RIAA vs The Economy 383
thumbtack writes "Boycott-RIAA.com is running an analysis
of the RIAA sales vs a number of other large corporations. It was compiled by
Justin
Moore at Duke University. It is really quite interesting, showing the the
RIAA sales are pretty much consistent with the rest of the economy. From the analysis:
I would assert, however that it does make the case in cold, hard numbers that
the RIAA's claim of digital piracy ravaging their sales must be taken with a rather
large grain of salt. The CEOs of Eastman-Kodak are in a nearly identical economic
situation as the RIAA, yet do not have the luxury of blaming digital piracy."
You don't understand... (Score:5, Interesting)
I would assert, however that it does make the case in cold, hard numbers that the RIAA's claim of digital piracy ravaging their sales must be taken with a rather large grain of salt.
You don't understand, the economy went down so quickly, it was like the equivalent of going out of business 5-6 times.
Re:You don't understand... (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, if the accountants hadn't multiplied the profit margin numbers five or six times...
Re:Get the analogy right!! (Score:5, Insightful)
Bull.
There are two theories about the etymology of the phrase "taken with a grain of salt." One theory traces it back to the Latin phrase "cum grano salis", which was found -- among other places -- in the works of Pliny in the first century as a description of an additive to make an antidote effective. A second, more believed theory traces the phrase to the kitchen table, where salt can make any dubious dish a little better.
In either case, the meaning of the phrase is not to treat something as insignificant, but rather to subject it to a healthy dose of skepticism.
So... (Score:2, Insightful)
Since when is this news?
Re:So... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:So... (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't know about you, but I don't care if someone presents an obviously biased view. I just care if they can back up their bias with good arguments and data.
It starts with you. (Score:3, Funny)
Re:It starts with you. (Score:5, Funny)
I'm gonna burn each one onto a CDR 10-15 times, I figure he'll be broke by the time I run out of blanks.
MIRRORS (Score:4, Informative)
UVa Computer Science [virginia.edu]
-jdm
Re:It starts with you. (Score:5, Funny)
They just blame Digital Photography. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:They just blame Digital Photography. (Score:5, Insightful)
and exxon can blame stricter environmental laws
and honeywell can blame global warming affecting thermostat sales
etc etc
Companies need to evolve to the state of the world, not point fingers about causes (real or imaginary) of thier misfortune. Digital content distribution is real and it is here to stay. It can either be looked at as an opportunity or as a degression; obviously the RIAA sees a degression since it can't rely on its standard business model and can't adapt to the change.
Re:They just blame Digital Photography. (Score:5, Informative)
They actually tried that before and succeeded.
The war on pot started as a gift to DuPont to stop hemp from competing with their new product: plastic.
Re:They just blame Digital Photography. (Score:5, Interesting)
Relevant, interesting, and only slightly different from the way I understand it. I thought it was actually nylon. At least that's what I surmise from the excellently supported arguments in Jack Herer's The Emperor Wears No Clothes [jackherer.com] . Or, maybe you mean plastic fibers, which I suppose is what nylon really is? (Is it?)
Either way, the following excerpts are interesting examples of the inverse (converse?) of what this story is about: a company manipulating legilation to create a better market for an otherwise not-as-attractive product. Contrast this with the RIAA blaming market conditions (or technological advancement) for their lack of profits. Which is worse?
Comment removed (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:The situation's aren't comparable. (Score:5, Insightful)
So you advocate the artificial creation of scarcity? So the owner of an otherwise non-scarce product can artificially create scarcity so that something that wouldn't otherwise have value has value?
I can understand the artist's desire to make money, but things that are by nature NOT scarce should not and, in the long term, CANNOT be made scarce. Legally or illegally the market will make certain of that.
The owner consumed resources to develop the IP, and it is reasonable for that owner to expect to extract value from that investment.
Many people create IP and don't expect to extract money from it. Many others even invest time and money creating IP *expecting* an ROI and never get it. Just because something requires time to create doesn't automatically mean they are entitled to money. The market decides what any given product (or IP) is worth. If the market has decided that music in its digital form is free then the artists either adapt to that reality by taking advantage of free music distribution to promote themselves, their products, and hopefully score endorsements, or they can find something else to do for a living.
I have yet to see a credible argument that only tangible property has value.
It's not that IP doesn't have value, it's creating artificial scarcity that gets you (or the RIAA, rather) into trouble. Charging $20 for something that costs a buck and for which even $3 should create healthy profits is as much robbery as people getting some free tunes online. You overcharge like that and you're just ASKING for a black market to be formed (file sharing) or asking for someone else to redefine your market (Apple).
The thief can justify it however he or she wants, but the IP has less value after he or she takes it without permission.
Maybe, but if the owner had chosen a price nearer to its NATURAL PRICE the owner would find that fewer people would "pirate" it and, thus, fewer people would lower its value by taking it without permission. In fact, I'd say that piracy is bringing the overall price of music to its NATURAL PRICE. They charge $20 for CDs but lots of people get it for free. Perhaps if you did the math you'd find that averaging the total amount earned and the total amount pirated that the final amount earned was, say, $6 a CD. To me that means that that's the NATURAL PRICE.
Legally or not, all products in a free market WILL find their natural price. Free markets do that.
But in the end, yes, digital distribution will reduce the "value" of music. That's because most of the value has been concentrated in the DISTRIBUTION of music and that's now nearly cost-free. I'm not convinced any of this really affects the artist who generally earns more money from concerts and endorsements than from the sales of their CDs.
