And if music sales are tanking, the main reason is the awful quality of what passes for popular music these days.
Exhibit A: "Flava Flav"
Posted on 12/19/2008 8:26:38 AM PST by Stoat
After years of suing thousands of people for allegedly stealing music via the Internet, the recording industry is set to drop its legal assault as it searches for more effective ways to combat online music piracy.
(edit)
Instead, the Recording Industry Association of America said it plans to try an approach that relies on the cooperation of Internet-service providers
(edit)
If the customers continue the file-sharing, they will get one or two more emails, perhaps accompanied by slower service from the provider. Finally, the ISP may cut off their access altogether.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
About damn time.
It seems like a better match between the punishment and the crime.
THAT'S a winning change.
It’s way worse. This strategy will turn your ISP into a private police force for the RIAA.
We are conservatives. The use of the internet is not a right, nor is there any privacy on the internet. This is a solution that effectively punishes the guilty, acts as a deterent, protects peoples intellectual property in one of the few ways that might actually work.
At least the damn liberals will have to start paying for their Dixie Chicks and Black Eyed Peas.
No mention of the key points that are required (e.g. damages for false accusation on a level equivalent to the damages extracted from an actual infringer who gets caught).
—protects peoples intellectual property—
Nonsense. If someone wants to share a song from a CD he legall purchased, there is nothing wrong with that. Downloading an mp3 for free is not theft, as the mp3 file has no corporeal existence. Unless you are worried that Britney Spears may have to purchase her blond hair dye off the shelf.
“Meanwhile, music sales continue to fall. In 2003, the industry sold 656 million albums. In 2007, the number fell to 500 million CDs and digital albums, plus 844 million paid individual song downloads — hardly enough to make up the decline in album sales.”
- They are suffering the same fate as the car companies, people don’t want to buy their over-priced crappy products anymore. Maybe they’ll get a bailout too.
More like cheaper.
The "recording" "Industry" is dead.
Except for live concerts, acting, or worse ads, there is no money left.
Hardcore uploaders/downloaders will start using software which blocks their IP address. There are so many occasional downloaders that the ISP won’t be able (or even want to, for financial reasons) to go after them. And if music sales are tanking, the main reason is the awful quality of what passes for popular music these days.
I’m no fan of Oprah, but she is giving away Christmas music downloads on her site, if anyone is interested. http://www.oprah.com/article/oprahshow/20081118_tows_holiday/2
“Nonsense. If someone wants to share a song from a CD he legall purchased, there is nothing wrong with that. Downloading an mp3 for free is not theft, as the mp3 file has no corporeal existence.”
You are flat wrong. You are so wrong I don’t even know where to start.
Speak for yourself. Being a conservative, I have an expectation of privacy on the internet.
Great, now ISPs are going to be spying on us even more.
I realized a while back that the industry’s approach to intellectual property disturbed me on a level well below my intellectual understanding of the legal issues: these guys were determined to extract every penny they could from their “property” - if they could find a way to make you pay a licensing fee to on their tunes they would cheerfully do so - and the resulting legal battles and copyright technologies and general level of inconvenience and unpleasantness just eventually turned me off to recorded music entirely, I rarely buy anything these days, and when I do I buy it used on CD on Amazon.
Exhibit A: "Flava Flav"
Err, that SHOULD be:
I realized a while back that the industry’s approach to intellectual property disturbed me on a level well below my intellectual understanding of the legal issues: these guys were determined to extract every penny they could from their “property” - if they could find a way to make you pay a licensing fee to hum their tunes they would cheerfully do so - and the resulting legal battles and copyright technologies and general level of inconvenience and unpleasantness just eventually turned me off to recorded music entirely, I rarely buy anything these days, and when I do I buy it used on CD on Amazon.
This is another move to protect the current delivery system (hard media like CDs). There are legitimate uses for file sharing.
1. To share files. Not all files are music files.
2. Most musicians make $0 from their album sales (has been true for a long time. They make money from live shows. There is a growing movement in the music business for bands to totally bypass the record companies. They are producing the songs themselves, and putting the songs up on file sharing sites. This is the real target of this move, as it will eventually put an end to record companies.
I support the record companies from one standpoint. They own the copyright on the music they sell, and only they have the right to sell it (or give it away via file sharing.)
However, that right extends to everyone that produces music. If I form an independent band, record songs on my own, and want to give away copies of my songs via file sharing to promote my band, that is also my right.
The fact that someone is sharing an mp3 file DOES NOT mean they are sharing it illegally. The record companies are trying to shut down their biggest future competitor: independent artists that CHOOSE to give away their music via mp3 & file sharing.
Awww. How can you not love that face! </jk>
—The fact that someone is sharing an mp3 file DOES NOT mean they are sharing it illegally.—
How would the ISP even know it was a copyrighted mp3 file. It could be an mp3 of my kid singing at a recital, for all they’d know.
RIAA= useless sack of shiite lawyers & money grubbers.
I’m not affected because the most I ever do is once or twice a year rip a CD I check out from the library. Windows media player is always happy to do this. Then I make my own CD from it and/or put a few tunes on my cheapo MP3 player to hear when taking a walk
Your expectation is a false one.
Remember- the internet is a loosely coupled collection of government and corporate zones of control. You pay a private entity that provides you access and in return gives you a traceable number, where they record all your activity. These private corporations are possibly liable for your activities.
You frequent sites that generally have a terms of use that says your activity will be monitored. Every file you touch is associated with your ip address - and is thus traceable back to you - both on the website’s logs, and on your isp’s logs.
Cookies are planted on your computer to track what sites you frequent - third parties provide weather, desktop searching, screensavers and other tools that covertly analyze your computer use and directs advertisers to your likes and dislikes so that they can more accurately target you with ads.
In short - you can expect privacy all you want. It doesn’t exist on the internet. Your ISP is already required to monitor you and keeps logs X number on behalf of the government or any person who wants to serve them with a subpeona. Just as you shouldn’t expect privacy when selling drugs on a street corner or murdering someone in full view of a survellliance camera, you shouldn’t expect privacy when you are stealing, hacking, distributing child pornography or download music on the internet.
Welcome to the real world.
I didn’t get the impression they were trying to kill the MP3 format. I think they are trying to protect music they own that is uploaded to the net and downloaded by third parties.
lol
Your argument is that people don’t own the music they write, create, produce, etc. That is, of course, a slap in the face of everyone who works for a living - but as long as you get free stuff, you’ll probably be happy.
Of course downloading MP3s is theft, as well as software, movies, etc. By your argument, child porn would be legal, since JPGs don’t have “corporeal existance”.
Good luck with that.
Anonymizing software will get you only so far. There are several remedies to stop their use on a single server, or at the isp level.
—By your argument, child porn would be legal, since JPGs don’t have “corporeal existance”.—
The child who is being exploited in child porn DOES have a corporeal existence; laws against child porn, are, quite properly, aimed at punishing those individuals who would sexually exploit minors—thus their intent is, ultimately, to protect children, certainly not to protect the IP rights of pornographers.
“I didn’t get the impression they were trying to kill the MP3 format. I think they are trying to protect music they own that is uploaded to the net and downloaded by third parties.”
I’m sure they are trying to protect their intellecutal property, and I don’t blame them for that. Their biggest long term threat though, doesn’t come from illegal sharing of mp3s, but from legal sharing of mp3s.
This solution is like eliminating free speach, because there is a rash of people yelling fire in crowed theatres.
Record compaines developed because: 1. the cost to record a song was high, 2. the cost to produce physical media to distribute the music was high, 3. promotion costs were high, 4. the distribution channel was expensive (and came to be dominated by a few big companies.)
Recording costs have dropped through the floor. Computers have brought the ability to record and edit music to the basement level.
There is no cost for the physical (mp3) media anymore.
The internet has made it possible for even the smallest band to promote themselves.
The only thing the record companies have left is domination of the distribution channel. Whether it is hard media like CDs, or soft media like iTunes. As long as record companies can force consumers into channels they dominate, they will exist. When people get comfortable getting music from non-record company dominated channels (from file sharing to independent band web sites), the record companies business model will fail.
IMHO, if the record companies want to survive, they need to get away from the $1 a song model for downloads. It can actually cost more to download an entire album than to buy the physical CD. They would eliminate tons of filesharing just by dropping the cost (I’m guessing abuot 20 cents a song.) What they lost on each song would be gained by more songs being downloaded (considering there is zero additonal marginal cost for each downloaded.)
Anyway, I think they are fighting a losing battle with this approach. The ISPs don’t get paid by the record companies,they get paid by the users. The smart ISPs aren’t going to punish their customers to help the record companies (unless they want to lose customers to their competiton.)
They could do what they did under Clinton, put a homosexual copyright lawyer who’s their guy in charge of the PTO, and, while wrecking the patent system further, focus only preventing folks in the hinterlands of places like Peru and Indonesia from using technology.
Who needs more Edisons when we have Babs Streisand?
—The smart ISPs aren’t going to punish their customers to help the record companies (unless they want to lose customers to their competiton.)—
Exactamundo. That approach works mostly with universities and colleges (who set up firewalls making hard to use p2p software) because:
1. They are afraid of lawsuits
2. Those darn kids are hogging valuable bandwith by file-sharing.
“To: (use semi-colons to separate multiple recipients)
seatrout
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In the News/Activism forum, on a thread titled Music Industry to Abandon Mass Suits (will enlist help of ISP’s instead), seatrout wrote:
—The smart ISPs aren’t going to punish their customers to help the record companies (unless they want to lose customers to their competiton.)—
Exactamundo. That approach works mostly with universities and colleges (who set up firewalls making hard to use p2p software) because:
1. They are afraid of lawsuits
2. Those darn kids are hogging valuable bandwith by file-sharing.”
Those darned kids are also the ones doing most of the illegal file sharing (ruining it for everyone else who wants to use it for a legitimate purpose.)
The crooks like the college kids doing illegal file sharing should be cracked down on.
I think I copied some extra stuff into my last reply accidently (and here I thought someone was posting something witty till I saw I had posted it.) ;)
“will start using software which blocks their IP address.”
Those schemes have not been proven to work so well. Anonymous routers have been set up by the RIAA in some cases to get the IP addresses anyway.
At any rate this is the last gasp of a dying industry.
“Your ISP is already required to monitor you and keeps logs X number on behalf of the government or any person who wants to serve them with a subpeona.”
There is no law that requires ISPs to keep logs for any certain length of time. They are only required to monitor a specific user after they are served with a subpoena, as is required of the phone companies under wiretap laws.
Most ISPs keep logs for maintenance purposes and dump the logs periodically. It used to be they would keep the data for about a month, I don’t know what it is now.
Sounds like the industry is hoping to bribe ISP's to cooperate with them.
I’ve never quite understood the difference between acquiring a free mp3 and acquiring a CD free from the public library. Chances are both will be listened to for the same period of time before deletion/return.
I have a feeling the Justice Dept, the FBI CIA and NSA and MI6 and Interpol is going to stop this dead in it’s tracks.
The I2P network encapsulation technologies are in stillborn infancy at the moment. HOWEVER if 100,000 warez and p2p coders tackle the I2P problems simultaneously and create a truly anonymous high level encryption software package that becomes popular with MAINSTREAM internet users, the intelligence agencies will be completely disarmed in the ongoing cat and mouse games against actual criminal networks, such as money, weapons, drug, and human traffickers and foreign counter intelligence.
If Tor/I2P/Freenet/GNUnet have another few million nodes because p2p users migrate to those I2P networks, the whole world changes and no digital content will be traceable to it’s source or destination.
