RIAA vs. hackers WAR?

[The Templar]

Originally posted by Sava
I'd just assume wipe my &*^$#& with that "law"

Now you see, this attitude is why the RIAA is doomed. Once people decide the law is bullshit, there is no enforcing it without heavy expenses.

And I guarantee more people feel like Sava than not.

[Pekka]

Sava, well .. by being the citizen of the US, you have agreed to follow and obey its laws.. you have a deal. If you don't like some of the laws, then you break the deal, and thus should denounce citizenship .

Right?

[Dis]

It simply amazes me how many people can justify stealing

hey I do it too, but at least I realize what it is I'm doing.

Yes it is true, I am downloading stuff I would never buy the CD to- so they aren't losing any sales to me. But it's still the same as me taking the CD out of the store.

But I do hope there will be a war. I need some entertainment.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Dissident
Yes it is true, I am downloading stuff I would never buy the CD to- so they aren't losing any sales to me. But it's still the same as me taking the CD out of the store.

Wait a second.

These two cases can't be the same.

[optimus2861]

(I think this is more for Sava than you, UR)

^ The 'steal CD = download song' analogy isn't perfect, but put the shoe on the other foot. What if it were your creative works being distributed on the internet without your permission? What if by selling those works, you earned a source of income that was taking a hit, perhaps even a severe hit, because of that unauthorized distribution? After all, why would somebody pay you for your work if they can download it for free? Wouldn't you be just a wee bit pissed off at those who were distributing your works and telling you to get bent, that you were a fascist pig, yadda yadda, when it's money out of your pocket?

It's too easy to just portray the rich guys as the villains without seeing the big picture.

(Granted, it's not been proven by RIAA that the downloaders are the prime cause of their declining sales, and given that they opted to settle the price-fixing class-action suit filed against them last year rather than defend themselves and clear their name, they don't have a lot of credibility.)

[Spiffor]

Optimus :
As of yet, sales through major labels is one of the few income sources for the artists to get their money. The other ways are copyrights paid each time their song is broadcasted by a legal actor, and fees earned at concert.

Indeed, for now, artists are the ones who can complain, because unlike the copy-industry, they are indeed ripped of their work. They would however profit from a system that gets rid of the middleman (the labels) to offer much cheaper prices to the consumer, with almost all the gains being reversed to the artist. IIUC, that's the principle of Itunes, and I'm sure such a system will become widely popular once internet matures.

[Soul Survivor]

a lot of the bands i listen to have already broken up, and the ones that are still around are mostly indie and the increased exposure is probably helping them more than hurting them.

its the same reason computer games put out playable demos

the ways i sees it they're stealing from me by charging such high prices for cds while giving the artist < 10%

[Soul Survivor]

THANK YOU verizon!

http://www.riaa.com/news/newsletter/062003_2.asp

[mrmitchell]

What if by selling those works, you earned a source of income that was taking a hit, perhaps even a severe hit, because of that unauthorized distribution?

Their profit hits aren't coming from P2P programs. Then again, you note that they have difficulty proving that, so I'll let it slide.

a lot of the bands i listen to have already broken up, and the ones that are still around are mostly indie and the increased exposure is probably helping them more than hurting them.

Exactly! If the world were like the RIAA wanted it, there would be no small competition....a new band getting by is impossible these days because of those jerks.

the ways i sees it they're stealing from me by charging such high prices for cds while giving the artist < 10%

Exactly. The RIAA's "official spin" for the outrageous cost of a CD is that it costs more money to produce and market it. To which I, and many other customers ask, How stupid do you think we really are anyways?. I'm sure they would gain many more customers by lowering the cost significantly than by price-gouging and "marketing" (haha, like I see 10 ads for every CD they put out.) Production? You could theoretically make an album with a computer and some audio-editing software. That's probably whut a lot of the small, cut-out-from-the-market bands do anyways.
---
It would've been funny to see the RIAA try to defend the price gouging lawsuit.

[The Templar]

Originally posted by optimus2861
The 'steal CD = download song' analogy isn't perfect, but put the shoe on the other foot. What if it were your creative works being distributed on the internet without your permission? What if by selling those works, you earned a source of income that was taking a hit, perhaps even a severe hit, because of that unauthorized distribution? After all, why would somebody pay you for your work if they can download it for free? Wouldn't you be just a wee bit pissed off at those who were distributing your works and telling you to get bent, that you were a fascist pig, yadda yadda, when it's money out of your pocket?

I wouldn't like it. But the question is, can my right to them be enforced effectively?

Moreover, if everyone does it, is it stealing? Doesn't criminality cease to be a significant concept if it apllies to everyone?

It's too easy to just portray the rich guys as the villains without seeing the big picture.