Re:The situation's aren't comparable. (Score:3, Insightful)
The best way I think there is to price software is with price discrimination, which is probably the next step in the chain it appears. For a better quality product, you'll have to pay more. I think that's were they are trying to head
Re:The situation's aren't comparable. (Score:3, Insightful)
Just because person or corporation has invested X amount of money into a certain business, product or business model doe
Re:The situation's aren't comparable. (Score:3, Interesting)
That's because Digital Photographers aren't STEALING THEIR FILM AND CAMERAS.
HA HA good one. Maybe if you THINK for a minute you'll realize nobody is stealing the RIAA's master tapes either.
P2P is distributing the RIAA's member's works for free to anyone that requests them. You CANNOT compete with someone taking YOUR PRODUCT and giving it away for free.
Then why do people still by CDs? How come I can go to library any time yet I buy books? Why is the Apple store so successful? THINK man, a Capitalis
Re:The situation's aren't comparable. (Score:5, Interesting)
You CANNOT compete with someone taking YOUR PRODUCT and giving it away for free.
Yes, you can, at least in this example. You can provide faster, more reliable, higher quality, verified products in a convenient medium chock full of value added aspects (music suggestions, news, special features, artwork, video, etc.) at a reasonable price.
I'm not saying it was or is incumbent on the RIAA to do so, but it certainly would have behooved them to do so rather than try to kill the distribution channel altogether and maintain the status quo. Being legal, and having a huge head start on content, they could have swamped the P2P's into usenet-binaries-like obscurity instead of helping thrust them into the mainstream by failing to fill the huge, obvious vacuum that Napster trickled into before it was shut down and replaced by more slippery P2P's like Kazaalite. Now it's too late.
Opportunity only knocks once (if at all).
Re:The situation's aren't comparable. (Score:5, Insightful)
I think the problem is that the RIAA only know one business model. That business model is out dated and consumers don't seem to be buying into it. Consumers are saying quite loudly that they want to pick and choose music (even by the track) and they want it cheap. People will pay for it (see the Apple music store for proof) if it is packaged attractively. Capitalism doesn't make any promises that your business model will work, nor does it promise that it will continue to work later even if it works today. If the only way to get someone to buy a car was to deliver it your house full of fine-ass women and cases of Heineken, then you damn well better believe that car dealerships would be doing just that. And right now, the RIAA has the equivalent of a large segment of their consumers wanting their cars deliever, with women and beer.
Re:The situation's aren't comparable. (Score:4, Insightful)
I thought we were talking about property. What people refer to as "Intellectual Property" is neither physical property, nor a service rendered. Music is a service if it's a live performance. If you sneak into the venue, you're stealing the service. If you steal CDs, you're stealing plastic laminate discs.
If you're stealing cable, you're stealing a service. Ditto for internet access, cell phone time, etc. Those services are provided at a cost to the provider.
You cannot "steal" ideas. "Intellectual Property" is ideas.
Copyright is not property. It is a temporary legal monopoly on the particular expression of an idea. It isn't a turnip, goat, or plot of land.
You need to get out of the mindset that ideas can be property.
Re:The situation's aren't comparable. (Score:3, Insightful)
Signal, if you 'steal' cable you're connecting illegaly to an electric circuit that has a finite capacity to source current. You are 'stealing' their signal strength and if enough people steal it they will have to increase capacity to maintain that signal for their paying customers. You are in fact stealing a physical good.
internet access,
Bandwidth, if you steal internet access you're sucking up bandwidth that paying customers are being denied. The ISP will eventually have to lay
Re:The situation's aren't comparable. (Score:3, Insightful)
I did not say that I (or anyone) was a freedom fighter. I did not say that the RIAA was unjust. You are so angry (why?) that you're completely missing my (valid) point.
To reiterate a key phrase:
I'm not saying it was or is incumbent on the RIAA to do so, but it certa
Re:The situation's aren't comparable. (Score:5, Insightful)
Hmmm... The RIAA seemed to do pretty good with cassettes that let you copy their product and give it to some one else.
CD burners have been available longer than P2P and don't seem to have hurt them much.
Oh, and the movie industry seems to do allright with video tapes.
The PC game industry seems to have done pretty good against people copying games and giving them away.
People are taking the RIAA's property and giving it away for free without permission, there is no way around this fact, no matter HOW you try and justify it.
Correct. But, as the cases above show it is possible to compete with very inexpensive. Oh, and just like the other cases of this same thing it is not free. Just very inexpensive. The cases mentioned above you still payed for media. With P2P you pay for your internet connection.
There is no justification for stealing, the problem is that a disruptive technology has entered the marketplace, and rather than embrace it as the opportunity it presents RIAA members have decided to try to put the genie back in the bottle. There attempts at embracing the technology have been feeble due to infighting (two subscription services that couldn't share catalogs). Not presenting a product that the consumer wants (subscription services only allow you to play music on your computer). Pricing that was unacceptable $10 a month whether you download music or not.
In the end, it appears Apple may save the music industry from itself by providing the product that people want, at a reasonable price, legally.
Re:The situation's aren't comparable. (Score:3, Interesting)
There was a lot more effort that went into copying tapes than a file on a hard drive. First, there was the cost of the blank cassette. Sure it wasn't much, but given high enough distribution, it adds up to a lot. With p2p there are no real distribution costs (don't tell me your internet access costs money because that's not a marginal cost, and you'd be paying for your internet anyway).
Re:The situation's aren't comparable. (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm not sure if you intended to make this kind of Valenti-esque slip in your reply, but you state that both CD copies and VHS tape c
Re:The situation's aren't comparable. (Score:3, Insightful)
When will you RIAA supporters get it thru your thick skulls that it is OVER. For the longest time you got money from us every which way. We paid three four, five times for the same piece of music. Now that the REALITY of the world has changed, you can't stand the fact that you can only get us one or two ways.
