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Wife of Harried Pirate Bay Witness Gets Buried in Internet Love
treqie writes "During the trial of pirate bay yesterday, a professor (Roger Wallis) took the witness stand. He told the court things that the prosecutors did not want to hear. The prosecutors then tried to discredit both him and his team's work in the area, as well as his title, it was a real spectacle. In the end, the judge asked if he wanted compensation for being there — he replied that he did not want anything, but they could send flowers to his wife. Many listening online heard, and began sending her flowers, from all over the world. As of this submission, the sum is over 40,000 SEK worth of flowers. There's even a Facebook group for it."
Isn't that a bit sticky?
...to the phrase "Flower Power" :D
Laters Sol "Have you found the secrets of the universe? Asked Zebade "I'm sure I left them here somewhere"
This warms my Heat. ROFLOL, ZOMG and Nice Friday feel good thtread ;-)
End of Line.
There's a Facebook group for everything. There's even a Facebook group who's whole statement is that there are too many useless groups on Facebook.
My twitter
Someone might appreciate a link to a sample of his work...
Whenever I do something that pisses off my girlfriend (yes, I'm one of the rare slashdotters with a SO), ask random people on the Internet to send her flowers, giving them her address in between.
On a second thought, do I still have the address of my bitch ex-girlfriend? Hmmmm *punders*
--- "When you gotta do something wrong. You gotta do it right. (Fighter)"
Wife of Harried Pirate Bay Witness Gets Buried in Internet Love
....makes my eyes bleed.
I do not support "The Man". I also do not support your irrational stupidity
When I read the headline, that's not what I pictured. :/
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
can I send a lump of coal to Danowsky, Pontén and Wadsted?
That's just beautiful! Happy anniversary, Roger and Gorel -- and many, many more!
licet differant, aequabitur
40000 kr SEK = $4446.68 USD = €3501.32 EUR
It should be noted that the krona is worth about $0.11, so it ends up being like $4,446. For those of us who purchased long stems for our loved ones last Valentines that comes up to about 3 roses and a plush teddy bear or a handful of Gerber daises and a cardboard and macaroni "I luv U" card.
He proposed half an hour after we met and I said maybe. After a day, he had convinced me.
The music industry should start selling flowers - you can't download those for free! Of course, they'll have to make sure the flowers can't produce any seeds.
Does anyone knows the address of the wife so we can send some flowers too?
And that, my friends, is how you spur on economic recovery. With one sentence, he managed to save the floral industry in his town.
Rules of Conduct:
#1 - The DM is always right.
#2 - If the DM is wrong, see rule #1
you can find her address on the website number. Make sure to gird your loins afterwards.
40 000 Swedish kronor = 4 446.68 U.S. dollars
One of my papers for my MBA was the study of piracy. My study recommended that there is ZERO link between lost revenue and torrent downloads BECAUSE they are from people they would never have done business in the first place. If someone downloads it for free, it's not lost revenue because they were never a customer to begin with. Yet these companies try to stop the 'thieves' who are not even going to become their customer.
My paper also showed that the issue was pirates selling full-priced products as the real-deal, not lost sales from never-would-be-a-customer. Even a bigger issue - these free downloads ALMOST 100% garner interest in these products - so that when they had money, or felt they wished to support a product, the former free-bee turned them into a paying customer to get a new version.
With that kind of data out there, these industry giants are forgetting the #1 tactic of product placement - give it away free, later a client they will be. That's Biz-101. It's obvious these giants are out of touch with reality.
Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things. - Peter F. Drucker
Business is a brutal and if you are not willing to do something like Valve's Steam that gives something for giving up something I have no sympathy. Adapt to the market place and quit complaining.
Before someone yells "Oh my, you could compare the rise of aids cases to lost sales and your graph would look the same" just shut up ok? Just shut the fuck up because you're another useless slashdot tool spouting the same "I HAVE A RIGHT TO STEAL OTHERS WORK" retoric that I've read on this fucking site for the last 10 years. There is a direct correlation between piracy and lost sales, I've seen it. Grow up.
I'm now beginning to feel suspicious of the possibility that you may have an agenda.
40,000 SEK is about $4500
I've seen 8 American karaoke labels die in the last 10 years, and as of now there's only like 3 or 4 left.
Yes, piracy has a direct impact on overall sales but in the grand scheme of things (the actual music market, not the tiny niche you want to show a link to) it doesn't make much of a dent especially when the majority of people don't pirate.
And just as an aside, we can all hope that when the last 3 or 4 die that the entire industry will fall into a pit, burn, and rot the death it deserves. I'm sorry but I don't see the necessity to foster an environment where drunken idiots sing worse than the mediocrity displayed by the original singer/songwriter while other drunken retards cheer them on. That entire fad is pointless, painful, and horrendous for the rest of us that want to drown our sorrows in fucking peace and quiet. /rant.
I don't understand how this fellows testimony as to the relationship between album sales and file sharing is relevant. If they broke the law, they broke the law whether or not the record industry lost money. If they didn't break the law, then they did nothing wrong, even if it did cost the record industry money. Does it not work this way in Sweden?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
...and it's still increasing.
Maybe you should set up a karaoke download web site, where people can pay a non-exorbitant fee to download the tracks they want and then burn them to their own disks. But no, you want them to order original exorbitantly priced karaoke disks--why?--Because you will make more money.
So I guess the easy answer is: Your business is failing, please pick a different one.
1. Karaoke and Karaoke DJs are different than general music and music lovers
2. A lot of times, karaoke covers sound like crap. I don't blame them for pirating.
3. If you're good at replicating other people's creative works without the vocals, consider making music books for Hal Leonard instead.
I can't imagine the decline of karoake establishments being any way related to the rise in popularity of people playing rock band or guitar hero at all. Nope, no sir, no way.
I will agree that if KJ's are stealing commercial Karaoke titles and using that for their own for-profit use, that is wrong and that is theft.
Don't confuse something that was popular in 2002 for being as popular as it is today. I don't see GM blaming their massive down-turn on "car theft is rampant!!!1 zOMG WTF". Time have changed and the consumer is the ultimate decider of what products and services are winners and which are losers.
Why is this a problem? If the people interested in karaoke aren't willing to pay for it, then maybe that niche market doesn't need to exist. If they really wanted the karaoke, they'd pay for it. This is the free market at work.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Selling karaoke CDs to DJs is not the same thing as selling CDs to consumers. It's a different market. Those DJs are using the items whose copyright they infringed to earn a profit, through public performance of the work.
As such, you and those in your industry will have a much easier time tracking down and winning suits against them. Good luck with that.
Meanwhile, don't the venues where the "KJs" perform have to have the music public performance stickers on their doors or face big fines? Why don't you hook up with that group and have them spot check not only the stickers but that the music being publicly performed is a licensed copy?
