts for downloading what artists rightfully put out their? (And I'm talking about artists that fully own their stuff and don't have to worry about whether a label has rights to it.) I think both artists and people very much have a right to trade that stuff over P2P. (Yes, I plan on doing this myself. Working on setting up my own sound studio at the moment.)
Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain't goin' away. - Elvis Presley (source: imdb.com)
I thought they were stealing music? Or at least, failing to give money. That sounds like they're accusing downloaders of actual theft of actual money. I would hope that sort of (false) accusation would land the accuser in serious legal trouble.
sig fault
When will all the traffic on the net be encrypted?
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
The slashdot crowd reaction could be predicted from a mile off. U2 is banking on the fact that the slashdot crowd has little effect on their fan base as a whole, and frankly I would be surprised if we did have much of an effect on future sales for U2.
The idea, I think, is that other media has more of a stronghold on the consumer base than the internet does. The internet community will grow inevitably, so better to oppose that community now, while you still have influential power.
I'm all for mandatory disconnects.... Of artists and bands who are no longer relevant or interesting but continue to act like they are because of their perceived past greatness.
PLus people tend to forget how much of a prick U2 has been in the past over 'rights' so this is hardly a shock.
I disagree with his magazine analogy. I think a better example would be to hold the telephone company responsible for what people do over their phone lines.
Back in the 90's I saw U2 live at Celtic park. It cost me at least 30 GBP and the journey and refreshments cost another 30 GBP. At
that time I owned almost all of their CD catalogue - average price 15 GBP's each.
Then they started cracking on about cancelling the Third World Debt and being UN Peace Envoys or whatever it was that made smash hits christen Bono "Umbongo".
Then they shifted all their finances offshore to avoid paying taxes in Ireland.
At this point I decided to mandatorily disconnect myself from any further consumption of their materials.
Dinosaurs!
Posts, MyBio or Sig, may contain satire, sarcasm, bolded nouns be sardonic or even witty & be Church of SD
Until they replace the Edge with Bill Gates. I mean, the guy got a high score on Guitar Hero already, give him the job!
I skimmed the article my self, and still did not pick up on this Diamond hidden in the ruff :)
stop downloading music, Bono is starving to death!
He [Paul McGuinness] also accused consumers of illegally remember songs they never paid for, and even worser sometimes also whistling to the tunes of the same songs!! That's a far greater threat to our stability as a civilized specie than the peak oil and global warming summed!
Seriosly, what to do? Maybe stop buiying anything from U2, and even better letting them now that having a manager totally disconnected from the reality isn't a good thing for them?
Bye!
SeqBox
Casey will rant anything you want, on mike, for a small fee. For an additional fee, he'll even do it sounding like Shaggy.
This guy understands that suing kids and old ladies looks bad and they don't have much money. Big companies, on the other hand, have lots of money and little sympathy:
The problem is that filtering, as proposed by this guy and others, sideswipes innocent users who will find their communications spied upon and legitimate uses of the network blocked. But I don't think this fellow particularly cares. For him, Chinese censorship is a promising sign, not an indication that his proposal has ominous implications:
I shouldn't call it "his" proposal though. This is part of a coordinated effort by the recording industry to institute ISP filtering worldwide. We have AT&T's efforts in theU.S., a position paper in Canada, and legislation in France and Belgium.
That is all...
...if you treat me or my coworkers like shit, I WILL be out in front of your place of business telling everyone what you've done. You'll also be out in front of my place of business telling everyone I've treated you like shit for damn near any reason, like if I don't hire union workers. Everyone knows how unions operate. No one I know takes the banners with "Labor Dispute!" or "Company X Unfair!" seriously. Why should we?I respect that you like your union and what it does for you. I have no respect for unions themselves.
Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines.
Hey artists, I have a suggestions for you. If you don't like how technology and tech companies are making money of your "art" on your expense, why you don't stop using the technology? Don't make any records and go and tour the world providing concerts in "MTV unplugged" style - as you used to 50 years ago.
And sorry to say this, based on the news stories of what makes you "creative" - everytime I go to buy CD I feel like a substantial portion of that money ends in hands of drug cartels.
In cooperation with the Federal Government the RIAA will be mailing all US citizens W-U2's. These will be mailed out by January 29'th.
The IWW has never endorsed any political party or theory. In the past, there were some pretty rowdy arguments between the commie/socialist types and the anarchist types in the IWW. In practice, our philosophy is classed as Anarcho-syndicalism.
As for the origin of the term wobbly, the official position of the IWW is: we don't know. But there are some interesting theories on that page. By the way, I helped make the IWW the second union on the web.(The Israeli Teachers union was first, by a few months.) I also helped with the world's first cyber-picket against Border's Books, and helped defend against the DDoS they or their agents launched in counter-attack.
As for the lingo, back in the depression, the IWW was very tight with the hobo culture and organized massive free speech protests all over the country, encouraging indigents to hop trains or hitch to get there. The IWW was also among the first in the front lines protecting the rights of migrant workers. Some of the worst beat-downs the IWW got were defending migrant workers. Basically, Wobs, hobos, and migrant workers go way back.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
"Building multi billion dollar industries on the back of our content without paying for it." For a second there I thought he was speaking about the record companies. Silly me.
DaveyJJ
Michael Stipe has called for mechanics to confiscate the cars of people who speed on highways.
Every single article on this subject has an astroturfer like you, and somehow these bloviations on morality always get modded up despite the utter irrelevance of morality in the issue at hand.
It's not our job as the general public to solve the problem. Many solutions have been found, and rejected by a government firmly in the pockets of this now completely irrelevant industry.
Yes it's illegal, because people whose business model is going belly up due to progress are buying laws against it.
It's not about sticking it to the man, it's about progress. There is now a far superior way of distributing music. It fulfills the purpose behind the constitutional provision for copyright: the (in this case) artistic enrichment of the public sphere, and it's our duty as a society to adopt it for the greater good.
Theyre not "weasel words", theyre hard firm reality.
So.. since you want ISP's to snoop my connection for illegal filesharing.. how about my email for treasonous plots too, then cut off my service and report me to the government whenever any congressman's hidden pandering is about to be revealed.
