Basically, instead of implementing a carrot for not pirating music, the RIAA wants a bigger stick.
It would be far easier for them to just implement a carrot. Make it fucking easy for me to pay for music that I can enjoy whenever I want to, on whatever device I like.
What's the problem with iTunes, or Amazon MP3? Instant downloads, DRM-free, reasonably high bitrate, standard formats. Seems to meet your requirements.
And, it's worth noting, it has largely worked. Used to be that just about everyone I knew pirated music. Now, in my circle of acquaintances, its only a couple techno-anarchists and some kids who couldn't afford it otherwise. I doubt they hurt the RIAA's bottom line much.
We'd do it anyway. I'd be bootlegging and sharing bootlegged music if it was the 80s. Why? Because I'm dirt poor and can't justify paying for such high level things. I still want it though. You can definitely make the argument that I'm stealing from them, I'll give you that, but I'd never buy it in the first place so I don't see how my copying something disrupts their bottom line so much.
If you never intend to buy said item in the first place because you can't afford it or whatever, how are you hurting the business in question? As long as you are not sharing the product and consuming it solely for yourself, then nothing in the world is changing, you are just using a product.
Hang on, this is not an interesting issue, is the core point of the whole debate. Have people missed it?
Its been the same since all the bleating went on about fake designer labels in the 80's. You are not likely to buy a fake Le Whatever t-shirt if you can afford the real thing. Who buys fake Rolexes? Its not the millionaires who buy the originals is it? If you are a rich person with fake designer labels, you look like a prat. There for, mostly, no loss. The whole thing is basically a lie. There is very little actual loss due to piracy.
Look, most people spend all their money each month. If not spend, then allocate. Which means they have a finite amount to spend. So, if they have to buy that which they down load for free, that means they don't buy something else. Maybe the would just do with out. Often with music it ends up not mattering. I mean, out of 100 CD's how many would you listen to regularly? How many never? What about those who have "illegal" downloads? Most of it you never listen too, right? I could go on.
So, the assumption that these industry Muppets make that all the recordings they see downloaded represents lost money is utterly ridiculous. And they must know that.
And here is why: Music faces massive competition for our finite funds. We spend less in percentage terms because now there is so much more to spend our money on than there was back in the 90's, 80', 70's, and so on. As the decades went by, the competition increased and the music industry got squeezed out, and that is a huge problem. They see there isn't really much they can really do about it, so what we have now is the final desperate tactic of blaming their former customers who chose to spend more of their money else where.
Ooooo, bit of a rant? Sorry... I think I stand by all that. Makes sense to me any way.
I guess part of the problem with fake rolexes is they affect the real brand. Much of the appeal of luxury items comes from their uniqueness & rarity.
The music industry's problem with itunes etc is that they're giving up a lot of control (pricing, customer info, etc) & aren't getting much money out of digital downloads. And Amazon could start signing artists tomorrow.
If anything you are only helping them with this action (despite what they think of it). You might listen to more libre music if commercial music wasn't available for free. You pay them with your attention. You will still be recommending commercial music to friends, boosting thier youtube/lastfm playcount, etc.
Exactly, which is why I'm so passionate about this. I live on a meager $200 a month ($CAD) for food and cigarettes (I smoke unfortunately, but it's hard to quit...), and the rest goes to rent, bills, and my student loan debt.
If someone attempts to tell me to buy media, the last thing I would prioritize, I'd tell them I couldn't, which I believe as the truth. Now you could say I'm harming the industry, but like I said, I don't have a budget for this stuff ATM.
When I manage to pay my debt off, I should be able to afford certain things, like Netflix, which in my opinion, is what a 20 something like me can justify. So in conclusion, I would if I could but I can't so I won't. But when I can, I will.
Eating lunch at work right now, I'm not sure how to search for music on iTunes. It appears I can search on the Apple website, which might give me a result (found "Modest Mouse;" did not find "Black Sabbath" or "FFF" -- looking for music), but it keeps asking me to download iTunes, which I can't do at work. (Do I need iTunes to buy music from Apple?). Amazon MP3 does actually have one album by FFF, but if I click on the artist link, it keeps me on the current page showing results by relevance -- which are not very relevant to my search, I might add.
So here's why I don't buy music online, in order of importance -- 1) lack of selection 2) unknown information about the bitrate. I don't see any information about this; I have a strong preference for v0, but I'll accept 320 or FLAC if I have to. 3) poor user experience.
