The RIAA couldn't do anything to make that impossible, not would they want to.
They want their members to be able to be compensated when their music is played on a webcast. What's so wrong with that? The law applies to all labels, not just the ones with the RIAA. And the musician's portion goes straight to them, not to the label.
For years, songwriters have been getting paid from radio airply, but artists and labels never have. Now there is a way for them to be paid for webcasting and it's even affordable for small webcasters (% of revenue or expenses, whichever is greater).
What's so wrong with giving music creators money for their work?
There are no "RIAA-approved" radio outlets.
Radio stations don't play songs by artists that are not on labels because the labels aggressively promote their music to the stations. There are only 3-5 new songs added to a playlist per week. Labels have relationships with these stations and bring them incentives to play the songs, such as in-studios, contests, performances at radio station events, etc. These relationships get them priority with their new songs.
And, the stations do research on what the audience wants to hear. They have increasingly gone for a mass market approach, because it gets more listeners which makes them more money with the advertisers.
There's a distinction to be made between the RIAA, a trade group, and the labels, the members of the trade group.
As a trade group, the RIAA can't just build a new system. That would be in violation of anti-trust laws. All the RIAA can do is represent and defend the rights of its members.
The labels are the ones who need to adopt a solution, and even they can't work together on it because that would also be anti-trust. Changes get made in the music industry by one or two labels trying something and being successful at it and the rest jumping on the bandwagon.
The labels have tried a few things, like with Bertelsmann buying Napster, licensing subscription service sites, and building their own like pressplay and Musicnet. Those services are getting looser and looser with their restrictions all the time. Labels are also releasing more singles for download. Warner just let 30,000 out for about $1/track, through Liquid Audio (available at most online retailers).
The changes are coming. The RIAA's job is to get rid of the infringing sites so that the authorized ones have a fighting chance.
The hole in Chuck D's argument is that, except for the advance the label gives them, artists essentially do make all their money from touring and merchandise (and commercials, etc) as it is.
But, that doesn't mean it's OK to download music and not buy the record. If the label doesn't make any money back on the sale of the record, then they will not want to make another one. The band will be dropped and have to spend their own millions on making and marketing a record to the extent that the label would have, which is really hard to do. And most bands don't have millions.
The DMCA applies to the music industry as well as the movie industry.
The RIAA and MPAA sometimes work together on legislation as broad as this because their members both have intellectual property copyrights.
The movie industry is in just as much danger as music. DVD burners are getting more common, and as broadband penetration seeps in it will be easier for the masses to download movies. Right now it's really slow on broadband, but bearable. I can't even imagine attempting it on 56k. Music is hit harder because it's easier to get.
CD sales are down for the first time since 1983. They were down 5% last year, and are down 7% so far this year. That is huge. We've gone through wars, recessions, bad music, etc before and sales have always shown an increase, however small. But they are down now, maybe not so coincidentally at the same time that filesharing is huge, every computer sold has a CD-R, and blank CD-Rs are dirt cheap.
Great post, yerricde. You're right, inflation does make CDs cheap by comparison. The average price for a CD these days is $14.
CDs may cost.25 to manufacture, but it costs the labels way more than that to
- sign the band
- pay for the recording (studio, producer, mixer, engineer, mastering, upgrade instruments, guest musicians, etc)
- get the band on the road (especially new bands, this can be as much as $15,000/week for a club act in a van with a u-haul)
- get the band in the press (photo shoots, tickets to shows, mailings, launch parties, etc)
- get the band on the radio (radio station contests, indie promoters, etc)
- get the band on mtv (videos are sooo expensive)
- get the record in the stores (yep, the stores charge for putting a record on sale and getting certain placement, as well as ads in the paper)
CDs are the labels' only revenue, save for the odd licensing to a movie or something, and on top of that they have to pay for salaries and misc employee costs, office space, etc.
So, CDs do not cost.25 to the labels. The labels get about $8-10 wholesale for the record, from which they pay publishers and the artist and recover their investments.
Only 1 out of 10 records released make enough back to pay for themselves. That 1 has to also cover the loss on the other 9. Tough business.
Because CDs are worth less. They deteriorate faster and are more prone to damage. CDs were introduced after cassettes and were priced higher as a "new technology", for superior sound quality, it lasts longer, etc. The pricing model stuck.
Bricks and mortar retail stores don't carry everything because they only have so much space in the stores to begin with. They have to carry what will sell often, not what will sell every six months.
The stores that do carry lots of underground and hard to find stuff are being run out of business by Best Buy et al because people go there to buy popular titles. That means the underground stores aren't able to pay the bills with the popular CDs, they have to rely on the less popular stuff, which doesn't sell well enough to keep them in business.
On a related note, lots of stores that specialize in 12" dance music have gone under because DJs are downloading new tracks for free and using mixing software. There was just an article in Billboard about it.
So my point is, if you're looking for the hard to find, go to the online stores that carry everything, unless you have a kick ass store in your town (lucky you!). And support the little guys.
