Kazaa Agrees to Pay $100m to the Record Industry

siddesu writes "BBC has the following breaking story: File-sharing site Kazaa will become a legal music download service following a series of high-profile legal battles. The peer-to-peer network has also agreed to pay $100m (£53m) in damages to the record industry. The announcement follows the release of a music industry report that says more than 20 billion music tracks have been downloaded illegally in the last year. Hungry artists across the globe rejoice."

Re:just how much will each artist make?

[gid13]

I think the ones that are hungry are the ones that WANT people to download their stuff. And I think that labels are a monument to mediocrity and mistreatment. Let's not forget the guy from Creedence Clearwater, who got sued for copyright infringement OF HIS OWN WORK because the record label owned the copyright. Or, much as I may hate them, the Backstreet Boys, who, after several hugely popular albums, testified that they hadn't ever received a royalty cheque. Or DMX, who compared the music business to legalized slavery. Let's not forget that the major labels were convicted of price-fixing, and got the tiniest penalty imaginable. This is a short beginning of a very long list, but I'm not going to type it all. The point is: pretty much anything that results in the major labels getting more money is bad. And this likely will.

None. This just offsets Record Industry costs

[giafly]

does anybody know just how many and just how much of this money will actually go to the artists?

"While the award may seem like a vast pot of money, it will merely offset the millions we have invested - and will continue to invest - in fighting illegal pirate operations around the world" - EMI Music vice chairman David Munns [macworld.co.uk]

Go Mexico Go!

[xtracto]

Wee Mexico on the TOP 10 list!.

On a serious note, instead of "fragmenting" and making harder to see where to go, what they are doing is homogenizing (spell??) it. All those kazaa users will go ([to bittorrent+emule+X]-1) P2P software that is available. That is great from my point of view because that way you will have to hunt less places to get what you need.

I remember once I downloaded winmx and could found the GAMEDEV magazine ISO disks, unfortunately I could not download it because my connction was still a modem. In those days you had edonkey, kazaa, imesh, napster, and I dont remember how many others.

The more of those netwoks they close, the better another network will become (in anonymity, content and users).

How about 4 out of 6, today?

[pedestrian crossing]

1) $0.22/track - Check

2) None - Check

3) See 1) - Check

4) Nope, sorry.

5) Maybe, I've seen extra tracks available for some albums...

6) Check [emusic.com]

Check it out!

Re:just how much will each artist make?

[vertinox]

Then I guess she shouldn't have entered into a contract that was a bad business deal for her.

I'm sick of this stupid hivemind attitude where the artists are so downtrodden and abused. Like it or lump it, these people aren't being mugged of their rights, they have to willingly sign them away. If they don't understand what they're signing, they should get a lawyer.

You are correct, but you forgot to mention one thing...

American musicians have no real alternatives to the RIAA!

Sure there are many Indie labels out there (such as my own), but we don't have the ability to put our CDs in walmart, put music videos on TV, and send our musicans on tours that cost ten's of thousands of dollars (have you ever looked into the logistics of having a road crew and a tour bus... it ain't cheap)

I will have to admit, if it weren't for the internet I wouldn't be able to do what I do today with promotion, sales, and distribution but we aren't making enough money to quit our day jobs.

So unless you have enough money to make your own label, an underground musician won't be able to compete with the RIAA's music.... Unless of course you don't mind doing it for free and the love of the music (which many do).

On the other hand... European major labels tend to be a bit more diverse and fair to their musicians.