Latest move by the music industry [Archive] - Front Office Football Central

GrantDawg

09-08-2003, 02:57 PM

Recording Industry Sues File Swappers
Mon Sep 8,12:51 PM ET Add Technology - washingtonpost.com to My Yahoo!

By David McGuire, washingtonpost.com Staff Writer

The Recording Industry Association of America (news - web sites) (RIAA) today said it filed lawsuits against 261 people accused of trading copyrighted songs on the Internet. The group also said that it would not sue file sharers who promise in writing not to do it again.

The lawsuits, which were filed in federal courts across the country, are the RIAA's latest tactics in its war against the illegal file sharing that record companies blame for plummeting CD sales.

In June, the RIAA promised to sue hundreds of Internet users suspected of illegally trading music using file-swapping services like Kazaa and Morpheus. The association in August clarified that it only would target the most egregious file sharers.

RIAA President Cary Sherman in a teleconference today characterized the people who were sued as "major offenders" who distributed about 1,000 copyrighted music files on average.

The amnesty program, reports of which surfaced last week, would require file sharers to admit in writing that they illegally traded music online and vow in a legally binding, notarized document, never to do it again. The amnesty would not apply to anyone the RIAA already has subpoenaed for information regarding file swapping.

"We're willing to hold out our version of an olive branch," Sherman said.

About 57 million Americans use file-sharing services, according to Boston-based research firm the Yankee Group. Among the most popular are Kazaa, Morpheus and Grokster, which rose to prominence after a federal judge shut down the pioneering Napster (news - web sites) service in 2001. Kazaa says that its file sharing software has been downloaded more than 200 million times.

Record companies say file sharing cost the industry more than a billion dollars in lost CD sales between 2000 and 2002. File sharing cost the industry $700 million alone in 2002, according to a report released last week by the Boston-based Forrester research group.

The RIAA has focused most of its efforts on shutting down peer-to-peer (P2P) networks, but a Los Angeles federal judge in an April ruling said that the sites have legal uses and should not be shut down.

The ruling came a day after another federal judge ruled that the RIAA could force Verizon Communications Inc., to hand over the names of two of its high-speed Internet service customers who were illegally trading large amounts of copyrighted music on the Kazaa network.

GrantDawg

09-08-2003, 03:01 PM

I just recieve a subpoena from the Newspaper Assocation of America. They are going to sue me for copy-and-pasting articles from their websites. Anyone know a good lawyer? :)

Bee

09-08-2003, 03:03 PM

There are quite a few lawyers that visit here.

Edit: Nevermind, missed the thing about wanting a good one. ;)

kcchief19

09-08-2003, 09:09 PM

In a related story, Vivendi Universal announced last week they are slashing the suggested retail price of their CDs by around 30 percent. Apparently it finally occurred to someone that the reason why music sales are down has more to do with the fact that CDs are an ungodly $17 a pop and less to do with downloading MP3s.

Frankly, I think the lawsuits are a very risky move by the RIAA. All it will take is one enterprising lawyer who can convince a jury that downloading music is fine and that record executives are weasels. Like that would be a challenge.

sabotai

09-08-2003, 09:20 PM

Wow, 261 people...out of 57 million. That's 0.0004% of file sharers.

I'm scared....

Buccaneer

09-08-2003, 09:28 PM

I'm not. Never had, never will, never needed to.

GrantDawg

09-08-2003, 09:35 PM

Originally posted by Buccaneer
I'm not. Never had, never will, never needed to.

Funny thing for a pirate to say. :)

Ksyrup

09-08-2003, 09:45 PM

As long as they leave us bootleggers alone, they can sue whomever they want.

Buccaneer

09-08-2003, 10:03 PM

Originally posted by Ksyrup
As long as they leave us bootleggers alone, they can sue whomever they want.

I agree, esp. since I have paid $30-$50 for bootleg CDs.

zums

09-08-2003, 11:40 PM

Just a question that i dont think i've ever seen definitively answered.......if you are still downloading on kazaa but not sharing the files are you in danger? the way it seems to me they are just going after the people who are uploading the original rips and those who are sharing a lot of files. without people sharing on kazaa the whole system starts to break down. i've continued to download at a not too high/not too low rate lately but am not sharing any of the songs.......am i in any real danger? how far back in the past can they go to file a lawsuit?? just throwing out some questions i was curious about and for discussion........

-zums

sabotai

09-09-2003, 12:18 AM

"if you are still downloading on kazaa but not sharing the files are you in danger?"

As of right now, they say they are only going after the people who share 1,000+ songs. But that doesn't mean that in the future they won't go after those who are simply downloading either.

MissionComplete

09-09-2003, 01:31 AM

It's too bad the music industry doesn't realize plummeting record sales are due to lack of talent rather than people downloading mp3's online. I have downloaded 100's of songs off of Kazaa, Bearshare, and the old Napster. In my case, I have probably bought more CDs than I would have previously if not for file sharing.

sterlingice

09-09-2003, 02:08 AM

Originally posted by Ksyrup
As long as they leave us bootleggers alone, they can sue whomever they want.

They industry has never gone after bootleggers. They just don't care because it doesn't really cost them cash. If you want to pay a decent sum for a concert cd or something, they figure you're already buying all of that bands albums anyways. Unless you're recording a show that is being turned into a live album, I bet they don't give a damn at all about bootlegging. Also there's the quality argument (see below).