It doesn't hurt to be nice.
Exciting. You have direct evidence that piracy effects sales. So, I have to assume this, your graph is like this:
Chart type: Stacked bar.
Y axis - Number of albums sold
X axis - Counterfeit items found sold as original (bottom stack), Original items sold as original (top stack)
If your graph isn't built like that, you haven't shown anything regarding piracy affecting sales at all.
Actually, looking at your site, what you've proven is that karaoke sales peaked in 2002, and that posts regarding karaoke peaked in the middle of 2005.
From this we can suggest a correlation that posting more about karaoke reduces sales. Although, the problem is, we've ignored all external factors.
I might suggest a more likely hypothesis: Activities that are enjoyable are not always linked to money spent on entertainment. As more money has been devoted to housing over the exact time period since karaoke sales peaked, less money has been devoted to entertainment, suggesting that as people have less money to spend on entertainment, they spend less money on karaoke. But that they still continue to enjoy the entertainment style of karaoke and that the number of potential customers has increased.
I'd also suggest, based on the sales numbers, that an effort needs to be made by the karaoke industry to exit the personal entertainment spending money business and they to enter other money markets. Like, say, corporate entertainment.
But that's just me. All I know is nowhere have you mentioned the number of counterfeits being sold as originals, which is the only form of direct correlation to lost original sales there is.
Thanks.
HAND.
Those pirates are spending money on flowers instead of our media! Quick, summon the lawyers!
We're all hypocrites. We all have hidden parts, it's the contrast between them that make us more a hypocrite than others
The compensation mentioned wasn't due to the harassment from the prosecutors' side, but rather due to the Swedish legal principle that anyone testifying in court is entitled to compensation for expenses and loss of income.
Bite me. Every karaoke dump I've ever been to, the song list is thousands of songs worth of second-rate crap. You publish a hit or two from an artist, then pages and pages of album filler that nobody cares about. Or worse yet, the song list has the same damn song in eight different arrangements.
If people are pirating karaoke tracks, they're getting their money's worth.
Lost sales can't be measured, so I'm not sure how you can test for a correlation between them and any other variable.
Here, let me give you some education:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_does_not_imply_causation
That's a lovely troll ya got going there.
Unfortunately there is evidence that shows that the necline of Napster directly contributed to the decline in CD sales and visa versa when Napster was in it's glory days. CD sales were skyrocketing during the time of Napster so your "data" doesn't even attempt to make a counter claim.
Don't expect people to just shut up when you present your argument in the manner in which you have. Now we have the days of XM and Pandora, last.fm, magnatunes, and a slew of others to provide us with free music or nearly free music so CD sales aren't as compelling as they once were. Now the only time we buy CDs is when an artist puts out something truly worth while. The days of buying one or two discs a week are simply gone.
Now let's look at your graph again and conclude that people have once again lost interest in Karaoke which I can attest to in all the bars I frequent, people that do it are few and far between these days. Instead I'm seeing guitar hero taking up the music at a number of bars in addition to regular DJ work.
Sorry, there is absolutely nothing compelling about your data. Compare the same numbers against gross per-capita spending during those times and look at a similar decline as the economy slid into where it is today.
Those lovelorn geeks, at least we know their hearts are working as well as their fingers! Very thoughtful.
Perhaps overcharging to a limited group of customers isn't such a bright business plan.
You're essentially selling lame music videos with closed captions.
It makes me wonder if I would be better off getting a DVD of music videos rather than a Karaoke CD.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
You misspelled 'rhetoric'.
There is no -1 Disagree mod. Slashdot.org/faq defines mod options. USE IT.
Not to put too much of a point on it, but the whole correlation vs. causation thing. And is thread count really a good metric for number of lost sales. For your theory to be true you would also need to show a increase in the number of karaoke venues. An alternative hypothesis, could there was a short lived spike in karaoke due to American Idol popularity. As the show has decreased in ratings so did the karaoke.
Cheers.
Shout as much as you want, mate, those stats mean *nothing*. Two lines vaguely in inverse "correlation" for only half the graph (and correlation for the other half, because you "took the sales numbers (like 191.1 mill) and multiplied each of them by 1000 so the line graph would start out somewhat even.", so the actual correlation is between one line and one THOUSANDTH of the other line, which means that the "curve" on sales is barely a blip and perfectly within the error margin of such pathetically collected data) without some sort of context do NOT mean they are linked, in any way, shape or form.
This is why we have professors of mathematics and statistics and why *they* are the ones who are tested in court and found to be reliable and accurate, because they *can* pick out a million faults with your data collection, plotting, analysis, etc. without even having to think about it, prove why you're wrong, and show you the *real* figure. Unfortunately, even most lawyers have no concept of mathematics which is why there are such things as case-law describing how DNA "matches" MUST be worded, tested, analysed and interpreted, because depending on what you measure and how you word the answer you can go from a "one in a billion" match to a "90%" match with the same two sets of DNA data. Look into things like the birthday problem (how many people do you need in a room for there to be a 50% chance of two having the same birthday?) to see how utterly careful you have to be and how atrociously bad humans are at judging probability and statistics.
Your figures (if I *were* to take them as accurate, and replotted them as they should be plotted without arbitrary fiddling) actually show me that there is probably NO correlation at all. I don't know if I believe whether there is a correlation in real life or not, I've not analysed it and I'd be a fool to say I definitely believe either possible outcome in advance, but this man has stood up to a court's test without the opposition managing to debunk his statistics - that holds more than enough water with me.
Good! Now we'll have less morons singing Bohemian Rhapsody, Meatloaf and every other 6-8 minute song that everyone insists on doing because people think they are so original.
I've seen 8 American karaoke labels die in the last 10 years, and as of now there's only like 3 or 4 left.
And if they're product is proprietary, trying to artificially prevent the most natural human tendency[1] in the world rather than encourage sharing and expanding upon what one finds exciting and enjoyable, I say GOOD RIDDANCE!
[1] Yes, I'd call it the most natural human tendency, including procreation, because what is procreation but a prime example of wanting to share what one loves with /who/ one loves, to the mutual pleasure of both, or in some cases maybe I should say all, participants? Further, sharing a work of art or intellect can be argued to be reproduction/procreation.
Duncan
"Every nonfree program has a lord, a master,
and if you use the program, he is your master."
R Stallman
Did you expect no one to click on your link?
You imply a negative correlation (higher postings, lower sales). However, looking at your graph, a positive correlation exists in 2001, 2002, 2004 and 2006... which leaves only a negative correlation in 2003 and 2005. (And both changes from 2002 to 2003 were insignificant, giving you one data point that supports your conclusion).
Furthermore, instead of charting sales in units, you charted sales in dollars. Given that a trivial reading of your source points out the decreasing prices of CDs, and the decrease of new content (11 new CDs in 2007), this seems to make sense. After all, most karaoke is old songs that, once purchased, don't have to be purchased again.
