Leaked RIAA Report: SOPA/PIPA “Ineffective Tool” Against Music Piracy
torrentfreak.com
torrentfreak.com
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.
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.
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.
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 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.
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.
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).
[1] http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html/?nodeId=...
I tried to buy some Def Leppard the other day. Couldn't find any.
Interesting/depressing. Good insight into who really steals from artists.
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.
m3mnoch.
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.
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.
Answer: Control.
Question: If Control’s control is absolute, why does Control need to control?
Answer: Control… needs time.
Question: Is Control controlled by its need to control?
Answer: Yes.
- William Burroughs - Ah Pook is here
He may have been onto something with this one.
Just as its in everyone else's interest to make them unable to do so (and that includes the artist's interest).
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?
[0]: http://www.pcworld.com/article/223431/riaa_thinks_limewire_o...
Not familiar with "journalism"?
Maybe a British trash tabloid thing, but here our "journalists" don't even need a whole sentence, let alone from "source" as "reliable" as a slide.