And even tha
Re:The situation's aren't comparable. (Score:3, Informative)
You CANNOT compete with someone taking YOUR PRODUCT and giving it away for free.
These guys [baen.com] think they can make a good living by giving away THEIR OWN PRODUCT for free, AND by allowing people to give it to others as well. As it turns out, they're doing very well at it, too.
Re:The situation's aren't comparable. (Score:3, Insightful)
Their declining music sales are supposed to be "proof" that digital piracy is affecting their business. However it's also possible that this is just part of a general economic trend, which is what this article is asserting.
For decades RIAA companies have made bucketloads of money of
No agenda there... (Score:4, Insightful)
If it was MSNBC running an analysis of a study showing Linux was a bad fit for business, most of you would be all over them for the clear, obvious Pro-Microsoft Bias.
Re:No agenda there... (Score:2)
Re:No agenda there... (Score:4, Informative)
Boycott the RIAA picked up on it, but I did it of my own choosing. Check the numbers if you doubt my work. Feel free, in fact. "Many eyes," etc. But check out the message, not the messenger (and, yes, I know slashdot as a whole doesn't follow that rule ;p).
-jdm
problem solved! (Score:5, Insightful)
The CEOs of Eastman-Kodak are in a nearly identical economic situation as the RIAA, yet do not have the luxury of blaming digital piracy.
Obviously, they need to add a license agreement to their film products. Just forbid the stuff you don't like to happen, and then you can use every crooked law in the book to sue folks who switch to digital.
all relative (Score:3, Interesting)
But - but - (Score:5, Funny)
Or that people are downloading 1,000,000 songs a week illegally over their T3 Internet connections and getting the full version of the albums after connecting for 60 hours a week and not going to job/school.
I mean, if you can't trust the RIAA, then who can you trust?
87% of all statistics are made up (Score:3, Insightful)
This just in... (Score:3, Interesting)
The loss is largem but it is driven by ClearCrap, not by piracy...
Eastman-Kodak a good comparison? (Score:5, Insightful)
Eastman-Kodak a good comparison? Pretty good/Apple (Score:2)
I would watch Fuji closely. (Score:2)
Re:Eastman-Kodak a good comparison? Pretty good/Ap (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Eastman-Kodak a good comparison? (Score:2, Insightful)
But how much is digital photography cutting into Kodak's business? It's not as though they're exclusively committed to the film business, you know. They have excellent lines of both amateur [kodak.com] and professional [kodak.com] digital cameras themselves. And while they don't make film sales on the cameras, the base price is enough higher that there's a significant short-term profit potential. They also sell inkjet photo paper, online printing services, and photoCD. They were not exactly caught off guard by the switch to d
Striking Analogy (Score:2)
Re:Eastman-Kodak a good comparison? (Score:4, Insightful)
E-K might be suffering from their own economic problems, but they're not running to Congress to get laws enacted to protect their business model, or outlaw the competition. My theory is that when new laws are proposed, the first question should be "Is there a valid problem that this is going to help fix?" I think my analysis hints that the problem might be -- not so much piracy -- but just a plain side effect of the economic downturn.
-jdm
EMI profits down 40% (Score:5, Insightful)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/1999556.stm [bbc.co.uk]
of course this has nothing to do with the fact that the public is tired of being ripped off and taken for idiots and now is not interested in their products.
so instead of creating products that people actually want or investing in talent instead of boy bands and the like, they blame their outdated buisness model on piracy, sounds like sense to me.
are you smiling yet ?
Entertainment vs. economy (Score:5, Interesting)
I wonder what the historical relationship between the economy and low-end entertainment (movies, CDs, similar) is? Is the entertainment industry recession-resistant? I know during the 1929 depression it wasn't, but since then?
I'm no fan of stealing, but hard times is certainly an excuse people use (should I say justification?).
I keep hoping that some well-run online song-for-song "rights buying" project comes up, maybe subscribing to a whole catalog? Verification is a problem, but I personally would pay a moderate amount for downloadable music, especially on a song-by-song basis.
I recognize both the interests of the artists and the argument that the industry rips off both the artist and the customer.
I suppose this is going to be another long, drawn-out social drama, especially with politicians involved.
Re:Entertainment vs. economy (Score:3, Informative)
Jesus, nobody told you? [apple.com] The Windows version will be out by year's end. And Roxio is planning a clone under a familiar name [macworld.com]. Probably others will follow. It's a race to Windows with this model.
Re:Entertainment vs. economy (Score:4, Interesting)
At work, so a quick comment:- As I've pointed out before on this site, RIAA's own research over the last 60 or so years (includes the Great Depression), suggests that demand for their products ebbs towards the end of the recession. Haven't seen the site so far, but if it says that music sales (as opposed to growth in music sales) is decreasing, then it is a good thing.
In conclusion... (Score:4, Insightful)
This particular analysis does not tell us exactly how accurate the rest of the model is, and several other professional statistician shortcomings. Remember, there are lies, damned lies, and statistics; this is just another statistic.
In other words, they are saying their numbers are also probably wrong. At least they admit it.
Re:In conclusion... (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't think my numbers are wrong. I think they paint a relatively accurate picture. However since I'm not a professional statistician, I figured it would be better to put this up front so people wouldn't accuse me of being a fraud. :)
-jdm
Obvious (Score:2)
And boy bands are of course getting as increasingly popular as never before while consumers could not possibly be hungry for more varied and less commercialized content - which means that the sales in the RIAA's eyes ought to have accelerated upwards and that
Out with the old and in with the new (Score:5, Insightful)
I am one of "those" dot commers responsible for screwing up the economy.
This is the attitude I get from a lot of people. Since the crash all the non-tech people I know have taken every oppertunity to take a cheap shot at me, "Ya told you it wouldn't last forever" or my personal favorite, "It's never coming back"
"Bullshit" I say to myself as I try to keep my temper from flaring up.
This type of thinking perme-ates (sp?) our society simply because nobody likes being replaced by younger newer models. This is the way it's been since the dawn of time. Someone makes technology (Castles) and someone else makes a technology that makes the former irrelevent (gunpowder) With both the RIAA and Kodak, it's the same problem. Someone came up with technology that quickly made the foundation of these organizations obselete.
In the case of the RIAA, the combination of internet with Mp3 compression made the old models of music distribution obselete. I worked for a local music magazine for a few years, and often I would hear rockers cry about how Mp3's are sending them all to the poorhouse crying because they can't sell CD's anymore. No matter how many times I would try and tell them website+thawte+oscommerce=mp3 online store they just wouldn't listen because they were all brought up to believe that the RIAA method was the only way. Now apple sells songs 99cents apiece and is making a fortune. With all the money and power the RIAA has, it's a shame they didn't adapt the way apple did and just give their customers what they want.
A good sign of how well CD distribution is dying is the ill fated "Wherehouse" music stores. To my knowledge here in san jose, they are all gone. CD sales just slipped into the toilet and all their stores have just vanished.
Kodak isn't much different. For years they depended on film technology as the cornerstone of their business. By the time they entered digital photography other players had already developed cheaper and more mass producable camera's with higher quality than kodak. I suppose kodak never thought that digital technology would catch up with film, they should have paid closer attention to moores law.
Both companies are old hats, trying to milk every dime out of innovations that are already 100 years old. Let them die already so the new upshots can give us better, faster, cheaper.
Re:Out with the old and in with the new (Score:3, Interesting)
Countering anecdote with anecdote: We had a Wherehouse or three here, and they're gone, but I didn't take it as a sign that CD sales in general slipped into the toilet, but rather that the store I checked out was a few blocks from a Best Buy whose prices were several dollars cheaper o
Piracy sometimes HELPS economic development (Score:5, Interesting)
As an example, look at many countries in East Asia -- piracy, for all its evils, helps build a base of demand for your products and fuels the sales of hardware, without which your stuff is useless anyhow.
What do I mean? There needs to be a established base of music listeners/movie viewers/software users and owners of hardware, like CD players, etc first. Without evil piracy, sales of PCs/CD/DVD players in Asia would have been much less than what it is now, and most people would not have heard of most Western software movies or music, if they had not been ubiquitously available.
So, in developing countries like China, piracy, by fueling a demand that would not have otherwise been there, and ensuring a base of owners with appropriate hardware, lays the foundation for a consumer base. Then, as economic conditions improve, companies move in there, leverage those customers and sell legit products while adding value (better manufacturing quality, etc.) at locally-affordable prices (this is a key point -- no one in any part of the world will pay the equivalent of a week's salary for a CD, for example). Look at places like Japan and Korea that are considered "developed" now. Of course, there's still some piracy in those places -- you can't eradicate it completely, but because you have these people now clamoring for music/movies/software, you now have a thriving music industry and market, both for local artists and for foreign corporations. As a country moves from developing to developed, so will piracy gradually decrease, if companies first build off the existing base of consumers which have been created by pirated material, and market to them (through the selling points of higher quality, etc.) rather than alienating or antagonizing them.
And of course, many times, piracy is the only option, if a company doesn't release their product there. One corollary and positive effect of it has been movie studios, for instance, releasing movies nearly simultaneously worldwide, whereas in the past, in Asia, one would often have to wait for months for a release, if it was to be released at all. In being a stimulus to create buzz and hype -- and ultimately, demand for more -- in countries where the American media juggernaut hasn't reached yet, piracy has been wonderfully successful in this regard.
Essentially, the blunt, hard, truth in much of the developing world is this: without piracy, you would not have had that base of potential consumers to begin with. It's a win/win situation, for the people, for the hardware makers, and ultimately (while it may take time) for the software and content makers as well. Sadly, the myopic vision of most of the corporations fail to grasp this fact.
The inevitable '2 good songs' thread (Score:2)
So use this thread to post CDs you have bought or heard that only had 1-2 good songs on it. Personally, I think that experience is rare. In most cases, if you like a particular song, there are other songs on the album that are similar in style and should be liked by you as well. The exception would be a situatio
Re:The inevitable '2 good songs' thread (Score:2)
About the only CDs I buy now are 'complete studio recordings of X' boxed sets, so this doesn't really apply to me. On the other hand, I rarely listen to any music recorded in the last 30 years, figuring that anything that's survived that long must have some merit and a lot of the noise has been filtered out by economics.
Sue Reality TV (Score:3, Funny)
Isn't it obvious? (Score:5, Funny)
and you don't think the RIAA knows this??? (Score:5, Insightful)
In Other News.. (Score:4, Funny)
CD sales and concert attendance both down (Score:5, Interesting)
First, CD sales and concert attendance are both down. That's an indication of a problem other than CDs.
Second, rather than looking at music alone, look at overall retail sales of prerecorded entertainment media. This includes videos, music, and games, but not downloaded content. The same outlets that used to carry mostly music now sell DVDs and games, all of which now come on very similar disks. The same players often play all three types of content. There's no longer a big distinction between "videos", "music", and "games".
Third, it's worth looking at discretionary income of people in the RIAA's demographic. If that's down, one would expect their sales to decline.
Fourth, the consolidation of radio station ownership has resulted in major changes in the way music is promoted. That effect has been inadequately analyzed. Clear Channel is quite open about the fact their business is selling ads, not music.
Given that, the suprising thing is that CD sales are only down 8%. Car sales for 2002, for example, were about 13% below car sales in 2001.
Re:CD sales and concert attendance both down (Score:5, Interesting)
That's not a very good analysis. The subject deserves a better one.
I agree completely. But no one had done anything of the sort, so I figured I'd give it a shot. If you can do better, please do. Hard numbers are much better than wild claims. :)
-jdm
Re:CD sales and concert attendance both down (Score:4, Interesting)
First, CD sales and concert attendance are both down. That's an indication of a problem other than CDs. . . . exactly, which has a lot to do with Fourth, the consolidation of radio station ownership has resulted in major changes in the way music is promoted. That effect has been inadequately analyzed. Clear Channel is quite open about the fact their business is selling ads, not music.
I would argue that it's not just the consolidation of radio stations, but the entire way music is discovered, packaged and promoted. Music is a business, and the larger a business gets, the more they will focus on profit.
The current process of "launching" bands resulting from the increasing commercialization of the music industry has become an expensive investment. No longer can an A&R scout use his better judgment, hear a band he finds 'good', throw them in the studio to cut a few tracks and put them on the radio to see if they stick.
Instead he faces a well defined marketing procedure that starts in the millions of dollars, and is faced with the question of "Will this band sell?" instead of "Is this band any good?" while that question of "Will this band sell?" is increasingly being answered by businessmen who have little to do with music.
So more and more over the last 10 years, that process of discovery, packaging and promoting has become boilerplate. The end result (and this is arguable), is that music has just become more bland.
For quick proof of this, note the explosion of specialty radio stations catering to very specific sub-genres of dated material like "Classic Rock" or "All 80s". Again, this is arguable, but personally this seems to be more of a reaction of people just not liking what's being produced these days. Or at least they are finding older, more familiar tracks a better alternative to the new stuff.
Of course, I'm not a music insider, and my opinions are simply based on my own impressions of the music industry. I mean, somebody has to actually go out and buy this crap that is played on the radio. Otherwise the RIAA would be gone over night. So it's easy to assume that at least somebody has to like it. But what I'm afraid of is the average consumer makes his music buying decisions based on targeted marketing and perceived impressions of bands rather then his own actual tastes.
And I believe this ultimately is the reason the RIAA is so scared of file sharing: That eventually a globally connected peer group on the Internet will supersede the music marketing machine in influence over buying practices.
When you can suddenly discover new bands from recommendations from those with similar tastes and preferences completely outside of the sanitized and tightly controlled world of the radio or chain record store, you're going to take them out of the loop all together. And consequently, their profits.
This hasn't happened . . . Yet. At least on a large scale. But eventually, hopefully in a few years, some band will rise out of relative obscurity to become a household name due to the power of massive word of mouth on the Internet. And they will do so outside of the "system".
I can't wait.
Hmm (Score:4, Insightful)
-Sean
RIAA should sue MPAA instead (Score:2)
So, back on topic, on
Be honest (Score:3, Insightful)
I have few close friends that buy CDs. They are mostly over 30 with well-paying jobs and extensive CD collections from the pre-Napster era, yet they do not buy CDs anymore. Instead they download (bootleg) all their tunes, including entire albums. Tell me you're surprised.
I recognise that the existing entertainment sales model is a dinosaur, but to suggest that music downloading hasn't affected the industry's bottom line is absurd. Granted, they may have made MORE by switching to a different model, but that says nothing about the source of their current state in this transition period. I don't believe the hype.
Oh No! (Score:3, Funny)
"The CEOs of Eastman-Kodak are in a nearly identical economic situation as the RIAA, yet do not have the luxury of blaming digital piracy."
Just Announced: Online Photo Sharing Prevalent, Photo Lab Revenue Down, Kodak Blames Kazaa!
The history of music (Score:5, Interesting)
So really, music existed for thousands of years. For a breif moment in time a technological inequality meant that recordings could be made, but not easily copied. Now, in a sense, technology is working itself out (removing the glitch) and music is back to the way it's been for thousands of years. Just because it's been this way since you were a kid doesn't mean it's been this way forever. The time for being able to charge for recordings is over.
I don't feel sorry for the RIAA--their time is up. The technological glitch is gone and music can get back to being music for music's sake. In the end people will look back at the time when people used to be able to charge for music and laugh. Paying money for nothing but a *recording* of music? What a silly concept.
Jason
other major factor (Score:5, Interesting)
Also, many people who had vinyl, tape etc, replaced such things with CD. The replacement is largely complete. During the replacement period, people not only bought albums they didn't have, but also bought albums they had. Now, people only buy what they don't have.
To analyze the above points, the RIAA should publish data of sales of new CD albums only and see if there is any decline. My guess is that it is actually increasing. By means of new, I mean never published before.
The third major factor is legal copying. IANAL, but I think it is allowed by law to make duplicate copies of album for personal use. It was hard to make such copies for tape and impossible for vinyl, but this is trivial for CDs.
So, it is doubtful that piracy is the cause of declining RIAA sales.
Proof! (Score:5, Funny)
Wouldn't really be surprised if RIAA eventually sports this argument. :)
My theory - perfect information (Score:5, Insightful)
1. Many buyers and sellers
2. Low barriers to entry and exit
3. All buyers and sellers are price takers(unable to affect price)
4. Homogenous product/service
And most relevant here:
5. Perfect information
Before people were unable to properly sample a music product before purchasing it, and therefore made their purchasing decision based on incomplete and often misleading information - often by factors that had nothing to do with the quality of the music (hype, etc). File sharing has created near perfect information for consumers, and the results suggest that with this information consumers have decided that they were not getting their money's worth in value. Also, and this has been proven in court, the small number of large recording companys have effectively created a cartel - and have and continue to collude to inflate prices. This behavior is expected in a market with such conditions. How else can one explain the inflated price of music despite obvious and significant efficiencies and cost reductions in the production, distribution, and manufacture of recordings?
Stating the obvious (Score:3, Insightful)
That said, I'll state the obvious from my perspecitve, the consumer. I only have so much money I can spend on CD's. I love music, and I'm pretty sure I buy more music than the average person, roughly 5 albums a month. If I could, I would buy more, but after losing my job and taking up a new job that didn't quite pay as much as my old one, having car payments, rent, insurance, utility bills, and a spouse to feed, there's only so much left to spend on what is essentially a luxury item. I don't think this is much different than most average people.
That said, I normally don't pirate software, I don't steal from people, and I consider myself to be a good citizen and neighbor. HOWEVER, I do download mp3's. Is it legal? Hell no. But so are a lot of other things that otherwise good citizens do which really doesn't harm anyone.
My CD buying patterns are strongly influenced by my economic status, and have never been influenced by p2p file sharing. (I can't buy 10 $15 CD's when there's only $75 in my posession.) I don't feel like it's morally wrong to copy something "virtual" (digital data) that I otherwise wouldn't have purchased anyways. The only thing that has changed with the arrival of p2p file sharing is that I listen to a wider variety of music, and make better purchases. (I buy more of what I like, and have fewer CD's I regret purchasing.) In short, I'm what would otherwise be known as an "informed customer" which is usually viewed as a "better customer" in most other industries.
So the bottom line is, yes, people download mp3's. Yes, people still buy CD's, whether or not they think $15 is a rip-off or not. And finally, yes, there are a (probably small) handfull of people who have likely stopped purchasing music completely since they've been able to compulsively download all their favorite music. On the other hand, there are also people that walk into record shops and shoplift CD's, which probably does much more damage. Either way, the number of shoplifters and p2p thieves are likely little more than static noise in the overall sales figures. Think about it, even if record shops all of a sudden stopped "tagging" the CD's and removed all surveilance cameras and tag sensors at the door, most people would STILL pay for the CD rather than pocket it. (Admittedly, the same shoplifters would probably steal even more hard cold physical products such as CD's are, if these surveilance systems weren't in place, but that's a bit different than stealing the data.)
So, the RIAA's claim has little basis, I'm preaching to the choir, stating the obvious, posting AC, and otherwise enjoying another day of bashing the favorite enemy in genuine
New model for the recording industry (Score:3, Interesting)
What I'd like to see discussed is how the recording industry actually stands to make more from net-based services than they ever could have from the old way.
Think of a central server, similar to what Apple has set up, but with the following features:
extensive back catalogs of all of the major labels, going back as far as recorded history can go. (MP3 downloads arent killing the Top 40 artists nearly as much as they're affecting catalog and "Best Of" compilation sales.)
$10 annual "membership fee". That fee gets you access to the system, and software that allows you to set up playlists, etc. that the RIAA can use the data from to aggrgeate stats on most popular tunes played and burned (with respect for individual privacy, of course). You also get powerful search software that can search by artist, song name, lyrics (so you can list every song that goes "...all of my love..."), year, and whatever other search types you can think of.
$0.75 per song, 128 kb MP3 downloads. All files have the proper artist & track name in the ID3 tag. Correcting misspelled, and incorrectly labelled p2p download file & track names is just such a pain in the $$hole. It sounds cheap - but your average 12 track LP would be $9.00 USD.
special "premium fan content" - if you're a fan of a particular artist, you might be more than happy to pay $2.00 or even more for a rare, out of circulation B-side tune, or an MPEG concert video, even tracks played on tour or even whole concerts can be recorded (as cheaply as possible) and sold track by track to the hardcore fans that want more. If the Grateful Dead could do it, why not every other band out there? We could follow our favourite artists across the country like the Deadheads from the comfort of our living rooms! If I want to have 15 different versions of "Satisfaction", why not just sell them to me and make some money! Get this stuff out in the public.
no restrictions on copying, burning to CD or DVD, or encoding in a different format. I'm sure many would scoff and say "if someone shares the stuff on P2P we'll be pirated". If you make the economics (time + low cost + low user base) work, P2P will die naturally. Yes, a few people will still pirate stuff, but at least it will be out of the mainstream.
powerful servers that allow fast downloading, and reconnect at no charge if the server went down in the middle of a transfer. This kind of raw power would leave Gnutella, Kazaa, etc. with few users who are willing to waste time searching through scads of crap files and downloading at 2KB/sec. Fewer users for P2P services = fewer available files, and more customers willing to pay.
since the product is somewhat inferior, you still want to recommend to your customers purchasing the actual CD's. Provide links to allow purchase, make it visible but not annoying to the individual who is content to download.
add to the premium content by selling liner notes, CD cover art (for those who are willing to print the CD cover) so that the total price of a 12 song CD is about $10.00. Add to that the cost of making, distributing and retailing the CD, and subtract the cost of the server infrastructure & staffing - the profit margin is roughly equal.
Now, granted, the record retailers and the people at K-Tel would suffer if this kind of a service were available, but the music industry as a whole would survive and grow under such a plan.
Here's a Doozy. (Score:3, Insightful)
I got these numbers from the Blockbuster website:
DVDANALYZE THAT / (SUB)
$21.99
VHS ANALYZE THAT / (P&S DOL)
$16.99
CD
ANALYZE THAT / Original Sound Track
$17.98
That's right. The SOUNDTRACK costs more than the VHS version (and only slightly cheaper than the DVD)
Now, let's not go into the fact that the DVD costs nealy as much and gives you more value... let's also go into the fact that people aren't *Nearly* as resentful about movie prices as they are about CDs.
Why?
You can RENT DVDs. If you just want to see the movie, you can fork over $4 and see it... no problem.
The RIAA could have had the benifits of File Sharing before File Sharing... Like only the one song on the radio? Not sure about the other 9? Rent the album for $2. If you don't like it, don't buy it.
Unfortunately, the RIAA isn't even keeping up with the business models of the late 1980s, let alone the business models of the 21st century.
One little known (well, at least in the US) fact. (Score:3, Interesting)
This policy has effectively killed off the piracy of locally published titles. Nobody does it anymore. People only duplicate games which are out of print. I can just go to the exact same CD retailer and buy the game I want from among the pile of the pirate releases of games they couldn't license.
The article really did not (Score:5, Insightful)
CD sales have dropped for me recently and this is why.
DVD movies now occupy that under $20 knee jerk purchase price point. Everyone knows a DVD is better than a CD in general, so how come the CD is still so expensive? I don't think twice about $16.99 for a DVD, that's a nice deal really. So what does that do for the same pricing on the CD? All I know is that $16.99 number on a CD is pretty unattractive in general these days. To pay as much for a CD as I do a movie, it had better be a damn good CD.
The current buttload of music being pimped via the usual Clear Channel right now is garbage plain and simple. Sure, there is plenty of good music, but it sure is hard to find, unless...
One can sample! Maybe that $16.99 is worth it. (It sometimes is.) I am willing to look and consider the purchase, but nobody is showing. Wonder why they don't sell product? Duh!
Currently I don't download anything. Thought I would make the change and see what happens with me and my family.
I must say that without P2P, I am missing out. All the radio stations here play the same (crap) music. There is little to get excited about. I know there is a lot of music that I would be interested in buying, but I can't find it easily!
P2P is costing the RIAA something in the young market though. If they (kids)have the money they will buy the CD, even if they have downloaded it. But if they have a (better) choice they won't. These days there are more good choices, so kids buy fewer CD's because they know they can get the music somehow later, but can't easily repeat a spur of the moment movie trip. So, the RIAA is losing sales here in my view. In a twisted sort of way, they might be right with the younger crowd. They can squeeze more out of their latest boy band if there is less P2P, but at what cost?
On second hand they might already be hosed. When I shut down the P2P, my kids ended up doing the same thing I did. They go to school, talk about the music, find out who has it and why, and copy it if it fits.
There are more CDRs laying around the house now than when P2P was running.
Now, I do get excited about movies and guess what? That is what I buy. The movie market appeals to everyone at some level. There are several layers to the whole thing that make it easy to sell to those looking to buy that music just does not have today.
The RIAA is currently trying like hell to milk everything they can from the kids. (Remember the point earlier about cost?) Problem is that those same kids also have DVD, subscription TV, cell phone plans and other new things to worry about. With all those new choices offering different values, is it any wonder CD sales are not as attractive given their low value proposition in comparison?
Your average teenage girl can get a cell plan for the cost of many CD's that will provide way more bang for the buck than that CD will...
I think the RIAA is getting squeezed right out of their prime market because of these things and their own ignorance.
Now here I am sitting with my disposable income looking for something to buy. Does it take much of a stretch to see that I am going to buy something from those people willing to entertain my business?
Whatever problems the the movie companies have with digital are not getting in the way of moving product. They are showing me lots of pricing options, good content and good value across the board. I can easily find blockbusters along with interesting smaller films.
What do I get on the music side of things?
Shit.
The majority of the content is aimed at people half my age. I cannot realistically sample using the radio because they are all but owned by the big boys, so they mostly play the same things. Going into the music store to sample is a joke really. All they do is put the same tracks on the in-store boxes that I just got d
Re:The article really did not (Score:3, Insightful)
I've seen this train of thought brandished around every time something of this nature crops up and I still don't get it.
Music has a much higher replay value that that of a Movie. I mean for the average person how many time do you want to watch a movie? Music on the other hand is listened to many times, and is often also put on in the background.
So please help me out and justify this reasoning.
Myself I havn
Re:The article really did not (Score:3, Insightful)
I agree for the most part. I still listen to my first CD often. Movies do have some repeat value, it is just different from the CD in some ways.
For me the issue of music price has been a sore one for a while. New vinyl was about $8.00 Singles were $3-4.00. The price of a CD has never dropped even though the medium promised great cost reductions. That first CD was $21.99. In 1985 dollars that was a lot. --It still has the sticker on it!
Kodak (Score:3, Insightful)
No... they have digital photography to blame. If people are happily making their own photos with Sony digital cameras, working on them in "digital darkrooms" with Photoshop, PSP or the GIMP and printing them out on Epson printers using photo paper made by Epson, that means fewer people using Kodak products. Sure the current lineup of digital cameras isn't ready to compete with real film for someone who knows the difference, but for "Joe America" they are "just as good" is not better because of how much cheaper it is to take a digital photo.
Re:A little common sense here (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:A little common sense here (Score:2)
Re:A little common sense here (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:A little common sense here (Score:5, Interesting)
And don't get me started on Apple's Music Store
Re:A little common sense here (Score:2)
Two words. Duck tape.
Re:A little common sense here (Score:5, Informative)
its duct tape
Actually either is correct [octanecreative.com] however it was originally Duck Tape, since it was intended for waterproofing.
Oh, and `it's' means it is, 'its' means belonging to it.
Re:A little common sense here (Score:4, Funny)
Why would buy a dishwasher, if you can use your sink for free?
Why would you pay for a hooker, if you can fuck your wife any time?
(Err, why is everybody looking at me like that?)
Re:A little common sense here (Score:5, Funny)
Re:A little common sense here (Score:2, Funny)
Re:A little common sense here (Score:2)
However when downloading VS. buying, downloading is easier.