Also, refuting "correlation is not causation" via shouting is pathetic. There are other ways to do so, try one of them.
Your ad here. Ask me how!
As always, I find myself taking a middle-ground line no copyright issues.
First off, the market for Karaoke tracks isn't the same as the consumer market for music. Commercial vs. personal use, for a start. Conclusions drawn by observing the one can't really be applied to the other. (This does not mean that I oppose copyright on consumer music -- I don't, as my post history should make clear. I do think the current system is broken and getting worse, though.)
So addressing the karaoke market... As far as I can tell, the reason copyright infringement in the karaoke business has gotten so bad is:
1) In the past five years, there's been a shift from CD-based to hard-drive-based karaoke systems. This is a vastly superior technology and makes for better, easier-to-run shows, but it does make it easy to copy entire libraries.
2) The karaoke industry has always had misinformation and over-enforcement (or at least the threat of over-enforcement) when it comes to copyright violations. This got worse with the rise of hard-drive-based systems, with many disc publishers claiming that format-shifting tracks you legally own would be a copyright violation.
3) There was a backlash against this misinformation, with the companies that sell software for hard-drive-based systems advertising that copying the discs to hard drive is completely legal -- but not always being careful to say "as long as you own the original disc".
4) A lot of KJ's, like a lot of other small business owners, hear what they want to hear when it gives them the opportunity to side-step thousands of dollars in expenses to build a huge library that will make them more profitable.
Just my observations by way of a bit of perspective: if the compaines making the discs had handled IP issues better, things might not be as bad as they are. That doesn't make piracy right, but it is a lesson that any media company should learn from.
None of that changes the conclusion that in the karaoke disc industry piracy translates to lower demand / lost profits. It is still not reasonable to call each track copied equivalent to a lost sale -- if they payed full price for discs, KJ's would do their best with a smaller library -- but that doesn't make the impact negligible.
When I think of "internet love", flowers are not the first things that come to mind.
You know what? You are right, I have pirated/stolen some music and a couple of games over the years. However, I can honestly say that of the games and music I've stolen, dependent on if it was music or games, MOST of it was either crap that I played for an hour or so before deciding it was utter garbage and wiped it off my PC (games) or it was something I decided was worth purchasing and purchased later on.
(Case in point, the original mystery case file games), I have since bought a yearly subscription from Big Fish and purchased over 20 games from them. Same for HL2, I originally downloaded it, played it, saw how fantastic it was, and then purchased it simply to have access to it.
On the other hand as far as musics concerned, I have downloaded several albums, only to go out and buy the album (usually at a used record store, but that doesn't matter as its a legally purchased copy of the artists work). A majority of the music I download is stuff I originally bought on tape or CD from years back, which has been lost, scratched, had coke spilled on it, got eaten in a tape deck. etc etc etc.
So, if it makes you feel any better, yeah I've stolen music, and I've stolen games. I'm not going to defend it any further than I have, because I don't need. My actions speak for themselves, in certain cases where it's been warranted, my 'thefts' have benefited the very industry that I'm supposedly ripping off. In others, there still hasn't been any damage done to whatever industries were involved because they were already compensated for their work. In the few instances where I downloaded something and didn't pay for it, it simply wasnt worth owning in the first place and my subsequent actions of hitting the delete key proved it.
It is my personal feeling that if I had paid for whatever item it was that I got rid of in short order, that *I* would have been the one who had been stolen from, I paid for entertainment, and wasn't entertained.
Correllation does not imply Causation.
Having seen some of the karaoke subs produced by anime fansubbers, I'm willing to bet that fan made karaoke videos will produce higher quality content than any professional label. In the face of ubiquitous video editing software, your industry has simply succumbed to its own irrelevance.
May the Maths Be with you!
You're trolling, but...I'll feed you.
Karaoke is different from simple music, in that a karaoke vendor is selling tracks to a business who uses those tracks to do their own business. They are directly profiting (in a strictly monetary sense) from your labor. If they were unable to pirate, the karaoke bars would either go out of business or purchase your tracks. This isn't at all the same as someone treating the internet as a personal call-in radio station, and attempting to correlate the two is patent nonsense.
The obvious solution is to sue each and every karaoke bar in small claims court for the value of tracks you believe they have pirated. A disk of tracks costs what, $20-$50? Small claims cost nothing but filing costs and your time. No lawyers are permitted, and it would only take a few snapshots of their catalog of burned CDs to serve as proof and recover your lost income. Stop whining about being a small industry and having no tools. The karaoke bars are the same level of industry as you.
Also, correlation != causation, your methods are suspect, karaoke is not creative work but merely reselling music created by others (parasitic iow), and you definitely have an axe to grind. Your conclusion is completely irrelevant.
...actually isn't as uncommon as you'd think. The cost of renting for some churches is one rose per year.
Attempts have been made in the past to collect on past due rose rent.
Just something to think about, because knowing that means that, unfortunately, this could be used to discredit the professor since he required a legitimately recognized form of payment just to show up in court.
And then is it really piracy if everywhere that they KJ has already paid for a music performance license? I mean, the license has already been paid. Who cares how they got the licensed music? See, when the labels don't get it both ways it somehow seems wrong to you. Maybe you've been brainwashed.
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
Based upon the DJs I've known (non-karaoke, that is), piracy seems to be a standard practice of DJs across the board. The difference is, Karaoke music companies, I imagine, target KJs as their primary audience, whereas the main record industry targets the average end consumer. For them, DJs are as much a means for advertising their product.
Although interesting, I can't imagine your analysis of what is occurring in the Karaoke microcosm of the music industry directly correlates to the industry as a whole, in much the same way that one can't use the anecdotes of the goings ons of one small suburb to accurately reflect the trends of the entire nation. At least not without a good healthy dose of corroborating data to show that such a relationship does indeed exist. Though the karaoke and greater music industries share some of the same trappings, their business practices and revenue streams are indeed unique.
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
Karaoke in America came from relative obscurity, one of those quirky things only "Asians" do. Then 2002 American Idol came out, and now EVERYONE wants to be a star. Karaoke venues started popping up everywhere, but hardly any of them are paying for their karaoke. It sucks, but ya, people steal music on the internet, sales drop for the karaoke labels, we get less karaoke.
This is a commercial venue, so here you can use the argument that they should be paying a license. This would not be covered by fair use. These are people making money off someone else's work. This is the sort of place that should be cracked down on, not people at home who maybe wouldn't ever have paid for the content, and are most certainly not making money off the work. Heck, in the non internet days these people would have probably just recorded it off the radio.
If you want Karaoke bars to pay you, then offer something that represents a fair deal, since they are making money off the music. If you make the price too high, then they will default to unofficial copies.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
"She was very worried before the trial. They questioned my competence and that made her very sad. She hadnâ(TM)t slept for two days," Roger said.