To be fair, however, I doubt my reasons apply to the majority of the population. In the meantime, I will continue to spend my music money elsewhere.
Regarding bitrate for Amazon, it looks like they do variable bitrate that targets ~256kbps (I believe this the same as v0)[1].
Also, while lacking in selection, Google Play Music has become an attractive alternative for me for music. Can stream from a browser, or download to my PC. Works and syncs across all my Android devices wonderfully. Bitrate is 320kbps for purchased music, and you upload up to 20,000 of your own tracks. I think the user experience is one of the better ones. Also, they usually have sales every week where a bunch of albums are $3.99 (this week appears to be only down to 6.99, but still).
You're probably well aware of this, but that's the fault of the label, rather than Apple or Amazon. The band is actually re-recording their entire catalog in order to sell music online and get a fair cut. http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/def-leppard-re-record...
Interesting/depressing. Good insight into who really steals from artists.
except for pricepoint. can you imagine buying songs for $0.25 apiece? or even $0.10! take the digital sales learnings from initiatives like the humble bundle and steam sales and $0.99 ebooks and just apply them.
i mean, with marginal costs being approximately zero, drop the prices by 4x and sell 10x.
better yet, let me subscribe to a service i love and give me EVERYTHING! imagine the chaos if the riaa got into the delivery business and rolled out a spotify clone -- but, globally. with their entire catalog. cats and dogs would indeed start living together.
If SOPA/PIPA would have been ineffective, why did they push it so hard?
I can think of a couple of things:
1. They didn't really push it all that hard, the RIAA thought they could just slip it through with a little help from their "friends" in Congress. They were genuiely surprised by the upwelling of opposition.
2. They've got some ulterior motive than just externalizing the costs of copyright enforcement. A "feint within a feint", maybe, or maybe the RIAA is a tool of some other, greater, force.
If you create an environment of fear or distrust, where many players are more interested in appearing to support the organization by doing what's expected, rather than actually supporting the organization by doing what's right, you'll end up with highly inappropriate decisions being made and actions being taken.
If you've never studied organizational behavior, this aspect (how group decisionmaking goes wrong) is a huge part of the field. Christensen's "Innovator's Dilemma" and Olson's "Logic of Collective Action" are among the better known of these failures.
> maybe the RIAA is a tool of some other, greater, force.
Honestly, I don't think it needs to be that complicated.
RIAA is the anonymous 'evil' face that Sony, EMI, Universal and Warner use to do their dirty work. It doesn't matter what RIAA does because their backers are protected from public ire.
As long as RIAA's backers are protected, RIAA can and will do whatever they think they they can get away with, no matter how unethical, if it results in even a tiny gain for their backers.
People who want to oppose RIAA just need to do one thing - call the organization what is: SONY, Universal, EMI, Warner.
It isn't "RIAA" that's pushing for internet censorship. RIAA is nothing. Blame Sony. Blame EMI, Blame Universal, Blame Warner. The rubbish will then stop.
I'm not clear on why, but the *AAs seem intent on controlling distribution, not just making money from it. SOPA and PIPA would have given them a way to control things even if it wouldn't really make them more money.
Focusing on controlling distribution is interesting, and indeed, the *AAs do seem intent on control. But that just moves the question one level down: why focus on control? Isn't micro-control of stuff like distribution usually externalized by corporations? Why try to control something that any thought at all leads you to say "why bother?"
Why wouldn't they focus on that? It allows them to control the market for profit and so it's in their financial interests to control distribution as much as possible.
Just as its in everyone else's interest to make them unable to do so (and that includes the artist's interest).
The RIAA seems content to antagonize their own customers to reduce piracy. Multiple studies have shown that the biggest pirates are also the music industry's best customers. They won't release a complete list of all their covered works, let alone put them all up for sale somewhere convenient.
> “These illicit sites are among the culprits behind the music industry’s more than 50 percent decline in revenues during the last decade, resulting in 15,000 layoffs and fewer resources to invest in new bands,” wrote RIAA CEO Cary Sherman in a New York Times piece last year.
If we assume that the average salary of the 15,000 laid off employees was $67k-100k, so that means they saved $1-1.5 billion a year with these lay-offs?
It's impressive how TorrentFreak can create such a long article out of a single sentence from a slide. Does anyone know why the RIAA believes that SOPA wouldn't be effective for music?
It would be far easier for them to just implement a carrot. Make it fucking easy for me to pay for music that I can enjoy whenever I want to, on whatever device I like.