Originally posted by dragonrider
Alright, NOW are we ready for a complete and total boycott???????

i was keen far long ago DR. Far more boycaotting than merely the recording industyr needs to happen, i say full society boycott, sadly the sheep will not get up and leave society, and the corporate monkeys wouldn't care if all those open minded just left, then their control would be even tighter. So lets just start with the recording industry, they don't prosecute people for taping things off radio and tv as they should so downloading files shouldn't matter either.

No media giant will have the balls to actually make a stand against this. We need to get this into the main strean somehow.

One of the largest recording companies recently said they are going to drop the retail value of CDs by $6. So they say that average retail was 18 and now it is $12. My problem with this is how can they suddenly afford to drop the price by 1/3 and not go broke. The only way is that they have been horribly gouging us on price, thats why no talent bands that put out one CD can become millionaires over night. Although it is a very good effort on their part, it infuriates me more to know how much they used to be making on us.

This is just beyond insane! Even some artists wanted Napster to stay.

A corporation can charge me about a 300% markup on their product and there's nothing I can do except either live without it and make them go broke (which seems to be the only way to go these days) , pay their astronomical prices while I go in debt and they get richer, or d/l it and GO TO JAIL!

Why are there no consumer laws that protect us on price gouging?

There are consumer laws on price gouging, however, man big companies are able to avoid getting in trouble, by finding loopholes in the system. For one, I think that in order to get back at record companies, everyone should just download as much music as possible, and they should keep handing out subpeonas and try and take everyone to court, but instead of letting them take it through a class action suit, everyone should do it seperately, thus clogging up the justice system, eventually, when push comes to shove, all the cases will be overthrown. Plus, if they made everyone pay up, just imagine what that would do to the economy, and I highly doubt that the government would allow for such a thing to happen. again. Just a thought of course.

Unforturnately most people don't see this for what it really is - a "back door" approach to the introduction of censorship of the internet. The "powers to be" are afraid of the internet and its ability to spread information quickly. You can set up a web site and have thousands of people from all over the world access that web site and gain information. This can cross international borders, a man in China can access a web site in the USA, etc. If you have read some of the proposed legislation for file sharing control, you will see phrases that can be used to control all sharing of files. This would of course control the dissemination of information on the internet. Although it does show the greed of the music industry. Another problem is the apparent deconstruction of traditional copyright law. In traditional copyright law, you could only recover the amount of the damages incurred by the infringement (plus legal costs). If the guy only made and sold one copy of you book, you could only recover from him the price of one book. The recording companies seem to be charging that millions of dollars of revenue was lost because a couple of guys were sharing files. This is also apparently done without any hard evidence as to the true lose of revenue. This alone should cause concern to the general public because the recording industry is now going way beyond traditional copyright case law to the point where some poor guy can be charge with several million dollars of revenue lose just because he had some file on his computer.

The law allows the RIAA to sue in civil court for up to $150,000 for EACH SONG on a defendants computer.
Heres the catch alot of the supenas were served to parents and grand parents for downloading done by there kids and grandkids. The RIAA is going to jit a brick wall when they try to sue some Bluehair for what her little Johnny did when he visited for the summer.
I would not throw the gouging term around so quickly. Gouging implies you need the item, You dont NEED music. You want it but dont have to have it. Gouging also implies an artificial rise in price that is not incrimental or due to market forces (like charging people $300 dollars a sheet for plywood when a hurricain is inbound).
I am not saying I agree with the RIAA.
When I was heavly into music about 8 years ago I could purchase a CD for about $12.00 now the CD is around $19.00. This was due to the Record industry attempting to test the market ( I believe thru price fixing) they pushed the price up and people continued to pay it. Then that price hit its top and people decided they werent going to pay that much anymore. So the market reacted and the software was developed and bootlegging tookoff.
Now the market is working to correct the artifical rise in price ( one company is lowering prices to $12.00 again).

I think this is a good thing. The record industry does make big money off of its product or they wouldn't be any record companies. However its the Distributers who get the lions share of the profit Most artist and producers only make about $1.00 off each CD. Theres nothing wrong with this its the way business works but what is going to happen is that since the price is coming back down there will not be as much Capital for the companies to put out for new talent. Nor will there be incentive for the distributers to market as much new music. So because of the bootlegging you will see a rise in the QUALITY of the new music from new Bands. This is why so many artist were coming out against the Downloaders they see their mealticket disappearing. They are actually going to have to work a little harder on that next CD. They cant just force crap on the fans and expect them to pay $20 for it!
Thats something the RIAA seems to forget If you produce a QUALITY product people will pay a little more money for it. Why should I buy a whole CD when theres only ONE good song on it and the rest is filler garbage that all sounds alike?
Fact of the matter is the technology exists its too late to stop it So they have to fall back and come up with a new angle to sell to the public!

The current laws are a reversal of previous laws of liablity. In the old method to collect damages you had to:
1. Prove that the party being sued did commit a cupable act, i. e., his actions created a damage.
2. Prove that the amount you were claiming were the actual damages created by his act.
This prevented people from turning a $500 clunker car into a $50,000 Cadilac. If someone destroyed your $500 clunker (on injuries), he only had to pay for a $500 dollar clunker. The liablity laws (including copyright laws) not only stated that a culpable act was commited (there was a copyright infringement) but the amount of damages also had to be proved (one copy made, cannot collect for a million copies). Now we are seeing the RIAA suing people for several million dollars with no proof as to the actual amount of damage caused by the person's action. This is a radical change in the laws of liability and will only be used as a method of futher censorship of the internet. The problem is that most people view this as only a method of the RIAA to collect some revenue. However, they fail to see the more draconian measure that this is really an action to promote censorship of the internet, which is what the government is really after.

