While I hardly have any sympathy for record companies and fat-cat artists like Metallica, I also have very little sympathy for the whiners on this board who are constantly offended by the audacity, THE AUDACITY, of companies to defend their businesses. I will leave it to the courts to decide the ins-and-outs of the legal ramifications behind Napster's business model (if one exists), but there is one thing that I know for sure: Napster is primarily used for piracy. You know it, I know it, and anyone who has ever used Napster knows it. Anyone who tries to claim anything different and makes excuses for Napster (like claiming that it's used to 'sample' music to see if you like it -- yeah right!) is weakly clutching at straws and/or deluding himself. While I have no doubt there are many uses for Napster, let's face it -- the biggest by use far is for piracy.
And while this activity has not yet resulted in a down-side to the recording industry's income, it is only a matter of time. Right now, Napster/Gnutella has simply replaced the tape as the music traders' preferred medium of piracy. The recording industry hasn't really lost anything because these people were going to trade this music anyway. But as this activity becomes more widespread and enters mainstream use, make no mistake about it there will be consequences to the industry's bottom line.
Having said all that, I also think the record companies are deluding themselves if they think they can stop this without some MAJOR re-structuring. Peer-to-peer technologies like Napster and Gnutella extend trading activity to a much bigger and more efficient arena than tapes ever did. Making the problem much worse is that this technology is, quite simply, un-stoppable. You can plug as many fingers as you want into all those little holes but this dike is going to crumble.
And it seems that one of those holes is getting a *lot* of attention. Napster has become the lightning rod for the industry's wrath. I think that it has also become a sacrificial lamb; the first-born son offered to the music gods for their appeasement. A knife almost assuredly will be plunged into Napster's not-so-innocent black little heart, but on-line music trading will continue to flourish despite the god's best efforts to smite us upside the head.
IMO there is only one way the record companies can prevent this activity from decimating the industry: Offer CD quality recordings for reasonable prices on a per-song rather than per-album basis. I'd be more than happy to pay $1/song for high fidelity versions of the songs I really like. And I should have the option of either downloading these songs from a web site or building a custom CD at a CD store. (Maybe the store-bought version could offer even higher quality sound for a small premium.) I'm sure that a large majority of people out there would agree to pay for music on this basis.
Mr. Bronfman, this is the only way the recording industry will survive. Of course this won't stop music piracy, put most people are honest (as long as the price is right) and these honest people would constitute a very large market. If music was available this way, I believe that the on-line trading of songs would again be limited to the ever-present music traders who would pirate songs even if they were sold for a penny (but you never made money off these people anyway). And of course you can still count on associated merchandising to provide a very nice line item on your income statement.
I'm afraid that you'll have to forget those halcyon days of obscene pricing and become a real business that operates within a reasonable profit margin but hey, welcome to the real world. In the meantime, all of these legal shenanigans are nothing but a mass of white noise. Napster's isn't the problem, it's just the symptom; your business model is the problem. While you had an iron-clad grip on music distribution, yes you could charge whatever you wanted. Welcome to the backlash. Technology has pried your grubby little hands off the reins Mr. Bronfman and your business model has become a liability. Go tell your friends.
Slashdot Mirror
And while this activity has not yet resulted in a down-side to the recording industry's income, it is only a matter of time. Right now, Napster/Gnutella has simply replaced the tape as the music traders' preferred medium of piracy. The recording industry hasn't really lost anything because these people were going to trade this music anyway. But as this activity becomes more widespread and enters mainstream use, make no mistake about it there will be consequences to the industry's bottom line.
Having said all that, I also think the record companies are deluding themselves if they think they can stop this without some MAJOR re-structuring. Peer-to-peer technologies like Napster and Gnutella extend trading activity to a much bigger and more efficient arena than tapes ever did. Making the problem much worse is that this technology is, quite simply, un-stoppable. You can plug as many fingers as you want into all those little holes but this dike is going to crumble.
And it seems that one of those holes is getting a *lot* of attention. Napster has become the lightning rod for the industry's wrath. I think that it has also become a sacrificial lamb; the first-born son offered to the music gods for their appeasement. A knife almost assuredly will be plunged into Napster's not-so-innocent black little heart, but on-line music trading will continue to flourish despite the god's best efforts to smite us upside the head.
IMO there is only one way the record companies can prevent this activity from decimating the industry: Offer CD quality recordings for reasonable prices on a per-song rather than per-album basis. I'd be more than happy to pay $1/song for high fidelity versions of the songs I really like. And I should have the option of either downloading these songs from a web site or building a custom CD at a CD store. (Maybe the store-bought version could offer even higher quality sound for a small premium.) I'm sure that a large majority of people out there would agree to pay for music on this basis.
Mr. Bronfman, this is the only way the recording industry will survive. Of course this won't stop music piracy, put most people are honest (as long as the price is right) and these honest people would constitute a very large market. If music was available this way, I believe that the on-line trading of songs would again be limited to the ever-present music traders who would pirate songs even if they were sold for a penny (but you never made money off these people anyway). And of course you can still count on associated merchandising to provide a very nice line item on your income statement.
I'm afraid that you'll have to forget those halcyon days of obscene pricing and become a real business that operates within a reasonable profit margin but hey, welcome to the real world. In the meantime, all of these legal shenanigans are nothing but a mass of white noise. Napster's isn't the problem, it's just the symptom; your business model is the problem. While you had an iron-clad grip on music distribution, yes you could charge whatever you wanted. Welcome to the backlash. Technology has pried your grubby little hands off the reins Mr. Bronfman and your business model has become a liability. Go tell your friends.