Villians or not, the viability of their business is coming to an end. It works like this -

There is no scarcity of music, not even of good music. MP3 and CD burners allow for ease and cheapness of distribution. No scarcity equals no market! Anyone's music needs can mostly be met without even file trading ripped music. MP3.com, Ampcast, and other sites offering independent music for free offer everything the big boys do, and much of it better.

Jazz and classical, you ask? Isn't a big moneymaker for the corporate boys anyway - so their not interested in producing more anyway. These forms are in danger file trading or no.

If the RIAA members want to survive, they'll need to do something new.

[Pekka]

One of the very corner stones of defending CDs high prices back in the day was that it's better technology and that the prices will drop. It was promised, that because of the producing is basically not that tough, and it doesn't cost that much to produce CDs as in copying CDs, that it will ultimately drop, the price that is. It was supposed to happen in few years. The prices has only gotten higher. How is this possible?

If you had a normal cassette, did you ever copy your own cassettes? Maybe made your own compilations? It IS the same thing, if you didn't own those cassettes in the first place. That seems to be OK, but it's basically the same thing. And maaaaaaaaany people did it.
They should finally stand up to the original promises and lower the price of those f:ing CDs, it is NOT expensive to produce them. Sure it costs money, but it sure is not as expensive as they claim it to be. RIAA is the middle man, that is not needed, and consumers are pissed at RIAA. Therefore it doesn't have any chances against consumers.

It is not the same if I go and steal it from record shop. It would be almost the same if I went to the record shop with my own empty CD and copied it there and left the original CD in the shelves, untouched. Legal? Maybe not, but it's not the same thing and it can not be compared.
This thing can be compared to stealing, and there are good arguments about it being stealing, but you can put it like that, you have to get better analogy .

[Pekka]

And this price thing happened way before mp3s came.

Besides, it was unstoppable evolution. I remember when I had my first soundblaster soundcard, and my first cd-rom, that it would be cool to put the audio to my HD, and listen it from my computer, source being my HD, not CD. So I converted it into .wav file. Of course I noticed that 'wow this takes lots of space'. But I was new with computers, and I didn't know how to compress it. So it was only a matter of time when mp3s came.

They should have seen this coming way before mp3s came. Everyone knew right then, that this is going to be the thing, since it takes only so little space, and quality is good, even when the first mp3s came.

So, I don't know who they had hired to watch out situations like these, future, and decide what course to take. Obviously they did not take any course. It's not getting too late, and they have only themselves to blame for the bad business. If they'd had acted when it was time to act, we might have different situation, or attitude.

It's like yelling to a hurricane 'you shall not pass!'. Yeah, you can act tough and yell, put it will go through to you and leave you dead, but you died as a stupid man. No shame in running, no shame in changing tactics against superior enemy. They don't have to quit and submit. Just need to change their strategy. Before it's too late.

[Inverse Icarus]

Originally posted by Dissident
Yes it is true, I am downloading stuff I would never buy the CD to- so they aren't losing any sales to me. But it's still the same as me taking the CD out of the store.

aside from the fact that you're stealling physical property in the latter case, in addition to the intellectual property.

and as we all know, that CD ad jewel case help bump up that price.

it's all mark up. i'd say something like 60-70% of the CD price is the stores selling them marking up prices to make cash. then, that justifies bands selling their own crap for the same price, as well as internet sites.

someone should start a NON-PROFIT music distribution service, whether it be hard copeis of CDs, or MP3s.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by optimus2861
^ The 'steal CD = download song' analogy isn't perfect, but put the shoe on the other foot. What if it were your creative works being distributed on the internet without your permission? What if by selling those works, you earned a source of income that was taking a hit, perhaps even a severe hit, because of that unauthorized distribution? After all, why would somebody pay you for your work if they can download it for free? Wouldn't you be just a wee bit pissed off at those who were distributing your works and telling you to get bent, that you were a fascist pig, yadda yadda, when it's money out of your pocket?

This is not the actual situation - it is the image painted by RIAA, but it is not what's happening.

First of all, you do not actually lose any money. In fact, you lose nothing. You can argue that you have lost potential sales, but you cannot show that without people downloading the MP3, they will by the CD's. The numbers, be it 10 billion or 100 billion, are just absurd numbers that's pulled out of somebody's rectum.

Secondly, I hold that people will pay you money if they like your stuff. Pekka offered some examples. Similar successes can be found in shareware, with WinZip, ACDSee and Paint Shop Pro being famous examples. Most people are not like what RIAA painted them out to be: shameless, parasitic freeloaders. Doing so just aggravates their distractors more.

Originally posted by optimus2861
It's too easy to just portray the rich guys as the villains without seeing the big picture.

