I still fail to see how such an idea is workable. At best, a few people will take the required effort to track down the artist and send them some cash, and that cash will get distributed to the correct people. In reality, however, it would be a wink-wink-nudge-nudge deal where people would be throwing around CDRs of peoples' work, and occasionally send a couple of dollars/pounds (less than what a label would pay them) to the artists.
"Singles" these days rarely consist of just one song. They usually contain at least a few songs, sometimes half as many as a full CD. And most of the songs you don't want. And it's rare for a band to put out a single for every song they create. They usually put them out for their most popular songs. So this is not a good alternative. And even if it were it's still subject to all the other problems I list.
But if you want every song a band creates, you buy the album. That is (part of) the point of an album.
As for "half as many as a full CD", what crack are you smoking? Sure, singles *used* to be expensive (I remember seeing a Madonna single priced at 5 quid once...10 dollars...extortionate even to me), but over here these days singles cost £1.99 (4 dollars) and have 2 songs on them.
Even better, if you *really* want to just have one song, use iTunes (and Hymn...yeah, I think DRM is a crock of shit, as is AAC, and I await the day when a music store offering Musepack is opened) and spend 99 of your hard earned cents on it. Problem solved.
Well, guess what? Copying music isn't stealing! If you took my TV then you'd be depriving me of being able to watch it. But if you could "copy" my TV I could still watch my own, and you're welcome to do with your "copy" whatever you want, as it doesn't affect my own TV.
I wasn't saying that copying music is stealing (it isn't), I was using the TV thing as an analogy. It's the same sort of logic.
The only people it "shafts" are the parasitic middlemen, who deserve to be driven out of business... the sooner the better. They've been bleeding consumers and artists for far too long.
Yeah, the parasitic middlemen who market CDs to a mass audience, secure radio airplay, pay advance fees, organise distribution/packaging/duplication and sometimes get extra personnel as and when they are needed. Those cocks!
Like I said above, record labels do not eat babies and shit cancer. Bands willingly sign to labels (and indie labels) because it takes a lot of the work out of their hands and gets them exposure. Nobody's coerced into it.
It clearly is about free, because your first paragraph says it's about that. You're confusing convenience (it's more "convenient" to walk 10 minutes to the nearest record store and spend £6.99 (about 15 dollars) on a CD than it is to take an hour or two downloading the same album from Bittorrent) with price.
If enough people did what I did there'd be no need for record labels, since the artists would be paid directly for their work and for future work from them.
If enough people did what you did, the artist wouldn't be able to release their work to a wide audience (believe it or not, not everyone has an Internet connection). Let's not forget, they get money in advance from-again-the label. So technically, they lose out.
As for why you shouldn't just buy the CD in the first place, first, I'd rather give money directly to the artist than have them get a tiny cut of what the record companies and distributors make on the CD....and shaft the producers, studio workers etc.
Second, I don't always know that I'll like the CD without listening to the music for a while... in fact, often I'll only like a single song or maybe two songs off an entire CD... so it's a rip-off to pay full price for merchandise of which I'll only wind up using maybe 20% of. And if I want ten songs of the artist that are scattered over ten CDs, then I'll wind up paying ten times more than if all those songs were on a single CD. It's a rip-off no matter how you slice it.
Don't buy it and don't listen to it then. Or buy singles. The artist has set their price, and since you're not willing to pay it, don't take their shit. I don't steal a TV because I'll only watch 2 hours of TV a week, and Panasonic set their prices too high.
I don't see anything wrong with paying for a CD's **worth** of music (not the a CD itself, for the reasons cited above) directly to the artist, after listening enough to the music to know that you like it enough to be worht it.
I do, because it shafts everyone else associated with the CD's production.
I LOVE this way people try to wriggle out of the fact that they're freeloaders.
The band (i.e. the people who make the music) have decided that they would like to sell their music through the record label. Chances are, unless they expressly say otherwise, they'd rather people buy the CD than get it off TorrentSpy. This funds the people who worked on the CD, including producers, studio workers and yes, the record companies, who believe it or not do not eat babies and shit cancer as is sometimes assumed on Slashdot, and instead fund a large amount of the music today.
And you say you'll buy some merchandise? Fine. Just remember though; if everyone does the same as you, sales will go down and the band will get dropped by the label due to poor sales, hampering their income and putting their career in the shitter. But hell, you all bought a band t-shirt, so at best the record company company will notice the huge discrepancy between t-shirt sales and album sales.
Anyway, if you like the band enough, surely you'd like them enough to spend 10 quid/15 dollars/whatever on a CD by them?
Yes, it is. If you want to get technical, call it copyright infringement. Either way, it's not exactly ethical.
The media industry hates us because of their so-called "loss of REVENUE", which IMHO may set a dangerous precedent. I mean, if they get their way, what's to stop them from litigating with anyone who simply doesn't buy their stuff?
The media industry don't give a fuck if you don't buy their stuff. They don't care if you buy an independent CD, or watch an independent film. They don't send round jackbooted thugs if you don't listen to Britney. They DO care, however, if you infringe on their copyrights by downloading their copyrighted material for free, because (like it or not) it technically is loss of revenue.