Just goes to show that courage, morality and determination are rewarded. And with that, my faith is restored....
I have left slashdot and am now on Soylent News. FUCK YOU DICE.
Yes,the labels need to get off their high horse and embrace their free advertising.
No, piracy is still wrong.
It's stealing in a moral sense, not a legal sense. But humans don't give a shit if they cheat. We already cheat on something as grave as taxes (which is often a federal offense btw), so why should we expect people to be honest with a piddly copyright?
People are already brazen enough to maraud and embezzle and even hijack, so why should we expect them to have qualms about pirating software?
And often times, people get what they deserve. Pirated software often has malware inside it. Since it's not vetted by the vendor, nobody's going to turn you in for boobytrapping your warez. Who wants to admit to piracy? The customer gets his warez for free, and the pirate gets his machinez. Win win, right?
So anyone that disagrees with you is a pirate thief. How mature of you.
I don't need to call you out on your bullshit, others in that forum have already done it.
Why you have only data up to 2006 is also suspect. I guess because it didn't fit with your "scientific" (lol) graph.
Straw man arguments are lies.
Arrrghhh that be warming the cockles of me heart. Hoist the colors mateys.
Be gone from my sight or prepare to feel my flaming wraith!
Yeah, and if restaurants interested in selling food aren't willing to pay for it, maybe restaurants aren't necessary.
It's not really a valid argument to say that people who run karaoke (and make money doing it) would prefer to not pay for their music, so they shouldn't have to. It's kinda ridiculous, in fact. Greed is never a good justification, even in opposition to the greed of others.
No, they should not shut up becasue your graph is seriously flawed.
You can't take a seriously flawed graph and defend it by telling them to shut up and the toss an ad hominum out there as well.
It is a POOR study and does no one any good.
Yes, the facts our counter intuitive, but you are letting that cause you to ignore important relevant data.
Yes, there is a corrilaiton, but it is turning out there is not any causation.
Learn why that's important.
Fact: Karaoke is a fad.
Fact: That fad is over.
Sure, some people still do it, but then some people still have pet rocks and mood rings.
Next time don't put you carrier in a fad market. or make a carrier out of moving from fad to fad, but do not think that these markets have any staying power.
If you haven't noticed, the music industry does have big labels and they ahve stopped exactly nothing.
If people just wanted to get there music for free, Apple wouldn't have sold over 2 billion songs. all of which are available for free with almost no addition effort.
You need to step away fro your emotional connection and think rationally.
Also, it's copyright infringement, not stealing. There is a fundamental difference between the two. It's still wrong, but it's not the same thing as stealing.
You Are Provably Wrong, deal. If you ahve some actual facts from a reasonable study, please enlighten me.
All the data put out by the music industry has followed economic trends not, in many cases sales have done better then the overall economic trends. Meaning it didn't drop as much as the average economy drop.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Dude, thats awesome. I wish I could make a statement and then say, "Yes, you could say (insert a completely true statement that completely proves that my statement is incorrect), but just shut up, ok?"
With such great debating powers, I can prove anything!!!
I admit to piracy. I have pirated several games in the last couple of years so I could install and play the game without dealing with some seriously invasive and crappy DRM. I buy the game, but that DVD never comes near my PC except for "Insert Disc" checks. I install with my legitimate key, but I install a cleaned version of the game. I support game developers, but I don't support DRM developers. (posting anon because I just modded parent up)
people steal music on the internet, sales drop for the karaoke labels, we get less karaoke.
So, what you're saying is piracy is a good thing?
Econ 101 moron...
If as you rightly state Karaoke is a niche market it certainly isn't large enough to support 12 labels... Hell, there are only 4 recording labels left in the country for MAINSTREAM music...
Niche markets have 1 or 2 dominant players and everyone else dies... that is what a niche market is.
It's not a troll as such it's more like:
Man in fas industry thrashes arounf wildly for any excuse to blame someone else for his dimming future.
really, this is like a pet rock* salesman thinking people picking up free rocks is why his sales are declining.
Yes I actual bought in back in the day. It was on a leash and for my girlfriend. we were in 6th grade. She gave me a life long hatred for Fonzie.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
1) Sales in $ != Units sold. Prices have changed over the last 10 years.
2) New to market releases change every year, there were significantly less releases in 2006 then there were in 2003.
3) Consumer trends vary. There was a boom in the karaoke market in the early 2000's, that trend has slowed over the last few years.
4) External market forces abound. It's hard to justify buying a new CD for a hobby/part time job when your day job is in jeopardy due to an economic slow down.
5) Pirated copies != lost sales. If the person wasn't going to buy the product anyway, you haven't lost anything. That doesn't make it right or legal, but it doesn't effect your sales or profits.
6) Newsgroup posts != pirated copies. Claiming so is just silly, that's like trying to prove a correlation between Windows sales diminishing because of Linux usage based on the number of posts on SlashDot.
Honestly, your post comes off as inflammatory, uneducated, and highly emotional. If you can maintain a profitable business model, go for it. If you can't, look for an alternative business model or get out of the industry.
Personally, I don't see a great need for the Karaoke label industry since it is relatively easy to filter out vocals from most pop/country music of CD's we already own. And if you try telling me that doing so is a violation of copy rights I will point you to the base/midrange/trebble/volume/fade/balance filters that are on almost all car radios. Broadcasting those filtered recordings to the public may be a violation of copy rights.
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
There are a whole bunch of different "pirate" groups out there.
Those that just out and out steal (yes it is appropriate, because it means taking something without paying, regardless of the lack of a physical item taken).
There are those that justify it by saying, "Oh it's OK I wouldn't have bought it anyway"
there are those that claim "there is no such thing as intellectual property" and take it because they can see it.
There are those that claim that "Oh it's OK I'm just trying it before I buy it."
There are those that take it saying "It's over priced and I won't pay that much for it." Here's a hint on this one. If it's over priced "Don't buy it". If you want it it is worth paying for, other wise it obviously isn't valuable to you and you don't get to have it. No matter how you justify, or perhaps rationalize it it is still not right. There is no real reason to take something without paying what is asked. You can try to negotiate and get it cheaper, or not buy it and they eventually lower the price but you don't get to have it anyway. I wish people would see this and stop rationalizing this stuff. The pirate bay is not guilty here because they are not the people stealing stuff. They at the worst are helping people find stuff to steal, but that has never been illegal as far as I can tell.
Why bother
Yeah, and if restaurants interested in selling food aren't willing to pay for it, maybe restaurants aren't necessary.
That's exactly right.
It's not really a valid argument to say that people who run karaoke (and make money doing it) would prefer to not pay for their music, so they shouldn't have to.
