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Sony Raises Price of Whitney Houston's Music 30 Minutes After Death
First time accepted submitter M.Nunez writes "Just 30 minutes after Whitney Houston died, Sony Music raised the price of Houston's greatest hits album, 'Ultimate Collection,' on iTunes and Amazon. Many technologists, including chairman of the NY Tech Meetup Andrew Rasiej, suggests that Sony should be boycotted for the move. In a tweet, Rasiej wrote, 'Geez Sony raised price on Whitney Houston's music 30 min after death was announced. #FAIL...We should boycott Sony.'"
Bunch of f-ing assholes.
Tacky? Sure. Taking advantage of the situation? Yup. But they have a right to make money for their product.
When an artists dies, many people rush right out to purchase that artist's work. It's as if people think they suddenly won't be able to get it again now that the artist is dead.
I've been boycotting them for years, starting with their rootkits on CDs, which should have been charged as a criminal act.
Remember the Alamo, and God Bless Texas...
This article is assuming we shouldn't have been boycotting Sony already.
Silly people... why do they need so much time to learn?
Since when is it illegal to price your product to make as much of a profit as possible? (That's not what's generally meant by "price fixing," by the way.)
How can we continue to believe in a just universe and freedom to eat crackers if we have no ale?
If a company charges too much, they're guilty of "price gouging."
If they charge too little, they're guilty of "dumping."
If they charge the same as their competitors, they're guilty of "price fixing."
Welcome to the "free market."
Liberty in your lifetime
If I was a major shareholder at Sony, I would have done the exact same thing. And you would have too. I don't know what the big deal is about.
The glory of Sony died with the MiniDisk Walman. This company is just an empty shell of what was once a positive household name for many geeks and nerds alike. As they say. Nothing lasts forever. Not even a reputation.
Life is not for the lazy.
http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/14/sony-says-price-of-2-whitney-houston-albums-was-raised-by-mistake/
According to the NYTimes the price raising was a mistake that only affected the UK Itunes store and nothing else. So of all the retailers and online shops only one was affected, Itunes, and only one region, the UK. If SONY wanted to capitalize on her death they likely would have raised prices across the board and just not the UK Itunes shop.
This probably was an error. Someone assigned to managing SONY's UK Itunes account royally fucked up by changing the price. And now it is basically a PR disaster because even though it likely was an accident SONY looks absolutely retarded. Someone will lose his or her job over this for sure.
Sadly I'm sure that some sneering fuck CEO from the RIAA or MAFIAA or SONY or whatever is sitting on his throne thinking of ways to capitalize on Whitney Houston's death without taking a major PR hit. They see her death as basically an opportunity for a lot of profit and a great time to line their pockets.
No, but there was dickishness on an epic scale. What they did is clearly legal, but absurdly scummy. A boycott would be a very appropriate measure.
To the haters: You can't win. If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine
Businesses arent supposed to "benefit society."
You have misplaced a tenet of capitalism, that trade benefits those involved, with this idea of "benefiting society."
If Sony is charging more than you would like to spend on a product, then dont buy it. Welcome to freedom of choice. If you dont trade, then neither of you are harmed. If you do trade, then we can only assume that you were happy to do so because you have free choice.
"His name was James Damore."
It can be argued (rather convincingly, IMO) that the problem with "economics 101" is that, by and large, #1 is a grossly incorrect premise.
Sony is a profit-oriented corporation
Their mission is to make profit
Whitney Houston's death was a chance for Sony to make more money, so they took it
I really can't blame Sony for doing such a thing, even when it's kind of bad taste
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
You know, I'm getting a little sick and tired of all these self obsessed, narcissistic, machiavellian, amoral masses of motile human excrement turning the world into an ontological toilet. We live in a free society, but this lowest common denominator crap is just becoming a simple excuse to be free of social responsibility, dignity, compassion or accountability for one's own actions. True freedom implies taking responsibility for a complex world of interactions where the price of your freedom is responsibility for the freedom of those around you. All take and no give, is the beginning of a free-for-all that ends in a stinking dung heap where a workable society once stood. Maybe its time to teach ethics to our children so perhaps they avoid the stupid mistakes we're making?
"supply and demand" isn't a very useful descriptive tool when the supply is infinite and valueless. More like, "access control and demand"...
Who's benefiting?
Presumably, the person buying the album. I didn't buy a sandwich today to support the restaurant owner, I bought it because I was hungry and thought it would taste good.
sounds like a good coput to me. How convenient that it was a "rogue employee" that just happened to raise the prices of a singer who died only 30 minutes earlier... im sorry, I simply dont believe it. If it was someone other than sony, I MIGHT believe it, but coming from sony, after the past mistakes, I simply cannot believe that excuse. They got called out for doing something dickish, and they are tyring to save face.
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
Yes, that is always my favorite story about the record industry. Talk about shooting the goose that lays the golden eggs. When Foggerty realized how ripped off he was by his record company, he asked/demanded a renegotiated contract. Their answer was, "This contract is legally binding. We don't have to change it. You're stuck with it." Think how much more money they could have made if he had continued writing songs and performing with CCR if they had been willing to renegotiate a fair contract with him. There are probably even ways that they could have spun it to make it seem like they weren't really trying to take advantage of him. "Well, there are a lot of costs involved in bringing a young act along and not every act ever pays back that initial investment. I completely forgot that we still had you under a startup act contract. Let's renegotiate to better terms for you."
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison