Canadian Music Stars Fight Against DRM 506
An anonymous reader writes "Some of Canada's best known musicians, including Avril Lavigne, Sarah
McLachlin, Sum 41, and Barenaked Ladies, have formed a new copyright coalition.
The artists say in a press
release that they oppose file sharing lawsuits, the use of DRM, and
DMCA-style legislation and that they want record labels to stop
claiming that they represent their views."
Re:Serious question (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Serious question (Score:2, Insightful)
My first guess. (Score:5, Insightful)
However my guess would be that it is something along the lines of
- Her label did it, not her
- She is opposed to her label having done it, and
- This is why she is starting a public pressure group specifically designed to get her label to stop doing such things.
Perhaps you will suggest that Sarah McLachlan should have used her leverage as an artist with the label to prevent them from engaging in such practices with her music at the time the CD was released. If you do this, I will laugh until I pass out from lack of oxygen."Piracy" is good for the RIAA (Score:5, Insightful)
First of all, like RMS, I hate applying the term "piracy" to non-commercial copyright violations, so I won't use that term. Instead, I'll call it what it is, unauthorized copying.
Unauthorized copying is to the RIAA what "terrorism" is to the Bush Adminstration, namely, a scapegoat and a straw man argument with which to justify draconian legislation and to garner (barely) sufficient public support for any new legislation favoured by both institutions.
As the Bush Adminstration maintains the conditions (ex: War on Iraq) to indirectly promote terrorism, it justifies renewing the Patriot Act on the basis that it will "help stop terrorism". To make a blatantly obvious statement, the goal of the Patriot Act does not in any way, shape, or form have anything whatsoever to do with stop terrorists, but is instead intended to grant the government the ability to further spy on and control its citizens.
In the same vein, I believe that the RIAA wishes to maintain a certain level of unauthorized copying because it will allow them to justify legislation such as the DMCA and the broadcast flag. The goal of such legislation is not to eliminate or even substantially reduce unauthorized copying, but to maintain control over the industry and keep out fledging competitors, such as independent artists who would have otherwise been promoted through P2P, and to maintain their antiquated business models, which for all intents and purposes should have become obsolete.
So, it's all an elaborate shell game on their part.
Re:Serious question (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:It's a shame its too late for Sarah's last albu (Score:1, Insightful)
instead of just taking it (without paying) why not send a cheque to the artist, make it payable to him/her personally (not their fan club or record company) and send it to her/him/them with a note saying , i downloaded your music and here is some appreciation
just a thought
A.
Excellent news (Score:5, Insightful)
It looks like at least a few artists have come to realize that the music industry cartel's stand on DRM is not helpful to artists. If they can get more artists on the bandwagon, they may be able to influence the debate. It's a helluva lot more difficult for the labels to convince people that DRM "helps artists" when the artists themselves are against it.
Re:Not suprising from Avril Lavigne... (Score:0, Insightful)
Re:Serious question (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:It's a shame its too late for Sarah's last albu (Score:3, Insightful)
returned the product and pirated it instead.
That's funny, because you could also just as well have pirated it without returning the product - that way you'd still be supporting the artist (in a very small way, and yes - you'd also be supporting the label, the drm guys, the shop owner, the guy driving the truck with packages of CDs/DVDs, etc.). All in all, though, nobody really forced you to truly pirate.
Also, you say they have lost you as a customer - that's a good definition, as they didn't lose you as a consumer. You still get to enjoy the end-result of people's work, without rewarding them in the way they have chosen to be wanting to be rewarded (i.e. $$$).
The sibling poster was right - could've bought it legit in a reasonable online store if you really, really felt strongly about returning the DRM-crippled CD/DVD.
Just my 2cts..
Re:Not suprising from Avril Lavigne... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Not suprising from Avril Lavigne... (Score:0, Insightful)
If you want to talk about punk heritage and following, start with Black Flag [wikipedia.org], The Dead Kennedys [wikipedia.org], and The Descendants [wikipedia.org]. (to name a few) There are many other stereotypical punk bands out there that grew from just the influence of these three, I cannot see how you make the connection between "Sk8ter Boi" and anything of value. There are way too many bands out there trying to make a point with their music and spoken word shows about these issues, that actually have some sort of heritage that can be traced back to these bands. To use Ms. Lavignes' name in the same vein with them is just ill-conceived at best, and insulting depending on how rabid you are about this.
Sorry about the rant, but seeing that just hit a nerve.
Re:Hypocrisy with Barenaked Ladies? (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, they could all be against sharing and downloading: nothing in their stance says "we think it's OK for you to download music without paying for it." What they've said is that they think the RIAA lawsuits are wrong, which is a totally separate issue from whether you think downloading music is morally wrong or right in the first place.
You can still be an artist, and dislike it when people steal your music, but think that the RIAA has gone way too far. Likewise, I'm against shoplifting but I wouldn't want them to start chopping people's hands off for it; I can be against chopping people's hands off and still be "anti shoplifting."
The black and white attitude where anyone who's anti-RIAA or anti-lawsuits is automatically pro-filesharing is just what the RIAA would like you to believe. It's an automatic "with us or against us." I'm not necessarily saying that you said that, but I think a lot of people make that assumption and I was just taking your comment as an opportunity to clear it up.
Just because somebody hates the RIAA/MPAA doesn't mean they think it's necessarily right to just go on Kazaa/BitTorrent and download stuff without somehow compensating the artists for it.
Good.. Let me see walk their talk... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Excellent news (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:My first guess. (Score:5, Insightful)
First: most of those artists are either on the Nettwerk label (McLachlan) or are managed or co-managed by Nettwerk (LaVigne, BNL, McLachlan, Raine Maida, Kreviazuk, Sum41). That makes it pretty obvious that two things are actually happening:
1) The artists, while feeling pretty hosed about how much rampant downloading is still going on, are not so hard-hit by that action that they feel outraged.
2) They do actually have some say about this since they are money-making artists on predominantly major-distributed labels.
I think that second point is key. Every major label artist, by that I mean one signed directly to an international major label, featuring international mass distribution, has either remained silent about this issue or has been so outspoken against downloading in particular that they've greatly damaged their fanbase ([cough]Metallica[/cough].)
Yes, most of these artists are on independent labels (biggest exceptions: Lavigne is on Arista, BNL are on Warner.) However that does not exclude them from major international distributorship (Nettwerk is distributed by EMI. Sloan is distributed by Sony / BMG. Most of the others have major distributors for their releases.) Whether you like Avril Lavigne's music or not, she is a top-five-selling artist who has joined this group of artists to make it known: she still doesn't agree with the tactics her major label is claiming to represent by suing her fans.
If it were a smaller artist - say: Harvey Danger, who actually allowed full on torrent files of their album to be released with no restrictions whatsoever last year - the attention payed to that motive is slight, and the response is usually "Big deal, who's heard of them? What difference will that make?"
I get the feeling that this is more likely a management / publishing mandate, with some artist buy-in. Nettwerk also handles or has a great deal to say about the publishing for all of these artists.
Interesting development. Maybe we'll finally get the music industry that consumers actually want, instead of this cat and mouse crap. Anything that goes a step or two towards evening the playing field when it comes to this industry is definitely a good thing. The last thing we need (which we have now) is another five Nickelbacks getting mass airplay on radio and then hearing them and their label and agents complaining that sales are down strictly because of downloading.
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Re:Hypocrisy with Barenaked Ladies? (Score:2, Insightful)
They don't want DRMed crap being sold in their names, that's not the same as the group wanting people to pirate their music. Any musician in their right mind doesn't want people pirating their music... but any musician that respects their fans (and BNL is a great example of such a group) wouldn't want DRMed shit limiting their fans' listening experience, either.
Re:For once (Score:2, Insightful)
As someone with an Antipodean accent, I was treated very well by Montrealers. It might have helped that I at least tried to use as much French as I had, and when people asked why, explained that this was Quebec and I didn't expect people to speak English. Like many non-English speakers, Quebecers get annoyed if people just expect them to speak English in their own country (or province in this case).
It's a wonderful city. Along with Edinburgh it's one of my favourites.
Re:It's a shame its too late for Sarah's last albu (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:They don't believe so strongly as to walk away. (Score:2, Insightful)
When they sign these record contracts, they are at the will of the label, and not the other way around. The label invests money in them, and oftentimes give advances to the artists. Artists are obligated to fulfill the terms of their contracts, and they can't just "walk away" from their record contracts.
Re:well duh (Score:3, Insightful)
You want to talk about f*cked up.... The conclusion I came to was that the public were the only losers... to the tune of a ridiculous sum of money.
Of course, we won't even bring up the rather odd discrepancies in counting resulting from Diebold Systems' electronic voting in which thousands of votes in Florida were mysteriously appearing and disappearing in ways that were never adequately explained. Don't get me started on how totally botched the 2000 elections were. 2004 was just as bad, if not worse.
Now Hanlon's Razor would say, "Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence." So I'm not saying that the votes were rigged. I'm just saying that there is plenty of reason to be suspicious, and that in the next election, citizens of the U.S. should demand better oversight over the electoral process.
To get us back on topic, though... yeah, DRM bad, Celine Dion worse, Lars Ulrich clueless. That pretty much sum it up? :-)
Effectiveness of measures (Score:2, Insightful)
Brutality is very effective.
People in glasshouses (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:well duh (Score:3, Insightful)
Whether you beleive it or not isn't the issue. The issue is that we shouldn't have to take it on FAITH that the voting process isn't being screwed with with those machines.