Tor/I2P/Freenet/GNUnet nodes in Europe are legal even if the node has child porn move through it. If another 2,000,000 early adopters set up nodes, it’s all over, the law enforcement of the world will have to force coup d’etats in order to nationalize the telecommunications infrastructure, or they can start mass arresting millions of users who set up nodes.
High level packet encryption onion routing software can be downloaded, configured and installed by total morons in under 15 minutes. All it takes is a few million morons to join I2P and the RIAA, Chinese Communists and Iranian Mullahacracy's thought police are out of business.You pay a private entity that provides you access and in return gives you a traceable number, - correct
where they record all your activity. These private corporations are possibly liable for your activities. -incorrect.
You frequent sites that generally have a terms of use that says your activity will be monitored. - correct.
Every file you touch is associated with your ip address - and is thus traceable back to you - both on the website’s logs, and on your isp’s logs. - incorrect.
Cookies are planted on your computer to track what sites you frequent - third parties provide weather, desktop searching, screensavers and other tools that covertly analyze your computer use and directs advertisers to your likes and dislikes so that they can more accurately target you with ads. - incorrect.
The best way to help underground Christians in China and to support the resistance in Iran and Russia is to install I2P or TOR. The only way Chinese dissidents can safely communicate over digital networks at the moment is through high level I2P networks.
ISPs will always be the point of enforcement. Whether it’s hunting down media free-loaders, terrorist plots, illegal drug deals or kiddie porn. The ISPs should try and seek some sort of immunity from future litigation immediately. ‘Course we could all go on Big Brother’s free internet - coming soon to a city near you. ;-)
By the file characteristics. They cam set up a database of what tracks would rip to...plus release their own honeypots.
ping
A professional studio will have advantages not available to a typical basement artist. The electronic parts of the path from performer to recording have gotten quite cheap, but except when using all-electronic instruments there's still an acoustic part that isn't so cheap. A performer in a recording studio generally isn't going to have takes ruined by unwanted outside sounds. Someone recording in his basement, on the other hand, often will. Of course, given a choice between having to do a few extra takes to get a good one, versus having to spend thousands of dollars for a studio, many people will opt for the former.
Also, I wonder what fraction of the people who listen to music these days really care what it sounds like? Someone listening to music under ideal conditions could easily tell the difference between a recording produced on $750 worth of equipment in someone's basement and one produced on $750,000 worth of equipment in a studio. Someone listening to a 128kbps MP3 with cheap headphones on a noisy subway, however, probably couldn't. Which type of person represents more of the market share?
The quality of musical recordings has been going down for several decades.
I listened to an old Paul McCartney/Wings album (on CD) a while back. The quality of the recording was shocking compared to the recording quality going out today (and I’m talking about mainstream commercial albums of today.) In other words, even commercial recording companies are scrimping on quality.
I can remember having a discussion with someone years ago who swore that the mp3 format would never catch on, because the quality was soo much poorer than a CD. Boy, was he wrong.
Look at the equipment people are using to listen to music with today. An ipod with earplugs. Even the BEST earplugs are sub-standard compared to full blown headphones (which pale compared to a full blown stereo system.)
Most people don’t buy music because of its recording quality, they buy it because they like the music. A basement recording artists today can put out a recording that is “good enough” quality wise to satisfy 90%+ of most people.
Also consider the musical style. If you like the symphony and opera, recording quality will be higher on your scale. How important is recording quality to the typical death-metal fan? Good enough is about all that is required.
To make a long story short, I’ve heard people argue “quality, quality” for a couple of decades, but I just don’t see a huge market for quality. Heck, you don’t even see the record companies pushing the fact that the sound off a CD is better than the sound of an mp3 (which they would be if they thought it would make any difference.)
Who buys music? I don’t know about today, but in the ‘70s and ‘80s the typical record buyer was a male between 14 and 21 (young men bought way more records than women.)
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