Don't get me wrong, I fucking hate copy protection, but only because it makes listening to music/watching movies I've legitimately bought a pain in the ass. Just stop believing that downloading someone's work for free counts as "competition" or "shopping decisions".
Oh come on, this is Slashdot, why should he break with tradition. Everyone knows that if you're going to slander millions of people, you gotta do it with as few apostrophes as possible;)
This is the thing that always riles me about the companies with the less profitable businesses. Basically, the ones whose businesses are less profitable because their product sucks balls compared to the next competitor (compare Intel to AMD...). They dance around the issue of their products being a pile of shite and instead decide it's something to do with their image being staid or something. This is what Intel is doing; thinking that it's the brand that is at fault, and not the fact that AMD kicks their asses both performance wise and price wise. Sort of reminds me of ITV in the UK (dropping ratings, went through loads of rebrands despite almost constant criticism to the effect of "The BBC's programmes are better", ignored the critics).
I was about to reply with this...foobar2000 is my favourite CD ripper/music player bar none. It works with 99% of formats (I even got it to play and encode WMA), it can transcode formats, it's small, fast, light and just works. Love it.
Quite cool; allows you to plot a journey on several different types of public transport. Even includes the amount of time it takes to walk to the station, which makes it really really useful.
Copy protected CDs? Pah. ABCDE and Foobar2000 both saw through that (CD writers can see both the audio and the data, allowing for easy ripping) and the proof is in my music collection.
Not to mention, there's the whole feeling of going into a record store and buying the CD, actually having it in your hands and getting all the artwork and other paraphenalia that comes with the music...and a whole stack of CDs on a shelf looks a lot better than a load of MP3s (acts as a nice conversation point too).
Slashdot Mirror
I still fail to see how such an idea is workable. At best, a few people will take the required effort to track down the artist and send them some cash, and that cash will get distributed to the correct people. In reality, however, it would be a wink-wink-nudge-nudge deal where people would be throwing around CDRs of peoples' work, and occasionally send a couple of dollars/pounds (less than what a label would pay them) to the artists.
"Singles" these days rarely consist of just one song. They usually contain at least a few songs, sometimes half as many as a full CD. And most of the songs you don't want. And it's rare for a band to put out a single for every song they create. They usually put them out for their most popular songs. So this is not a good alternative. And even if it were it's still subject to all the other problems I list.
But if you want every song a band creates, you buy the album. That is (part of) the point of an album.
As for "half as many as a full CD", what crack are you smoking? Sure, singles *used* to be expensive (I remember seeing a Madonna single priced at 5 quid once...10 dollars...extortionate even to me), but over here these days singles cost £1.99 (4 dollars) and have 2 songs on them.
Even better, if you *really* want to just have one song, use iTunes (and Hymn...yeah, I think DRM is a crock of shit, as is AAC, and I await the day when a music store offering Musepack is opened) and spend 99 of your hard earned cents on it. Problem solved.
Well, guess what? Copying music isn't stealing! If you took my TV then you'd be depriving me of being able to watch it. But if you could "copy" my TV I could still watch my own, and you're welcome to do with your "copy" whatever you want, as it doesn't affect my own TV.
I wasn't saying that copying music is stealing (it isn't), I was using the TV thing as an analogy. It's the same sort of logic.
The only people it "shafts" are the parasitic middlemen, who deserve to be driven out of business... the sooner the better. They've been bleeding consumers and artists for far too long.
Yeah, the parasitic middlemen who market CDs to a mass audience, secure radio airplay, pay advance fees, organise distribution/packaging/duplication and sometimes get extra personnel as and when they are needed. Those cocks!
Like I said above, record labels do not eat babies and shit cancer. Bands willingly sign to labels (and indie labels) because it takes a lot of the work out of their hands and gets them exposure. Nobody's coerced into it.
Renounce your past relegion.
Be touched by His Noodly Appendage.
Free Eye Patch, Video iPod, and EyeBud upon conversion.
Sorry, I think The Who got there first.
It clearly is about free, because your first paragraph says it's about that. You're confusing convenience (it's more "convenient" to walk 10 minutes to the nearest record store and spend £6.99 (about 15 dollars) on a CD than it is to take an hour or two downloading the same album from Bittorrent) with price.
If enough people did what I did there'd be no need for record labels, since the artists would be paid directly for their work and for future work from them.
...and shaft the producers, studio workers etc.
If enough people did what you did, the artist wouldn't be able to release their work to a wide audience (believe it or not, not everyone has an Internet connection). Let's not forget, they get money in advance from-again-the label. So technically, they lose out.
As for why you shouldn't just buy the CD in the first place, first, I'd rather give money directly to the artist than have them get a tiny cut of what the record companies and distributors make on the CD.
Second, I don't always know that I'll like the CD without listening to the music for a while... in fact, often I'll only like a single song or maybe two songs off an entire CD... so it's a rip-off to pay full price for merchandise of which I'll only wind up using maybe 20% of. And if I want ten songs of the artist that are scattered over ten CDs, then I'll wind up paying ten times more than if all those songs were on a single CD. It's a rip-off no matter how you slice it.