No democracy is safe from tampering if the voting process isn't open, if the voters can't be genuinely assured their votes are being counted properly. Otherwise the whole thing is a farce. Even if the "mistakes" were "innocent".
As for DRM, I honestly don't give a shit. I am a reasonably strong supporter of a free market economy, and if some company wants to sell me music that I can't copy, then so be it.
DRM and DMCA have nothing to do with the free market, and everything to do with *control*. Who owns your computer and its contents? Who controls it? Who has the right to run programs on it? Who has the right to choose not to run programs on it? Who has the right to decide the program can refuse to run if you own certain other programs?
It used to be *you*. DRM/DMCA have transferred those rights to external corporations, in the name of "protecting their assets".
Start down this slippery slope and its only a matter of time before your car dealership will have the legal right to come into your house and tow your car in for its regular maintenance, and while doing so they will check the onboard computer to see if its been driven over the limit and report you to the police and your insurance company, they will also log your driving habits, and will demand additional fees if you drove it more than 6000 miles since their last inspection, even though you "own" the vehicle; finally they will have the right to search your house and refuse to release your car back into your possession if they discover you have tools that would be capable of modifying the car in anyway, especially its logging and reporting functions, or even just capable of performing the oil change at home. (Which may be "unsafe", as you are not a factory certified technician).
Or perhaps next time you enter the mall you will be asked for identification papers, not from the government, but from the merchants association representing the mall, to ensure the safety of their employees and security of their property. They'll also reserve the right to search your person, and require you to have a microchip implant... and anyone that refuses to submit will be tagged and reported to the police as a likely criminal, or perhaps "terrorist".
Of course, you could choose not to buy those cars, or shop at these malls, or from members of these "merchants associations"...
To that I say "Good luck with that". I expect you'll be as successful with that as finding cable providers with commercial free content...
Frankly, I think these celebrities are a bunch of attention-whoring narcissists who want people to care more about this crap then they honestly should.
Frankly I think DRM/DMCA is FAR more important than most of the things celeb's protest about, and one of the few things they protest about that actually impacts them directly.
Re:well duh (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:well duh (Score:3, Insightful)
That is really beside the point. The fact that they make wholesale tampering so much easier and so less traceable. When Diebold comes in and "upgrades" the machines with un-certified code before an election, they could really hand the election to whomever they wanted. Is this a good situation as long as they hand the election to the highest bidder or the candidate least likely to regulate voting machines?
Actually, a government law that obligates a company to change how they do business is anti-free market. All the DMCA does is give formal protection to DRM software that precedent normally gave them anyway.
The DMCA very much obligates companies to change how they do business. The DMCA was needed because these controls were not at all supported by precedent. If I wanted to evaluate wall safes, I could buy a bunch and try to break into them. While the DMCA can't currently prevent me from trying, it can certainly prevent me from sharing my findings.
By your definition, all IP, and really all law in general, is anti-free market.
At any rate, you've been quite thoroughly convinced that copy protected music will lead a multitude of other things. Is there anything other than speculation to back any of those up, or is it just hyper-paranoia?
You obviously haven't been paying close attention. DRM is already extending much further than music. The DMCA has already prompted law suites in areas such as printer catrideges and garage door openers. Trusted computing has a lot of potential change how computers can be used.
Re:well duh (Score:1, Insightful)
>multitude of other things. Is there anything other than speculation to back any of those
>up, or is it just hyper-paranoia?
Well copy protected music lead to recrd labels installing hacker tools to comprimise potentially millions of PCs, or did you miss the Sony BMG rootkit?
DRM is not for protecting the rights of the copyright owners it is much more often used to infringe the rights of consumers. I have a number of CDs that I payed money for, I should therefore have the right to play them however some DRM systems are designed to prevent me from even doing that easilly. My PC is equipped with a CD drive that SHOULD be capable of playing CDs however DRM trys to interfer with the proper running of my machine. Luckilly I now use *nix and most of the malware made by record labels is targetted at windows boxes, plus the user I run as can't modify the operating system so thoose record labels might have a nice time trying to tamper with my OS to do nasty stuff.
Anyone else noticed that although goverments are ment to server and protect the public why they pass a large number more laws that restrict civil liberties than to protect them?
Plus certian companies *cough* Apple *cough* use DRM to prevent competition in markets. Isn't monopoly power in a market a really bad thing for consumers?
And what rights are the record labels protecting because they didn't create the music someone else did and they siad they don't want DRM on it, and most consumers who actually know what DRM does/can do don't want it, and yet because a minority of people want DRM laws are passed to enforce it, thats democracy for you! and to think the US invade foriegn countries and kill countless inocent civillans (not to mention thier own allies) because the country was contrlled by a dictator.