Or maybe it's just a DMCA like notice and takedown system, where Paul, or whatever corporation or individual capable of forging a convincing notice, can deprive me of my liberty on a mere accusation?
Apparently such concepts as net neutrality and individual rights fly right over your head you MAFIAA astroturfer.
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
Tonight, thank God it's them, instead of you?
(Ok, technically that's just Bono and not U2.)
I hear this all the time. It's dead wrong.
It would be easy to compete with P2P. How? By adding value. Right now there's no incentive to buy music, even DRM free music. You pay, download, and end up with a decent quality recording. With P2P? The same thing, except you don't pay. Why would anyone pay? Because it's the right thing to do? We've already seen that an entire generation doesn't think so.
Instead of suing people or pressing for ISP surveillance, compete. Add value. If there's real value, people will pay.
How could a music distributor add value to an online music store?
The price also needs to be minuscule per song. Precisely low enough that it feels like "nothing" when you purchase. Somewhere around $0.10/song and $1/album. At this price point no one will hesitate to buy something they're unfamiliar with, and people will gladly re-purchase their entire CD collection for a few hundred dollars because of the sheer convenience.
That's competition.
One of the first statements this twat makes is:
"What I'm trying do here today is identify a course of action that will benefit all: artists, labels, writers and publishers."
Apparently 'all' omits the consumer.
I have nothing against artists getting their share, in fact, the RIAA ensures that they don't. U2 appears to have enough business savvy to have not gotten their asses handed to them, but this guy is off his rocker if he doesn't see the marketing tool that file sharing really is.
"Look, Smithers! I'm Davy Crockett!"
As such, labor is subject to market forces like competition. Americans felt entitled to fifty bucks an hour to put tires on Cadillacs because the unions said they could...and uh oh! Outsourcing.
Unions, pricing themselves right out of the market. U2 hypocritical? Maybe, but they are making music to make a profit, they aren't unicef.
Much more relevant is the fact that U2 music sucks.
THL phish sticks
Someone will a cool name like that, with Guinness in it would be so up on harshing other people's mellow..
Too bad indeed.
refusing to work on a wage below X is extortion
Refusing to work for a wage below X, realizing in order to be paid X you need to actually work to better yourself, doing so, then looking for a different job paying X is not extortion.
Refusing to work for a wage below X, in job Y, when hundreds of perfectly qualified individuals would be happy to take said job at said wage, then proceeding to picket instead of actually attempting to make your life better, and in the process trying to prevent honest workers from taking the job you walked away from, yeah, that would be extortion.
"If you were a magazine advertising stolen cars, handling the money for stolen cars and seeing to the delivery of stolen cars, the police would soon be at your door"
Isn't the ISP more comparable to the printing company? I doubt the printer would be held liable for such things.
And on that note;
You, sir, can bite my shiny metal ass.
Now I remember another of the reasons I don't much care for U2. I haven't even STOLEN any of their music.
From sanctimonius to self-righteous, to offensively condescending, and back to sanctimonious. The evolution of a decent, but now irrelevant pop band. Stick to the music, and they can go far.
Now we have this little &*@#$ telling us we're evil. Mostly because he thinks it's costing him money.
Sure enough, follow the money. It always leads you where the real motive is.
Pus.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
Well, I guess I'm not going to be buying any U2 CDs. Oh wait, I never have! Seriously I wouldn't recognize a single one of their songs.
While we're at it, lets prohibit band members that use illegal drugs from ever using a musical instrument or performing again.
Can You Say Linux? I Knew That You Could.
Where the hell does he get off claiming that ISP's are selling their broadband services (and making money) off the back of recording companies' artists!?!? And he wants them to cough up or shut down the file sharers? This is so backwards I don't know whether to spit or shit! Surely the recording companies are making money off the back of an additional revenue stream which would be less profitable if it wasn't for the ISP's providing their customer base more accessibility to that service. So if you ask me, the recording companies should be paying out to the ISP's!!! And let's not forget that the 'holier than thou' politics of U2 do not extend to themselves. They are hypocrites of the highest order - they claim to be fighting for debt relief for Africa, with rich nations' populations putting their hands in their pockets (via the individual countries' Tax systems), yet their own accounts are all based offshore, so they pay NO Tax in their native Ireland. How sick, twisted and realpolitick can you get? Maybe it's about time these moaning fecks should face a sustained campaign to boycott their products through the widespread use of P2P. Then perhaps they might realise just how good they had it beforehand. I'm an independent recording artist, but I regularly give my music away online for free. Why? Because it's GOOD FOR BUSINESS!!! If someone wants to hear you, but doesn't want to risk laying out loads of wonga, they can get tracks for free. Then if they like you, they can support you financiallly by coming to see you play live (and who knows, maybe buy the odd track here or there too) - that's what musicians are SUPPOSED TO DO - PLAY LIVE!!! Perhaps songwriters should get off their fat arses and get out on the road to make a living like the real songwriter/musicians have to. At least we'd see the back of mindless manufactured pop shite permeating the charts in an endless stream of 'artists' who don't write their own songs... which is a win/win in my books.
Oops, it wasn'r 1996, it was 2006. Downmodding myself with the "no karma bonus" option"
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
Wonder how the final version will read? ;-)
Hope they fix the typo.
He has been nicknamed "the fifth member" of the band. And I'm not getting them mixed-up with The Beatles
then i'd hear the howls of those who say flash breaks the usability of the web, is the tool of the devil, etc. you can't win. so you pick a format and suck up the criticism
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
In any voluntary transaction, both sides value the thing they are receiving more than the thing they are trading away. Therefore, extra value is created in every transaction. However, the distribution of that extra value is unfair. The owners have a lot more resources and power to influence how much of a cut they get. Collective bargaining helps even out that imbalance, giving workers a more powerful position to bargain from. Obviously, if the workers price themselves out of a job, they are not bargaining correctly. I'd be happy if labor got even half the extra value created in the transaction. I mean, everyone wants to pay as little as they can get away with, and without unions, owners can get away with paying the bare minimum that workers are willing to accept. There is also a maximum owners are willing to pay, don't you think it's fair that workers can bargain collectively to get something in the middle?
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
I love how this is advertised as a proof of lost sales. People who were NOT even willing to pay $0 to download 'In Rainbows' from the official site would have paid for the album if file sharing didn't exist? How is that reasoning possible?
What this fact proves, quite soundly, is that the vast majority of illegal downloads were never lost sales at ANY price. The reasoning used to say it is 'lost sales' shows a stunning lack of basic business sense that just might be the real problem in the music industry.
What do you think AT&T plans to do to monetize that mass-wiretapping gear the government bought and offered them immunity for?
I figure they'll go after P2P and try to get copyright filters made mandatory. That way, all their competitors will have to buy the gear on their own dime and they can control a bit more of the world.
This is tiring now, these people seriously overestimate themselves and the their work. I think the best response to RIAA and MPAA is to take their music and movies offline, just eject them and their content from the internet. And let's be done with it. End of story.
Pirates have some self respect. Boycott these guys by rejecting their product, not pirating it. That's the only thing that will bring them down to earth. At the moment they are wallowing in self importance.
Does anyone have audio of this speech that I could download illegally? I'd love to release an album using only his speech as source material. That and maybe a chainsaw.
If anyone does find audio, if you could email mungo HAT downwithpants DAWT org and tell me where to find it. I'll totally send you a signed copy of the album when it's done.
http://downwithpants.org Overthrow the tyranny of your pants
It'll never happen. American companies aren't going to cut off paying customers for something as stupid as this. Give me a break. If he likes French law so much, move there and be content. Don't pick and law here and a law there to make your own personal utoipia and force it down everyone else's throat. No ISP is going to tell a paying customer "we don't want your money anymore because you doanloaded a song." And if they start having to cut people off for something like downloading a sog, what is next? If you fart while online you'll lose your service? It's a domino party and you're not invited.
"...Bono was the biggest piece of shit ever."
Yeah, he's like 86 courics. Didn't you hear?
Les Miserables Volume 1 now up with my reading of
Ehhh, who said anything about liking their work? I like the work of plenty of artists I don't respect as people. I happen to love early U2, but I think they suck now. I like Beck, but I'd never respect anyone who is a Scientologist.
I think you are being disingenuous and insincere. I think you are attempting to imply that anyone who takes a stand and speaks out about their beliefs is trying to shove those beliefs down your throat. I'm not. If you're not buying what I'm selling, more power to you. But I'm not going to shut up just because you try to imply that me voicing my own opinions makes me some kind of fascist dictator wannabe.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
1970 vs. 2008
Scenario: Jack goes quail hunting before school, pulls into school parking lot with shotgun in gun rack.
1970 - Vice Principal comes over, looks at Jack's shotgun, goes to his car and gets his shotgun to show Jack.
2008 - School goes into lock down, FBI called, Jack hauled off to jail and never sees his truck or gun again. Counselors called in for traumatized students and teachers.
Scenario: Johnny and Mark get into a fistfight after school.
1970 - Crowd gathers. Mark wins. Johnny and Mark shake hands and end up best friends. Nobody goes to jail, nobody arrested, nobody expelled.
2008 - Police called, SWAT team arrives, arrests Johnny and Mark. Charge them with assault, both expelled even though Johnny started it.
Scenario: Jeffrey won't be still in class, disrupts other students.
1970 - Jeffrey sent to office and given a good paddling by the Principal. Returns to class, sits still and does not disrupt class again.
2008 - Jeffrey given huge doses of Ritalin; Becomes a zombie; Tested for ADD; School gets extra money from state because Jeffrey has a disability.
Scenario: Billy breaks a window in his neighbor's car and his Dad gives him a whipping with his belt.
1970 - Billy is more careful next time, grows up normal, goes to college, and becomes a successful businessman.
2008 - Billy's Dad is arrested for child abuse. Billy removed to foster care and joins a gang. State psychologist tells Billy's sister that she remembers being abused herself and their Dad goes to prison. Billy's mom has affair with psychologist.
Scenario: Mark gets a headache and takes some aspirin to school.
1970 - Mark shares aspirin with Principal out on the smoking dock.
2008 - Police called, Mark expelled from school for drug violations. Car searched for drugs and weapons.
Scenario: Pedro fails high school English.
1970 - Pedro goes to summer school, passes English, and goes to college.
2008 - Pedro's cause is taken up by state. Newspaper articles appear nationally explaining that teaching English as a requirement for graduation is racist. ACLU files class action lawsuit against state school system and Pedro's English teacher. English banned from core curriculum. Pedro is given his diploma anyway, but ends up mowing lawns for a living because he cannot speak English.
Scenario: Johnny takes apart leftover firecrackers from 4th of July, puts them in a model airplane paint bottle, and blows up a red ant bed.
1970 - Ants die.
2008 - BATF, Homeland Security, FBI called. Johnny charged with domestic terrorism, FBI investigates parents, siblings removed from home, computers confiscated, Johnny's Dad goes on a terror watch list; not allowed to fly again.
Scenario: Johnny falls while running during recess and scrapes his knee. He is found crying by his teacher, Mary. Mary hugs him to comfort him.
1970 - In a short time, Johnny feels better and goes on playing.
2008 - Mary is accused of being a sexual predator and loses her job. She faces 3 years in State Prison. Johnny undergoes 5 years of psycho-therapy.
Scenario: Jack Buys the last Beatles album and records it to cassette, loans it to Trish to listen to.
1970 - Trish likes the music, returns the cassette then later that week buys the album.
2008 - Trish likes the MP3, adds it to her 128GB collection of music she has downloaded from Jacks site, Trish then puts a GB of music on a flash drive and takes it to Sally's house where they download it to Sally's Dell, where then Sally puts the music in her LimeWire share folder to share with her 750,000 closest friends.
Sally knows all the Beatles are rich and don't mind it if she gives away their music, it's OLD music anyway.
Someone online calls Sally a thief, Sally is outraged.
750,000 of Sally's closest friends come to her defense.