I suppose if you're recreating entire CDs with the cover art and CD done up to look like the original and then selling them out of your trunk to people for $5, then they you probably already have a crack RIAA operative at your door right now (...or some drunk guy might stumble upon this page 5 years later when there is a new medium for music).

Originally posted by MissionComplete
It's too bad the music industry doesn't realize plummeting record sales are due to lack of talent rather than people downloading mp3's online. I have downloaded 100's of songs off of Kazaa, Bearshare, and the old Napster. In my case, I have probably bought more CDs than I would have previously if not for file sharing.

Originally posted by kcchief19
In a related story, Vivendi Universal announced last week they are slashing the suggested retail price of their CDs by around 30 percent. Apparently it finally occurred to someone that the reason why music sales are down has more to do with the fact that CDs are an ungodly $17 a pop and less to do with downloading MP3s.

Frankly, I think the lawsuits are a very risky move by the RIAA. All it will take is one enterprising lawyer who can convince a jury that downloading music is fine and that record executives are weasels. Like that would be a challenge.

I really shouldn't answer these because I don't have the time to do this entire argument right now but this just comes from such flawed misconceptions... THIS IS NOT THE POINT. It's not your music to steal. You cannot take the moral high ground if you are ripping music.

Right now, the law states that this is illegal and to download as your form of protest against high prices is just petty rationalization for doing something wrong. Two wrong don't make a right, blah, blah, blah.

To say that you purchases more CDs now than before is also a logic flaw. It was not your right to download it. Also, do you have all the CDs of all the songs you have MP3s of or even the ones you just listen to? Heck, even discount the ones you download because a friend tells you something sounds cool, you sample it, think it's crap, and then delete- that's kindof like going into a store and sampling a cd (not that sites like CDNow haven't provided that service for at least 5 years now). I'm sure you still have a lot of MP3s in your rotation of songs that you listen to which you don't have CDs for.

When I was in high school (not that long ago, tho CDs were pretty new)- I had to choose what CDs to buy because, yeah, there were a lot of crappy CDs that had a good song or two on it and if the song was good enough, I had to buy it along with the rest of the crap- that's how the system works. If I didn't like it- I taped it off the radio because that was legal. The tradeoff for this system was that I didn't pay $12 for a CD (if you're paying $17 for a CD, you're an idiot unless it's something quite off the beaten path) but the song that I got wasn't of nearly the same quality- static-y with dj chatter, etc. This is why the system has broken down now: I don't want to pay my $12, I could still find all the songs with the exact same quality online and that's why it's different now versus then.

As for the quality of music- there always have been crappy bands and there always will be crappy bands. However, there are a lot more bands now since mainstream recording is more accessible. So you can easily argue there are more crappy bands. Any idiot with a sub-$500 mixing board and a cd-burner can put out CDs now. And one could always argue that if your idiot contemporaries could be convinced to stop buying crappy music they would stop making crappy music, but that's a a story for another day.

SI

Bee

09-09-2003, 06:30 AM

SI,

While I agree with your points, I think the quotes you mentioned were more disagreeing about why CD sales are down not justifying stealing the music. I don't think it's right to steal music either, but I also don't think that's the reason CD sales are down. I think it's more to do with a lack of talent right now, ridiculous prices and a wealth of other entertainment in society. That doesn't mean I think downloading music is right.

Something I'm curious about is whether or not it is legal to download a song that you already own on CD. My understanding is this hasn't been determined yet. I believe at least one of the people being sued is arguing this angle (that all the songs they downloaded, they have on CD). The RIAA seems to be saying that you can make your own MP3, but you can't download a copy that someone else made. It will be interesting (to me at least) to see how that specific argument plays out. BTW, I don't think this argument will work in this case since this person made those songs available for download by others which is also illegal; but I'm still curious how a ruling on this specific aspect will affect future actions by the RIAA.

Ksyrup

09-09-2003, 07:00 AM

I used to use the Napster's and Audiogalaxy's (my personal favorite) to download songs to try out before I bought the CD. Now, I'm able to find whole songs of most of the artists I want to try, either right from the source or from a fan site, etc. So I've largely stopped using WinMX to find anything but bootlegs. However, there are a few seriously underground bands that I will search WinMX for, because I've tried to locate them on the net and they don't have a presence. Usually I'm successful in finding one or two songs, and that's fine with me.

I have a collection of miscellaneous MP3s still on my computer, but 99% of them were downloaded from sites other than through file sharing programs, so I presume the artist has given consent to the clips I find on their site, their record company's site, or even a fan/mag site. And yes, I delete the MP3s of artists I try but don't like, simply because I have so much on my hard drive that I don't want to waste the space.

One thing I find interesting is the notion that downloadable music is the wave of the future and there will be no more CDs. I don't know about anyone else, but I like my CD collection. It's tangible. It's not contained on a piece of electronic equipment that could be erased at any time. The idea of having to transfer that many MBs of files to a new computer every 2-3 years seems like a tremendous pain in the ass. As long as it is an option, I will always take the hard copy with CD insert over the download. And when I download, the first thing I do is burn to a disc. Am I in the minority on this?

Ksyrup

09-09-2003, 07:05 AM

Originally posted by Buccaneer
I agree, esp. since I have paid $30-$50 for bootleg CDs.

