The recent judicial ruling by a U.S. district judge that requires that Verizon gives up the name of an individual who allegedly has 600 songs on his or her hard drive that this person is said to be sharing via the ‘net is disturbing. The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) seems to be taking is members reduced sales exceedingly seriously. And it could be interpreted that one of the consequences of its Javert-like pursuit of the individual in question could have an effect on our rights to privacy. That is: Who gets to know what we have on our own equipment in our own domiciles when the things in question were obtained legally and have no conceivable threat to the Nation?
Tag Archives: RIAA
RIAA Hacked Again
RIAA hacked again. Explanation.
Boycott the RIAA!
Back to the Future
The Recording Industry Association of America catches the 80s retro vibe with an attack on its arch nemesis: technology. And just like last time, it’s not only a losing fight but also a misguided philosophy. While the RIAA claims that P2P file sharing is to blame for shitty CD sales (not the fact that the 12 year old girls who two years ago bought N*Sync et al are now 14 year old teenagers desperately trying to shake a kiddy image), other reports show just the opposite. Looking for a villain in all of this, downloading has the RIAA’s dander up like Alf in a cat show.
mp3rd Rate
Why the RIAA should love us
As the digital music conflict (read: the RIAA v. post-Napster file sharing) continues to pick up steam in the mainstream press, one key issue seems to be frequently omitted or forgotten: Quality. We all remember Neil Young’s attack on the compact disc format in the early ’90s. Let’s not revisit that argument—that CDs have inferior fidelity than good old fashioned records—as it’s now a moot point; CDs have triumphed and even record snobs have succumbed to the format’s convenience. (My record collection went into storage in a friend’s basement this year.) But what of mp3s?
It’s a fact: At common encoding rates, mp3 files have inferior sound reproduction than do CDs. Don’t believe it? Rip an mp3 of your favorite CD and play it next to the original on a decent stereo—you’ll hear the difference. For me, this came clearly into focus when I bought Wilco’s Yankee Hotel Foxtrot after having lived with a copy burned from mp3s for eight months before the album was officially released. Yet it is this inferior format the RIAA claims is hurting CD sales, threatening the very viability of the record industry. At first glance its logic seems sound—why would someone pay for that Wilco CD when they already own a copy of it?
Yet I (and a hell of a lot of other people) did buy it, just as we bought records of music taped off the radio in our childhood, just as we bought CDs after friends had taped us fuzzy copies on boom-boxes. Do we always buy something we pirate? Of course not—some, perhaps even the majority, of this “stolen” music is garbage, destined to be taped over, forgotten, deleted, never to be listened to again. But the good music, the stuff that we want to listen to again and again—it is crucial to get the real thing, to own an original. Of course, we’re probably not the average music buyer. We’re music geeks; the RIAA would probably maintain that we don’t count. After all, we’re listening to Wilco, not Nickelback, and music conglomerates are usually disinterested in artists of the non-multi-platinum variety.
So does the typical music consumer care that mp3s are inferior to commercially distributed CDs? I’ll agree with the RIAA here: No, I’m sure most people are perfectly satisfied with their lo-fi digital copies. But why? Is it because the music industry has trained consumers to treat music as a commodity to be used and thrown away? After all, there will be another Britney, Celine Dion, or Linkin Park sitting in the endcap at Wal-Mart next month. The real threat to the music industry isn’t coming from the serious music fans—it comes from the casual radio listener who buys an album to listen to that one heavily-rotated song a few dozen times before losing interest and moving on to the next Top 40 hit.
Of course the problem with this is that all that junk, those cotton candy mega-hits, the songs most likely to be ripped and traded and then not purchased, they are what pay the bills for the rest of the music biz. Digital music is going to force the recording industry to rethink their business model and that’s what scares the fat cats of L.A.: Change. If the typical music consumer can freely obtain the disposable music that forms the foundation of the recording industry, the RIAA isn’t going to have anyone left to sell CDs to. Except us.
Choice, Value & Connection
In a recent interview with a USA Today reporter, Hilary Rosen, CEO of the Recording Industry Association of America, said, in reaction to a line of questioning related to the nullification of Napster through the efforts of that group, “Consumers want to know their access to music is going to give them the most choice, the best value and connection with their artists.”
Let’s break that down.
I’m not precisely sure what “connection with their artists” means. I always figured that this was the sort of thing that Tiger Beat—er—Rolling Stone provides. To say nothing of posters, T-shirts, bath towels, hats, and the other objectifying objects of today’s musical professional.
As for “choice,” I think that this is one area that the Internet certainly provides an advantage, but one that is curiously enervated. Look what’s happened to small record stores. Actually, you’d have a tough time looking, because they have, by and large, disappeared. Their economic model is being crushed by the likes of Best Buy, Circuit City, etc. While those big stores once offered a variety of product, of late it is clear that only the “hits” are stocked. Try to find something that was released the week before last and you’re probably out of luck. The reason why the small record outlets have all but vanished is simple to understand. The majority of music consumers buy hit records (which explains why they are “hits”). The big stores not only have other product lines to help contribute to profitability (from irons to audio players to big screen TVs), but they are also able to secure large quantities of hit discs: Buy in bulk and cut a better deal. So the small guys who remain have an exceedingly tough time of it, being largely sustained by GloNo-friendly customers. But before long, many of them will be empty storefronts—or Starbuck’s outlets. And with their passing, choice. Which then leads to a search for the non-hit on the ‘Net. Which may be efficient, but isn’t there something to be said for the physical act of discovery of the obscure in the stacks, something far more satisfying than the mere tap-tap-tap on the keyboard?
Finally, the “best value.” How many people—be they consumers or even recording artists—associate “value” with the way that the recording companies provide product” Whereas the CD format once provided new economies for consumers, it seems that the only economies of interest are related to economies of scale, as the injection molding machines run 24/7, chunking out still another N’Sync, Britney, _______________ (fill in the blank) hit-maker. Prices creep ever-upward with determination.
Who is well served by the status quo? Only those who assure that it remains so.
Gold and Platinum
Wanna see something creepy?