If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to our RSS feed.
Thanks for visiting!
Spotted on: Recording Industry vs. People
The record industry is at it again, seeking to further limit our use of our catalogs of recorded music. In a current Arizona case, Atlantic vs. Howell, RIAA is now claiming that ripping our own CDs onto our computers for our own use is copyright infringement.
We already have DRM, which limits our enjoyment of music to a platform (iTunes and Windows Media Player are the prime examples of this). This new motion would force us to buy the same song over and over again, to listen to it in our car, on our stereo, on our computer, and on our portable MP3 player.
Is it any wonder that record sales are crashing and burning? Music is not a necessity, and people buy it because they want to enjoy it. The more we are backed into a corner, told that we cannot copy or back up our own music, the greater the backlash toward the record business and the faster album sales slump.
Maybe there’s a totally different angle we’re missing. If the RIAA and the big labels see that their model has failed perhaps all of this litigation is an attempt to squeeze every last penny they can out of us before they collapse under their own weight. All the claims of protecting copyrights and artists may be a sham. The more ridiculous the legal environment about copyright infringement becomes, the more damage is done to artists.
Within five to seven years, there won’t be major labels like there are now, and we will be free to buy the music we want one time and convert it to any format we choose.
However, the resentment that the RIAA is generating toward buying music may be around far longer. Mainstream media outlets tend to only trumpet the loudest voices (in this case the RIAA), and most of the alternative opinions and methods of distributing music are relatively unheard.
Without all of the DRM, root kits, and legal controls of our music catalogs, music will continue to be made and bought. The more restricted our music catalogs become, the less willing we will be to buy it. And who loses is the artist. Musicians make a living off their music. If people are unwilling to buy it, musician will not be viable career. And this backlash hits independent artists even harder. As music loses its value at the mainstream level, it loses it on the underground as well. Artists and labels that do not believe in DRM or controlling the use of their music suffer from the same public opinion that people have toward major labels. The only difference is the major labels positions are available on the newsstand, and to lobby for laws. In fact, indie labels are the second largest entity selling music, and are left with the same restrictions and laws set by the RIAA and the Big Four.
Bottom Line: The continued attempts to regulate music is the biggest source of the current collapse we see in music sales, and the devaluation of music as a commodity.
This article is right on time. The cool thing is the RIAA only represents the major record labels and their are ten of thousands of inde record labels, recording artist and garage bands seeking music fans. http://www.gojawar.blogspot.com
Major labels will survive if/when they realize what their real purpose is. They are marketers… they discover talent and shepherd it to known markets, advertising as they go. They add value by scouting for and cultivating talent. They add value by packaging it in ways that will sell to various market segments. Joke all you want about the evils of capitalism, these functions actually stimulate creativity and the delivery of creative works to the masses.
Unfortunately, the major labels have become attached to one obsolete revenue model (mass production and distribution of disks), mistaking it for their primary purpose. Instead of focusing on their core vision and mission as marketers of music, they see themselves as manufacturers of little pieces of plastic, so they are defending their rights to those disks even as new technology makes them undefendable.
There’s an old saw in marketing: “Give (sell) the customers what they want.” If customers want the freedom to copy disks as part of fair use, then record companies (and indie artists) should sell those rights. The trick is to be paid before anyone’s copying undermines the market.
I think that I have solved that problem. Now I just need to find a way to persuade the public to use it. If I succeed, then today’s digital piracy will become tomorrow’s royalty-free fair use.
Jeffry R. Fisher
President, Propagate Digital Content, Limited