Ouch. I admit that back in the day, I paid for bootlegs. But not any more. There is simply no reason to buy a bootleg, when most artists have dedicated fans who are willing to give away, or do a B&P at least, to provide another fan with a copy of a boot. There are also tons of download sites and FTPs, you just have to find them. You might have to settle for an MP3 version instead of a copy from a master, but in most cases, I honestly don't think there is that much difference - certainly not enough to justify not having a particular show because it's in MP3 format.

ice4277

09-09-2003, 07:07 AM

Originally posted by Ksyrup
One thing I find interesting is the notion that downloadable music is the wave of the future and there will be no more CDs. I don't know about anyone else, but I like my CD collection. It's tangible. It's not contained on a piece of electronic equipment that could be erased at any time. The idea of having to transfer that many MBs of files to a new computer every 2-3 years seems like a tremendous pain in the ass. As long as it is an option, I will always take the hard copy with CD insert over the download. And when I download, the first thing I do is burn to a disc. Am I in the minority on this?

Not only this, but hard drive crashes, etc. If a CD scratches or warps, you lose one CD. If your hard drive were to crash, you could lose the equivalent of possibly hundreds of CDs. Not a good thing.

Buccaneer

09-09-2003, 09:18 AM

Originally posted by Ksyrup
Ouch. I admit that back in the day, I paid for bootlegs. But not any more. There is simply no reason to buy a bootleg, when most artists have dedicated fans who are willing to give away, or do a B&P at least, to provide another fan with a copy of a boot. There are also tons of download sites and FTPs, you just have to find them. You might have to settle for an MP3 version instead of a copy from a master, but in most cases, I honestly don't think there is that much difference - certainly not enough to justify not having a particular show because it's in MP3 format.

Ksyrup, I respectfully disagree. The mindset I see a lot of folks have is the assumption that something is or should be free. There are always cost involved and unless explicitly stated that it can be given away or incurs no cost to the consumer, one cannot make that assumption. Bands like the Deads and Phish have encouraged free copying but others have not or not explicitly stated so. In the case of “bootlegs” or “imports”, my collection comes from imported recordings of U2 in the mid-1980s to early 1990s. They are packaged as distributable CDs but the only caveat is that they were not offered for sale in the US. I cannot assume that the label or band did not enter into some private distribution agreement, esp. for the local market (like in the case of some of my rare Amsterdam or Dublin concert recordings). I gladly paid good money for these recordings through second-hand channels (pre-Internet days) and would continue to do so to encourage more quality recordings and packaging. The same things applies to computer shareware and independent/private development efforts that have not been declared open source. If one takes advantage of the “free” distribution methods and not pay for it, then you are saying that it has no value. Nothing in my mind would discourage me more, as a developer/photographer/writer/musician/etc. if I would to offer my work for sale (as oppose for advertising or promotional) and no one would pay.

QuikSand

09-09-2003, 09:38 AM

Aside from the "justification why I steal music" debate (which just eludes me every time), I keep hearing people complain endlessly about how CDs are ridiculously priced. I find that curious.

By my recollection (and I am admittedly a pretty selective buyer of music, so I'm not the best source) the standard price for a CD when I was a more avid music buyer (the late 1980s and early 1990s) was in the neighborhood of $12-14. Now, around 10 years later, I'm hearing people screaming bloody murder bevause theu see prices around $17 (though some dispute that being a reasonable price, even).

Hmmm... $13 to $17 over the course of 10-15 years? That's about a 25% increase in total... meaning that by almost any metric, the cost of a music CD has gotten lower, in real terms, over that time period. (When you compare that price growth to that of the economy as a whole - the price for a head of lettuce, a box of cereal, and a car tune-up, got it?) We're all making more money in earnings, the costs of everything has risen over time, and it's pretty much a wash. At the very least, it's awfully tough to say that the price of recorded music has been an outlier-- increasing at much higher rates than the other things we buy. (Like much health care would be)

So, in my mind - it's very tough to say that the reason recorded music sales are down today is primarily because of "ridiculous pricing." The pricing today is absolutely no more ridiculous now than it was 10-15 years ago -- the baseline for nearly all these comparisons about CD sales.

The only way that you can make an argument about pricing being ridiculous is if you introduce the fact that CDs now have to compete with a "free" alternative distribution system, that is of equivalent quality. If I wanted digital-quality sound back in 1990, I had one option-- cough up $13 for a CD. If I want it now, I have a lot more options, both legit and otherwise. Now *that* is a changed marketplace, and it certanly makes the people who still pay for their music feel like they are paying an increasingly "ridiculous" sum, doesn't it?

But - that observaion doesn't make anyone feel better about their practice of stealing music files, so we'll keep it under wraps.

In this whole debate, I'd just like to see people be honest about the whole thing. Rather than come up with such convoluted nonsense about how record companies treat the artists unfairly, and how the overpricing of CDs leaves people lke us with no options, and how it's really perfectly ethical to trade copyrighted material because it might lead us to buying more music at another time... why not just dump all that crap and come clean?

Try this one on: "Getting high quality music for free is wrong, but it's damned cool, and that's why I do it."

Ksyrup

09-09-2003, 09:42 AM

Bucc,

In the case of the recordings you have, it sounds like the bands were involved in the agreement to produce and distribute the recordings. I'm not sure there is a real distinction between "import" vs. "bootleg" when both are coming from overseas, but it sounds like you have "imports," not bootlegs. Those types of recordings are able to be purchased by us in this country, although for quite a bit of money.

