Slashdot Mirror
Canadian Music Industry Calls For Internet Regulation, Website Blocking
An anonymous reader writes "Canadian law professor Michael Geist reports
that the Canadian arm of the RIAA is calling for new Internet
regulation, including website blocking and search result manipulation. While the Canadian music industry experienced increased digital sales last year (sales declined in the U.S.) and the Ontario government is handing out tens of millions of tax dollars to the industry, the industry now wants the government to step in with website blocking and ordering search companies to change their results to focus on iTunes and other sales sites."
So, basically a gun to people's heads while the other hand rifles through their pockets.
Greed. The one thing that's in truly infinite supply.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Google: buy back to black
Seems that search engines somehow work without out already... who woulda thunk it.
Bye!
a magic pony that lays gold eggs.
Requiem for the American Dream
They get a tax subsidy in Canada, new copyright legislation protecting broken-in-principle DRM and now they want search engines -- which make more money than them -- to be subservient to their industry. Wonderful.
---- The above post was generated by the Turing Institute. Maybe.
If they are really worried about piracy, they need to keep teens apart -- one of my teenaged relatives has a half dozen or so usb drives laying around with songs he's traded with various friends -- She's got a music library of over 10,000 songs (though oddly, she only seems to listen to 10 of those, over and over again). They trade entire music libraries at school, thousands of songs at a time. So no matter how tightly they lock down the internet, music will continue to be traded.
I'm a lost cause, the mainstream industry isn't likely to get much of my money no matter what they do. I'm well out of my teen years, and about the only albums I buy are for small regional artists, and I usually get them at concerts or direct from the artists. I already own several hundred CD's from the groups I listened to in my teens and 20's, and rarely hear a mainstream group I want to buy a CD from today -- Pandora and Spotify are good enough.
As broken as Americas copyright law is, Canada seems to be engaging their retard-afterburners and are really going for it.
One word: Bieber
From the Fine Article ...
Music is becoming a hobby, not a career.
Translation: "We can no longer buy popularity with pop music and no longer manufacture the latest fad of boy-bands or girl-bands. These indie bands can do it cheaper, and that cuts us, the middle man, out of the picture! We don't get our fair share from YouTube, etc."
"Oh Noes! People are using this internet to freely share things and we aren't getting our cut ! Must maintain artificial scarcity of the source else we can't over-charge for numbers! Suckers! Er, mean, 'customers'."
Never mind the fact that the easier it is for people to find music, video, that is akin to free advertising.
Nah, let's shit on our potential customers and treat them like pseudo-thieves because "How dare they share something they value with someone else!"
Only cowards use censorship
It was the plan all along. First you establish the ability to block and censor. Then you find an excuse no one can NOT support (stopping kiddie porn). Then you move on to the obvious next level (we must protect our children from porn in general!), then intellectual property (it's illegal!!).
Next up, blocking whistleblower sites and newspapers that publish whistleblower revelations.
Soon enough, all political speech that challenges or threatens the government status quo.
The cow says "Moo." The dog says "Woof." The Timothy says "Thanks, valued customer. We appreciate your input."
...but I thought that the Canadian RIAA had a tax tacked onto blank storage media that was supposed to help pay for the pirated tracks. Did that disappear?
Just make music trading paraphernalia illegal
This is the TRUE solution. CD/DVDs, USB sticks and drives, computers.
All of if has to go. Shutdown the libraries. Burn the contents.
We MUST go back to the 50s where all music came from the good old music labels. They know good music and how to make it.
The church of Profits commands you! /S
It for the good of unborn artists in the future.
Obama's legacy: (N)othing (S)ecure (A)nywhere and (T)error (S)imulation (A)dministration
The recording industry, the biggest bunch of middleman thieves ever, is finally losing its free ride. You don't NEED a record company anymore, you can be your own! If they didn't think they were dying they wouldn't be violently throwing tantrums everywhere - lobbying for really radical unilateral changes to the law, suing regular everyday people for "piracy" to the point of bankruptcy, hassling bars/restaurants (usually mom and pop operations, barely making it as it is) into paying commercial licensing fees for music, etc.
A band now can cut their own album and sell it on iTunes, Amazon or a host of other music sites and retain a lot more of the proceeds. Back in the day even large, famous acts were getting stiffed by the record companies! Thanks in part to the way that record companies have pushed musicians up against the wall now for many years the market is now to a point where the artists don't even make money on the albums themselves. Instead they make the money at concerts, both on tickets and on merchandise. An artist now almost has to *give away* the music (many seem to - look on Youtube for all of the "full album" videos) as the loss leader in hopes of getting people to their concert. Artists can post samples on Youtube (at no cost) to drive sales and exposure. The record company middleman has less and less importance in a marketplace like this.
I'm glad to see that more and more musicians are standing up for themselves and taking advantage of the offerings that don't involve RIAA-related entities. If the entity doesn't add value they shouldn't have a role in the marketplace anymore.
If Canada feels it's important to block public access to the internet because a few commit illegal acts, then why wouldn't they block public access to the highways for the same reason?
If we start/continue to block/disallow everything that can be used for unlawful purposes, pretty soon, everything will be blocked/disallowed.
All the music I listen to is 100% free to download.
How do people usually find out about these recording artists who offer their own professional-quality music for download at no charge? Virtually none of the music played on FCC-licensed U.S. FM stations is free as in speech or free as in beer, and I doubt CRTC-licensed Canadian FM stations differ.
I assume that if all these governments from around the globe have successfully 'blocked' all these nasty web sites offering pirated content, then it stands to reason that the recording industries tax on blank media no longer would be appropriate or relevant, so we can have cheaper blank media again?
We get dragged down because the Conservatism pandemic jumped the border back in 2006.
upon the advice of my lawyer, i have no sig at this time
The Parliamentary system coupled with first-past-the-post voting means that highly contested ridings can go to someone that only got 30-40% of the vote.
First-past-the-post can be made harder to game by simply allowing voters to vote for multiple candidates. Or would you prefer that districts/ridings be constructed such that they're not really contested, as became common with the recent Redistricting Majority Project round of gerrymandering in the United States?
If tools have improved such that hobby music can equal the songwriting and production quality of career music, then perhaps the public would benefit if music were to become a hobby.
You don't NEED a record company anymore, you can be your own!
If a recording artist is his own label, how would he go about getting his music onto FM or satellite radio or onto the playlists of popular Internet streaming music providers, such as Pandora, Spotify, and foreign counterparts? And how should a songwriter make sure that he didn't accidentally copy parts of a popular song when writing his own? (See, for example, the "My Sweet Lord" lawsuit.) RIAA-affiliated labels add value through promotion and through their affiliated music publishers.
Well... there you have it. People who are still limiting themselves to FM transmissions are missing out.
Then how should people listen to anything other than FM in a car or bus without having to pay hundreds of dollars per year to a cellular carrier for a mobile data plan?
Sorry, but your argument is wrong.
Most "Owned" Bands (i.e. on a Major Record Label) do NOT make their money on the CD Sales. They make a pittance. They make most (if not ALL their money) on tours.The reason we have things like JB, is they sell their souls to the music industry and allow them to be totally manipulated and peroform cookie cutter music that you can't tell from the other 20 performers of that style of music.
As for the "ugly" comment, You're telling me that a performer like Ted Nutgent.. I mean Nugent can't sell tickets ? Sadly he does.
If you want REAL musicians, Look up an Indie artist. There are a bunch. And some are even geeky. You have Marian Call, The Double Clicks, Molly Lewis, Jonathan Coulton, Paul and Storm, and others.... Support them and support their music.
UPS Sucks
Fortunately their multiple attempts at getting a fee for MP3 players didn't go through.
Yes and no: a 5% tariff on MP3 players is currently in place, to be effective as of 2015. Luckily the exception is pretty large; if the MP3 player can be connected to a computer, they're exempt from the tariff.
Sorry, but your argument is wrong.
Most "Owned" Bands (i.e. on a Major Record Label) do NOT make their money on the CD Sales. They make a pittance. They make most (if not ALL their money) on tours.
Isn't that what GP is saying? Since they make the majority of money on tours, studios focus on bands who "put on a good show, but do little else"
There is a levy on blank CDs. (I can't remember the last time I bought a spindle of CDs). It used to be about 30 cents a disk, which is insane considering bulk CD-R cost about 25 cents. At least they didn't go full retard and charge for MP3 players. At the time the levy was introduced, MP3 players were about 128 to 256 MB capacity and I can recall fees of $5 to $10 on MP3 players (based on 5 cents/Megabyte) being considered. The music industry would love to collect $800 on a 16GB ipod nano.
None of them can see the clouds; The polished wings don't care.
As you note, the levy is for private copying. However, thanks to the most recent copyright legislation which was pushed through by our current government, Canadians are now paying that levy for something that they can no longer legally do if the work they wanted to copy utilized any kind of technological protection measure which might prevent it from simply being copied too casually.... since such measures are becoming increasingly prevalent as content increasingly moves towards an all-digital format, the levy will end up being for something that Canadians are no longer practically able to legally do, since the laws regarding TPMs do not contain any exception for private copying (even though the government that proposed the bill before it became law was repeatedly asked to insert such an exception into the bill by its opponents).
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Why do these people think they deserve to be treated so specially? They're not the only ones who have their work "thieved" (hell, they're considered thieves by a lot of the people they're supposed to represent), and every concession we've made for them in Canada hasn't been enough. At some point you have to accept reality, and stop trying to control it.
Look at it the other way... they keep asking for another pony, and more often than not, they get it. Why would they want to stop asking?
I am part of the Canadian music HOBBY and I'm not in favour either. The fact that you said "favor" makes me doubt whether you're really Canadian, but I know many musicians, both inside and outside the industry, who aren't in favour. In general, the CRIA is understood to represent RIAA interests and only represent the Canadian recording industry as a hobby themselves.
I thought corporations believed in less regulation.
...Canadians are calling for the government to ban music industry associations...
Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
If a recording artist is his own label, how would he go about getting his music onto FM or satellite radio or onto the playlists of popular Internet streaming music providers, such as Pandora, Spotify, and foreign counterparts?
Information for artists submitting to Pandora
Information for artists submitting to Spotify
Getting your music on iTunes
In short, that depends on the service they want their music on. Different services have different procedures.
And how should a songwriter make sure that he didn't accidentally copy parts of a popular song when writing his own?
As you so helpfully pointed out, they don't/can't always. The human mind is prone to subconscious influence; there's no way around that.
RIAA-affiliated labels add value through promotion and through their affiliated music publishers.
True, although it's debatable whether the value that they add is greater than the cost that they impose. The artists that they promote are like lottery winners: the lucky few that you can point to as indicators that the system is beneficial to artists and the public as a whole. In a nutshell, they're a great example of a selection bias.
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
If you can't make the money in a BUSINESS that you expect to make, get out of the BUSINESS. Don't whine, complain about the technology and demand handouts and concessions from others.
They charged a tax on all storage media regardless of if any music bytes were ever spilled on it. However, I would imagine that the sales of CD/DVD media is quickly drying up, they they are not making their pound of flesh. They still get it from devices, but they don't provide the numbers. It was easy to see 5 years ago that everything would be moving to online content both music and movies, and that physical media is pretty provincial. So now comes the next big fight, trying to force legislate profits from the internet. How? Regulation of course. Nothing new here, give us free money.
I can finally buy some cheap CD-ROMS! Now I can really use my DISCMAN!
Gonna turn that BASSBOOST all the way up man! :p
local music scenes are never about albums or cds, they are about the shows. they are hardly being hurt by copying. Hell it may help them when they go on tour.
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
Bootlegging is killing the music industry and making it much more difficult for musicians to make money
Bootlegging has very little effect on the demand for live performances. It's not like a bar can't play recorded music easily enough, and the reason they get live bands in is because a lot of people like listening to live music more than recorded music and are willing to pay a cover charge for the privilege.
In fact, arguably, bootlegging increases demand for live performances. It certainly didn't hurt the Grateful Dead.
I am officially gone from
that.. is completely nonsensical? if an MP3 player can be connected to a computer it's exempt? shouldn't it be the other way around? :) (it's nonsensical for other reasons, but that's the one that caught my eye.)
Fun fact about Canada, if you live in Southern Ontario the chances of you using the non-OUR version is pretty high, especially if you were educated in the 80's, since the entire edumudcation system was waffling over whether or not it was okay. For those of us who went through that it's been hell ever since.
Om, nomnomnom...
Isn't DRM and search engine manipulation the reason why sales in the US are declining. I guess they want their sales in Canada to decline too.
while
Err...the rock bands of yesteryear would tend to argue with you. They did albums sure, but their concerts were legendary:
Rolling Stones
The Who
Pink Floyd
Led Zeppelin
And none of those guys were all that much to look at really....
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Wait, I thought we were only allowed to shit on the US around here.
We still are shitting on the US, its the Canadian arm of the RIAA an American creation. How is this not america's fault? Canada is the victim of the US in this story.
Fun fact about Canada, if you live in Southern Ontario ... if you were educated in the 80's, ... it's been hell ever since.
Well, if you live in Southern Ontario, you're south of 49 anyway :D
Something to do with there being a tariff exemption for "devices that enhance the operation of a computer" or something like that. I don't remember the text of the exemption.
"...wrote a blog post late last year lamenting musicians' earnings, a situation he blames on the Internet allowing a few to "amass staggering, unprecedented wealth" while musicians toil for tiny incomes."
Isn't that what's been happening to the rest of us who aren't in the top 1% of incomes?
I'm David Adams. I write fiction for a living (http://www.amazon.com/David-Adams/e/B006S1GSXI/?tag=wwwlacunavers-20 is me). So where's my money?
Sure, I'm Australian and not Canadian, but where's my tax dollars handout? I could really use that. After all, I'm a publisher too and not just a writer, so I should surely qualify for some money. My books get pirated after all, they appear on heaps of pirating sites, so where's my share of the tax on blank media?
Again, let's just pretend that I'm Canadian for a second. It shouldn't be too hard; the RIAA already doesn't recognise international borders when it comes to copyright infringement, so surely they'll be eager to give me my share of that money any day now.
Any day now.
Maybe I'll send them another email just to be sure. They seem to have lost the last few.
I'm sure it's just a mistake. They care about the artists. They said so. It couldn't possibly just be a selfish money grab at the expense of regular Canadians, supporting an outdated business model that just needs to shrink or go away entirely. Surely not.
Check out my sci-fi book "Lacuna" at http://goo.gl/MVxX8
an MP3 player [...] will, however, only play tracks that you load onto it, so it's a little weak in terms of music discovery
This was sort of my point.
You can use it to evaluate artists recommended to you by your friends, by your "friends", by strangers, by "strangers"
Is there an app for that, namely for automatically downloading a playlist of music recommended through similarity or social media and storing it on the MP3 player? How are people likely to discover such an app? And I anticipate that in practice, friends are likely to recommend major-label music. So how would such an app survive a lawsuit from labels in the RIAA/CRIA?
And how should a songwriter make sure that he didn't accidentally copy parts of a popular song when writing his own?
As you so helpfully pointed out, they don't/can't always. The human mind is prone to subconscious influence; there's no way around that.
I've calculated that there are about 105 million possible legally distinct melodies. (If you want, I can show my work.) So if there's no way around eventually being sued for accidental infringement, what can an indie songwriter do to make sure the inevitable lawsuit doesn't bankrupt him?
Well, yes, if you don't want to be spoonfed shit from the radio
First one has to discover in the first place that there's an alternative to being "spoonfed shit from the radio".
From the other side, I'm already paying $$$/year to have the phone I like, since that phone isn't available from any carrier without a data plan.
You appear not to understand thrifty people. A thrifty person will suffer with a phone other than the phone he likes because the phone he likes has a prohibitive total cost of ownership. For example, instead of buying and carrying an Android phone, he might buy and carry a flip phone and a Nexus 7 tablet.