If they don't pay for their karaoke, there won't be any more karaoke made. Then there will be no karaoke, and these people won't be making any money. If that's the choice they make, why should we intervene?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
In this sentence you stated exactly why unauthorized copying is not theft: nothing is taken from the owner. The right car analogy would be taking a picture of a car, not stealing it.
To think a teen who has a million dollars worth of media in his computer would have bought that with his $100/week allowance is dumb.
I'm sure the wives of the Prosecutors must feel overlooked. Does anyone have any suggestions as to what to send them?
Before someone yells "Oh my, you could compare the rise of aids cases to lost sales and your graph would look the same" just shut up ok? Just shut the fuck up because you're another useless slashdot tool spouting the same "I HAVE A RIGHT TO STEAL OTHERS WORK" retoric that I've read on this fucking site for the last 10 years. There is a direct correlation between piracy and lost sales, I've seen it. Grow up.
No, no. I think you're on to something here. I'm going to plot the rate of "piracy" (heck - even piracy) and the decline of auto sales. Piracy just might be undermining the auto industry as well!
You're essentially selling lame music videos with closed captions.
except that with music videos you at least get, ya know, video.
there is evidence that shows that the necline of Napster directly contributed to the decline in CD sales
Correlation != causation. The decline of Napster could have coincided with increased public awareness of MP3s and file sharing, and the rise in alternative services like Kazaa.
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
I'm gonna get modded into oblivion. I don't care if you downmod me. I know what slash is all about.
He was questioned on the link between the decline of album sales and filesharing. Wallis told the court that his research has shown that there is no relation between the two.
What his research has shown is that the music industry has a tendency to kick and scream at every new technological advancement, but they [the music industry] survive when they reinvent themselves. And his point is that this time is no different.
Instead of putting words in his mouth and arguing against the arguments you just made up, argue against the real point he was making.
Or perhaps you're disillusioned because something got lost in translation. (I'm a native Swede, so I can read the transcript).
So, would a KJ have to pay several hundred dollars for a cd because it is intended for use in public performances? That's somewhat different than the market for consumer CDs. It's also less defensible(morally and legally) because they are using to make money.
I don't mind Adobe going after companies for pirating their product. I think it's retarded(though more or less within their right) for them to do the same with individual end users. I'm not sure if that would be analogous.
It's Lidingö - that's an "o" with two dots over it.
See here:
http://yodo.se/wallis/
I don't know what the fuck 99% of that site says, but the following near the bottom seems pretty clear! -
"Thanks to all of you who have sent flowers to the Wallis. But enough is enough. With flowers, vases, teddybears and chocolate for over $5000 they allready got more than they can handle."
Of course I'm sure dropping a message or something may be a nice gesture to show your support, that or a cheque for a small amount to not buy an RIAA affiliated music CD with or something ;)
There were plenty of times where I wanted a copyrighted product (movie, song or app) and decided pirate it instead of buy it because it was more convenient. Had it been difficult to find said copyright material online, I would have gone out to the store to buy it. In these circumstances the sales were lost because it was a hassle for me to drive to the store to buy the product.
Going to the store consists of having to get dressed, fight traffic to drive to mall, find parking in a crowded parking lot, walk to the store, find the product on the shelves, stand in line to pay for it, walk back to my car, and fight traffic on the drive home, -a process that takes several hours. Instead, in that same amount of time, I can torrent it and spend the time doing something else, fun like watch TV or play a game, or get some work done. To me, that's a no-brainer more efficient use of my time.
Also, why would I pay for a product when there is an easily obtainable copy available for free? Sure, I'd like to support the artists and developers, but I have to watch out for my own pocketbook too. This may make me a sleazebag, but that's just the way I am. Not gonna get much sympathy from me if it means separating me from my hard earned cash. If the pirating option was not available to me, I'd be a paying customer, and the RIAA realizes that this is true for a lot of people as well, which is why they're fighting so hard with underhanded tactics.
They must be feeling left out,
maybe we could send them a bouquet of fragrant turd blossoms?
Yeah, I've seen this.
You have a window of about 3-4 months to sell karaoke versions before they are sufficiently pirated and people stop buying them.
I went into software after that. Nowadays I rip off open source code, change the license, obfuscate it a little and re-sell it. Copyrights are so last century.
I call upon the mighty mods above to smite thee and all thy trollish accomplices!!!
Wanna take bets on how many of those orders were done with stolen credit card numbers?
There is even a web page in english, where people can report what they give. Near the bottom of the page is a list of articles from around the world about this. There has even been written a tribute song to him after his testimony, which Wired covered here.
And this court case has really helped the Pirate Party of Sweden. During the last week they have gotten over 1000 new members, which makes them the second-largest opposition party (in member count) in Sweden. Their youth organisation has also grown to become the second-largest political youth organization in Sewden.
It sucks, but ya, people steal music on the internet, sales drop for the karaoke labels, we get less karaoke.
See, piracy is good. Yea, less karaoke!!
"Business is a brutal and if you are not willing to do something like Valve's Steam that gives something for giving up something"
Are you referring to Steam giving DRM for giving up your rights? :p
While technically accurate the period in question involved a brief shutdown of napster due to court injunction and subsequent reinstatement.
More to the point, I was counterclaiming the parents assumptions and was not attempting to prove my example. The reference I made was to a slashdot posting a few years ago on the topic of Napster. You are right in that the decline of Napster and the decline of CD sales are not necessarily directly linked although I do think that they are. It's just hard to prove on any scale so I won't fault anyone for thinking otherwise.
Here's some evidence to back up what I've stated.
Kazaa cropped up shortly after all this happened so it's not linked to the issue at hand but there could indeed be one or many other external factors not being considered such as the quality and quantity of albums released during those times.
If one assumes that copyright is moral, then yes. If one assumes that copyright is immoral, then no. If one makes no assumptions about the morality of copyright, then it comes down to whether one considers breaking law immoral in itself.
For the vast majority of people, breaking copyright is right there with jaywalking at 3 at morning: technically illegal, but not bloody likely to hurt anyone. And that's just for straight-up copying; but what about derived works? What about sites like fanfiction.net? Are they morally wrong? They certainly are in gross violation of copyright law, being full of derived works.
Actually, since pirate groups usually strip off the DRM malware added by the vendor, pirated software tends to be safer. An off-the-shelf software might disable your CD burner or copy of Daemon Tools, but I've never heard of a rip from a reputable warez group doing anything like that.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
They seem to think falling sales == piracy
Beause they can't measure piracy, they assume it must be going up.
And so this assumption then causes a correlation between falling sales and their assumption of increasing piracy.
But, as you so wisely said, correlation != causation.
So go tell them that.
I mentioned this trial the other day to my parents and they mentioned having seen one article about it on the BBC early last week. Let's use this to draw more public attention to the case.