My (admittedly rudimentary) understanding is that that is far from the case with the vast majority of "produced" bootlegs from overseas, particularly in places like Italy. Those CDs are manufactured and sold over there, but are not made with the consent of the band - which is why they are not permitted to be sold in the US. I don't know why that is, other than a peculariarity with those countries' laws. I've seen plenty of beautifully made Dave Matthews Band bootlegs from overseas, for instance, that DMB does not want to be sold, and they ask their fans to report any places in the US that sell them - all the while giving express consent to the taping and trading of their shows by fans.

Bottom line, I would be surprised if any of the bootlegs I have that I know are copies of bootlegs made and sold overseas, were made with the express permission of the artist. Therefore, I don't believe the artist intends for anyone to pay for them, and I don't believe they even want me to pay for them, since they make no money off of those sales.

Also, I know of no artist who has openly stated a policy that taping and trading (with no profit) of their shows is forbidden. I know of some who don't like the fact that poor quality recordings exist and they would prefer that those never be heard, but that's as close as I've personally seen an artist come to expressly forbidding bootlegs. Most either support it, or at least acknowledge that as long as no one is making money off of it, there's no harm and that it probably helps grow a fan base (ask Metallica).

John Galt

09-09-2003, 10:16 AM

QS,

I think you are missing a couple key points.

First, although the cost of a CD has fallen versus real dollars, it hasn't decreased at the rate normally associated with a mainstreaming of a new technology. A parallel example would be VCR tapes to DVDs. Remember when movies cost $80 to $100 on tape and now you can get DVDs from $9.99 to $24.99. Given the limited content on a CD (audio only and potentially only one good song), the fact that a CD costs roughly the same as a DVD seems a little out of whack to many consumers.

Second, the RIAA has made every effort to frustrate and stop alternate distribution mechanisms that would greatly decrease cost and threaten the artificial markup in CD prices. While the companies have started begrudgingly accepting some means of digital distribution, they continue to do so in ways very hard for consumers to use. And none of these mechanisms would even be considered viable, if Napster hadn't shown the way.

I'm not defending piracy per se, but I do think the "pirates" in these cases have done a lot of "good" and without them we would be stuck with a cartel keeping high CD prices forever. We still may be, but at least Napster and its progeny have opened the way for alternate methods of distribution.

Fritz

09-09-2003, 10:22 AM

i read that CDs made in an old radiator can make you go blind.

Bee

09-09-2003, 10:26 AM

Originally posted by QuikSand
Aside from the "justification why I steal music" debate (which just eludes me every time), I keep hearing people complain endlessly about how CDs are ridiculously priced. I find that curious.

By my recollection (and I am admittedly a pretty selective buyer of music, so I'm not the best source) the standard price for a CD when I was a more avid music buyer (the late 1980s and early 1990s) was in the neighborhood of $12-14. Now, around 10 years later, I'm hearing people screaming bloody murder bevause theu see prices around $17 (though some dispute that being a reasonable price, even).

Hmmm... $13 to $17 over the course of 10-15 years? That's about a 25% increase in total... meaning that by almost any metric, the cost of a music CD has gotten lower, in real terms, over that time period. (When you compare that price growth to that of the economy as a whole - the price for a head of lettuce, a box of cereal, and a car tune-up, got it?) We're all making more money in earnings, the costs of everything has risen over time, and it's pretty much a wash. At the very least, it's awfully tough to say that the price of recorded music has been an outlier-- increasing at much higher rates than the other things we buy. (Like much health care would be)

So, in my mind - it's very tough to say that the reason recorded music sales are down today is primarily because of "ridiculous pricing." The pricing today is absolutely no more ridiculous now than it was 10-15 years ago -- the baseline for nearly all these comparisons about CD sales.

The only way that you can make an argument about pricing being ridiculous is if you introduce the fact that CDs now have to compete with a "free" alternative distribution system, that is of equivalent quality. If I wanted digital-quality sound back in 1990, I had one option-- cough up $13 for a CD. If I want it now, I have a lot more options, both legit and otherwise. Now *that* is a changed marketplace, and it certanly makes the people who still pay for their music feel like they are paying an increasingly "ridiculous" sum, doesn't it?

But - that observaion doesn't make anyone feel better about their practice of stealing music files, so we'll keep it under wraps.

In this whole debate, I'd just like to see people be honest about the whole thing. Rather than come up with such convoluted nonsense about how record companies treat the artists unfairly, and how the overpricing of CDs leaves people lke us with no options, and how it's really perfectly ethical to trade copyrighted material because it might lead us to buying more music at another time... why not just dump all that crap and come clean?

Try this one on: "Getting high quality music for free is wrong, but it's damned cool, and that's why I do it."

Well, I don't download music at all, but I disagree with your opinion about the pricing issue. Comparing the prices of CDs to healthcare is comparing apples to oranges. I think one needs to look at similar media such as DVDs and videos where prices have dropped over the same time period where CDs have actually increased in price.

That being said, IMO there are many reasons for the drop in CD sales and while high pricing and stealing of the music are both factors, I don't see either of them as the predominant reason.

Solecismic

09-09-2003, 10:44 AM

John Galt,

There's a lot of irony in that argument coming from someone with that handle, by the way. Who is John Galt?

What was the quote that made the fictional Galt abandon society? "Each contributes what he can, each takes what he needs." Something along those lines.

You're not paying for the technology that goes into the CD. Manufacturing has dropped in price quite a bit, and that's likely why the cost has not met inflation, as QuikSand explained. I always thought movie prices were absurd at $80. I didn't own any as a result. I guess others felt the same way, so simple economics brought the price down. I've gotten hundreds of hours of use out of my favorite CDs - can't say that about any DVD I've bought. Certainly, I'd buy more CDs if the price were lower, but setting the price is not my perogative.

You're paying for the intellectual property. Now, I know people will complain that the record execs get more than they need, and Britney Spears certainly doesn't [i]need[\i] another vacation home on the Riviera. But where do people get the right to tell another person how much money she should make? Where do you draw the line? If Britney loses 31% of her salary, I guess it's hard to feel sympathy. But that 31% drop may mean thousands of other artists who are barely scraping by have to give up their dreams.

People have a fundamental right to earn a living the best they can. A fair wage for a fair service. The society the fictional Galt helped construct was based on that dollar symbol.

QuikSand

09-09-2003, 10:45 AM

I understand the notion that we have some expectation that new technology would decline in price over time. And to the extent that CDs have not really done so is a psychological factor, I will admit. But, it's simply not a rational one.

Bee, I am not comparing the cost of CDs to that of health care - you misse dthe point of that observation. My point is that health care is an unusual case of a commodty whose price has soared, while that of recorded music clearly has not.

I also don't agree that the only relevant price comparisons are with other media. People so not only trade off buying DVDs to buy CDs - that's not true at all. People decide whether to spend their $15 to buy a CD, new pair of shorts, a new tropical fish, a new curling iron, a DVD movie, or the all-you-can-stomach special at Olive Garden. Or to leave the money in their pocket. This idea that the universe of competition for CD investment is somehow artificially limted is misguided, I believe.

If people who value recorded music bought CDs ten years ago for $14 and won't buy them now for $17.... it's not because they are "ridiculously" overpriced. It might be because of spite - that the customers have decided they are entitled to a drop in price (like what they have seen in other areas). But unless they have changed their opinion about how much they value recorded music via CD (which is certainly possible), this isn't a rational decision in terms of price (again, unless you consider the towering presence of the "free" alternative, which we keep trying to ignore in this debate).

GrantDawg

09-09-2003, 10:52 AM

Originally posted by Solecismic
But where do people get the right to tell another person how much money she should make? Where do you draw the line?

Ummmm....when people stop buying. Sales are down. Don't you think that is a legitmate way of telling people their price is too high? I hardly ever buy a CD unless I can get it for under $8. If they lowered the price for all CD's to that level, I'd be buying 1 a week.

Mac Howard

09-09-2003, 10:54 AM

For me the main complaint - I stress complaint because this is not a justification for illegal copying - is that the publishers have not used the Internet to bring about the price reduction that it can.

Around 90% of the price of a CD comes in the marketing/delivery of the music. This includes the cd itself, packaging, marketing and the whole publisher/retail chain etc. Much of this can be cut out by directly distributing the music via internet download. The music publishers have made no effort whatsoever to use this direct delivery to produce a significant price drop and so, to some extent, they're the cause of their own problem. I repeat, this doesn't justify downloading the music illegally, but it certainly explains some of the antagonism for the publishers that the online world has and leads to some simple but effective self-serving rationalisation :D

Of course, it's difficult to compete with "free" as Stephen King found out with his $1 episodes and exactly how the music industry can solve the problem is difficult to forsee. But, successful RIAA convictions or not, I suspect they'll have to.

GrantDawg

09-09-2003, 11:01 AM

By the way, just so you know where I stand, I've never bought very many CD's because of the price. Whether it was back when they were $12 or now that they are $17. That is just too much money for a medium that is supposed to be cheaper to mass produce.

QuikSand

09-09-2003, 11:02 AM

Originally posted by GrantDawg
Ummmm....when people stop buying. Sales are down. Don't you think that is a legitmate way of telling people their price is too high? I hardly ever buy a CD unless I can get it for under $8. If they lowered the price for all CD's to that level, I'd be buying 1 a week.

But when does that logic ever end, if that's as far as you think it through?

The local pizza place charges $15 for an extra large pizza with everything. That's too much for me, I never go. They probably sell 40 pizzas a night, let's say.

If they dropped their price to $10 for the same pizza, I might be interested, and so would lots of other people. They might be able to sell 100 pizzas a night.

Of course, if they dropped their price to $2 for the same pizza they might have me and my whole neighborhood standing in line - and they might be able to sell 300 pizzas a night at that price.

Does that necessarily mean that they should start selling their pizzas for $2 each, because they will sell more of them? (Here's a hint - they'll have the same revenue from selling 40 pizzas at $15 as they will selling 300 pizzas at $2... but they'll be buying a lot more ingredients and hiring lots more employees to make all those pizzas)

Solecismic

09-09-2003, 11:03 AM

QuikSand

09-09-2003, 11:04 AM

Originally posted by GrantDawg
By the way, just so you know where I stand, I've never bought very many CD's because of the price. Whether it was back when they were $12 or now that they are $17. That is just too much money for a medium that is supposed to be cheaper to mass produce.