What's the big picture? Most people feel that music CD's don't worth the USD18-20 that they are priced at. At least half of the songs on an album are crap. People are upset and what you are seeing is a popular backlash.

[Pekka]

And of course then there are the big companies selling mp3-players! Now you can get them to your car (I want one!!!), or just a small portable one. Yesterday I was looking at a small mp3-player, the size of the palm of your hand, able to store 20 gigs of mp3s.

Everyone wants to make these devices now and compete who has the best player, since they sell like crazy and people want them. So, how come they are perfectly ok to make? Sure, you can always copy your OWN CDs you have actually bought, but then again everyone knows this is not the case at most times. And why the CD protection then, that you can't copy it, and move it to your computer? How are you supposed to use your brand new expensive mp3player, that was legal?
It's not a question of protection of CDs failing even before they came to few CDs (thanks to hackers).

Even when consumers are being hypocrite and stealing, companies are doing exactly the same thing.

[Inverse Icarus]

legally, you're allowed to rip your own CDs, and any company stopping you from doig that can be sued.

realistically, capitialism prevents you from suing them.

big business > rights

[Pekka]

UR, I agree. I buy lots of vinyls, and spend a fortune to them. I know what I like, what labels I like, and fortunately I know source where they are being released on mp3s. Sure I could go to groovetech.com and listen the sound clips, but I like listening the whole tracks, it is important to me, and I don't have a record shop with music of my likings near me, so I like the fact, that I can listen the vinyls I am about to buy first. And if I like it, I WILL buy it. Sure I also downloads lots of crap that I'm not about to buy, so it's not like some kind of saint.

But the point is, what I like, I'll buy. I won't buy CDs, because they're so fricking expensive, and because I can't play them with my decks .

It saves me lots of time and some money too. Actually I still spend the same money (almost everything I have) anyway, I just buy more quality music, music that I like. My money is not being wasted on music that I think is promising but I'm not sure. So, the industry is not losing any money because of me, as I still give the same amount of money. Maybe even more money, because there is so much good music out there. And as for the mp3s I have and albums I'm not about to buy.. well I can't literally afford them anyway, so it's not away from the industry, even when I'm stealing it.

[Pekka]

And more about these mp3players... the manufactures knows the key factors of a good player. The best one is that can storage the most and is still relatively small. So the essential thing is, that you can stuff as much mp3s as possible. Does everyone have 5000 CDs? Maybe someone has, but the trend is clear, and it is very clear that the point is to benefit from the trend of mp3s and p2p-networks offering mp3s.

If Madonna is so worried that her albums are being copied, and that's shes losing so much money, would she give me the album free if I was poor african child? I didn't think so. She goes there acting saint and singing about hypocrites etc, but she's one too. Too bad I don't like her music so I'm not even downloading it.

Some people upgrade their ancient internet connections just so that they can leech those mp3s faster than with 28.8 modem. That gives mroe money to different manufacturers, ISPs etc. Maybe that's why ISPs are reluctant to really step in. They say they're being against all this illegal trading, but they're not doing anything to stop it. They would lose money.
And mp3players manufacturers would lose one helluva market. Creative would lose a big market here; they have created a player, and are makign new players. Producing them is not very cheap. They have calculated how much they will make money, and profit. If they suddenly couldn't sell these, then they'd be pissed I guess. Maybe they have enough money and lobbyists to keep there business safe, while RIAA attacks consumers and p2p-network users.

[Pekka]

So, in order RIAA not being hypocrite themselves, they need to prioritize things. First they need to get the ones who makes money because of this. That means attacking factories in eastern europe and in asia, that are controlled by organized crime. They are making big money, while p2p-network users are not making any money. Then they need to attack companies that makes mp3players. They make money and benefit from 'illegal' activities the most, and they know it. The exploit the situation. All these folks, they are making big business, so maybe that's why RIAA is not so quick to attack.

And that's why they're making a big mistake. People will see them as hypocrites. Consumers don't like them because of the double standards.

If they want to stop the mp3s from travelling, the only thing they can do is to change the attitudes of the people. That they don't want to download mp3s. Otherwise it's impossible. But with aggressive attack and being hypocrite about it, they will lose. They need to be more sneaky.

[Pekka]

And it should be noticed, that some smaller labels are actually making more money. Why? Because the money has transferred from bigger labels to the smaller and more unknown ones. Why? Because people are now able to check out music scene so much better, they can listen to any kind of music, any artist and find what they like. There should be research not showing how much people download mp3s, but how much money people use to buy music, and how it's been developing for the last 10 to 15 years. That way we know how much money there is in the industry, and is it so dramatically dropping as RIAA claims.

This puts a big pressure to bigger labels, that makes crap music. I'm talking about the ones that make one hit, and then fill the rest of the albums with something they hired some guy to do. People have always complained about that. So, now when people can access all kinds of music, labels and artists, they find new good stuff, and then they go buy them. Big companies lose money, because there's a pressure to lift their standards and quality of products. This costs more money. So instead of investing to that, they decide to go for the cheaper one and blame the consumer with a middle man so they don't look so bad themselves. Without big companies making huge profits and being uncertain of themselves, there wouldn't even be the need for RIAA. And that is one reason why people don't like RIAA either.

So, why some smaller labels are not making a big fuss about it? Because they're making more money! It brings more quality music to the markets, that people who can afford them can buy them. It's true competition, other ones are just being sissies and using middle men to blame and condemn stupid consumers to hell who are not smart enough to buy their crappy albums, while smaller labels with quality music are being more happy that their music is being discovered.

[Pekka]

Many of my points can be argued and there would be no absolute truth. But all I'm saying is, that consumers and p2p-network users are not the only ones who are being hypocrite. Sure, two wrongs doesn't make it right.

But it gets worrying, when there are very few people who refuse to listen to CD because it has been downloaded from the internet and burned with a home CD-R. When my mom asks me to get few records and burn to her.. then you know you are against people who you cant win, because they simply don't see it being too wrong. Or maybe all people are too greedy in the nature, but it still doesn't change the fact that they can't win this battle. That brings to my mind, how much mp3s has actually raised the sells of CD-Rs? Or how about empty CDs? 'Yeah we all burn our documents'... sure.
Or why people buy bigger HDs? Because OS today take over 1 gig of space, so they need that other 100 gigs for their documents, e-mails and to cache their browsers? I don't think so. Or are everyone graphic designers, so their work at HOME takes so much space????

It is also too late to put up campagns 'downloading is wrong!!11111111' claiming stuff that isn't even true. THey should have done it earlier.

Or how do you say it 'quitters never win and winners never quit, but only stupid people continue trying when you can't win'.. something like that.

[Whaleboy]

Lets not forget the key argument of the RIAA etc is that p2p people are "stealing" their music. That is simply not the case.

Like I said before, all that is happening economically, is the potential market being reduced. That happens everyday with stuff like bad record reviews etc. Its a market force that these people have to adapt to, or die out. That is a fundamental part of business, evolve or die, and I shed no tears over companies that refuse to do so, because of a new technology it fights, as opposed to work with.

[Paul Hanson]

Record labels ought to start bringing out their own ranges of hard drives and CD burners.

[Whaleboy]

If so (and I doubt thatd happen, itd take too long and require too much capital probably), then the non-doctored equipment will remain very popular.

Lets also consider the civil liberties issue too, do I want the RIAA etc given access, control and power over my computer?

[Az]

Actually, even that is not correct, Elijah, since I have some CDs that I bought after I had the MP3s, and vice versa.

Of course, now I have the CD burner, and ....

[Whaleboy]

Azazel: Indeed that is true! I would suspect many who download music to also buy cd's possibly because some do not have cd burners so computer speakers are lame, also because the quality of most mp3s tends to be around 96kb/s - 128kb/s, although ogg vorbis tends to be better quality for the same size, its nothing compared to cd quality.

[Sava]

Sava, well .. by being the citizen of the US, you have agreed to follow and obey its laws.. you have a deal. If you don't like some of the laws, then you break the deal, and thus should denounce citizenship .

Right?

Nah, laws are written by humans. And they are only as legitimate as the people writing and enforcing them. I choose to follow what laws I do simply because I don't want to deal with the headaches of litigation and/or prison, and because of my own morality. The reason I don't shoot people is not because I could go to jail, but because it's wrong. As I said, laws and the rule of law are subject to human fallibility. I have problems trusting and having faith in a system subject to such errors. The Justice System commits murder too, only we don't call it that.

It simply amazes me how many people can justify stealing

Wrong. There's nothing to justify. It isn't stealing.

Yes it is true, I am downloading stuff I would never buy the CD to- so they aren't losing any sales to me. But it's still the same as me taking the CD out of the store.

Wrong again. It's not the same. People downloading songs that they wouldn't have bought anyways aren't stealing anything. Participating in the free exchange of art and ideas isn't stealing. My feelings on "piracy" are quite simple. The free-exchange of ideas and binary bits on computers is fine. The second someone starts copying CD's and selling them, they are stealing. That's when the RIAA or recording industry loses money. NOT, when people leech.

[Az]

Elijah: CD quality is barely noticeable over Mp3. esp.

[Whaleboy]

It sure is over my Keg q15.2's, 100W each which cost £200 for the set .

Besides, I'm an audiophile!

[Whaleboy]

Sava: