The Music Industry’s New Extortion Scheme | Hacker News Reader

The Music Industry’s New Extortion Scheme

techcrunch.com

21 pointsnickb19 comments

http://www.gnu.org/gnu/manifesto.html

All sorts of development can be funded with a Software Tax

Kids today never know who they are criticizing.

Read further: "But if the computer buyer makes a donation to software development himself, he can take a credit against the tax. He can donate to the project of his own choosing".

I think there would be much less offense taken to this "tax" if we could pay the $5 to the artist of our choosing and get the same benefits.

So the buyer donates to his friend, and his friend donates to him, and effectively no one ends up paying the computer tax.

I really hate the music labels. Here's hoping online publishing (thefeelgood.com, amiestreet.com) puts them out of business before they can do too much damage to the legal institutions of this country.

I'll throw in a good word here for AmieStreet.com. I've been on there for about 3 months and I'm loving it.

_________ industry revenues will be a set size, regardless of the quality or type of _______ they release. Incentives to innovate will evaporate.

Yes. Fill in the blank - public education, health care, etc.

To be fair, 99% of the time I'm not looking for innovation in my hospital stay.

If the blood-letting is still working for you, then, by all means, stick with it.

Indeed. Health care, over a long enough time line, becomes the area in most urgent need of innovation.

There's a difference between being stagnant and being a guinea pig though.

As there is between a serious concern and a straw man.

There can still be competition within the industry though. All that is needed is a way to to determine how to best reward the industry participants for effectiveness. For music that could be some measure of the number of downloads/listens to each artist's piece of music.

I'm not sure this is the way to go. You could argue that innovation in 'non-measured' uses of music would be stifled. But within the framework there would be incentives.

I think it's obvious that the music industry is headed towards an "all you can eat" model to generate the bulk of revenue related to its recorded properties. Either this (doubtful) or a premium on your MP3 player (likely), or something else. What will be interesting is how this changes the way music gets marketed.

I actually don't see anything changing. Labels will simply push all their artists into 360 deals where the labels get money for not only their record sales but also everything else, touring, merchandise, etc. The incentive is still going to be there to promote acts that classically "sell" even if "sell" no longer includes record sales.

When a whole industry starts suing their customers on a regular basis you know they are in serious trouble.

There are so many alternative ways of making money, and I'm frankly amazed that the music industry hasn't even managed to implement one single money-making scheme. Apple clearly shows that it is possible - so they really have no excuse.

They should stop sobbing and get out there and compete in a market that is always changing and often brutal. That's what the rest of us have to do.

As the banking industry has shown us, what's good for the industry in the long term is often not what's good for the individuals in charge in the short term....

So I can't entirely say I'm surprised.

Spain has already a music tax. They just assume that every DVD-R, CD-R, Hard Drive, iPod, etc. will be used to store "pirated" music so they charged them accordingly.

And, since there has been payment, people are then allowed to "pirate" music?

Yes. If you don't make money from it AND it is from personal use, it is technically legal.

In practice, however, restaurants, salons for private weedings and even individuals who throw parties in their houses are being sued (or charged with a fee) for using copyrighted music in a non-personal or profit-making way. It's totally insane.

The tax is collected not by the goverment but instead by an increasingly-powerful-lobby who "represent the artists" (called SGAE) so the situation it's only getting worse.

If the music industry as we know it is dying, what's going to replace it?

Music tax - definitely bad idea. Buying CDs/albums - apparently, that is 'dying'.

So, then, how are artists going to get payed in such a way that both artists and consumers are happy? They won't work for free, after all. I've been think about this, but to no avail - nothing really comes to mind.

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