And I have no argument with that at all. In any market, there ought to be people who just decide that the product is not worth the price.

My argument is with the notion that we can account for most or all of any drop in sales in recent years to prices which have basically stayed the same.

GrantDawg

09-09-2003, 11:04 AM

Originally posted by QuikSand
But when does that logic ever end, if that's as far as you think it through?

The local pizza place charges $15 for an extra large pizza with everything. That's too much for me, I never go. They probably sell 40 pizzas a night, let's say.

If they dropped their price to $10 for the same pizza, I might be interested, and so would lots of other people. They might be able to sell 100 pizzas a night.

Of course, if they dropped their price to $2 for the same pizza they might have me and my whole neighborhood standing in line - and they might be able to sell 300 pizzas a night at that price.

Does that necessarily mean that they should start selling their pizzas for $2 each, because they will sell more of them? (Here's a hint - they'll have the same revenue from selling 40 pizzas at $15 as they will selling 300 pizzas at $2... but they'll be buying a lot more ingredients and hiring lots more employees to make all those pizzas)

Supply and demand. You know it as well as I do. They have to decide their level. I think they are wrong on the level right now. That is my point.

Bee

09-09-2003, 11:28 AM

Originally posted by QuikSand

My argument is with the notion that we can account for most or all of any drop in sales in recent years to prices which have basically stayed the same.

I agree pricing doesn't account for most or all of the drop in sales, but I also don't think it's kids downloading mp3s to their computer. While I think both contribute to the drop in sales to some degree, I don't see either as accounting for most or all of that drop. From statements I've seen from the RIAA, they want to blame downloading music exclusively for the drop in sales and I don't agree with their logic. I think there are lots of other contributing factors, including prices.

As far as the cost of CDs from $13 to $17. Ten years ago when they were $13, it was perceived that wasn't overpriced. Today, at $17 it is perceived as being overpriced by at least a portion of the public (myself included) and I think that's why pricing is affecting CD sales...because they are perceived to be overpriced.

GrantDawg

09-09-2003, 11:36 AM

Originally posted by Bee

As far as the cost of CDs from $13 to $17. Ten years ago when they were $13, it was perceived that wasn't overpriced. Today, at $17 it is perceived as being overpriced by at least a portion of the public (myself included) and I think that's why pricing is affecting CD sales...because they are perceived to be overpriced.

To follow up on that a bit, at the time CD first came out they were selling for about 3 dollars more than the cassettes. The arguement for that (since they were cheaper to make than cassettes) was because they were a new format, and that eventually the price would come down. People thought they were too expensive, but still bought them for higher sound quality.

Now, it has gotten even cheaper to make them, they are the dominate format, yet the price has gone up and never down. I think the perception of CD's being overpriced are right on.

John Galt

09-09-2003, 11:38 AM

As for my name being John Galt - I like using it because he embodies a "pure" character, but one who I admire and loathe. I certainly believe in the principles behind American conceptions of intellectual property, but I also recognize their shortcomings.

I think in the case of Napster pirates, they have done more good than harm because the music industry is fundamentally a distribution cartel that hurts consumers and artists. At one time, the Big Five were a necessary mechanism in a capitalist society to distribute music. Musicians couldn't afford to pay to record, distribute, package, and promote their own music. Nowadays, however, distribution and packaging costs can be almost $0 on the internet and the cost of recording has also decreased (especially in some genres like techno).

I think the Big Five are threatened by this potential revolution and have done everything possible to stop artists from leaving their coalition. They have also done everything possible to stop digital distribution. In reality, if Madonna or Britney Spears wanted to distribute their future albums via the internet (they can't do past albums because they don't have the copyrights on their music), they could do so without a Big Five middleman. As a result, the Big Five heavily subsidizes big name artists to keep them from jumping ship. Meanwhile, they use Congress and the courts to scare companies away from digital distribution techniques.

The result of all this is the consumer pays higher CD prices to subsidize big name artists and prevent them from offering their music at reduced prices through digital distribution. Consumers, in effect, are paying to screw themselves.

My model of the system obviously depends on a few points that you might disagree with:

1) The Big Five forms a potentially illegal cartel.
2) The Big Five is no longer needed for music distribution.

I think the primary evidence to show that the industry is corrupted beyond hope is that an economy of scale has never developed in music - you pay the same (or more) for less popular artists. The industry doesn't have price competition amongst the Big Five and so no market equilibrium is reached. This is a classic market failure.

The pirates, at the very least, have opened up a new method of software distribution - the internet. Without their efforts, the music industry wouldn't even be in the tough spot they are today. The technology of distributing music needs to change. That it took a little illegal action to force the music industry cartel in the right direction is unfortunate, but probably necessary.

And as an aside - Jim, I strongly oppose software piracy and recognize your interest in all this - I just think the music industry is a different case.

Samdari

09-09-2003, 11:38 AM

Originally posted by Solecismic
John Galt,

There's a lot of irony in that argument coming from someone with that handle, by the way. Who is John Galt?

What was the quote that made the fictional Galt abandon society? "Each contributes what he can, each takes what he needs." Something along those lines.

