Slashdot Mirror
RIAA Says No Mystery In Rash of College Complaints
Doug Lederman writes "As colleges receive exploding numbers of complaints from recording companies about alleged illegal downloading of music files, theories abound about whether the industry is changing its criteria, aggressively targeting users who merely make downloaded music available to others rather than actual infringers. But after weeks of silence, the president of the RIAA says No: Better technology, he asserts, is merely resulting in better enforcement."
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
Note that the RIAA is no longer referring to MediaSentry as its "investigator", instead referring to it as a "contractor" or a "vendor". I wonder if they think that will make their legal problems go away.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
You never know what you'll catch.
You are in violation of Epic Records' copyright of Cheap Trick's song Surrender. Their lawyers will be contacting you shortly.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
"The actus reus of theft is usually defined as an unauthorised taking, keeping or using of another's property which must be accompanied by a mens rea of dishonesty and/or the intent to permanently deprive the owner or the person with rightful possession of that property or its use ."
/. 101 stuff.
It is not theft. You have *not* deprived the original owner of his/her property or use. It is copyright infringement. Sheesh.. I thought that was
The CD cost has to support not just the artist but also the promotion and distribution of that album ...which they will charge to the artist in their corrupt and insane fraudulent contract schemes, ensuring that actual profit on the artist's part will only come about from tour/merchandise/product endorsement sales (and the MafiAA will even try to get most of THAT money too)...
...which they don't do any more, instead we get mass-pushed crap of the latest Britney "boobjob" Spears/Hannah Nopantsa/K-Fed/Snoop Crapping Dogg/Cop Killa Ni**a Wannabe Poser/etc etc, courtesy of the payola system ensuring there's no decent music on the radio without shelling out $50/month for satellite radio (wonder how much stake the MafiAA had in THAT plan)...
...nope, they don't gamble or give new acts a chance any more, they wait until someone gets youtube/net buzz for free and THEN try to enslave them...
plus there has to be enough revenue left over to support the label's business of representing new acts in the hope that one of them will be successful
to find that one act that people will really like they have to gamble
I think it's a fair bet their business model will have to adjust
Most of the ARTISTS are even saying this - in other words, the SLAVERY of the crappy contracts, of the constant accounting FRAUD by the MafiAA companies, needs to end.
but to say that the cost of that $20 CD is limited just to the per-copy production cost of the disc itself is not at all realistic.
Actually as far as the labels are concerned, it is. If the artist were actually getting the money, and I was satisfied I was buying a good product, great. The problem is, the MafiAA pays the artists what amounts to less than minimum wage after all the chargebacks and accounting fraud, and THEN piles it on by locking the artists into contracts for years with no way out to seek a better deal, AND then holds them hostage when they've got 1 CD to go by refusing to accept the last offered CD unless the band/artist signs their soul on for another series under the gun. End result? The artist is getting less than 1 cent of the money from that $20 CD, and any other actual services involved (studio time, mixer, etc) are getting likewise hosed.
Artists I like who've put stuff up to purchase/download themselves? GREAT. Love it, have purchased on a regular basis.