~hylas
--
So who is hotter? Ali or Ali's Sister?
McGuiness' hyperbolic comments about the end of songwriters is the most complete and utter load of crap I've ever read.
I have been playing in bands for over twenty years and have recorded several albums. I know loads of musicians who spend countless hours practicing, writing, rehearsing, fighting Windows drivers for their audio cards, changing strings, learning Sonar, tuning drums, etc;, etc;, all so they can play and record their own music. In many instances, few if any listeners ever hear their music. They, like myself, are doing it for the sheer enjoyment of playing and recording our own music.
McGuiness and his ilk are the leeches who live off of creative people.
No one is going to stop writing and recording music simply because Universal, Geffen or Sony isn't getting their "cut". What utter nonsense.
Also, his comment about Abbie Hoffman really shows what a dimwit he is... WTF do the Yippies/Hippies have to do with ISP's, P2P and music? Nothing.
We play the game with the bravery of being out of range
I mean, this is news?
Unlimited growth == Cancer.
Looks like Metallicops is about to get a new sequel!
BitTorrent is not an "illegal P2P download service." BitTorrent is a protocol used for sharing files of all kinds over a network in a distributed fashion.
LimeWire is not an "illegal P2P download service." LimeWire is a client that uses the Gnutella protocol, which is a protocol used for sharing all kinds of files over a network in a distributed fashion.
I'm willing to bet that these same idiots would lobby for the elimination of JPG and MPEG as a complete and permanent halt to child pornography.
Web 2.0 == Giant Blogspam Circle Jerk
Someone who worked for the music industry noted this (I paraphrase because I don't think I could find the CNET article):
The music industry was so busy thinking of ways to sue people rather than thinking of ways to take advantage of the Internet, that there's a generation of users who will likely never buy online music because they've always gotten it for free. If the RIAA had worked from the start to have a model to sell songs via the internet, people would be more used to buying the songs that way.
I'm calling for mandatory disconnection of idiots, including music industry personnel.
Wow, suddenly IPv4 will be sufficient for the next 100 years at least.
I have spoken'eth.
Original submitter seemed to suggest Apple was among companies accused of supporting business models that took money away from the industry. Quite the contrary, the manager suggests consulting Apple and the like for their input as to how to make systems in which the artist is fairly compensated.
Of course what is never discussed in the context of these debates is what "fair compensation" is in today's world.
I agree that the recording companies shaft both the consumer and the recording artist, but what is the inevitable end result of having so much access to so many recording artists who can out of their own bedroom gain international notoriety by supplying their music directly on the internet?
Well, the commoditization of music has had many incarnations throughout time... and the model in which artists aspire to be ridiculously wealthy, and only a handful signed to even major labels ever become so, is quite possibly an anachronism.
I think recording artists need to adjust their sights... and get used to the reality, the fact, that the consumer is not willing to pay what they used to for music, and that accessbility and supply play their part in the shift of the equilibrium price per track or album.
That being said, some artists are in greater demand than others... but I'll get back to that in a minute.
If Radiohead's experiment is an example of anything, it's not that the consumers have it entirely wrong. Do I think the consumers are being fair? Hell no. But the data shouldn't be looked at in terms of how many people paid nothing. The data should be looked at in terms of, from the top to the bottom, what was the AVERAGE price paid. This figure will tell you something about at least that band's demand factor... and if they have brains, they'll use that data to figure out a pricing strategy that is appropriate for their material and their demographic targets.
If they're stupid and greedy, they'll blame the consumer, the internet, everything under the sun... without ever thinking that hey, maybe they just aren't that popular.
To provide a counterpoint to U2's manager's argument: People if left to their own devices on Ebay will still pay a quarter of a million dollars for a Patek Philippe wristwatch. But note the difference in terms of scarcity, of quality, and of demand, of that product and its REASONABLY SIMILAR competitors.
So maybe the artist's expectations are flawed. Maybe the industry's demands are flawed. And maybe the consumer is also flawed.
But if you want to make money in this world, there's no getting around the flawed consumer... for whatever reasoning they apply to their purchasing habits, they represent in sum total what cost the market will bear. Clearly that cost is shifting for music as a commodity.
If U2 wants to get paid ridiculous sums of money in this paradigm, they need to be capable of doing the following:
1. Follow market pricing strategies to establish a fair transaction... an honest analysis of where their equilibrium price falls based on hard data.
2. Providing a product that is unmistakably theirs and difficult to reproduce by competitors and pirates. They can't control the pirates, but they can continue finding innovative ways to beat them to the punch... but they need to find the balance between countermeasures and losing sales, rather than going entirely one way or the other. As for being unique, I think they have this locked down but they cannot rest on their laurels before another band out there gives people a reason to fall out of love with U2.
3. Leverage/engage other media into providing a unique experience for their fans that is always one step ahead of the pirates and the competition. This may mean 3D movies, this may mean more live concerts, it may mean releasing in formats that are extremely inconvenient to copy. It may mean a bit of all of these.
Even with all these strategies, bands need to contend with the changing times and get used to the reality of an impendi
The headline and summary make it sound like he advocates ISPs aborting music downloads, even authorized ones, as though if Radiohead chooses to sell music over the net, he thinks the ISP should interfere with that commerce. The speech, though, really just talks about aborting illegal (i.e. copyright infringing) downloads. (That's a dumb idea of course, for a variety of reasons including the fact that there's no way for a third party (ISP) to know whether a transaction is legal or not.) I think it's kind of interesting that the submitter seems to have systematically removed that. What are you trying to do?
They're nothin' but a bunch of slack-jawed faggots anyway. Seriously though, why would they think it's the internet that's responsible for their declining record sales? They should have quit twenty years ago.
I don't need
Come read my stupid blagablog. Rants and Giggles
Look, we've let "you people" call it piracy for ages, despite the fact that it doesn't involve raping, murdering, or stealing or even the high seas! Can't you just meet us halfway here? It's been happening for so long now that it's become a pretty standard definition. Can't you just stick with that instead of fucking up the meaning of words like steal, theft and thieve?
Call the downloaders pirates, I don't care, but stop calling copying stealing. Otherwise, what's the point of having all these extraneous words? Technology professionals do so much actual copying of bits to and fro that redefining the term is really going to make our lives confusing.
Read Heinlein's 1953 Revolt in 2100, now more than ever.
I'm curious what U2 has to say about this.
Probably something along the lines of, "Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah YEAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!"
Move all sig!
If anyone wants a copy of every u2 album every release in .mp3 on cd rom just send me your address. I'm burning 5 right now and I'm going to leave them at the bus stop.
First off, stop with those faked statistics. They're BS, and you know it. Secondly, get real on the nature of the crime. There are far worse crimes that are not solved, and I don't see the point of wasting justice time on this crap when there are more serious things to be addressed . Go after the volume distributors, fine, but for that you don't need any new legislation. If you dislike following due process, well, bully to you but it also protects you.
I have bought U2 music. In about an hour there will be no trace left of it on any electronic device I possess, the CDs will be scratched and binned, and none will be bought again. Ever. And I'll advice my friends to do the same.
You're not part of the solution - you're not even "part of" the problem.
You ARE the problem.
I can tell you this much, since U2 has chosen to allow him to co-op their name for this, I'll not be purchasing anything else that says U2 on it anywhere. Instead, hoist the Jolly Roger.....
2 cents,
QueenB.
HDGary secures my bank
Not to mention that I'm sure he personally made money off Bono doing iPod ads. Hypocrite.
This certainly sheds some light on this little incident..
http://www.xkcd.com/354/
I'm usually harshly anti-P2P, on the basis that it hurts artists through cheapskates using it instead of buying music through legitimate sources, therefore denying them revenue. Given that I kinda like having said artists around to listen to, I really, really don't like P2P.
For U2, however, I will make an exception. I'd use Azureus and hurt them myself, but my broadband connection would start crying and go on strike at having to carry such shite.
The same goes for the film Lady In The Water. What a godawful piece of shit that movie is. I didn't even pay to see it and I want the ticket price back as compensation.
I write bullshit
Disaster preparedness, healthcare, education, infrastructure.
poor repubs cry about taxes too
Cutting off your nose to spite your face.
Geez, Paul McGuinness must really hate and despise U2's fans to basically assume that they're all just a bunch of thieves unless draconian measures are applied. This sounds more like a fascist than someone trying to promote a band. This reminds me of those mall shops that practically frisk you as you come into the store. While it's true that some people will steal things, most of your customers are not thieves and should not be treated as such just because some are. What ever happened to the customer's always right? Contempt for the customer is not what I'd call a good long term business plan, unless, of course, your band is Dethklok!
To the making of books there is no end, so let's get started
As has been pointed out in passing, there's one way to deal with this, boycott U2. I'm sorry it happened to them, but yep, its over for me. U2 has been added to the media axis-of-evil in my book.
Back in the day, making copies of vinyl records was near impossible, making copies of tapes was easier, but degraded, now with CD's and computers, its trivial. So U2's solution? Burn the innovators!
I have no problem with artists being paid. I have a problem attacking innovators whose improvements accidentally break the coincidental copy-protection that existed for years.
Welcome to my black-list you ignorant paranoid luddites.
Guitarist edge says: "iPod and iTunes look like the future to me and it's good for everybody involved in music."
http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/index.cfm?NewsID=9991#mainContent (MacWorld UK)
When Apple released iTunes for Windows, Bono joined the stage via iChat video conference and said said the new service was a "really, really cool thing." "That's why I'm here to kiss the corporate ass," said Bono, drawing a huge laugh and applause from the crowd. "I don't do that for everyone."
http://www.wired.com/gadgets/mac/news/2003/10/60851 (Wired)
I wish the ISP's and service providers would keep me from downloading U2's music. They haven't made a decent album since "Joshua Tree". Everytime I hear a new U2 song all's I can think of is "I still haven't found what I'm looking for".
He who said 1,000,000 monkeys on 1,000,000 typewriters would eventually type the great novel, never saw an AOL chat room
> "illegal P2P download services like BitTorrent and LimeWire".
Right, well...there's no such thing as an "illegal P2P download service." It's just a distribution tool, that gets used for legitimate content as well (at least in the case of BitTorrent, which *is* used to distribute large software.)
Skot Nelson music is my saviour / i was maimed by rock and roll
Why does this whiner have a voice that people listen to? Because he has influence.
How did he get influence? Truckloads of money flowing through the band he manages.
Where did he get his truckloads of money? You.
Lesson: Stop giving these people money and they just might go away.
Your wallet is more powerful than you might think - who you give money to determines who influences your government in the future far more than your insignificant vote ever will.
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
My old professor used to say, "Those companies with unions have, in almost all cases, done something to the employees to deserve it".
And the best part is: when you go back and actually fact check that statement, he's exactly right.
You just don't see unions at places that treat their workers well. And in the converse, you almost always see unions where they don't (or at least attempts to unionize). Sometimes they intersect when the unions try to recruit new members at "good" companies but for the most part, unless the employer is just an asshat, they get rebuffed. In places where the employers are good to the employees, the unions just don't get the play that they demand.
Are these the same guys that became tax exiles so they wouldn't have to pay their fair share?
Or are they the ones that formed Elevation Partners, a private equity firm that owns interests in content and media companies?
Mandatory Death for idiot bands/people like this. ( and no, i don't mean it in a business way )
All talk like this does is piss off what little bit of fan base they have left. If they are too stupid to understand that free sharing of music HELPS them in the long run, they shouldn't be around to pollute the airwaves with their trash.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I'm sure the band agrees with this guy, but they realize if the band says it, they'll get whacked like Metallica.
He's giving them (im)plausible deniability. At least that's the intent.
I suppose you have to be at the end of the line artistically, to care more about people who don't pay for your music than actually making new music. I guess they realized the tank is almost dry.
How soon before the "reunion" tour?
Here here :)
He wouldn't be where he was today if he'd relied solely on contributions from non-gigging songwriters.
Paul is so wrong on so many levels he has his head up his ass basically.
> 'makers of burglary kits' who have made 'a thieves' charter' to steal money from the
> music industry.
Sure looks like libel to me.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
U2 fans have such poor taste in music, they probably never heard dirty boots by sonic youth. U2 so obviously mashed together the supremes and sonic youth for that 'song'.
I wonder what the U2 of "Under a blood-red sky" would have thought of the article. Not to mention U2 having a .com, commercial website. It's a shame, I used to really like those guys. Their politics have become selfish.
.
' Nobody has ever called copyright infringement "robbery"...'
:)
I'm sure someone, somewhere has, but not me - not this time.
My words in neither form nor manner, either implicitly or by inference, associated anything whatsoever with copyright infringement. That errant association was your opportunistic and shallow method of forcing yourself into the conversation. Trite at best, and amateurish as far as debate tactics go, but thanks for taking a run at me none the less - better luck next time
"They have agreements which artists are perfectly free to refuse" - funniest thing I've seen all day. Didn't get you modded up, tho, did it? hehehehhehe
This is most likely true, but a lot of the reason Radiohead's making a lot of money is because they were heavily promoted by a record label in the past, lots of people know about them, Radiohead got massive amounts of free media exposure by doing what they did, and people are flocking to them because of it. Radiohead makes music that a lot of people like, but many other bands make similarly good music without anything like the same amount of exposure, and would make a lot less if they did the same thing than if they were able to get signed by a label and have massive amounts of money poured into promoting them.
Not that I support the music publishing cartel or the way it works, and I also don't think it would be unlikely for a band that hadn't been promoted by record companies to have a similar success. I just haven't personally seen it yet on the same scale as what Radiohead's managed.
Actually from a consumer perspective I don't care even if we don't see this happen for smaller independent bands very often. What matters for me is that the availability of quality music improves over time, that it costs more reasonable amounts, and that the money I pay goes directly to the artists to the extent that good artists can reasonably continue to produce more good music, rather than to publishing agents in the middle who take 95% and use it on marketing to try and convince me to buy more of their crappy music range.
Why is it that arrogant, self-aggrandizing ignorant fuckwits like this get any media time at all?
On the other hand, they let the President open his mouth on occasion too.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
What's happened to the notion of "due process"...
Instant, mandatory disconnect ? sheesh... the ISPs will now be judge, jury and executioner ?
Does this guy realize how close his position wrt to downloaders is to Bush's position wrt to "terrorists" ?
Shall we send off "downloaders" to Gitmo for a few years on the say-so of the RIAA et al ?
This is largely a consequence of how greed has permeated the recording industry. Real musicians do what they do because they love it, but notice I didn't say "music" industry. The real money here is in the distribution of work, and musicians get compensated a very very small portion of that. What musicians really seem to feel they're owed is a lifestyle that could only have existed during the heyday of the recording industry. During that time entertainers were paid an absurd amount, and recording execs paid an even more absurd amount, and this was artificially high. It's just not possible anymore. They need to just give up.
Sorry for the incoherence . . . feelin' pretty scatterbrained today.
Yes there are moral rights. I take your work and plagerize it (pretending it is my own), or I alter it to construe a statement you did not intend (and attribute that to you) I have infringed on those rights which include attribution and control over your own speech.
:-)
Of course, commercial rights are distinct from moral rights both in law and common thought.
IANAL, of course. And moral rights laws are especially weak in the US....
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
This guy shoved his foot so far down his mouth that it is sticking out of his ass.
I'm impressed.
Yeah, the thing that mostly will affect U2 sales is that they have started making crappy music and the manager feels the need to blame someone else for fucking up.
Managers and record company executives are starting to realize that they have become leeches on the artists' output and want to remove the focus from this fact before more artists go "wait a minute..." like Radiohead, Madonna and Trent Reznor/N.I.N.
Cory Doctorow suggests in 'The Guardian' that the sensible thing to do is have one set of copyright rules for commercial operations and one for non-commercial situations.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/jan/29/copyright.law
Now, there's probably room for some debate, devil's in the details and all that, but seems like a reasonable course of action to differentiate in law between me borrowing a CD and ripping it onto my PC vs a commercial pirating operation that churns out hundreds of stamped CDs.
The plural form of "anecdote" is "anecdotes", not "evidence".
Let's make gas stations and car manufacturers criminally liable for selling gas to bank robbers or manufacturing the getaway cars!
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
created a band and called it U-238....
Not that U2 (the plane) and U-238 (the isotope) have anything in common other than politics of the cold war....
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Now, I don't think that there is a technological solution because any technological countermeasure is more expensive than the countermeasure to the countermeasure. I.e. an ISP might spend thousands of dollars filtering stuff out, and the next generation of P2P services might use HTTPS (maybe by porting protocol functionality to SOAP), SMTP w/SSL, or some other common open standard on the internet. This sort of thing is not difficult to do and in the end such technical measures will fail. Hence the real solution is social. *We* have to decide to help foster a Free Music industry. *We* have to build it. *We* have to show that it can be viable and protect artists.
However, I do agree that until we do build such an industry, that blaming the problem on an outdated business model is a problem primarily because at the moment there isn't really a viable alternative for comprehensive distribution. Once such an alternative is in place, *then* we can watch the music industry go through such a phoenix-like transformation. But to do so before such a system is in place does nothing to create the just system I think we all want to see. Anything else is just an exercise in smoke and mirrors to justify theft. First, copyright infringement is not theft. I maintain that it is something worse than theft because it denies new models in the marketplace a fair chance to compete. In essence, if copyright infringement is "theft" it is a theft of opportunity from those who want to build an alternative means of distribution, not really a theft of money from the owners of the copyright. Hence it is only "theft" in the same way that abuse of monopoly is "theft" (because the net result is actually nearly identical).
Plus it just feels better not to have anything to do with businesses that treat one as a criminal whether one is or not.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Why is the morality irrelevant? I was talking about the difference between legal and illegal distribution. Where is the greater good of illegal p2p filesharing? Is its everyone's right to have the music? What about the rights of the artists in this?
The argument goes that the distribution is through the record companies and their trade bodies. They are manipulative, faceless bodies, that have screwed the artists out of what is rightfully theirs. Therefore downloading the music illegally hits the record companies and that's okay. It doesn't matter that the artists lose their cut as well 'cos its not a lot, comparitively, and anyway you're sticking it to the man.
As I said, weasel words. The argument is flawed. It is unlikely that the current record companies will survive in their current form due to the changes that digital distribution brings. That doesn't mean that its okay to just download stuff without paying anyone for it.
I don't give two stuffs about the constitutional this or that. I'm not a US citizen. I never said anything about having the ISPs snoop your connection for illegal filesharing, or DMCA takedown notices, or such like. These were all you trying to find an emotive way to dodge the principle. Weasel words again.
There is greed at work here. In the case of the record companies yes, but in all of the illegal p2p downloaders too. They want the music but they aren't prepared to pay for it. Its possible to purchase music electronically. Does this mean that illegal traffic will stop? No, of course not. Why pay for something when you can get it for free?
You may think me a tired, old, cynic. I'd have to disagree about the tired bit.
because their music isn't downloaded as much as other people's music, so they want to spoil the party for everyone :-)
I have been purchasing U2's music since the 80s. Guess what, I will purchase no more. I have been a very dedicated fan and have purchased all of their offerings. No more. The Zune deal was ridiculous. Why should a company give record companies money for hardware that they sell? That makes no sense. The record company is just the victim of the fact that we can not be forced to pay for the music again in the latest format. All in all, the file sharing community has helped music quality anyway, as the best music is not (nor ever has been...for the most part) by the biggest name artists. I buy more music today than I did pre-digital and I steel no music. Regardless, I will live without any future U2 music.
that is all.
"It would be pathetic to be good at the music and bad at the business" -Paul McGuinness, numerous occasions No, it wouldn't. But guys, remember, this is U2's manager and not necessarily U2. As a lifelong U2 fan, I can only hope they're looking for a way to make their "5th member" quietly disappear.
Apparently another manager has simply misunderstood the way the internet works.
In other news, water is wet.
If my ISP ever blocked a service because someone used it for illegal purposes I would drop the ISP and find another ISP that *would* allow me to use that service.
I switched my business to only Open Source Software, I deleted any questionable content from my computer, and destroyed all of the CD's friends burned for me after I did a lot of self confrontation one day. I rarely buy music unless it is on CD, and then I immediately rip it onto my computer. I also use bit-torrent to download the software my business runs on. Most of the time, the torrents are provided by the makers of the software.
I never use bittorrent for illegal activity, and in fact rely on it for my business. Why a manager in the recording industry should prevent me from being able to use the tools I rely on is beyond me. And do they honestly think that ISPs will simply add all of the service filtering and packet sniffing without increasing the cost to the general public, or without dramatically slowing down the general speed of the internet?
What would happen if every ISP was required by law to extract packets and test them for copywritten materials? Even if packet filtering only adds a millisecond, I would imagine that would add up VERY fast, and would be increased exponentially by the number of ISP's a single packet might flow through before getting to the intended audience.
Obviously this guy simply does not understand the way the internet works other than how it intersects with the music industry.
I understand that he must have quite a bit of work to do, and the only time he hears of "bittorrent" is when people are reporting the number of albums stolen on it.
Sure, 80% of internet traffic may be stealing music and movies, but let's be honest, if I downloaded all of the text from all of the slashdot archives, a copy of linux, apache, mysql, perl, and whatever else needed to run a server to host slashdot, and also downloaded an illegal copy of lord of the rings, then at least 50% of my internet traffic would have been used for stealing movies.
This is just another reason I wish all the losers on the internet would stop downloading music and movies illegally. I'm going to get screwed out of perfectly legal services that help my business simply because someone wasn't willing to fork over the $15 for a CD.
"Now the trouble about trying to make yourself stupider than you really are is that you very often succeed." -C.S. Lewis
Apple is called out as stealing from U2? This is very funny. U2 is a great darling of Apple pushed many times on U2. There is a U2 autographed ipod. I didn't hear of U2 except for Apple's push on their behalf. I bought a U2 collection as a result. Some stealing. A lot of groups would wish for such "stealing" of their content. I hope U2, a damn fine group, gets rid of this clown before he drives fans and customers away. I would not have bought that U2 collection if I had seen such comments associated with the band beforehand.
It's not explained in the article, nor did I find anything by Googling it.
Are we missing something important here?
theefer
There are rumors that most people have piracy devices at home called Video Recorders, tape recorders, harddisk recorders.
I think it is necessary to turn off their access to TV and Radio. They are all pirates, and because they listen to music from their radio/TV, they causes billions of losses for the record industry.
Cutting people off the Internet is pretty drastic, as this is a necessary means of communicating with government services in modern countries. No Internet = No unemployment money (unless you go to the unemployment office, and use their Internet connected computers)
Can't argue with that.
Paul McGuiness is a 20% equal 1/5th member of U2 with the other members of the band since their earliest days when Bono couldn't even sing properly (pre 'Boy' single version of 'Twilight' anyone? Like someone dropping a ten ton weigh on a moose's foot - what a yelp!). The point of TFA is clear enough. He's a bit cack-handed in suggesting a particular commercial solution but he fully discloses it up front in the speech. (BTW Modding someone to +5 for pointing out something that someone has already disclosed in the speech????? That's the ultimate endorsement for not RTFA!!). But the point of discussion is the principle of what he's saying so lets move on.
U2 have more money than god. Easy to have a pop at them for being so rich. Whatever. No really because this argument also applies to a band with more debt than god on first album release too.
There is a distinction in law between theft and copying / breaching copyright, definitely. Emotive use of 'stealing' will always bring out those who want to make the correct distinction.
However, if you have ever been in a band on a deal releasing commercial product, like I have, then the stuff you put out is your shit which you sweated blood and tears over. If you understand that someone is copying it and not paying you (ultimately) for it, I can tell you it feels without doubt like someone is 'stealing' your shit even if that's not technically correct as a term. That's what it feels like. You can choose to promote, do radio play, give away cd's, play free shows, do whatever you want but if you've put something out for commercial sale it should be respected as such and paid for.
There isn't a games writer, app developer, music producer, fim director, visual artist, comic book artist, actor or writer who *if* they choose to release commercially doesn't want to get paid for their work. That's the definition of why you release something commercially. And they have a right to getting paid for it in civil law everywhere. For all the gloriousness of the interweb and getting hold of material you couldn't otherwise afford or find in a shop or whatever, copying and enjoying the produce of these people without paying when you know that was the basis on which they put it out there IS morally and legally WRONG. It would be really refreshing if a significant maj^H^H^inority of Slashdot readers could at least admit this basic point instead of getting into this mob-justification that somehow that is not the case.
F$*! the RIAA and all the brown-shirted jack-booted ways of enforcement that exist. I'm never up for that. But what the bloke is suggesting is trying to improve the ability of artists in the broadest possible sense to get paid for stuff they release commercially. And that's what those artists all want - they really do. Those that don't can opt out of releasing commercially - you can release for free, you can do all of that.
It would just be nice to see a bit of balance about this and to stick a hand up for reality. With that I shall watch my mod points fall through the floor. The partisan one-sidedness of the +5's on this issue undermine the quality of debate on this issue. I don't have to be 'right' (whatever that means) but its pretty bad when all the argument is one way....
Men I would fire that guy right on the spot if I were U2. This guy obviously doesn't know a thing about illegal download. I mean, ok accuse Apple already its far fetched... but Google and Oracle.. Oracle, how could they care less, how are they in ANY way related to illegal downloading? Because BitTorrent trackers runs they Database on Oracle. Wow this guy is just plain idiot.
I remember reading that U2 had such a good record deal, that the band were guaranteed £3 between them from each record sale. On a CD costing £12-15 retail, that's a hell of a lot. It sucks that their manager thinks that's not enough.
Really? Seems to me it's walking a fine line between extortion, and making sure workers get a living wage.
Plenty of people are willing to work at below reasonable wages when they're desoperate and/or the employers have colluded to keep wages down. There need to be forces on both sides of this argument and unions are one way the little guys can step to the tabl;e and actually have a serious chance at negotiation.
that the pretentiousness isn't limited to just the members of U2.
U2 is the MOST OVERRATED band EVER!
"Please don't put your life in the hand of a rock and roll band,you'll throw it all away"-Oasis
When did we decide that anything Bono and his band of outdated morons had a valid opinion on how to run the world? Let's face it,they're just press darlings and sex objects for any politician who think they're furthering their careers by being "hip",associating themselves with someone the young voter demographic look up to.
The real reality check here is the music industry is outdated and dying and Bono is just trying to save the evil empire for his own gain.We are on the way to a new paradigm where any musician can be heard,not just the ones who suck corporate c**k and get millions in promotional funding while actual talent is passed by because some flunky finds it harder to market than the same old sh*t.Like horse carriage factories were superceded by FORD,so is the industry outdated and becoming just as important.
Music can never be marketed the same way again.The business model doesn't work and it never will again.
I suspect performance,not recordings will be the future of profit for music.
Continuing to force the issue in the courts only creates a battle against the consumer.Talk about "how to win friends and influence people"!
Paying any attention to Bono and U2 is only prolonging the amount of time we have to listen to these has-beens p*ss and moan.
U2 who?
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
"Otherwise they are a blight on society from my experience."
Yes some industries seem to thrive on the blight model, and the ones that do, sometimes manage to provoke unions that allegedly try to protect the worker's rights. Big Coal? Of course I think unions are a thing of the past. Big Media? As it is now, our fearless industrial leaders need merely employ the legislative system to legalize any means of doing business, and outlaw unions as well, so our only protection would seem to be the largess of the corporation. Thank you and good night.
The cost of that cleanup, of course, will be borne by taxpayers, not industry.
McGuiness is such a wanker. Once again, we see cries of foul play coming not from the artists, but from the parasites that depend on the artist for a living.
:-P
He's almost as bad as Lars Ulrich
"Creativity is allowing ones self to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep" - Scott Adams
you too dipwad?
Every single logical argument brought up in the discussion of art leads to one conclusion: Art is opinion. People choose if they like something or not, if they like the person making it or not, if they like the format it was made in or not, etc. so how is it possible to say that one certain creation over another can be priced? On top of all of this, I hate to mention it but you're going to become way overwhelmed once you start in on TRUE copyrights. Who created language? Who created the guitar that you're using? Where do the copyrights for them come from? Who made music in the first place? YOU CANNOT ANSWER THESE QUESTiONS. Too many, too long. Art is art; art is and always will be free. Make me something that cures my cancer. Perhaps define what it means to make a creation that is beneficial to the human race and something that is beneficial to the mood of the human race and perhaps then we can decide what to charge for and what not. Then again, I'm a little nuts but I go off into the grand conclusion that money shouldn't exist. I suppose I was born a few thousand years too early for the grand connection of this human race to come to that quite sound conclusion. It's just not rational enough, yet, kinda like trying to formulate schools in the times of neanderthals beating women until they bore their children. Just can't work yet. But hey, as McGuiness mentioned, one year in "internet time" is like 10 in "non net" time. Maybe we can get the ball rolling even faster in the most proper direction. It would have been nice for those mothers before ours to have a greater source of communication to learn from and utilize. But I'm not concerned about the human race. It will do what it will do, grow in which ways and speeds it desires, and in the end, all that matters is right now, and how broke I am and how much I love music. Sorry, Mr. McGuiness, for thinking the band you represent makes great music, but not being born into a family of monetary convenience. -- Heidi
artists likely get more money from me if i go along to their tour and buy a shirt, than if i buy their whole fucking discography. they get my money and the corps get zilch. everybody wins!
Fair Use: The Story of the Letter U and the Numeral 2 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_Use:_The_Story_of_the_Letter_U_and_the_Numeral_2
"Ladies and gentlemen we are floating in space..."
How fucking old are you, 12?
It's spelled "you", sentences begin with a capital letter, etc., etc. Your really really sucky fucked up spelling and so forth distracts hugely from your argument, however valid or dip-shittedly flawed it may be.
Dickhead.