You're not paying for the technology that goes into the CD. Manufacturing has dropped in price quite a bit, and that's likely why the cost has not met inflation, as QuikSand explained. I always thought movie prices were absurd at $80. I didn't own any as a result. I guess others felt the same way, so simple economics brought the price down. I've gotten hundreds of hours of use out of my favorite CDs - can't say that about any DVD I've bought. Certainly, I'd buy more CDs if the price were lower, but setting the price is not my perogative.

You're paying for the intellectual property. Now, I know people will complain that the record execs get more than they need, and Britney Spears certainly doesn't need another vacation home on the Riviera. But where do people get the right to tell another person how much money she should make? Where do you draw the line? If Britney loses 31% of her salary, I guess it's hard to feel sympathy. But that 31% drop may mean thousands of other artists who are barely scraping by have to give up their dreams.

People have a fundamental right to earn a living the best they can. A fair wage for a fair service. The society the fictional Galt helped construct was based on that dollar symbol.

This would be a great point, Jim, if not for one thing. When CDs first came out, casette tapes (the dominant seller at the time) of popular music were selling at 8 or nine dollars. CDs for the exact same recording were usually selling for significantly more ($15?). If all we were paying for was the intellectual property, shouldn't they have been the same price?

But they weren't, and the recording industry justified the increased cost by saying that CDs had increased production costs. As production costs have gone down, below even what casettes used to cost, CD prices have not fallen in comparison. People who buy new CDs for $17 are paying artificially inflated prices.

Mac Howard

09-09-2003, 12:03 PM

The price of many low priced items is "artificially inflated" or at least appears so - I used to buy Jiffy bags (padded bags for mailing) direct from the manufacturers at 9 pence each. One time I ran out of them and bought some to carry me over from the local office retailer - at 72 pence! The price comes from costs other than production costs.

It's the price of marketing and distribution not the price of the cd that determines the final price. I doubt the entire package these days costs 50 cents along with say $1.50 or so for the artists - so around $2. But each operator in the chain adds his "cut" to this depending on his costs, how many he expects to sell and "what the market will stand" etc. Eventually you finish up with your $15 or whatever.

But the point here is that we're not just moving from a vinyl disk to a cd, a tape to a dvd etc where the distribution costs are similar. It's a physical CD to a digital download. We have a revolution in distribution. The Internet can remove much of these costs - in the extreme the artist can supply direct to the user for the $1.50 he gets. Certainly the publisher can supply directly.

It doesn't happen because there's too much to lose by those in the distribution chain. They are not going to appreciate it if the publisher provides them with cds at say $10 and then charges half that or significantly lower than their final selling price for Internet download.

So it doesn't happen. Too many people have too much to lose.

But, in the end, they will lose. The publishers will abandon them or collapse themselves. They're just beginning to recognise that. They have to find a way to make Internet distribution pay.

Solecismic

09-09-2003, 12:08 PM

Samdari,

It's very difficult to price intellectual property. It's all artificially inflated - same brain, one copy or one million copies.

In the early days of CDs, I'm guessing that the price difference was justified by the manufacturing cost. Especially when a technology is new, manufacturing can be dramatically more expensive.

The real cost has dropped, though. I don't really want to argue that CDs at $17 are bargains. I don't think so any more than you do. But I believe it's wrong to download it for free, and justify that as some sort of protest of unfair prices. Protest by not paying the price, absolutely. But you can't have your cake and eat it, too.

John,

I think we have to agree to disagree about the appropriateness of revolution in this case. Listening to the latest Eminem disc is not fundamental to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

The situation really isn't different in the software business - it's just that we're in a small group that's aware of independent publishers (like me). There are individual music publishers, too.

The fight for shelf space in software stores is every bit as nasty. Eminem can't do without having his disc in stores, just as EA can't survive without Madden and The Sims in stores.

Now the oligopolies in both industries may well be practicing illegal price-fixing. That should be a matter for the courts, or people should band together and make it an issue that grabs the attention of local politicians.

There are right ways and wrong ways to address a perceived injustice. And for now, like it or not, those music cartels have the legal right to charge what they want to charge. There's nothing noble about theft.

vtbub

09-09-2003, 12:27 PM

At some point doesn't the RIAA need to look at the quality of their product? What are they doing to get people between 25-54 into record shops? Kids can record off the radio, or MTV, or off the digital music channels on digital cable/satellite. By in large they are already getting the product for free anyway.

Software's a bit different. You have to make a concious effort to pirate. If I wanted a copy of FOF4, i'm not going to see it played out in full at SportsSims network, I'm either going to buy it or copy it. If I want too see the series continue, I'd buy over download.

Fritz

09-09-2003, 12:27 PM

Originally posted by Solecismic
Listening to the latest Eminem disc is not fundamental to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

dude!

Samdari

09-09-2003, 01:23 PM

Originally posted by Solecismic
Samdari,

It's very difficult to price intellectual property. It's all artificially inflated - same brain, one copy or one million copies.

In the early days of CDs, I'm guessing that the price difference was justified by the manufacturing cost. Especially when a technology is new, manufacturing can be dramatically more expensive.

The real cost has dropped, though. I don't really want to argue that CDs at $17 are bargains. I don't think so any more than you do. But I believe it's wrong to download it for free, and justify that as some sort of protest of unfair prices. Protest by not paying the price, absolutely. But you can't have your cake and eat it, too.

Well, I am not part of the industry, but from what I understand, the per-unit cost was always less for CDs, since they could be stanped out. When CDs were first available, the companies had to invest money in new equipment, but the amortized per unit costs went up something on the order of a dollar, and the music publishing industry used that to justify a 5-6 dollar increase in the price.

I do not bring this up to justify stealing, just to point out that the industry lost the right to use the "you are paying for intellectual property" argument the minute they used lies about manufacturing costs to justify price fixing. I do protest by not paying the price, myself.

Marmel

09-09-2003, 01:35 PM

Just my 2 cents:

I have downloaded a few dozen songs off the internet. For the most part, I am content to listen to music on the radio and I only buy a few CDs where I really, really enjoy the artist.

However, I think what the record companies are doing is stealing as well. If you think that is too harsh, then I would relate it to price gouging (sp?) sort of. I really can't say I am a bit surprised by the massive amounts of downloading going on. If it spurs a revolution in the way music is distributed, then it is a good thing because the way it is distributed now really sucks.

For some reason when this topic comes up, I always think of the debacle at the Woodstock reunion several years back. It was hot and humid and vendors were selling bottles of water for 11-15 bucks a pop, when there was no other place to get water. The people had enough and started stealing it (among other things). Can't say I really blame them. Those asshole vendors got exactly what was coming to them. I call it market regulation....the companies have their high priced lawyers and courts, we have the power of masses.

However this turns out in the end, I have found the discussions and each side's movements to be fascinating, to say the least.

Blackadar

09-09-2003, 08:26 PM

Originally posted by sabotai
"if you are still downloading on kazaa but not sharing the files are you in danger?"

As of right now, they say they are only going after the people who share 1,000+ songs.

;)

zums

09-09-2003, 08:43 PM

ok some other things i thought of...... the RIAA only represents the major 5 labels. so if you use kazaa to download from artists on lesser labels or basically anything not on those 5 labels, essentially you would be free from this round of lawsuits unless those other labels decide to go after sharers, correct? i'm not saying this is right, just that if you download mostly underground or indie artists you should be safe i think at least for now.

and for potentially the most important question.....what about the porn??? no way you get in trouble for that, right?!?!?! :D

lynchjm24

09-09-2003, 09:01 PM

Originally posted by QuikSand
But when does that logic ever end, if that's as far as you think it through?

The local pizza place charges $15 for an extra large pizza with everything. That's too much for me, I never go. They probably sell 40 pizzas a night, let's say.

If they dropped their price to $10 for the same pizza, I might be interested, and so would lots of other people. They might be able to sell 100 pizzas a night.

Of course, if they dropped their price to $2 for the same pizza they might have me and my whole neighborhood standing in line - and they might be able to sell 300 pizzas a night at that price.

Does that necessarily mean that they should start selling their pizzas for $2 each, because they will sell more of them? (Here's a hint - they'll have the same revenue from selling 40 pizzas at $15 as they will selling 300 pizzas at $2... but they'll be buying a lot more ingredients and hiring lots more employees to make all those pizzas)

You seem to know a lot about pizza. Do you know anywhere where I can download free pizzas?

Thanks in advance.

Buccaneer

09-09-2003, 09:10 PM

Abe Sargent

09-09-2003, 09:23 PM

I have almost 1000 MP3's and all are legal to own. Does the RIAA check to see if you own legal ones prior to suing you?

-Anxiety

Solecismic

09-09-2003, 09:33 PM

Samdari,

Having reason to distrust and dislike record execs doesn't justify a wrong.

Anxiety,

From what I understand, the lawsuits are completely based on people who choose to share their music. Whether they owned it legitimately or not before placing on the server really doesn't matter.

I'd be in trouble myself if that were the case, as I have copied my favorite songs from my CD collection to my own hard drive and often play them in WMP while I work. Should that be prohibited?

My guess is as mp3 players become the norm, we'll no longer physically be able to do that any more, and then, rather than praising the pirates for forcing change on the industry, we'll be cursing them as we won't be able to burn mixes for our private use without paying a hefty surcharge.

Abe Sargent

09-09-2003, 09:39 PM

I don't share, so I figure that I'm safe one way or the other.

-Anxiety

Ksyrup

09-09-2003, 09:49 PM

Originally posted by Solecismic
My guess is as mp3 players become the norm, we'll no longer physically be able to do that any more, and then, rather than praising the pirates for forcing change on the industry, we'll be cursing them as we won't be able to burn mixes for our private use without paying a hefty surcharge.

This is what I fear. In one sense, I hope the lawsuits are successful so that the industry doesn't find it necessary to go forward with some of the other ideas they have, which are just plain bad/idiotic - technology to restrict your ability to burn copies of CDs for your personal use, attempting to surcharge used CDs, etc.

Draft Dodger

09-09-2003, 10:03 PM

Originally posted by Anxiety
I don't share, so I figure that I'm safe one way or the other.

-Anxiety

for now...

but I don't believe that's going to last. I think the reason the RIAA is not going after downloaders right now is because there's some murkiness to whether or not you can legally download a song you already own (on CD or tape or whatever). Right now, they can't really go after a downloader, because it's conceivable for him/her to say that they own the CD and there's no way the RIAA can prove that he didn't own it at the time he/she downloaded it.

so, for now, they are going after people who are offering copyrighted material up for others. but, I can almost guarantee, their legal teams / lobbyists are working on ways to either prove that you can't download a song you legally own already, or change the law to make it illegal.