Slashdot Mirror
IFPI Won't Share Pirate Bay Damages With Musicians
An anonymous reader tips this news from TorrentFreak:
Earlier this year the sentences against the Pirate Bay defendants were made final. Aside from prison sentences, they will have to pay damages to the entertainment industries, including €550,000 to several major music labels. The court awarded the damages to compensate artists and rightsholders for their losses. However, it now turns out that artists won’t see a penny of the money, as the labels have allocated it to IFPI to fund new anti-piracy campaigns. ...While it may come as no surprise that the music industry has a hard time getting money from The Pirate Bay defendants, what comes next may raise a few eyebrows. 'There is an agreement that any recovered funds will be paid to IFPI Sweden and IFPI London for use in future anti-piracy activities,' IFPI writes. In other words, the money that the Court awarded to compensate artists and rightsholders for their losses is not going to the artists at all."
This certainly comes as a huge surprise...
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Stop buying music altogether and this problem will go away...
That's all. .)
They operate like organized crime. (In regional cells and a strict hierarchy ruled by having connections
They harass people like organized crime. (Mostly protection rackets.)
They defraud and steal from people like organized crime. (Getting creative works from others, then asking lots of money for every worthless copy, without moving even a single finger.)
They take drugs like organized crime. (I had a colleague who had to do all the deals with that industry for our company. Often there was no way of even making a deal without at least consuming cocaine and ordering some hookers. [I wish I was just making that up.])
They would shoot and torture people like organized crime, if they weren't openly in the spotlight and could get away with it.
They are organized crime.
So we must treat them like organized crime.
It's the musicians who sign up to these labels. They're the ones doing work for them. They're the ones who could cause the labels to shrivel and die simply by choosing or building alternative distribution methods.
Worst of all are the half a dozen successes who pretend that these scrounging middlemen act on musicians' behalf, with superstar whores acting no better than the celebrity representatives of Scientology from Bee Gees to Metallica to Lily Allen (only joking, Lily - you're no superstar, you're shit).
Now make sure to spread this to every single one of them employed by said company and make them feel guilty as absolute hell for still being under a label as corrupt as they are.
While I know a good chunk of musicians are equally as corrupt, most actually aren't and are just afraid.
Artists don't need these stupid labels anymore.
They made sense back in the disconnected world.
Most of the world is connected up in some way or another, even if it is only indirectly.
In particular, most of the world a musician would care about reaching is connected.
People pirating songs isn't going to do a damn thing.
People pointing out how corrupt they are on some blog or community isn't going to do a damn thing.
Making the artists realize their labels are corrupt and don't give a damn about even their lives IS going to do something. It already has worked before, and it can do it again.
Some labels go as far as walling in their "property", closing them off from reality as much as possible. That is the worst part!
This is a godly piece of information that every artist, musician and anything even remotely related to the industry and label should read. Everyone has to see this, not just generic consumers or bystanders. The labels don't care about opinions.
I'd feel a modicum of sympathy for these musicians if they understood that the record companies have never cared about their careers, just about how much money they could wring out of them before disposing of them and moving on to the next disposable musicians, but they don't.
They naively believed that they're all on the same side and the reality is that they've never been and never will be.
This has been well known from the start. For the RIAA/MPAA/etc, the recording artists are *resources*. Like lumber, or oil, or minerals. Just something to be mined and discarded when it's of no further value. You don't see mining companies making sure their mines are well taken care of, do you? Or taking the profits from the sale of the minerals and pouring the money into old, abandoned mine shafts?
Of course not. Artists are resources to be consumed.
Suing copyright infringers is really just fucked. It's like if I, as a citizen, started sending letters to people for jay-walking; I'd sue them in civil court for $5,000 (with photograph evidence obtained legally), or I'd settle for $50. Just sign the papers, fill in your bank details, then we'll deduct the money from your account.
Is that legal? In this specific example, probably not, unless I *owned* the street. Let's say for a moment that I do.
Is it immoral? I'd consider it immoral.
I publish all my books DRM free and I don't give two fucking shits if people download them illegally. Every time one of these fucking "sue the piraters FOR THE ARTISTS", I always say... "Where's my share?" I own the rights to books. I publish them electronically. They get "pirated". Why shouldn't I get free money for it?
Well?
Well?
The real reason is, obviously, the MPAA/RIAA are cunts and the idea that they're doing this for the artists in any way is completely retarded.
Check out my sci-fi book "Lacuna" at http://goo.gl/MVxX8
It's the musicians who sign up to these labels. They're the ones doing work for them. They're the ones who could cause the labels to shrivel and die simply by choosing or building alternative distribution methods.