Maybe if they stop churning out crap music I'd be more inclined to give them 20 bucks for a crappy cd, in which the artist might recieve a dollar.

Here is my thing though what if I own the CD but dled the mp3?

I've done that a lot, so how am I really stealing it?
I bought the song didn't I?

ok, my question is who the hell bought a baja men cd?

We shouldn't be told a groups name until they have 2 top 40 hits, if they wanna charge us 20 bucks for a crap ass cd.
150k a song? how has 1 song caused 150k dmg?
Hell I usually dl an mp3 of a band first to see if they suck or not and that decide wether or not I get their cd, or make plans to go see them at a concert out of town.
It's like that radio but I hate listening to the radio, how is ppl recording songs of the radio any different? Damn near all the radio stations are owned by the same companies, ie Clear Channel, hmm they wanted to get mr gates for a monoply... yet..

Heil Mein Führer!

Grenadier: You are CORRECT... the MARKET sets prices. Whatever people are willing to pay THAT's the market. To say they are "Gouging" is ludicrous... Your examples are correct.

Jagd: I don't which country's law you are quotong here but the U.S. has had a "Treble Damages" clause for WELL over 30 years. The intet of this law is if an entity commits GROSS NEGLIGENCE and or BLATANTLY STEALS your "Professional/Intillectual Property" with the intent of profitting from its theft (remember all the pop-up ads at Napster - they were making MONEY) then YOU are entitled to at LEAT 3X actual damages.

This is designed tp be a deterant to such acts. It worked for many years until the advent of WWW.

To now point the finger of "censorship" is, IMHO wrong headed. What if YOUR family depended on YOUR mind's work to EAT? What of some goober simply stole your Mind's work that you charge a fee for and gave it away to your customers so they wouldn't have to pay you anymore?

Your family would starve and your ability as a father and provider would be in SERIOUS DOUBT. Would you not seek remedies afforded you by the legal systen?! Of Course you would! What kind of Father/Husband would you be of you didn't?

P...
m...

I would also buy stuff if it was a good product. If i ever download movies or songs it is because i will not pay for them. I think the artist should make more money from the cd.

Springer,
I am well aware of the treble damages clause (which is also being misused in the USA) but it is still tied to actual proveable damages (not some figure pulled out of the RIAA's rectum). In the past you had to prove the amount of the damage (or lost revenue). What we seem to be having here is the RIAA is suing people for large sums of money based solely on the fact that certain files were on their computer and available for download. The RIAA has shown no basis for the computation of the loss (such as the number of times the file in question was downloaded and how that could be related to the number of sales). What is the RIAA's basis for the claims of the loss generated by these file sharings? Also what makes the RIAA so special. If I sue someone for copyright infringement of my intellectual property, I would have to be able to document the loss I alleged to have occurred. Indeed if were you or me who had their "intellectual property" infringed, we would have to go into court with hard evidence to prove the amount of the loss. Indeed the theft of intellectual property has been around for a long time. Remember all the hackers who started back in the 1980's breaking the copy protect of various software products. Well the software companies came to the conclusion that it really wasn't worth going after most of these people because the number of copies made were too small and the copies went to people who wouldn't buy the product anyway. How many of these people who download music files would have bought the CD otherwise. Very few I think. I personally don't think that sharing music files represents that great of a revenue loss for the artists. At least I would like to see some hard documentation as to how the alleged loss was determined. It seems to me that the RIAA is pulling loss figures out of thin air and making them stick in court. Yes the theft of intellectual property can be a serious one, I am aware of that fact. But are we to allow anyone who has had intellectual property stolen to go into court and sue for outrageous sums of money with no proveable documentation as to actual damage?

As for my contention of "back door" censorship. Coupled with the move to eliminate "porn", we will soon see moves to eliminate "sensitive information",etc. I have heard of proposals that would prohibit any sort of file sharing on the internet, not just music files, but all files. I still say the issue is not the loss of some revenue by no talent artists because of file sharing. That is just the justification for measures that will ultimately lead to futher censorship of the internet.

They was saying on SKY NEWS this morning that there's over 250 people now being taken to court for copywright stuff now?

Anyone else heard that that? or any links?



blackwidow

My thoughts


Someone asked what the difference was between recording songs off the radio and d/l them. I don't think there is a difference except the RIAA can't track down who records from the radio.

I think what really caused the mp3 d/l craze was the fact that for years we've been bombarded with a mountain of audio garbage and been over-charged for it. It seems as though every teenage bimbo in a skimpy outfit seems to skyrocket up the charts and crank out albums like crazy. As a result, consumers quickly grew tired of paying $20.00 for a CD that was mostly or entirely garbage. Sales went down the drain so the RIAA had to come up with a reason why their profits dropped faster than a prom dress. It would be bad business and self-damaging to admit they made bad choices for the "hottest stars" so they found a scapegoat.

The RIAA may win a few cases, but in the end I think they'll only do more harm than good to themselves.

Another thought....Has anyone else ever noticed a severe lack of singers who arent all looks and no real talent? I know a few people who arent much to look at, but their singing voices are incredible. Which only goes to prove that record companies concentrated too much on looks and not enough on talent and are now paying the price for their superficial thinking.

Again,

Anyone else interested in a complete and total

BOYCOTT???

Just dont share the files. Just download them.