Send her flowers, more and more flowers till every news organization in the world covers the story (it's exactly the sort of fluff they would like) and then of course they're likely to go into the trial; after all why is she receiving all these flowers? Gonna be harder for to fuck the pirate bay when more than just tech nerds are following the shamble of a trial.
Sorry Wallis...
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/02/26/pirate_bay_neo_nazi/
The pirates bay, now with less nazi.
Wow. This sort of thing gives me hope for the world and life in general seems a bit brighter.
Nah! I'm BS-ing ya. Everything sucks! ;-)
[1] Yes, I'd call it the most natural human tendency, including procreation, because what is procreation but a prime example of wanting to share what one loves with /who/ one loves, to the mutual pleasure of both, or in some cases maybe I should say all, participants?
No, that really doesn't make any sense.
I don't love my jizz, but I'm quite happy to share it with any and all women who are interested. I don't need to love them. Hell, I don't even give a shit what their names are.
So for a typical male, it has nothing to do with a thing you love or a person you love.
Um, dude, Americans stopped doing Karaoke a long time ago. Now they just do "karoke". *rim shot*
I can see it now! If Pirate Bay wins, every one will start sending the Music bosses "A bunch of pansies" with a note saying "Sorry! for stealing your music. Hugs and kisses The Pirates" :D:D
Laters Sol "Have you found the secrets of the universe? Asked Zebade "I'm sure I left them here somewhere"
But karaoke bars are actually fun.. you rent out a room, get some finger foods and drinks, and have fun with your friends. IMO it's much more enjoyable than going to watch a movie, or just sitting at a bar with friends.
"Action without philosophy is a lethal weapon; philosophy without action is worthless."
EmptyFlowerBed.rar -- Please seed. thx!
Valve's Steam has DRM but they've slowly earned the trust they have. I go through computers at quite a high rate, and just with my username and password have managed to have my bought games up and running within minutes on every PC I have ever used, whether on Windows or Linux. I've been running Counterstrike off there for a decade, and never once have I been restricted in how many installs, or what operating system I can install on. The prices are reasonable on there too. Steam is the only instance that springs to mind of DRM done right.
Phillip.
Property for sale in Nice, France
Given the above, I don't know what we can say from the data - probably nothing.
"I know what slash is all about."
This is slashdot.
Slash refers to something very, very different.
Now, if you actually meant that you're really into Kirk/Spock fanfic, I apologize for misinterpreting your post.
Back in the day, when we were all PFYs, we joked that nobody on Slashdot had a girlfriend, and it was mostly true. Some of us probably did live in our parents basements back then. That was a long time ago. I'm going to hit forty soon. Almost all of us moved out of our parents basements and got wives a long time ago. But we still like to joke about the good old days. And because, you know, there's a new generation of PFYs that the jokes still apply to.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
the first rule of Statistics Class is:
correlation does not imply causation
I've seen 8 American karaoke labels die in the last 10 years, and as of now there's only like 3 or 4 left. /end rant.
Karaoke labels?
WTF?
It's other peoples' music with their words scrolling on a screen. How can you have multiple labels in that non-industry?
You can't take the sky from me...
Seriously - you may not agree with what the prosecutors are doing, you may not even like them. But it's nothing to do with their wives and families. Leave them out of it.
This is an academic that is being *asked* to give up his valuable time to help the State in a case. Trying to destroy his reputation is completely unacceptable. To the professor, giving evidence in this trial is just a brief inconvenience whilst he pursues his career. Instead it turns out he was very brave to take on an organisation that acts like the mafia. His wife deserve those flowers, and the Pirate Bay have scored a massive victory in swinging public opinion in their favour.
Phillip.
Property for sale in Nice, France
HA, many "Karaoke Labels" had no rights to a lot of the songs they added to their cd+g's. It is not difficult to create a CD+g either, the software to attempt vocals removal is pretty pervasive. I bet you can find more tools for creating a karaoke cds or mp3s then you can find for playing them.
This niche market was mostly built up by piracy.
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
There is a direct correlation between piracy and lost sales, I've seen it. Grow up.
There is also a direct correlation between the lack of pirates and global warming.
All of this piracy is saving the planet So grow up and get over it.
In times of universal deceit, telling the truth gets you modded -1 Troll
...yes, I'm one of the rare slashdotters with a SO
Significant Odor?
steal (yes it is appropriate, because it means taking something without paying, regardless of the lack of a physical item taken).
No, it is not appropriate because you are NOT taking something away from someone.
When my old cassette from a movie soundtrack got chewed up by the tape deck and I couldn't buy the CD because it was out of print and there was 0% chance that it would come back in print, finding those songs through "piracy" was not stealing, because they won't take my money even when I drive downtown and try to give it to them.
They are stealing from me by denying me access to the cultural elements that interest me.
And I don't want to buy the crap I keep hearing on the radio every time I walk into a shop, I demand reparation for the mental anguish caused by having their crappy tunes stuck in my head! A thousand US dollar per iteration of that suffering... I figure I'm owed a few millions, to say the least.
You can't take the sky from me...
Oh my, you could compare the rise of aids cases to lost sales and your graph would look the same!!!!
Oh and FTR the karaoke market won't die as long as demand exists, there will be casualties but thats darwinian evolution in the business world.
Wow out here on the east coast, Karaoke had a big upswing. I can tell you where you can go any night to find it. I think Guitar Hero and Rock Band may have had much to do with the karaoke comeback. Unfortunately good live music seems to be suffering. All anyone is hiring these days are cover bands and DJ's. The lack of interest in anything original is very depressing.
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
Indeed, car theft is GOOD for car companies. Obviously, the person who has had his car stolen (and not recovered) is going to need another car, which will likely be purchased for him by his insurance company. If the car IS recovered, theft is still good for the car company. In most instances, there is some significant damages done to the car in the act of stealing it. Replacements parts must be bought.
I presume you're being facetious, but just in case you aren't...
Broken Window Fallacy
In times of universal deceit, telling the truth gets you modded -1 Troll
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Then riddle me this, Batman.
I used to buy some 30-50 CDs a year ( collection is around 500 or so ). I have been buying at the rate 2-3 a year over the past 8 years or so and I have NO pirated material. How come? Because it all sucks. American Idol garbage and Rap Crap.
Pirates don't pirate because they're selfish bastards; they pirate because they disagree with the company's practices, the state of the industry, or because they can't afford it. In addition, a lot of the time, piracy actually spreads the interest of the product to the people who wouldn't spend money on it, developing a stronger presence in the world for the company and its product.
People speak with their money. Due to the absurd prices and actions of the record industry, music is pirated. Yet, these same people go out of their way to send flowers internationally for the wife of a man who was harassed in court. It's not that people aren't willing to spend money; they just refuse to deal with unreasonable prices and corrupt companies. This international gesture of Flower Power makes that clear.
Correlation does not imply Causation. Look up Pastafarianism. Statistics show that the recent surge in global warming, earthquakes, hurricanes, and other natural disasters has a striking correlation to the shrinking numbers of (literal sea-faring) pirates since the 1800s. To further this correlation, Somalia has the highest number of Pirates AND the lowest Carbon emissions of any country. Time for a reality check, record companies. It's not music pirates that are digging your grave; it's you.
Funny how different parts of the country are. Here in the southwest and back in my home state of VT Karaoke is not dead but certainly not terribly popular. Of course in both places as well there is no shortage of good original music. I'm going to go see someone sing tonight actually and it will be all original music.
I've also found that its more popular among people that don't have a lot of money. You're more likely to find karaoke in dive bars for example. So my experience may be jaded by the fact that I've been in more expensive places lately.
I agree in principle, but Steam is a poor example. I'm most certainly not willing to give up what Steam is asking for in exchange for the benefits.
And the second is :
Causation implies correlation.
"don't the venues where the "KJs" perform have to have the music public performance stickers on their doors or face big fines? Why don't you hook up with that group and have them spot check not only the stickers but that the music being publicly performed is a licensed copy?"
They already do that, i'am a DJ and after performing at most large scale venues, i have to fill in a form stating every track i played and which record label its on.
Somehow I think a link to a story describing the content of the court room or what was questions the witness was asked would make this story more interesting. Can someone provide this link? or did I just miss it?
Making a decent-quality CD+g is considerably harder than you think.
Sure, it's (sometimes) easy to suppress the vocals.
Now get the words on the screen to sync correctly and smoothly. This is one of the big differences between the quality of discs even among the well-known labels (and probably has as much as "lost sales to piracy" to do with why some of them failed).
I confess....when I was younger, and pet rocks were the fad, I found one in the wild and domesticated it myself.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Three weeks ago I read in a forum about a Tindersticks concert in my country (Portugal).
I do not know them before. The forum thread had some videos from youtube that let me very curious about. I went to wikipedia, saw the discography and after that I downloaded 2 or 3 albums from "illegal" sources. After hearing I was so fascinated that I immediately bought a ticket for the concert. Amazing concert !
Never had the opportunity to go (and buy) to the concert without internet, youtube and "illegal" downloads.
PS: Sorry for my bad english
Before someone yells "Oh my, you could compare the rise of aids cases to lost sales and your graph would look the same" just shut up ok? Just shut the fuck up because you're another useless slashdot tool spouting the same "I HAVE A RIGHT TO STEAL OTHERS WORK" retoric that I've read on this fucking site for the last 10 years. There is a direct correlation between piracy and lost sales, I've seen it. Grow up.
I'm now beginning to feel suspicious of the possibility that you may have an agenda.
He probably doesn't, but I'll bet his employers do.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
It's not flied lice ... it's fried rice, you plick !
Bonus points for naming the movie where that quote came from ;-)
I confess....when I was younger, and pet rocks were the fad, I found one in the wild and domesticated it myself.
I also. But then the little hardcase hit me on the back of the head and took my wallet.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Good! Now we'll have less morons singing Bohemian Rhapsody, Meatloaf and every other 6-8 minute song that everyone insists on doing because people think they are so original.
I think they pick songs like that (and let's not forget Bye Bye Miss American Pie) because they get to be up on stage and hear the sound of their own voices for that much longer.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
So, if it makes you feel any better, yeah I've stolen music, and I've stolen games.
So, in other words, you broke into a store or a warehouse and physically removed said goods without authorization?
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
You are forgetting that had they not spent that money on flowers, it could have otherwise been spent breaking RIAA lawyer's windows instead. Let's not forget basic economics here, please.
What is meant as "theft" is not what I gain, but what I take away from you. If you teach me something, you are not forgetting what you taught me, are you? I gained something valuable, you lost nothing.
Or are you saying every student steals from his teacher?
You may think this is off-topic but..
We're supposed to care about some minor shit like downloading music from a bittorrent site because it's bad but the very people who are telling us it's 'naughty' are invading foreign countries and murdering people to steal their oil.
There's a single operating space for morality; there isn't 'morality for governments' and 'morality for subjects', there's just 'morality'.
Lead by example you corrupt pieces of shit!
</rant>
Requiem for the American Dream
The lesser of two evils is still evil, much like you being a black pot doesn't give the kettle a right to be black as well.
Unless you have failed to notice, the system of money exchange is a global, catastrophic failure which leads to economic slavery and villainy. By its very nature, it must self-destruct.
The notion of sharing energies is the only one which really works, which is why it has been demonized from without and destroyed from within with enormous social programming efforts. If people start sharing, it threatens the system which keeps the elite in power. There is a reason there is such a huge fight going on over copyright. People are seeing that when things are shared openly, certain universal principals come into effect; somehow everybody, both producer and recipient benefit despite all the clever, fear-based economic theory. --I've seen many examples on both the small and large scale. The fear just isn't validated.
--As a result, I produce tons of stuff for free because I LIKE to. And amazingly, this has led to many non-linear rewards to the point where I have been able to quit my formal job. I was nervous at first, but after the years add up, the emergent pattern becomes impossible to ignore. When you do what you love and you do it well, you can't fail. It's like a theory of motion or energy or something. It might be both.
People like money because it feels safe, but that's only because they've never known anything different and they've been hammered with endless streams of propaganda and education on the matter and all the connected matters. The paradigm of fear and selfishness doesn't work unless people are strictly controlled. But that system is going to collapse. People will have to learn new systems, and those systems, if people want to survive, will require human contact, love, and the concept of sharing openly without immediate reward. New systems will almost certainly involve wealth markers of some kind; there will always be power-mongers and so there will be continuing problems with slavery and abuse and cycles of collapse. But whatever happens, I can guarantee, people will still make food, art and everything in between, and those who do it well, will always have the option of living in comfort. Why? Because we love them!
The old system is a giant, hideous failure which can only be endured when people either live in a neurotic state of discordant awareness where they don't think about global slavery, --or if they are broken inside and WANT there to be slavery.
Move over. There's something better on its way.
-FL
Are are you trying to pass on one of those subliminal naming conventions like "Mike Hunt" or "Buster Hymen"?
The American generic notion of "fair use" does not exist in Swedish copyright law. The current Copyright Act (which dates from 1960, but has been amended several times since) instead lists a number of exceptions to copyright which may or may not apply in certain situations; here are a few of them:
... the list goes on. Some of these situations may be listed in the U.S. Copyright Act as well (I haven't checked), but for those that aren't, I suppose a defense of fair use could be tried.