Worst of all are the half a dozen successes who pretend that these scrounging middlemen act on musicians' behalf, with superstar whores acting no better than the celebrity representatives of Scientology from Bee Gees to Metallica to Lily Allen (only joking, Lily - you're no superstar, you're shit).
"we call it Riding the Gravy Train."
Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
Doesn't surprise me one bit. Here in Belgium you have Sabam which also collects money from different sources but "fails" to get the money to the artist. If I remember correctly last year artists where waiting for about 200 million of euro's and that in Belgium alone. You know how much interests they get on such sums ? And those interests don't get into the pockets of the artists.
They are also masters of getting money out of peoples pocket. When a slick Sabam inspector arrives, you know it will cost you money and they go through some stupid lengths to justify the "extra's" you need to pay.
A flemish satirical program Basta! went even that far to organize a concert with a jar of vegatables (from the brand Suzy Wan), a mixer from Kenwood and another thing that I can't recall. And Sabam slapped them with an invoice for those "artists". So they went with the jar of vegetables and the mixer to the Sabam HQ so the "artists" could sign up to get their money.
Sabam was not amused en when the Basta! guys where planning to give concert with those 'artists', they called the police.
Sabam was even under investigation that they falsified the accounts so they could put money away to bribe officials. But even after all the shenanigans those organisation can still operate. And it isn't that the general public doesn't hate them, they loathe them with a passion.
That is using the failed logic that a pirated copy is a lost sale. Also if all funds received from courts for piracy go into fighting it more the artists will never get any of it as it will be a continuous loop.
'...if only "Jumping to a Conclusion" was an event in the Olympics.'
Check out the current Humble Bundle: http://www.humblebundle.com/
FLAC Audio and DRM-Free, not a penny to the leeches! And if you think that the bands are too hippy, you can choose to send all of your money to the EFF who actively fight said leeches.
Even if we accept the utter bs argument that piracy is stealing(it's not), this would mean the "stealing" is from companies who themselves steal from the artists.
Interesting.
If you ignore ACs because they are anonymous - you're an idiot.
Except these activities have about as much chance to increase the sales as the Kyoto Protocol has a chance of decreasing the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere in the next few decades.
Ezekiel 23:20
It was never about the artists. Stop pretending it's about the artists.
this signature has been removed due to a DMCA takedown notice
In other words, the money that the Court awarded to compensate artists and rightsholders for their losses is not going to the artists at all."
Anyone who is at all surprised by this has simply not been paying attention.
The RIAA and the IOC are very similar in this regard. They don't care about the people they make money from. They don't want to pay them. They want to take anything they earn and keep it for themselves. Their weapon of choice is copyright and also trademark in the case of Prince and the Olympics. And they seem to get worse each time you hear about it.
You can't be ahead of the curve, if you're stuck in a loop.
From TFA:
In other words, the money that the Court awarded to compensate artists and rightsholders for their losses is not going to the artists at all.
This is not a logical conclusion. If anti-piracy activities increase future sales by detering illegal copying, the artists will (proportionately) benefit just as much as the labels.
You do realize that "money that the Court awarded" and "increase future sales" are not the same? One is actual cash, and the other is wishful thinking. So, logically, your second sentence is a non sequitur.
The court explicitly declared that the money should go to the artists. If the artists decide it should be used for that, fine, but it should be going to the artists first. If they decide to give it to someone else for some other purpose, whatever, but not giving it to the artists is violating a direct court decision.
I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?
But you kind of hit on the reason why this problem is the fundamental problem, but also why getting musicians to act can't possibly be the solution.
That reason is that people like Lily Allen only succeded in the industry because her dad got her there due to his contacts. The fact is the music industry is absolutely full of acts who just wouldn't have gotten anywhere without the industry to turn them into a product. These artists wont leave the industry because it's the only way they can make a living doing what they love - they sure as hell couldn't go it alone because without the music industry's cartel operation to prop them up they wouldn't stand a chance in a free market where they're competing based on talent.
The industry keeps these people employed as "artists" whilst keeping any uncontrolled real talent that hasn't signed up out. It's a protection racket, unless you sign up you've got no hope, and half those who have signed up signed up because they had no hope otherwise anyway due to them having a severe lack of talent compared to everyone else.
There's just trash after trash after trash - Nikki Minaj seems to be the latest abysmal excuse for an artist that's being thrust repeatedly on the radio here in the UK right now. A few good artists make it through, like Rihanna does actually seem to have some talent, for example, but even they get used as tools to prop up the shite - case in point, I don't know what song it is because I don't care but there was a song on the radio a few weeks back which involved some fairly decent singing from Rihanna and then you get that silly Minaj bitch come on to just completely destroy the track. Had she not had Rihanna to prop up the song most sane people would just completely and utterly ignore the track. Christ, I don't even like this type of music, but again, because of the cartel, there's really little choice to listen to anything else during my commute as it's all the radio stations play in the UK.