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Non-RIAA artists get paid for webcasting just like the RIAA ones. The law says so.
The RIAA couldn't do anything to make that impossible, not would they want to. They want their members to be able to be compensated when their music is played on a webcast. What's so wrong with that? The law applies to all labels, not just the ones with the RIAA. And the musician's portion goes straight to them, not to the label. For years, songwriters have been getting paid from radio airply, but artists and labels never have. Now there is a way for them to be paid for webcasting and it's even affordable for small webcasters (% of revenue or expenses, whichever is greater). What's so wrong with giving music creators money for their work?
There are no "RIAA-approved" radio outlets. Radio stations don't play songs by artists that are not on labels because the labels aggressively promote their music to the stations. There are only 3-5 new songs added to a playlist per week. Labels have relationships with these stations and bring them incentives to play the songs, such as in-studios, contests, performances at radio station events, etc. These relationships get them priority with their new songs. And, the stations do research on what the audience wants to hear. They have increasingly gone for a mass market approach, because it gets more listeners which makes them more money with the advertisers.
There's a distinction to be made between the RIAA, a trade group, and the labels, the members of the trade group. As a trade group, the RIAA can't just build a new system. That would be in violation of anti-trust laws. All the RIAA can do is represent and defend the rights of its members. The labels are the ones who need to adopt a solution, and even they can't work together on it because that would also be anti-trust. Changes get made in the music industry by one or two labels trying something and being successful at it and the rest jumping on the bandwagon. The labels have tried a few things, like with Bertelsmann buying Napster, licensing subscription service sites, and building their own like pressplay and Musicnet. Those services are getting looser and looser with their restrictions all the time. Labels are also releasing more singles for download. Warner just let 30,000 out for about $1/track, through Liquid Audio (available at most online retailers). The changes are coming. The RIAA's job is to get rid of the infringing sites so that the authorized ones have a fighting chance.
The hole in Chuck D's argument is that, except for the advance the label gives them, artists essentially do make all their money from touring and merchandise (and commercials, etc) as it is. But, that doesn't mean it's OK to download music and not buy the record. If the label doesn't make any money back on the sale of the record, then they will not want to make another one. The band will be dropped and have to spend their own millions on making and marketing a record to the extent that the label would have, which is really hard to do. And most bands don't have millions.
The DMCA applies to the music industry as well as the movie industry. The RIAA and MPAA sometimes work together on legislation as broad as this because their members both have intellectual property copyrights. The movie industry is in just as much danger as music. DVD burners are getting more common, and as broadband penetration seeps in it will be easier for the masses to download movies. Right now it's really slow on broadband, but bearable. I can't even imagine attempting it on 56k. Music is hit harder because it's easier to get.
CD sales are down for the first time since 1983. They were down 5% last year, and are down 7% so far this year. That is huge. We've gone through wars, recessions, bad music, etc before and sales have always shown an increase, however small. But they are down now, maybe not so coincidentally at the same time that filesharing is huge, every computer sold has a CD-R, and blank CD-Rs are dirt cheap.
Great post, yerricde. You're right, inflation does make CDs cheap by comparison. The average price for a CD these days is $14. CDs may cost .25 to manufacture, but it costs the labels way more than that to
- sign the band
- pay for the recording (studio, producer, mixer, engineer, mastering, upgrade instruments, guest musicians, etc)
- get the band on the road (especially new bands, this can be as much as $15,000/week for a club act in a van with a u-haul)
- get the band in the press (photo shoots, tickets to shows, mailings, launch parties, etc)
- get the band on the radio (radio station contests, indie promoters, etc)
- get the band on mtv (videos are sooo expensive)
- get the record in the stores (yep, the stores charge for putting a record on sale and getting certain placement, as well as ads in the paper)
CDs are the labels' only revenue, save for the odd licensing to a movie or something, and on top of that they have to pay for salaries and misc employee costs, office space, etc.
So, CDs do not cost .25 to the labels. The labels get about $8-10 wholesale for the record, from which they pay publishers and the artist and recover their investments.
Only 1 out of 10 records released make enough back to pay for themselves. That 1 has to also cover the loss on the other 9. Tough business.
Because CDs are worth less. They deteriorate faster and are more prone to damage. CDs were introduced after cassettes and were priced higher as a "new technology", for superior sound quality, it lasts longer, etc. The pricing model stuck.
Bricks and mortar retail stores don't carry everything because they only have so much space in the stores to begin with. They have to carry what will sell often, not what will sell every six months. The stores that do carry lots of underground and hard to find stuff are being run out of business by Best Buy et al because people go there to buy popular titles. That means the underground stores aren't able to pay the bills with the popular CDs, they have to rely on the less popular stuff, which doesn't sell well enough to keep them in business. On a related note, lots of stores that specialize in 12" dance music have gone under because DJs are downloading new tracks for free and using mixing software. There was just an article in Billboard about it. So my point is, if you're looking for the hard to find, go to the online stores that carry everything, unless you have a kick ass store in your town (lucky you!). And support the little guys.