My theory on life never changes... (Score:5, Insightful)
I've have a theory that life never changes. Most of the people pirating music are teenagers and people in their early 20s (e.g. college students). When I was that age, back in the days of LPs and 8-tracks, there was rampant pirating. When I was in high school it was common for one person to buy an album and pass it around to his friends to copy to tape. Certainly the Internet and MP3s have made this process a little easier, but I question that the magnitude of the problem has changed significantly. Back then I knew people who had tape duplicating parties. In college dual tape machines were common and made duplication easy. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Re:My theory on life never changes... (Score:3, Insightful)
what if we paid money directly to musicians based on their sharing metrics, using hash signatures of the music getting moved? then, a pool would need to be built from money somewhere. howa
Re:My theory on life never changes... (Score:5, Informative)
i think the problem is worse. things have chagned.
Have they?
almost-infinite, perfect copies. no tape/record to wear out.
But what people trade are, largely, intentionally degraded copies. Sure, the 100th copy of a lossily-compressed MP3 sounds the same as the first, but none of them sound like the CD. Both then and now, a little degradation in quality doesn't matter.
the technology to do this is becoming ubitquitous.
So were cassette tape recorders then.
the mechanism to play the result already exists everywhere
I submit that computers and MP3 players are *less* common today than cassette players were 20 years ago.
# anonymous sharing. i don't have to know the 46 people who are sending me chunks of the song
Nor did you really have to know the friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend who bought the record your tape is a third-generation copy of. Nor did you have to know the people at the tape duplicating parties. Nor did you have to know the DJ playing the songs you taped off the radio.
Nope, the OP is right: The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Re:A little common sense here (Score:3, Insightful)
> Of course P2P is affecting sales, how could it not?
Because the question isn't how much music people are getting for free, it's whether they are actually buying any less than they would have bought if p2p and omnipresent CDRs didn't exist.
For a purely anecdotal illustration: I don't steal music, but for other reason's I've almost completely quit buying CDs; I've been buying about two a year for several years now. If for some reason I get the urge to find out what's happening on the music scene and d
Re:A little common sense here (Score:2)
Because if you can't, you're desired point is 100% moot and not really applicable to this discussion.
No. I buy FAR LESS music now since Napster died.. (Score:3, Insightful)
Napster increased my music spending by several 100%. Now I even if I find something I want, I hate buying it because I feel like I'm supporting the RIAA even if not 100% true.
I now just have a bad taste in
Re:A little common sense here (Score:5, Insightful)
There are few who would dispute P2P is having an effect (although I might, in my more snarky moods). That is not the question.
The question is the precise nature and extent of that effect.
The {MP,RI,SI}AA argue shrilly that the result is billions of dollars in "lost" sales annually. This is clearly an unsupportable conclusion for two primary reasons. First, there has never been an independent academic analysis of the economic effects of unsanctioned copying -- all the "studies" performed so far have been industry-sponsored, and are based on assumptions and axioms that have yet to be tested, much less verified.
Second, the basic question -- how much are we "losing" in sales -- is a fundamentally unaskable question. It is an attempt to measure events -- in this case, sales -- that did not happen. Logically, it is tantamount to asking the question, "How many times didn't you beat your wife last week?" It is an absurd question, for which any response is equally justifiable. Therefore, even a serious attempt at an unbiased, comprehensive study would be fraught with difficulty.
But even once you get past this, there are the higher-order ethical questions: Should unsanctioned copying be unlawful at all? There are compelling arguments on both sides.
On the one hand, it is argued creative people need an incentive to keep on creating, something that can be converted into meeting their basic needs. Currently, this is expressed as a monopoly right -- copyright -- in the manufacture and distribution of duplicates of their work. This monopoly right is typically converted into money, which goes towards the creator's needs.
On the other hand, there is the argument of "shared abundance." Everyone has a computer, which is a little digital factory, and can make a duplicate of anything they want any time they want. There is no artificial imbalance here; "consumers" and creators alike have this ability. So if everyone has equal access to anything they want, what purpose does territorialism serve? Why put a fence around your stuff if you can make a copy of anything you want, including stuff that "belongs" to you? And, frankly, if it's this easy to commit the crime of copyright infringement, should it be a crime any longer? If so, is five years/$500,000 a reasonable penalty?
Personally, I'm inclined toward more liberal policies, not more restrictive ones. So far, the hard data doesn't back up the shrill arguments made by the industry. My own experience in the computer industry has shown that copy protection actually depresses sales. There is not a single case of a company going under due to unsanctioned copying of its products. And Microsoft, who likes to paint itself as the biggest victim of unsanctioned copying, continues to post record profits quarter after quarter. So, clearly, the industry has demonstrated an ability to weather this, "problem." There is no reason to believe the same won't be true of the music and movie industries.
Schwab
(P.S: It is probably prudent to point out a subtle but important distinction between unsanctioned copying -- people informally passing bits around -- and counterfeiting. Counterfeiting is a form of reputation fraud (or, "lying," if you will). The counterfeiter represents that the disc and manual are the result of the vendor's manufacturing and quality assurance process, when in fact it is no such thing. I do not support counterfeiting in any way.)
Re:stealing become acceptable? (Score:3, Interesting)
Hundreds of millions of Napster/Kazaa/etc users seem to find it acceptable. Take into consideration how many people on this 6 billion person planet a) have a computer b) have internet, and then realize that MANY people find it accceptable.
Yes, its illegal. Hey, so is J-walking, but I'll bet you dont do that, right? And that, despite the fact that it'd be too easy to create a study showing how J-walking slows down traffic, which slows transportation, which sl
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:re 2 song thing (Score:2)
So now you're telling us what to like?
No, it was the passive voice. He's telling the song that it should be liked. By you. Or else.