Instead, the government kept all of that money justifying that they would/might someday provide Medicare for those people -- despite the fact that most did not receive Medicare benefits! The State governments even announced that they were using the funds to build roads and for other projects!
This is one more demonstration that these types of groups seek to champion causes in order to perpetuate themselves, by keeping up the fight (fear), rather than relaying recovered damages back to those who were harmed. It's disgraceful.
Why is this allowed? I hope artists get together and sue RIAA/IFPI. As mentioned in other comments, these organizations are nothing more than bullies.
"The Brady Bunch is back...working homicide"
Pirate Bay is .... pirates.
RIAA/IFPI are privateers. Want to fix the problem? Rewrite the crazy copyright laws and reduce the terms. Its not about benefits to the artists. It never was. Its all about slipping more cash to the middlemen.
Have gnu, will travel.
This is exactly why I don't buy music from stores. The only discs I have were bought directly from the artist after a live concert. Doing so, I believe I am sponsoring the artist directly because the discs they sell after stage, despite still being produced by their record label, do not contain distribution and retail fees. The disc price might even be higher but that way I really believe I'm sponsoring the artist and not the mafia.
As a side benefit, all of my discs are signed by their respective artists ; )
It's unrealistic to expect that the MAFIAA will be stopped if artists no longer sign with them. There are probably 10,000 - 100,000 artists that sign with them. If some fraction decide to stop, they'll just sign some more to replace them. And what's the average lifetime of most artists nowadays... less than 5 years? So they're easily replaceable.
Besides, these so-called artists don't even really do very much. The MAFIAA makes its killing on the major 'stars' who don't honestly do very much themselves. All they do is find find a woman that has no respect for herself or her image or a boy that'll make 12-year-old girls horny, then they manufacture a song and market the shit out of it. Let's face it - there will always be at least 100 people who are stupid and/or desperate enough in America to enter some kind of ridiculous bargain like this. So there really isn't much of a way to stop these 'artists' from signing them.
Now as for the rest of the artists who aren't stars but still actually make their own work, you could argue that we need to fund independent labels so they don't sign with the corrupt labels, but what do you expect that to achieve? It's gonna take a lot of artists and a lot of marketing to make any success for them.
But regardless, the only hope of breaking these industries is to break their public image. There needs to be created a New World Order of sorts in the music industry, one which will make the current labels look antiquated and corrupt. Explore new revenue models: support real online music stores like Jamendo and Bandcamp that actually support the ones who make the music and cut out the middlemen. If we break their image, then we can start to push them out of the way. They will try to take us back over, but if we tarnish their image so much that they can't recover, then maybe there will be hope
I have left slashdot and am now on Soylent News. FUCK YOU DICE.
The guy who had the patent for how windshield wipers worked took decades to prove it in court, getting settlements that never even covered his many hundreds of thousands in lawyer fees.
The system is set up for lawyers. Note 99% of politicians are also lawyers.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
That album was released in 1975, 37 years ago. Back then there was no Web, the Internet was still ARPANET, copyright in the US only lasted 28 + (optionally) 28 years and the RIAA wasn't suing their customers left and right. It's not comparable.
Dilbert RSS feed
Hear hear. I strongly recommend Just a Minute for anyone who wants to know what "Britishness" really is.
If God forks the Universe every time you roll a die, he'd better have a damned good memory.
A lot of aspiring musicians don't realize how bad the industry is before they sign. Once they sign their first contract, they're pretty much stuck unless they want to break a contract as the companies involved won't release their final contracted album until they sign a new contract.
According to this model they would use the money to sue more people in order to get even more money from the state they could use to sue... Anything else would be against the market's principles.
Oh, the beautiful gloss of greality!
Of course, the MAFIAA isn't getting any money either, because the Pirate Bay people don't have any.
didn't the IFPI just commit piracy? If you take from the pirate what he has plundered and not return it to it's rightful owner and 'repurpose' the bounty aren't you just as guilty?
some people are a "glass half empty" some are "glass half full" i'm a "there is something in the glass be happy" person
one of the biggest problems is that while artists can unsign themselves from a label, they can not (in most of the world) unsign form the copyright protection monopoly "representatives" which collect fees for radioplay, public performances and so forth, part of that money is then used to do things like sue piratebay. worst part is that that their business is approved - and awarded to the specific org. through law.
so once you sign up you're registered forever and you will have to pay.. for even performing your own shit. so even if new artists would stop signing up it would take a loong time for their income base to flush out(and in some cases they'll take the money for artists they don't even represent anyways).
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.