Don't buy it and don't listen to it then. Or buy singles. The artist has set their price, and since you're not willing to pay it, don't take their shit. I don't steal a TV because I'll only watch 2 hours of TV a week, and Panasonic set their prices too high.
I don't see anything wrong with paying for a CD's **worth** of music (not the a CD itself, for the reasons cited above) directly to the artist, after listening enough to the music to know that you like it enough to be worht it.
I do, because it shafts everyone else associated with the CD's production.
I LOVE this way people try to wriggle out of the fact that they're freeloaders.
The band (i.e. the people who make the music) have decided that they would like to sell their music through the record label. Chances are, unless they expressly say otherwise, they'd rather people buy the CD than get it off TorrentSpy. This funds the people who worked on the CD, including producers, studio workers and yes, the record companies, who believe it or not do not eat babies and shit cancer as is sometimes assumed on Slashdot, and instead fund a large amount of the music today.
And you say you'll buy some merchandise? Fine. Just remember though; if everyone does the same as you, sales will go down and the band will get dropped by the label due to poor sales, hampering their income and putting their career in the shitter. But hell, you all bought a band t-shirt, so at best the record company company will notice the huge discrepancy between t-shirt sales and album sales.
Anyway, if you like the band enough, surely you'd like them enough to spend 10 quid/15 dollars/whatever on a CD by them?
Btw, downloading or copying stuff isn't piracy
Yes, it is. If you want to get technical, call it copyright infringement. Either way, it's not exactly ethical.
The media industry hates us because of their so-called "loss of REVENUE", which IMHO may set a dangerous precedent. I mean, if they get their way, what's to stop them from litigating with anyone who simply doesn't buy their stuff?
The media industry don't give a fuck if you don't buy their stuff. They don't care if you buy an independent CD, or watch an independent film. They don't send round jackbooted thugs if you don't listen to Britney. They DO care, however, if you infringe on their copyrights by downloading their copyrighted material for free, because (like it or not) it technically is loss of revenue.
Don't get me wrong, I fucking hate copy protection, but only because it makes listening to music/watching movies I've legitimately bought a pain in the ass. Just stop believing that downloading someone's work for free counts as "competition" or "shopping decisions".
Being from Britain, why the fuck would you want any of our women?
*shudders*
It's not like NATO was going to shoot it's nukes...into some empty desert.
Well, it was going to attack Russia. Close enough, IMHO.
Oh come on, this is Slashdot, why should he break with tradition. Everyone knows that if you're going to slander millions of people, you gotta do it with as few apostrophes as possible ;)
This is the thing that always riles me about the companies with the less profitable businesses. Basically, the ones whose businesses are less profitable because their product sucks balls compared to the next competitor (compare Intel to AMD...). They dance around the issue of their products being a pile of shite and instead decide it's something to do with their image being staid or something. This is what Intel is doing; thinking that it's the brand that is at fault, and not the fact that AMD kicks their asses both performance wise and price wise. Sort of reminds me of ITV in the UK (dropping ratings, went through loads of rebrands despite almost constant criticism to the effect of "The BBC's programmes are better", ignored the critics).
Yeah, I'm bitter. So sue me.
In Japan they do.
Rampaging robot hordes invade your home, rape your wife and kill your family... in Japan!
...that IE was a pile of cock.
It won't be. If you haven't heard, support for Mac IE is due to be discontinued.
The latest Kopete works a treat. I tried it and it even handled now playing media properly (with amaroK). Give it a go.
...he is in the wrong sort of movies.
YES.
:)
I was about to reply with this...foobar2000 is my favourite CD ripper/music player bar none. It works with 99% of formats (I even got it to play and encode WMA), it can transcode formats, it's small, fast, light and just works. Love it.
Give it a go, you might just like it
the only thing that seems to be a long time coming is a voip gaim equivalent
um...PhoneGaim?
Transport for London Journey Planner
Quite cool; allows you to plot a journey on several different types of public transport. Even includes the amount of time it takes to walk to the station, which makes it really really useful.
Microsoft makes program in native language. Big fucking whoop. Attempting to read some kind of monopolistic landgrab into this is stupid.
Extending its influence? Pah.
Thank fuck for that. Tiny PCs were always a pain in the ass to fix.
How about Vendor User Licensing Volume Agreement? Better acronym, IMHO.
Copy protected CDs? Pah. ABCDE and Foobar2000 both saw through that (CD writers can see both the audio and the data, allowing for easy ripping) and the proof is in my music collection.
Not to mention, there's the whole feeling of going into a record store and buying the CD, actually having it in your hands and getting all the artwork and other paraphenalia that comes with the music...and a whole stack of CDs on a shelf looks a lot better than a load of MP3s (acts as a nice conversation point too).
I was waiting for a comment like this one :P
(The Final Cut is underappreciated imho, certainly better than the two Roger Waters-less albums which followed)
my sig says it all