As long as we discuss "two people", the relevant exception here would be private use (Article 12 of the Swedish Copyright Act). As has been pointed out by AC above, this is a bit hard to claim when someone makes copies for thousands of recipients. However, as the Bittorrent protocol may just as well involve thousands of people making one copy each for another person, I'd say this defense would actually have some merit, depending on other circumstances. If everybody is allowed to make a single copy, you can't prosecute a thousand people for doing exactly that just because the net result is the same as if one of them had made all the copies. Neither can you prosecute someone else for contributing to a collective act which itself doesn't constitute infringement.
However, this particular defense happens to be moot in the TPB case, because the prosecutor dropped the "contributing to the making of copies" charge already on the second day of the trial. The charge that remains is "contributing to making works available to the public", which is a different kind of infringement, and that does not come with an exception for private use!
This still doesn't mean the TPB guys will be found guilty, because it's the "contributory" part that seems difficult to prove. Making works available to the public, that's traditionally what a radio station may do, and the kind of "contribution" to that which would correspond to the Pirate Bay is to publish lists of radio stations, their frequencies and broadcast schedules free of charge. And one of those radio stations may actually be operated by King Kong in Cambodia, who hasn't even been called to the witness stand. Illegal or not? The court should tell. Will the World Radio & TV Handbook be next?
I've seen 8 American karaoke labels die in the last 10 years
and there was much rejoicing.
Property is theft.
I'd like to start by pointing out that I'm not a music pirate - I've bought the sum total of 2 CDs in my life and I own coming up to 3000 songs bought from iTunes. I write code for a living so I'm a firm believer that it's Wrong[tm] to copy stuff without paying for it.
That said, if you've been on slashdot for 10 years you must know that correlation is not causation. You need to do research where you change one variable and observe the effect on the other.
Side-bar: in a psych class we were shown the compelling correlation between number of churches in an area and crime in that area. Does this prove that churchgoers are criminals? It ended up being the affluence of the area (of which churchgoing was an indication).
There are other examples like number of bananas imported into a country and the level of bad mental health (bananas go up, mental health goes up).
Reasoning people are simply not going to listen to you when you bring up a correlation as your 'proof' (normal people on the street might, but certainly not someone who has a scientific background). Has it occurred to you that things like Rock Band and Guitar Hero are giving people what they want in their homes? It's not traditional karaoke but it's fulfilling a similar need. They've sold millions of copies & they let you get together in a group now
Global symbol "$deity" requires explicit package name at line 2. - If only $scripture started "use strict;"
I've seen 8 American karaoke labels die in the last 10 years, and as of now there's only like 3 or 4 left
You say that like it's a bad thing!
Lethal Weapon 4. Please send the bonus points to the Wife of Harry^Hied Pirate Bay Witness.
You aren't like my friends.
We'd far far rather sit at a bar where we can actually talk, hear each other, and not have to put up with someone that only thinks they can sing bleating out some song so crap that we think the world would be better off had it never been written in the first place.
I think I'm going to have to completely back the AC in his desire that "the entire industry will fall into a pit, burn, and rot the death it deserves."
In the meantime I'll continue my policy of walking out of any establishment that begins karaoke while I'm in it.
It was nice of you to not mention the drop in interest in Japan with Karaoke and it maybe having something to do with the reduction of completition.
Or perhaps the possibility that the karaoke formats out there require expensive or bulky equipment in alot of cases or conflicting formats for the equipment. Its alot easier the just download it all to a laptop and use that. Hell even the process of getting discs and ripping them onto a laptop it a royal pain. Its easier to download and use. But noone offers that model. If there was a viable downloadable alternative and a standard format across the industry they may have a chance.
You also don't happen to mention the mergers of those labels or the fat that the labels themselves are trying to put their competitors out of business.
Karaoke technology is even more behind the times that the music industry.
I think your troll label is appropriate. You focused on possible casue for the reduction of the labels and made sure your research gave you the answer you want.
Way to go fucker.
Perhaps he stole at a retail level.
Xavier Rabourdin for president 2012
Copyright laws are in place to protect Intellectual Property (IP) but the latter is a curious animal. Consider this: I pay $4600/year in tax property for my house and I don't make any money by being a house owner. But IP holders don't pay anything for that kind of property, yet they can send a man to jail for "stealing" (=copying) it, even if the "criminal" doesn't sell it. Moreover, the IP holders can make a virtually unlimited number of copies of their property and sell them for profit. That applies to books, music, movies, software, patents. If this is really a new type of property, why was there never a referendum on how it should be dealt with? Why are commercial entities such as RIAA in charge with enforcing laws that a large number of people seem to disagree with? Why is Intellectual Property not subject to taxation?
I was just wondering, could Slashdot become any more biased in the stories it covers on the trial? Every single story is on the side of the Pirate Bay. Now we actually get one where we're supposed to feel sorry for the poor, beleaguered witness whom the prosecutors tried to discredit--the horror, a prosecutor doing what prosecutors do! Those big, mean prosecutors actually caused people to send flowers!
I, for one, hope the people operating the most widely known torrent tracker network in the world get away scott-free so we can continue to rip artists off and not pay them for their work. Let's keep our fingers crossed, eh, Slashdot?
My favorite justification from pirates is the "obsolete business model" argument. It's like you are purposely ignoring that iTunes and other online music stores have existed for years.
Your piracy has nothing to do with business models. It's just a selfish act of getting something without having to pay for it. I know you and other pirates invent entire belief systems trying to justify it, but it's all a flimsy foundation to make you not feel guilty. "I'm not the bad guy--the RIAA is for their, uh, 'obsolete business model!' Yeah, that's it!"
No wonder you posted anonymously.
Those companies should try something novel, like expanding their offerings. For instance, find me one legitimate source for "Flight of the Conchords" karaoke songs or B side Cure songs from the 80's.
Also, from my experience, most karaoke websites and disks are set up in a very "to the trade" format. The companies don't have a good presence with the end consumer (the singers). They don't market to them either. Ignoring your customers usually does not bode well for you business future.
If karaoke is taking off like you say, it seems to me that the companies should be adapting their methods to reach the new audience. If they are not, they are acting just like the RIAA and digging their own graves. A particularly neat trick because they can dig so furiously without displacing any of the sand piled around their heads.
When the only tool you have is a claw hammer every problem starts to look like the back of someone's skull.
(on SEK and SEKS) All you need to know is that one can be used to purchase the other.
Actually, that is illegal in Sweden ;-)
What does that have to do with anything? ;-)
Karaoke bars are built specifically for karaoke. You rent out a room with some friends and it's like your own private studio.
"Action without philosophy is a lethal weapon; philosophy without action is worthless."
Mate, the artists are not the ones suing.
But nice rant.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Avast Ye Landlubbers, check out my CARTOON about the Pirate Bay Trial http://www.pcdisorder.com/2009/03/pirate-bay-trial-almost-over-before-it.html
Soluto - Mapping PC Frustrations one machine and one user at a time.